Lectionary 16. 2009                                         Christ Church , York

Frantic, frenetic and fast-paced! These are the words we use to describe our lives these days. I-pods, blackberries, Facebook, emails and gizmos about which I have no real understanding, keep us connected 24/7 or what seems more like 25/7 these days! Our lives move at a hectic pace, as though we were all on some sort of treadmill that we cannot easily get off. The Supreme Court and the Congress of the United States may take the whole month of August off, but most of don’t live in that sort of world and so we plow on, working crazy schedules, taking little time off and all the while remaining hooked to those machines which keep us in touch with what is happening in our real world at work. And the Church is not immune from all this hustle and bustle. I remember an old pastor who told me that when he started in ministry, the weeks between Memorial Day and Labor Day was basically very quiet. But with weddings and funerals, pastoral issues and concerns, staffing matters and all sorts of other situations, I will be the first to affirm that this has hardly been a quiet summer around here so far.

So I can relate with these disciples, these twelve that had been called by Jesus to engage in an evangelistic mission. They had been sent out to proclaim the Good News of God’s salvation to the whole world. But their work did not end there. They were to preach repentance of sins - always a demanding task. They were given authority over unclean spirits and so they found themselves casting out demons - which can be physically and spiritually draining. They came across the sick and infirm and anointed them with oil, which resulted in many people being made well and countless lives being changed – but only increased the clamor of those seeking their attention. In short, they were engaged in a demanding, time consuming and very draining ministry, work which demanded long hours and great effort, not made any easier by the fact that many in the towns and villages ridiculed them for their work and rejected their offer of help for mind, body and soul. And after the work had been completed, the disciples return to their home base, to report to Jesus and tell Him all that they had done and taught. But they had also come back for something else, for these were drained disciples, men who needed to be refreshed, renewed, replenished and recharged after their crazy few months of ministry. And above all others, Jesus knew firsthand the great demands and immense consumption of energy that God’s mission and ministry required. Seeing the disciple’s weariness and identifying with their exhaustion, Jesus therefore says to them, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” It must have been like music to their ears.

These most welcome and refreshing words shared with the disciples so many centuries ago are not restricted to them, but rather are equally offered to all of God’s people in all times; indeed they are words of refreshment for you and for me this day. For who among us is not in need of renewal? Who among us would not benefit at this very moment from God’s recharging spirit replenishing their lives with the energy of new joy and the confidence of new hope? For like those early disciples, each of us been called to an evangelistic mission; and I mean all of us, since the proclamation of the Good News is our common task together and not restricted to those of us who wear a funny collar.

As God’s people we are called to live the faith into which we have been baptized, to exercise a common ministry of caring and compassion, to speak to the world of the Good News and to be faithful to God through the words we speak and the things we do, letting our light so shine before others that they will see our good works and give glory to our Father in heaven. But answering this baptismal call from God requires a great deal of us and following Christ can be tiring as well as stressful. Living our lives for Christ often places an overwhelming demand on us and brings unprecedented weariness and exhaustion to our physical, emotional and spiritual lives. Service to God is nothing short of sacrificial love, as we see full well in Christ who gave His own life on the cross.

And in some ways we are in a far worse situation than even those early disciples. After all, we live in a world which is vastly more complicated and difficult. We live in a world that is often moving much faster than we are and it’s hard to keep up. We live in a world that pulls our lives in more than one direction at a time, often forcing us to go places and do things against our will. We live in a world where more is expected and demanded of us than we are often capable of giving, so that sometimes we want to simply quit and give up. We live in a world that finds itself overwhelmed with alternative lifestyles and questionable moral behavior, leaving us to make choices that are not always clear to us. We live in a world bent on individualism, where dependence upon and commitment to others are often suspect and rejected. The end result is that too often we are drained of our power, our resources, our energy, our excitement, our vitality, our very life itself. We end up feeling disconnected from others, from ourselves and from God. We become like a power tool that has been left for too long off its charger, useless to God or man. How are we to survive in such a world? How can we remain faithful to the God of our baptism? How can we become charged persons when we have lived for so long in the same demanding, tiring, make-ends-meet, rut of a world? How can any and all of us become challenged and serious about the Church’s mission and ministry?

The answer is found in the simple words of Jesus which we heard this morning. For just as Jesus witnessed the weary, worn out disciples who returned to Him so long ago, so Jesus knows the worn out lives and needs each of us have. Jesus knows how tiring and taxing our lives can be living in the fast lane. So Jesus’ advice to his twelve disciples long ago is the timeless advice for each of us today, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” Yet somehow we don’t want to hear these words. We all have our excuses. We claim that we don’t have time to come away. We work two jobs. The weekends are our only chance to sleep in, do the household chores, go boating or golfing. We’re busy people, so busy in fact that it is hard for us to imagine how people will survive without us. In many ways we have become a drained world of detached people. We’ve become couples who don’t connect with each other; parents who don’t connect with their children; children who no longer connect with aging parents; friends and neighbors who don’t connect one with another. And in our disconnected world we have, above all, lost the ability to connect with God through Christ Jesus. That is why the ancient words of the Psalmist need to be heard once again, “Be still and know that I am God.” God becomes known to us in the quiet moments of prayer and through the periods of time we set aside for devotions. Our contact with God is like recharging the phone or the power tools that we own, it is re-connecting with the power source of our lives. That is why we need to heed the timeless advice of Jesus given so many centuries ago, to “come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.”

And just how do we do this? How do we break away from the busy schedules and the heavy demands of our lives? After all, we have become immersed in our careers and our self-interests, in the goals we have set, seek and believe to be so important for ourselves and others. Yet in our baptism we are children of God; we are God’s people. We are people who are called by Christ to live and serve in a disconnected world. But to do that we are called to return to that source from where we will receive renewed strength, direction and hope for our mission and ministry. Sometimes that may be a truly quiet place in this world - a basement workshop, a sewing room, that favorite reading chair. But it is also to return to that source from which we will draw our greatest strength to help see us through the madness of this life and that is to Christ Himself. For our Gospel begins today by telling us that the disciples “gathered around Jesus” gathered around to tell Him what they had done, what it all meant, how it had gone. We are called to do the same, to gather around Jesus Our Lord, to speak to Him in prayer, to reflect upon His Words in Scripture and to feel His true presence in the Holy Sacrament. Along with our basements, our chairs and our vacation cabins, this place is also our quiet place, a place where we can rest awhile and be refreshed and renewed through the power of the Word and the grace of the sacrament. Through these means we will find ourselves reconnected to God in preparation to serve others in Christ’s name, for here God’s strength, comfort, love, forgiveness and mercy await you and are available to you. Hear then and heed the words of Jesus this morning, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest awhile,” for these words are the key to surviving in our world today. Amen.