The easy burden

‘My yoke is easy, and my burden is light.’

What does it mean to have freedom? It’s a deceptively simple question, and a complex notion – we talk about freedom to choose, freedom of speech, political freedom or liberty, physical freedom either from captivity or from illness and infirmity; we think philosophically about the idea of free will, and about metaphysical freedom. For some meaning of the term, it’s very highly valued in our society, which places emphasis on self-determination, the ability to choose at will between different options, and individual identity. We rightly value the freedoms that we enjoy in this country, and which have been hard won – the freedom to elect our rulers, the freedom to express ourselves – and we seek change where there is an injustice or an imbalance in who is free to do what. And yet, freedom, like many other good things, can become an object of idolatry if we are not careful. Self-determination can become selfishness; the right to choose can turn into a demand to choose without facing consequences. Our gospel today shows us, perhaps, another way.

In today’s passage from Matthew, Jesus compares the generation around him to “children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another, ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.’” This comparison comes in the context of a discussion of the witness of John the Baptist, whose approach to ministry is contrasted with that of Jesus. John lived a life of extreme asceticism, as we know: he lived in the harsh conditions of the desert, fasted continuously or ate only what he could forage, and altogether lived a life outside any of the conventions.

Jesus, although he also lived an unconventional life, was in no way so extreme: indeed, in Matthew’s gospel and elsewhere he is regularly criticised for his lack of restraint. He and his disciples prepare food on the sabbath; he eats with tax collectors and sinners. Jesus has several answers to those who criticise him for this behaviour: he talks of being called, like a doctor, to be with the sick and not the healthy; he talks of wedding guests rejoicing at the presence of the bridegroom, and of new wine being put into fresh wineskins to mature. The message seems to be that he, Jesus, is doing what is right for his ministry, and John the Baptist is doing what is appropriate for his ministry – an approach which fits in with our modern sensibilities perfectly well. Each to their own.

And yet, in this evocative, and somewhat mysterious image of the children in the marketplace, Jesus offers a criticism of those around him. What’s the use, he appears to say, of offering you a choice between two options, if you’re going to pay attention to neither of them? Jesus, according to many commentators, is the child who played the flute, who offered the chance to dance, to live rejoicingly in the knowledge of God’s presence among us; John the Baptist is the child who wailed, who sought to teach those around him of their profound need for repentance and forgiveness. And yet no one has paid either of them any attention: the marketgoers continue about their business, choosing perhaps this loaf of bread or that cut of meat, but all the while ignoring the real freedom of choice that is being offered to them.

This is the trap for us, as well, as we pursue our own goals and desires, in the busyness of our responsibilities: that we fail to notice when we are being offered a path which leads somewhere very different. Jesus again offers this path at the end of our gospel reading, in these beautiful words which have resonated for so many down the centuries: ‘Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, 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.’

What is it that is different about what Jesus is offering? Well, one way of thinking about what marks Jesus out as different from every other human being that has ever existed, is the way in which he was able to conform his human will, his desires and his choices, to be perfectly in tune with God’s will. Both the human will and the divine will were present in him, and therefore it was not that he was some kind of automaton, set on a pre-programmed path from which nothing could make him deviate. Rather, through prayerful attention, through courage and discernment, he found the strength freely to choose what was right, every time, even when that led him to the cross and to the grave.

And so Jesus does not say that coming to him means the putting down of all burdens. Coming to Jesus, weary and heavy laden, does not result in an easy freedom, one that will have us skipping down the street, rejuvenated, footloose and fancy-free. We know from experience that there is a cost to following in the way of Christ: it can cause us to question things that we had held to be comfortably true. It can force us to hold ourselves to high standards of integrity. It can affect our relationships with those around us, perhaps because they hold us accountable for the many sins and failings of the Church, or perhaps because they feel that we have entered on a path of self-delusion.

The freedom that comes with following Jesus is a paradoxical freedom. The paradox is that there is still a yoke, and still a burden, but that it is of a different kind altogether from the ones that weigh us down now. Jesus promises us in this gospel that the burden which we take up when we start to follow him is a yoke that frees us, because it is a burden that he has already carried. The choice to carry this burden, this yoke, this cross, was his free choice, first and foremost, not ours. He chose to lift this burden, and when he lifted it, it was so heavy that he needed the help of a bystander even to make it out of the city to the place of execution. And yet, when we take it up, he promises that it will be easy, and light. This is because, by taking that decision, by freely choosing to follow his path to the cross and the tomb, Jesus has changed even the meaning of ‘freedom’, freeing us from our inevitable bondage to sin, and opening the door to what St Paul calls ‘the glorious liberty of the children of God.’ So as we come to encounter our gentle and humble saviour in bread and wine, let us have the courage to lay down our burdens and distractions, and to take up his yoke instead. Amen.