Sung Eucharist on the 5th Sunday of Trinity from St John the Baptist Clowne

Apologies that the signal drops part way through. Here is the text of the missing sermon: Last week we celebrated our patron, St John the Baptist. This week’s gospel reading actually follows on from what is depicted in the fifth window of John the Baptist’s life. John is in prison and he sends word to Jesus, ‘are you the messiah or should we expect another?’ John has a moment of deep doubt. I am so glad that this is depicted in our windows here. John, who was described as the greatest person who ever lived by Jesus, had his moments of doubt. I think this is a greater doubt than that expressed by Thomas, whose feast day was last Friday. Thomas is rather unfairly called ‘doubting’ Thomas. John, however, who has been preaching that one that is mightier than he was coming, had his doubts that it was indeed Jesus. Jesus sends a reply, ‘Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.’ In other words, Jesus reassures John that he is indeed the one he has been preaching about. But in a way, Jesus’ teaching continues and there is another reply to John’s question and that is in perhaps one of the most beautiful passages of the gospels. Those of you familiar with the old Book of Common Prayer communion service might remember this verse as some of the ‘comfortable words’. Comfort here in the 16th century English means ‘strengthening’, words to strengthen us in the faith and they begin: ‘Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.’ John is in prison as an innocent man, he is carrying a heavy burden and it is painted so powerfully in our window here, a man at rock bottom, and into that situation we hear the voice of Jesus: ‘Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.’ We talked at our bible study group on Tuesday about finding rest. If our Christian life is a pilgrimage or journey with God, then rest along the way is important. We talked about the difference between physical rest and mental rest. That often we might be physically resting but our brain isn’t resting at all. I feel that when Jesus offers us rest, it is both, a physical rest and a mental rest. A lifting of those burdens. As if you’re hiking up a hill with a big rucksack and Jesus offers to carry the bag for us for a while. To find rest with God we need to first unburden ourselves, give it all to God, and then carve out space for rest – which doesn’t necessarily mean doing nothing – for some of us, going for a walk or a run (or in Paul’s case, a swim) might be the most restful thing we can do. I have a friend who is a prison chaplain. She carries painful stories of the prisoners she works with, they could be a heavy burden, but every night she writes their names down and puts the paper under an icon of Jesus as a way of handing them over to God. Some burdens are not for us to carry. The people who were listening to Jesus were often overburdened by the religious leaders of the day – being told that they had to even tithe the spices they used on their food. The word ‘yoke’ that Jesus uses here is a term for the teaching of the Torah or teaching of the faith. The yokes that were put on the people were too heavy for them to cope with. Jesus says that his teaching, his ‘yoke’ is different, it is easy and light. A yoke is a piece of wood that goes around the neck of perhaps a milk maid – carrying buckets or around the neck of an ox or pair of oxen pulling a plough. To use a different analogy, cooking with poor utensils is really hard work isn’t it? Cutting a tomato with a blunt knife is horrible, and you can find sometimes that you put up with it and get used to it and it’s not until you finally relent and buy a new knife or have it sharpened that then you begin to enjoy preparing food again. The teachings people were living with were slowing them down and overburdening them. Jesus offers a teaching that is more fitting, that is still to be followed but is easy and light and makes life worth living. So, the first thing we need to do is to come to Jesus. The second thing is to try and unburden ourselves, particularly those burdens that are not ours to carry. This might simply be writing names down or describing those burdens to Jesus. You might find it helpful to light a candle or put some pebbles in a bowl to represent letting go of your burdens. The third thing is to make space for rest – whatever is restful for you, whether literally stopping and relaxing and reading a book or going for a walk or entering whatever ‘dwelling place’ works for you. Jesus is waiting for you there, offering his rest, his full rest for your soul. Today as you come up for communion, come and receive that rest from Jesus in the form of the bread and wine and pray that you can carry that peace and rest with you into the week. Amen.