Matthew 11:25-30

I was presented with an interesting conundrum this week. Next week, I will be filling in for another pastor, so I will actually be preaching the sermon I wrote. I had planned out a title and chosen a scripture, but had not yet written the sermon. The pastor contacted me to let me know that I would be preaching on the same passage they were preaching on two weeks prior.

Most congregation members probably wouldn’t even notice. There is zero chance we would preach the same message as well; I’m me, they’re them. And yet… something seemed off about it. I had inadvertently tried to correct the error, thinking the email had come for the church I preached at last week. I am preaching at a lot of different churches over the summer, and pastors prepare their services. Some a few days in advance, some weeks, some months, and some hours. So I’m getting scattered emails from various levels of preparation and I get confused sometimes.

At any rate, preaching the same passage didn’t feel right. For starters, I would not want to intentionally create an environment where the congregation would be prone to comparing our sermons or preaching skills. People are going to do that anyway, but you certainly don’t want to encourage the behavior. Not to mention, what if I was the one found wanting? I also happened to be in the middle of a fun sermon that only utilized the first section of this week’s lectionary. When I preach at a church, I like a fun sermon. If I’m having a good time, it increases the likelihood they will too. Not all sermons are fun.

This week, I begin with the second half of the lectionary from Proper 9, Year A: Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30 The yoke of discipleship. If you are curious, the section that is skipped over is entitled “Woes to Unrepentant Cities.” Nobody wants to hear about the negative consequences for failing to comply with God anymore so we skip the part about where Jesus calls people out on their crap and compares them to others who would have repented. Kind of like being compared to your goodie-two-shoes sibling who never would have done whatever it was you did. I’m totally okay with Jesus being human, getting mad, and saying things maybe he shouldn’t have said in a way he probably shouldn’t have said them but our forefather’s were not so we skip passages like this that are hard to explain away. I’ll write a sermon on it another day from the Interpretive Theology perspective I am working on developing through my life’s work. I highly recommend following me but, I might be biased.

Moving on.

Jesus thanks God for hiding things from the wise and revealing them to infants. Those who seek knowledge will find it those who seek life will find it. You might try to argue that you are seeking life but if you’re not finding it you’re not actually seeking life but answers. Life is sought by living it. Enjoying it. Being present in it. It is not found in trying to understand it.

Every “why” we ask in life takes us a little bit further away from understanding.[1] For each piece of information we seek to acquire, we are distanced a little bit more from God. The fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil did not do us any favors. As with many things, it seems that with humans, we learn by experiencing. But, experiences cannot be unexperienced. Unlike forgetting, we cannot go back to who we were before we learned what we now know.

Children seek knowledge. They want to know more about the world. But, the knowledge they seek is different than that from adults. Adults want knowledge to use an excuse for why they do what they do whereas children seek knowledge that they might function more like adults in the world. The knowledge adults seek is burdensome. The knowledge children seek is uplifting. It builds community and helps them to make friends.

I promise you that in most social situations your rattling off fun facts of how others can live their lives better is not going to make you any friends. But,[2] kindly and thoughtfully inquiring to know more about others and their interests might. This is a give-and-take situation. I can’t just ask you questions and offer you nothing about me. We must both be of childlike inquiry toward one another to build trust, bond, and create a friend. The one thing Adam and Eve did right in the whole fruit situation was that they did it together. What they did wrong is they did it without God.

I’ve met a lot of people in my life. Very very very few would I call friends. For me to consider them a friend, I need to know their why and they need to have at least tried to understand mine. Why is our driving child-like force. Our bond with God. Why is our reason for living and our reason for dying. It is our reason for working and our reason for resting. It is our reason for staying and our reason for walking away. Our why is what God breathed into us at birth. It is something we cannot find alone. In our why, is how we be like children and have fun.

Children instinctively build community if they aren’t traumatized away from it at an early age. They seek interaction with others. Even those who are neurodivergent keep others present in their world, albeit at arm’s length. Happy children create friendships.

It is so much easier to create friendships as a child than it is as an adult. They are so much less judgmental. Highly observant, less judgmental. Children are prone to pointing out our flaws. They’re going to ask why you don’t have hair on your head, why you have scars, why you walk funny, why you’re short, why you’re a different color, they’re going to ask a lot of “why” questions. Many of these are actually “why” questions. They aren’t looking for a scientific answer. They’re asking if you have a personal preference for those things.

Maybe you chose to be bald. It isn’t from the cancer treatment they don’t understand. Maybe you think the scar is cool, not that you were involved in a tragic accident. Maybe you think it’s funny that one of your legs is shorter than the other, not that it’s a birth defect. Children aren’t seeking knowledge or intelligence in these questions; they’re seeking to know you. It isn’t until an adult teaches them that these things are a reason to ostracize, pity, or taunt someone that it truly matters. If you give them a satisfactory answer that it is something you like, enjoy, chose, or want to share with them, share a piece of your why, they’ll play with you.

As adults, we interpret these questions as critical. We tell children “not to stare”; pretend you don’t see it. Sure, that’s a great way to start a friendship, right? How about I lie to you right off the bat and pretend to not see something remarkable about you? We assume that people, even children, are asking these questions to be mean, rather than out of heartfelt curiosity. We assume that these questions are asked for the interrogator’s accumulation of wisdom or intelligence. So why don’t we choose instead to assume they just want to get to know us better? Hear our story?

Adults are setting themselves up to fail at creating new friendships because they are hesitant to ask probing, meaningful questions, and they are programmed to interpret those questions as rude or demeaning. That’s on us.

God designed us all to be different. We have shortcomings; others might have strengths. God’s truth is hidden from us because we choose not to see it. We seek to use information to harm or lord over others, rather than seeking and using it to grow closer in relationship to them.

Children are more capable of making friends because at some point they came to understand how someone’s large nose, floppy ears, lactose intolerance,  or deformed whatever, has impacted their life and continues to impact their life. Once they understand, they immediately seek to mitigate the negative consequences of their differences in one another. Tall friends grab things up high for short friends. Low-energy friends take on sedentary activities while energetic friends do the running. Those who understand one another, help one another.

“Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”

Children instinctively will carry burdens for one another, learn from one another, lift shame from one another, and find rest in one another’s presence. They don’t have to pretend to be good at something they’re not or be something they are not. Wisdom and intelligence will not bring you closer to God. We get closer to God by getting closer to one another. Gathering information about one another to understand their “why” and that they may come to understand ours.

For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

Jesus told his disciples his why. He didn’t try to hide it. He included his faith in his daily conversations. He shared that deepest part of him that drove him to do the things he did, to grow as a human being, to create relationships with others, and to let them have a relationship with him. He modeled friendship.

Anyone want to argue Jesus wasn’t wise? Anyone want to argue he wasn’t intelligent? These things do not automatically exclude us from salvation. The way they are used and why we learn them will. We should be curious about one another. We should strive to learn more about one another. Not to exclude or pity one another but to be able to more easily and naturally include one another.

I encourage you this week to break societal standards and learn something about someone! Ask kindly, lovingly, genuinely about someone. Seek to understand not what they know but who they are. Only then will we be able to carry one another’s yokes and make the burden light. Only then will we be able to truly make friends and love one another.

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[1] You’re really asking “how,” NOT “why,” but that was a different sermon you should go back and read. I put “why” here because that’s what children ask, not because it is the appropriate word. “Why is the sky blue?” The sky is blue because of how the sun’s light reflects off tiny particles in the sky and is received by the eyes. That’s actually  “how” the sky is blue, not “why” it’s blue. It’s blue because God made it that way. Why is the reasoning not the process? It cannot be answered by a scientific answer but requires an emotional one. I’m a bit behind on getting this post ready this morning. I’ll try to find you the link to the sermon later. For now, just read my past posts until you find it.

[2] I’m going to see how many sentences I can start using this word “but” in one sermon.