Transcript
It has taken me a long time to realise that my greatest insights into the nature of God and my relationship with God, did not come from theologians – at least not the classically trained ones. I realise now that I’ve learned more about the incarnation and the redemptive nature of God from people who maybe didn’t even realise they were teaching at the time. People who didn’t clutter their lives with profound theological arguments and long treatises on transubstantiation. Their explanations were earthy and practical and not constrained by fear of not being accepted as a credible source of knowledge. They were people whose words and witness made me ask questions about the ‘why’ and ‘how’ of God and creation. Now, the common characteristic of all these people is that they all had simple insights and a certain faith born of experience and a realistic approach to life. It started to become clear to me that we don’t really learn about God so much as we live God, sometimes by trial and error, but never without getting to know the part of us that connects up with God. Although Jesus never ran for public office or sought to join any religious community, He too had to trust His own lived experience. Along the way when He shared that wisdom, He was rejected because He was not one of the publicly acknowledged authorities. We can imagine that He lived and learned from the simple people of Nazareth. He knew first hand that their hardships were like His own and that He saw that His role to assist them to lift those burdens, by reminding them that not all burdens are important and some are mere ‘baggage’ not ‘responsibilities’. But not all people saw His inner purpose of doing the Fathers will. Maybe He thought that the rabbis and those who were educated in the word of God would be the first to recognise what He had come to offer. But on many occasions, He was disappointed. What He came to realise is that the Father often overlooks the learned and the clever to settle His favour on the simple, on those who have received no formal training in the Law. So when it comes to revealing who He is, Jesus looks to people who exercise no power and enjoy no prestige in the community. He looks to people like His own disciples. Remember that in Jesus’ time there were whole groups of people who were dismissed as sinners because chose they follow what were regarded as dishonourable callings – people whose lifestyle did not permit them to observe the small print of the Law. These people were at the bottom of the social heap and were ignored, but Jesus had a word for them and all those people who were bowed down by the interpretation of the law. He had no intention of doing away with the law, but He refused to support those who spent their time finding new burdens for broken people. Saint Peter in Acts 15 also admits that the disciples of Jesus could not bear the full yoke of the Law. He said: “Why should they demand of others that which they have never managed to do themselves?” So then a gentle reminder that are saved in the same way as the lawmakers are: through the grace of the Lord. Jesus offers any who were prepared to listen, an invitation to come and learn from Him and find rest for their souls and in doing so He makes Himself the centre of His own teaching.