Community Church Sermons
The Seventh Sunday After Pentecost – July 7,
2002
"Dance, God, Dance!”
Matthew 11:16-19; 25-30
“Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy burdened, and I will give you rest. 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. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
There is probably not one of us here today who has not claimed that passage as we passed through difficult times. Whenever we are beaten down by life, physically and emotionally exhausted, shackled by burdens that seem too heavy to bear, we can turn to these words of Jesus. They are an invitation to us. An invitation to come to him, and to bring our problems with us. They are a promise that he will help.
And he will!
This has been one of those weeks here around the church when it seems as if the weight of the world has come to hang heavily around the shoulders of many of our church families. One has lost a father, another a mother, another a brother. One has lost a husband, and many of us have lost a friend. This has been a week not only for 4th of July fireworks, but also for bedside vigils, by-pass surgeries, knee-replacement operations, chemotherapy treatments, and who knows what else. There are lots of burdens being borne today, and I want to be sure to let you know that God cares about you, and wants to help you carry that load.
What a beautiful promise! But along with that invitation, I wonder if you’ll be willing to come with me a little deeper into this passage today. There is far more here than simply God’s offer to help us in troubling times, and in fact, the heart and soul of the passage can bring us to a place where we can experience God’s help and involvement in our lives in even more powerful ways.
You see, the people to whom Jesus was speaking that day were Jewish people upon whom many burdens had been cast because of the religious law. The law was restrictive, and life-sapping, and rather than bringing people closer to God, it tended to drive them away. All the requirements of things to believe, and all the commandments of what to do and not do made life so complicated that the religion of the day disqualified many more people than it redeemed. So when Jesus says “Come to me…my yoke is easy and my burden is light” he is telling us that he has a better way than the way of religion, than the way of the law.
And earlier in the passage, in verse 18, Jesus identifies the problem. He reminds his listeners that though John the Baptist came as a gift from God, the people for the most part did not receive him as such. And likewise, though Jesus himself is the long-promised Messiah, most of the people did not receive him either. And the question we are left to ask is “Why?” Why did people miss the God-given and beautiful gifts of both John and Jesus?
Jesus offers a fascinating explanation.
John the Baptist, he says, came neither eating nor drinking, which means that John was sort of a party-pooper. I guess you might say he was not a people-person. He always had on his game-face, and took things very seriously. He was not one to go to dinner parties with folks, let alone to pop a cork and swizzle a little wine. So, many of the people rejected John. He was so dank and dour, they claimed he had a demon.
I’m reminded of an occasion when our son Peter and his then-girlfriend, now his wife, Melissa, went to a religious conference. There was an after-hours worship service, and it was unlike any worship experience they’d ever been to. Let’s just say that people were VERY exuberant. There was a lot of emotion – a lot of shouting – a lot of jumping around and even dancing in the aisles. Sort of like at our church! (Not.)
Well, as different as this service was, Pete and Melissa tried their best to tolerate it, and learn from it. But then someone came up to them, and invited them to also get up and dance for the Lord. They said, “No thanks.” Then the person said no, they didn’t understand. They had to dance for the Lord, if they were really saved. They said, “Don’t think so.” Then the person said just what those people said to John. “Well then, you must have a demon.” Some of the leaders of the group then came and wanted to pray for poor ol’ Pete and Melissa. But they got out of there fast - before the anti-dance demon could be cast out!
And, you see, that’s what they did to John, too. Said he must have a demon. Because he wasn’t one to get up and boogie for the Lord.
And, in this passage, we learn the same thing happened to Jesus – but in the opposite way. Unlike John, we read in verse 19, Jesus came eating and drinking. Jesus was a party-kind of guy. He loved to eat fatty, cholesterol-laced food, and to go out to parties at peoples’ houses. And with the most disreputable people in attendance! And when the wine was served…Jesus was the first in line! And you may remember that time when the wine ran out…he made more! Out of water! No wonder he was so popular!
But only with some. A lot of people said, “Hey this is no way for the Son of God to act – like a glutton…and a drunk.” Yes, that’s what it says in verse 19. They called Jesus a glutton and a drunk. I wonder why they would say this about Jesus? I quote that passage to my mother every time she insists the wine Jesus drank was non-alcoholic wine. Then, in self-defense, she turns to me and says, “You must have a demon.”(I’m only kidding – my mother does not say that.).
Now here’s how Jesus described these folks who rejected both him and John. “They are like children sitting in the marketplace, and calling out to others, ‘We played the flute for you (meaning John), but you did not dance; we sang a dirge to you (meaning Jesus), but you did not mourn.’”
And with that little metaphor, Jesus taught that what often stands in the way of our finding a true relationship with God is the obstacle of our own false expectations.
We see this a lot in the church. Not too much time ever goes by when the choir sings some amazing piece of music, and at the end, some in the congregation burst into applause. And on Monday, I get calls from people saying we need to put an end to that. Then on Tuesday, I hear from others who say, “Oh, can’t we do MORE of that? It is SO GOOD to express ourselves to the Lord that way!” But do you see what’s happening here? One group is playing a flute, but people won’t dance; the other is sounding a dirge, but people won’t mourn. Both groups are expressing their own expectations of what is and is not acceptable to God. But do you know what? Neither group is representing God. No, they are representing themselves – their own personalities – their own preferences - their own set of religious laws.
And using those laws, they are trying to form God and others into their own image.
Do you know that in the Scripture there are times when God says, “Shut up and be still!” I don’t think I’d want to be clapping when God said that! But also in the Scriptures, there are times when God says, “Clap your hands and get up and dance!” I don’t think I’d want to be telling people to shut up and sit down when God said that!
You see, the real question here is, “Who actually is GOD in this relationship we have with the Creator?”
Jesus tells us in this passage that most of us want to be our own gods, setting up expectations that are completely our own, telling the true God what he can and cannot do, what is appropriate and not, what must be done and what must not be done.
“Dance, God, dance!” some will say. “Don’t do it, God!” others will counter.
And that’s the main problem we have in the journey of faith. We create in our minds all sorts of religious laws that translate into a jumble of false expectations. And then we spend our lives trying to live up to those expectations, and getting others to do it too, and we end up all bound up in law, leading both ourselves and others astray.
I grew up in a culture that taught that to doubt was to sin. Maybe you grew up there, too. To question the Bible, to not be sure of the miracles, to not even be certain there is a God were all signs of a life gone awry and headed for hell in a handbasket. And maybe you’ve spent a lifetime trying to ignore the unresolved questions in your own heart. Maybe you’ve spent years trying to force your kids and others to believe in things they’re not ready to believe. But listen, this aversion to doubt is a human expectation, not God’s. Why, in the Bible, Jesus actually encourages us to ask, and to seek, and to knock!
Same is true in imposing human expectation upon Christian living. I read the other day about a woman who was killed by her husband. For years, he abused her. A family member said she never left him because she was a Christian, and Christian women don’t leave their husbands. She offered constant forgiveness, but he never practiced repentance. And finally, he killed her. How sad it is that so many people live under the burden of religious expectations that are not really Christian at all, and turn out to be terribly dangerous to themselves and others.
So listen to Jesus today: Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from ME…”
Christian discipleship requires us to reorient our thinking about God and about life. And we can only do this by leaving our own expectations behind, and taking up a whole new set of thoughts about God. Jesus says, “Come and learn from ME…!”
And when you leave your own religious thoughts behind, and begin the journey of learning from Jesus, one of the things you’ll discover is that this life of faith is a lot simpler, a lot easier, and a lot less burdensome than you ever imagined.
“My yoke is easy, and my burden is light,” Jesus said.
And it is!
Let me close today by sharing with you some of the simple points of the faith Jesus came to share:
“Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy burdened, and I will give you rest. 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. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Thanks be to God!