In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.
On this long Canada Day weekend, when so many of our fellow citizens have made their exodus to the campground and cottage it seems appropriate to reflect on the biblical understanding of leisure. For we Canadians carry with us our consumer mentality even when we’re on vacation or even spiritual retreat.

We work as hard at playing, relaxing or seeking spiritual nourishment as we do at our labours, because we view it all as part of the same acquiring exercise. We are consumers of experience as well as goods.This is why so many people return home after a long weekend or vacation exhausted.

Under the stress of “consuming all those experiences” we frequently complain of needing a vacation from our vacation. Sometimes we even succumb to physical illness. And yet ironically it is when we are physically “spent” that we at last feel in some measure a sense of immense relief. It is our pneumonia, our cancer, our heart attack, our accidents that create holy leisure for us.

Certainly, as Christians we know that this is not the way of life that God wants us to lead. But this insight doesn’t seem to lessen the tension that we feel as we try to navigate our way in a fast paced, changing world  and at the same time strive to be faithful to our Lord Jesus Christ.

Like circus jugglers, we try to balance our careers, our volunteer commitments, our family commitments, our vacations, our own need for time alone, our relationship with God. We struggle with unemployment, with sickness and the limitations of old age. So many days we feel like the mythological Atlas carrying the whole world on our shoulders.
The most rigorous ascetics of all, the early Desert monks, considered this problem as well it seems. Was all of life to be penance? Was all of life designed to exhaust the body in order to save the soul? Was all of life meant to be spent pouring ourselves out?

In response to these questions they told the story of Abba (Father) Anthony, the founder of monasticism.
“One day a hunter in the desert saw Abba Anthony enjoying himself with his brothers and he was shocked. What kind of spiritual guide is this? But the old monk said to him, “put an arrow in your bow and shoot it.” So the hunter did. Then the old man said, “Now shoot another.” And the hunter did. Then Abba Anthony said, “Shoot your bow again, Keep shooting, Keep shooting, keep shooting.” The hunter finally said, “but if I bend my bow so much I will break it.”

Then Abba Anthony said to him, “It is jut the same with the work of God. If we stretch ourselves beyond measure, we will break. Sometimes it is necessary to meet other needs.”

Holy leisure then is an essential part of the Christian life. It is not laziness and it is not selfishness. It has something to do with the depth and quality of our lives.
Now in our gospel reading from Matthew, Jesus invites all who are listening to “come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”

But as I have already mentioned, rest, holy leisure is one the most difficult spiritual elements to achieve. We are trained to be doers and makers, not dreamers and seers.
At the same time, this biblical concept of Sabbath may conjure up memories of long ago Presbyterian Sunday afternoons where there was no entertainment at all. Afternoons that seemed to stretch on for an eternity, where they never seemed to end. And yet Sabbath or holy leisure is profoundly counter-cultural concept. Sabbath demands that we stop this foolishness of throwing ourselves away in the endless quest for experience. God not only lures us to the Sabbath but commands that every seventh day we stop and give up being a consumer.

The former UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold captured this experience of rest beautifully when he wrote; “I don’t know Who-or what-put the question. I don’t know when it was put. I don’t even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer Yes to Someone-or Something-and from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, therefore, my life, in self surrender, had a goal.”

Now the rest that Jesus assured is obviously not a magical cure. As Christians we are not immune from pain, fear, failure, disappointment and rejection. And yet into the midst of the pressures and burdens comes again and again and again this invitation from Christ:
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest from your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

And I know that at the end of a long day it is so much easier to slump in front of the television than it is to accept Christ’s invitation to enter into the quiet. We all tell ourselves that what we really need is this episode of CSI  not holy leisure.

But the fact is that it is our souls, not our bodies, that are tired. And the yoke is not one that Jesus imposes, in fact it is one that is tailored to our own particular circumstances. It is an opportunity to learn from him, to release our grip from life and surrender to a power greater than ourselves. To look deeply within ourselves and acknowledge those things that we are so afraid to show to the world-our weakness, our sin, our fears and our doubts.

It is an opportunity to embrace the gentleness, the littleness and humble spirit of Christ. For Christ understands that the burdens which weigh most heavily upon us are not so much the physical burdens but the spiritual and emotional ones. The burdens of the soul.

 It is not so much the financial struggles to acquire more things but the worry about tomorrow. It is not so much the failure as the fear of rejection and loneliness that comes. It is the burdens of our souls that wear us out.

And yet when we are yoked to Christ, we are able to bear even what seem to be the impossible burdens because we don’t have to bear them alone. In him we can find rest. Rest from the consumption of experiences, rest from the fears which challenge our dreams, rest from the anger and wounds of the past that won’t heal. For In Christ we find what holy leisure truly means.
THANKS BE TO GOD, AMEN.