Becoming Unburdened

Gospel: Matthew 11: 28-30

Nearly every human being is burdened by life and grows weary spinning on the wheel of existence.  We all feel it, but we never ask ourselves why this is the case.  It is because we human beings put our hope in the wrong things.  We embrace an ideology or a revolution, only to discover that the thing we have created is no better than what we replaced.  We follow religious figures with their personae and ideology only to watch them fall one by one into hypocrisy and scandal.  

We are like children chasing fireflies in the dark.  We are disappointed at not catching any, and we are equally disappointed at catching some only to see them die in our grasp.  We are ever in pursuit of the ephemeral and impermanent, or worse yet seeking to make something permanent in an impermanent world.  All these pursuits will leave us weary and burdened; they offer no satisfaction whatsoever.

Jesus did not offer ideology or revolution, nor did he offer a cult of personality and cheap theology.  What Jesus offered was a way of living  - one that accepted the offer of mercy and love from God, and one that then shared that love and mercy with others in the world.  The acceptance of mercy and love unburdens us; the offer of mercy and love enlivens us and others.  It is the only authentic Christian existence in the world.