There was a window in the church [the church I was raised in, in Wayne West Virginia] that stood right above the choir. And there in stained glass was a beautiful picture of Jesus. And he was reaching out with his arms, ready to welcome and receive and embrace anyone who would come. And around the picture, around the arch, were some words that were just as lovely. And just as inviting. Beautiful words from the Gospel of Matthew…

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 

Beautiful words. Tender, grace-filled, life-giving words…

I don’t remember her name. (Isn’t that awful? Sometimes I have to stop and think just to remember my own.) But she was a young woman, in her late thirties, I would guess. And she had decided to postpone her career just long enough to raise her children and see them off to school. So in those early years she was at home. A lot. And something about the words weary and heavy laden (or overburdened, as it says in some bibles) sound strangely familiar to the parents of young children. Conjures up images of home, oddly enough… images of their own homes. And in this woman’s home there were eight of them. Eight little children.

They lived in a little village called Darlington in northeastern corner of Maryland. Eight children. All in one house, mind you. And she had to leave them there for an hour or two while she went to pick up a few groceries, she said. [Though, I’m not sure anyone with eight kids at home could pick up just a few groceries.] But she went. She told the oldest boy, who was about thirteen, that he was in charge. Most thirteen year olds think they’re in charge already. But just in case, she reminded him on her way out the door.

And she went to the grocery store and looked around, taking her time… “No hurry,” she thought. “I’ll just enjoy a little peace and quiet here in the frozen foods, and sample the cheese balls, and enjoy the fresh scent of Laundry detergent and bathroom air fresheners. And she did. It was like the twenty-third psalm, resting beside the still cantaloupes, her head anointed with the sound of music wafting down from the speakers up above. And when it was time to go back into the shadowy valley of chaos and destruction she called home, she was not afraid… Until she opened the door that led from the garage through the pantry and into the kitchen. For, when she did, she noticed that it was a bit quieter than usual. A little too quiet, mind you.

She peeped around the corner and into the living room. And there she beheld five of her little darlings sitting in a circle. So, she put the groceries aside on the kitchen table, walked into the living room where they had gathered, and saw them playing with five of the cutest, most adorable little skunks you’ve ever seen.

Oh, the peace and serenity of her time alone in the grocery store just went right down the chute. And the poor woman screamed “Run, children, run!” And each child, in a panic, grabbed a skunk and ran in five different directions. Bowls of popcorn, tumblers full of red Kool-Aid, magazines, chairs, untied shoes, and half-eaten Sloppy-Joe sandwiches just went every which way. And the worst part of it all is the poor woman’s screams scared the kids so much that each one of them squeezed their skunks. Which, of course, made the skunks panic. The poor things thought they were goners. And when skunks feel that they are in danger… well, you know what they do. They bow their humble little heads and say, “Let us spray…” And they did. They did. It was chaos. Bedlam. Sheer mayhem it was. And the stink was on them like grease on grandma’s skillet. All the bubble bath in the world couldn’t cover it up.

That was on Saturday. The next morning was Sunday. And for once, the whole family sat in the same pew…

Oh, if only that poor woman could get away from it all… To some quiet, peaceful, place of retreat. Beside the still waters where her soul could find rest…. if only for a day. Or an hour. Some quiet refuge. A shelter from the storm.

Oh come, says Jesus.

Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Church was like that for me when I was little. It was a peaceful place. A quiet refuge. Away from the chaos and confusion. Away from all the busyness of the world. Especially on Communion Sundays when we knelt before the altar with warm, kind-hearted, loving people on either side. So close you could smell their aftershave and perfume and feel their touch. And the pastor would touch my shoulder or pat me on the head as he offered the bread and wine of holy communion. It was a place where I felt loved and accepted. And that’s what mattered. That’s what made the difference for me.

And one of the clearest, most vivid memories I have of those years is about going to another place like that. Only it wasn’t a church or a chapel, mind you. It was the pond. A fishing pond in Elmwood. Right next to house that I had lived in all my life… until I was six.

What I remember about that place is that every time we had Communion at church, I would go home and change into my favorite sweatshirt — the one my Dad brought home from Colorado State — and some old blue jeans. And I’d sneak into the kitchen and put a slice or two of Heiner’s bread into my dad’s lunchbox. And I’d pour some grape juice from the refrigerator into his thermos. And I’d carry it over to Ferguson pond with Mitzi, my Beagle. And we would sit there together on a little wooden bridge. I’d tear off a little piece of bread and dunk it in the grape juice and say, “Mitzi, this is the body of Christ broken for you.”

Mitzi was one of those beagles that are so kind to little boys and go along with them, no matter what. So she would take it from my hand and gobble it up. And then I would tear off a little piece for me. And I’d tell myself the same thing — that this was the body and blood of Jesus our Lord.

And it didn’t feel like playing church or pretending or a make believe thing to me. Because we’d sit on the bridge and look out over the pond. And as silly as it sounds, I’d try to see if I could hear him somewhere or see him, maybe, up in the clouds, or across the pond. Because my grandma always said, “Whenever two or three gathered in Jesus’ name, he is there with them.” And I didn’t see him, mind you, or hear his voice. But I can remember sitting there thinking “He’s gotta be here somewhere. Jesus has to be here somewhere.” Because I just had that feeling. You know the feeling. That you’re not alone — in a good way, I mean. The way you feel when it’s dark and dreary, and maybe just a little scary, and then you realize that they’re home (your parents), they’re with you. And they love you. They do.

I wouldn’t tell anyone about that for the longest time. Because I thought they would think I was being foolish or stupid. And then I found out that Jesus did the same thing. Not with the Heiner’s bread and a beagle by his side. But he went to a place that was like that. He went to a place where he could be alone with God. A place where his soul could find rest.

It’s one of the first things Mark tells us about him in his gospel – the Gospel according to St. Mark… He was baptized. That’s the first thing Mark has to say about Jesus. Baptized in the Jordan by John the Baptizer. And the heavens were torn open and the Spirit came down and a voice from above said, “You are my Son.” That’s the first thing Mark wants us to know about Jesus.

And then, while he’s still dripping wet from the waters of baptism, that same Holy Spirit just thrust Jesus into the wilderness for forty days where he was tempted and tried… like the people of Israel hundreds of years before him when they were tempted and tried in another wilderness for forty long years.

And after that he called people to follow him and be his disciples. On the Sabbath, as you heard last Sunday, he went to church – to the synagogue in Capernaum. And he opened the scriptures and cast out a demon. Remember the man who started yelling at him in church?
So it had been a busy day for Jesus already. Hadn’t even had Sunday dinner yet. (Or Sabbath dinner, I guess it was then.) So after the service and all the commotion with the man who was possessed by the unclean spirit, they went home. To Simon Peter’s home. Which was not far from there.

But when they got there they found Peter’s mother-in-law in bed with a fever. And… you know what happened. Jesus took her by the hand and lifted her up. And when he did, the fever left her and she was well — so well, in fact, that she waited on them hand and foot. (I can just hear my mother-in-law. “Isn’t that just like a bunch of men,” she’d say. “They can’t do a thing for themselves. Couldn’t even let that poor woman rest.” As if they had Jesus heal her just so she could fix them their dinner!) Ah, but it said something. It was a message, a sermon without words… just like the man with the unclean spirit who was made whole. “Nothing can separate you from God’s love. Not even a fever. Not even illness and suffering and pain. God’s love is so great that he won’t let anything keep you from serving him.”

That’s was the message. That’s what Jesus was preaching in his words and his actions. He was spreading good news, touching lives that were broken and making them whole. And the thing that gets me is there were so many people who needed that touch. So many people who needed the grace and the wholeness Jesus came to deliver.

Mark says there were so many of them that by sunset that evening the whole town was gathered there at the door. And Jesus spent the evening touching and healing and casting out demons. Can you imagine?  My mother, the nurse, used to come home from the hospital exhausted — drained and weary and just plain worn out. And Jesus was God in the flesh, mind you. But he was human, too. Just like one of us. And there were so many people and so much to do — so many hearts and lives that were battered and broken…

Mark wants us to know that about Jesus. Right off the bat. But there’s something else he wants us to know before we even get through the first chapter… For the very next morning, well before daylight, Jesus got up and he went away from the house, and away from the crowds, and away from the noise and the chaos and all the things that just had to be done, to a quiet, lonely, deserted place. And he prayed… Jesus prayed. He went to some quiet, peaceful, place of retreat. Beside the still waters of God’s presence where his soul could find rest. 

And later that morning, when the sun came up, they couldn’t find him. So everyone started looking for Jesus. Because people were waiting. They wanted to see him. And do you know where they found him? They found Jesus praying. “Everybody’s trying to find you,” they said. And Jesus said, “It’s time to go. We need to move on so I can preach the good news in other communities. Because that’s why I’m here.”

It always amazes me to think how many people went out to see Jesus. The whole town was there when he went to Peter’s that day. And later on, in the second chapter, Mark says there were so many people crowding in and around the house that no one could get near him. So four of them carried their friend up to the top of the house and made a hole in the roof just to get their friend to him. And at the lakeshore one day he healed and taught and touched more than five thousand people (not counting all the women and children there, mind you). And then he fed them. Every last one of them. And on the other side of the lake, Mark says he was with four thousand people. And it was probably twice that many, because they only counted the men! It just amazes me that Jesus could do that — that he could serve and love and preach to so many people, with or without words, without a vacation! Without any time off. Without any rest! But then I remember — he did find rest. His soul found rest in God alone.

Albert Schweitzer, who was pretty busy himself, used to say, “If your soul has no Sunday, it becomes an orphan.” You know what he meant. If your soul has no Sunday, no Sabbath, no time to rest with God in prayer, then you’re… you’re just sunk. [Or sinking.] But for those who will make the effort to set aside some time just to be with God. Well, you heard what Isaiah said…

The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

That’s his promise. To you and to me. Our souls find rest in God alone. For God is our strength. God is our help. God is our salvation, our hope, our wellspring, our fount. And Jesus our brother, God-in-the-flesh, invites us to come away with him to a quiet place that we may find rest and be restored and renewed so that we might be able to spread the good news of God’s love to others…

A long time ago, on St. John’s Island, just off the coast of South Carolina, some people from Africa who’d been labeled and sold as slaves were working hard in the scorching sun picking cotton. And there was a young woman there with her little boy beside her. He was six, maybe seven, years old. Out there in the hot sun. And his mother was working the fields, just working away. With one hand she picked the cotton and with the other she would caress the child’s forehead. But after a while, she grew weary. She was exhausted and thirsty and weary to the bone. And the sun and the heat made it worse. And she fell down from the weight and the weariness of being abused and enslaved. And the boy tried to wake her up. Because he knew what would happen if the slave drivers saw her. They’d make an example of her and beat her and who knows what else.

So he tried to shake her and wake her up. And an old man came over to him. An old man the Africans called Preacher, but the slave drivers called him Old Devil. And the boy looked up at the old man and he said, “Is it time? Is it time?”

And the old man smiled and he looked at the boy and said, “Yes!” And then he bent down and whispered into the young woman’s ear who was there on the ground. And he said the words: “Cooleebah! Cooleebah!”

And at that very moment the boy’s mother got up. And she stood straight and tall, full of dignity. She stood like a great queen and she looked down at her son, took his hand in hers and looked up toward heaven. And all of a sudden they begin to fly.

The slave drivers rush over and they see the slaves flying and they’re confused. They don’t know what to do! And while they’re standing there befuddled, the old man turns around to all the other Africans and begins to tell them, “Cooleebah! Cooleebah!” And when they hear the word, they all begin to fly. Can you imagine? The slaves flying? The weak and the weary? The bruised and the broken? People weighed down and wounded — people treated like garbage, used up and thrown out — these people are flying? And at that moment the slave drivers grab the old man and say, “Bring them back!”

They take him and beat him. And with blood trickling down his cheek, he just smiles at them. And they say to him, “Please bring them back!”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because the word is already in them and since the word is already in them, it cannot be taken from them.” 

The old man had a word from West Africa. Cooleebah. A word that means God. And that word had been placed into the heart of these displaced Africans. God had been placed into their hearts. And now they had dignity and strength.

They would tell this story, this parable, and pass it along among the slaves. And when they told the story, they would repeat the words of Isaiah: The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

[Oh, my soul finds rest in God alone. He is my strength and my salvation… One thing God has spoken, two things have I heard: that you, O God, are strong, and that you, O Lord, are loving.]

What about you? Are you weary and wounded? Is your heart weighed down with grief or worry? Are you broken and bruised in your heart — in your spirit? Jesus invites you to spend time with him. To pray and feed on his Word. He invites you to come — Come all who are weary and heavy-laden. And what does he say? I will give you …. rest.

In the name of the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Soli Deo Gloria
Benen, OblSB