Just think about this for a moment. The Gospel reading for this morning gives us an idea of what Jesus’ life is like…when he was in full stride with his life’s ministry.
We see Jesus…traveling about, teaching, proclaiming good news, curing disease and sickness. And…he had compassion for the people to whom he was ministering. After all…the Gospel of Matthew says, “He has compassion for them because the were harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd.”
Raise your hand if you feel harassed and helpless right now. My hand is raised.
How do we acknowledge what we are going through in our personal lives and what we are going through as a nation. No, for this moment, I will not detail all that we are experiencing but I am strengthened a bit to realize that Jesus had his moments of being overloaded. He couldn’t escape it and neither can we.
My younger brother Paul posted an article the other day on Facebook about the Cincinnati Red ball player Joey Votto. It was a simple but revealing article about what this celebrated white baseball player did to turn his mind to the problems of systemic racism within society.
There is nothing provocative there other than a man examining his life and place in society. It was well written and revealed a man who examined his life and his place in this society and those to whom he was close. I appreciated that my brother posted it. It’s uplifting and bears out what I believe today about sports, which is….the lives of athletes are even more interesting than their athletic pursuits. One of my brothers friends posted that he did not want sports politicized, since it seems to be our last refuge of uncluttered diversion. My brother simply stated that he wanted to show this athlete’s journey. His friend then posted something like….well I guess everything is political. And it is. I would partially agree and say that everything is interwoven in our lives and with the lives of others.
So I went looking for ways to go when I am feeling overloaded and nearly hopeless. I found an article where numerous therapists give some timely advice for today. Actually it mostly involves giving yourself permission to unplug from the 24/7 intense life that we have.
There are things we can do…like….”Take a break”…. “Focus on what we can control”…”Try a grounding exercise”….”Instead of imagining something terrible happening, create a positive scenario.”
Anyway…you get the picture. It is OK to NOT be overloaded all the time. You are not shallow to take a few moments for yourself.
“One of the best suggestions was to turn to your support system.” I think in laymen’s terms that means friends and trusted colleagues. And that offers a perfect segue to the rest of the reading from the Gospel of Matthew. Jesus says, the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. I hasten to add that Jesus was not turning to therapeutic techniques to advance the Gospel. It’s probably that modern therapeutic techniques are stating what Jesus already knew: that having others to share your load makes for a well, lighter load.
In the country of Zambia in south central Africa. The rains come around December and if they fall true to form…they last until about the first of March. We experienced those rains every year when we taught at a secondary boarding school in Zambia some years ago. When it wasn’t raining, then it was steamy and every living plant (and bug) grew, quickly and relentlessly. (And by the way…I can tell you some stories about bugs….but I digress.)
At the secondary school the areas around the dorms and the staff houses, the football pitch (soccer field to us Americans)…every thing was overcome with grass growing….four foot tall. No John Deere tractors for mowing. No students to slash the grass during the four week Christmas break. We staff members would try to keep some of it at bay…but alas, the grass grew by the minute. I swear that by the time you slashed a bit around your house and turned around, it had grown back.
Finally the students returned in early January. All 700 of them. And they and we had our work cut out for us. We were not harvesting but we are cutting and slashing tall grasses. It took about two weeks of after classes work projects for the houses and dorms and football pitch to be seen again. Each student had a slasher…which sounds a bit ominous but it was a golf club sized slasher that you could hold in one hand and swing back and forth to cut the grass. The students made quick work of it. The grass was plentiful and the workers were few until after the Christmas break.
I suppose if you want a takeaway from this meditation and today’s Gospel of Matthew, it would be…give yourself permission to rely on and sometimes lean on those around you.
And in the case of Jesus and the work to be done; He recognized that His work, the Gospel message was better, when it was also given to others to carry across the land. Then Jesus summoned his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness. And he sent them out.And then the real work had begun. Amen