Our topic is fellowship. But you might wonder how the text we just read is going to help us understand anything about fellowship. I know that most people read this text as a call to salvation. When Jesus says, “come to me.” Each person hearing that invitation responds according to his or her own convictions. How has this text got anything to do with fellowship?
Well, when I began to think about this, the first thing I noticed is that Jesus says, “"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened.” He did not say, “Come to me each of you...” So Jesus keeps us mindful of the fact that he is calling together a group of people who all have their weariness and burdened souls in common. If misery really does love company, Jesus is gathering a fellowship of saints who will learn by seeing the crowd of other burdened souls that they are not alone in their suffering. Thus Jesus will give rest, partly by providing the relief of Christian fellowship in which people might really bear one another's burdens. Such people would be able to comfort each other, where nobody looks down on anyone, but each one could say to every other, “You too? I thought I was the only one.” “Friendship Is Born at That Moment When One Person Says to another, 'What! You Too? I Thought I Was the Only One.” C.S. Lewis said that. You and I can find true comfort in the acknowledgement of our common condition and our shared need of Gods grace.
Then I noticed that this invitation comes immediately after Jesus praises the Father for hiding these blessing from the learned and wise, and revealing them to little children. The wise and learned practice their religions. In many faiths the priesthood is reserved for the educated ones. Unfortunately for those educated ones, they often have too much confidence in themselves because of their knowledge. They are puffed up and think they know better than others. They think they know the way to God because they know what the scriptures say. They think they are in good with the father because they “live by the law” keeping the commands and regulations of the faith.
But let's be clear that Jesus reference to wise and learned does not intend to teach us that education is a bad thing. There are plenty of people who never finished high school and yet have the attitude Jesus would reject. These are the kind of people who can pray like the Pharisee who said, “God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.' You see he placed all his confidence for salvation in his own good behavior. He is praising himself for his wisdom and learning, even if all his learning comes from his own experiences rather than formal instruction.
Another example of this kind of person is the elder brother in the parable of the prodigal son. He was just a farmer on the family farm. Probably didn't go to college. But he was wise and learned in his own eyes. He thought himself worthy of his father's praise because he stayed home and worked the farm like a good boy. But he is the one who was angry when his brother received mercy. Why was he angry? Because he believed the prodigal son didn't deserve the mercy and forgiveness that he got, not to mention the party. Instead this elder brother felt that he did deserve special treatment for being the obedient son and he wasn't getting it.
These wise and learned people are only wise in their own eyes. They are the kinds of people who easily forget that they are also sinful and in need of God's grace. They look too much at their own good works, and not enough at their own continuing failures. Indeed, there are many people in churches today, perhaps even among us here, people who keep track of how good they are, how much they give and how hard they work for the church and think that these things will please God.
This attitude is harmful to fellowship. It causes church members to set standards according to how they are doing. They then compare the behaviors of others to the standards they have set and those who don't measure up are frowned upon. So the haughty ones hold the others in contempt, and the less than perfect ones feel that and resent the condemnation. How can this be good for healthy Christian fellowship?
In fact, I am personally acquainted with at least one person who will not attend church anymore because she has already personally and painfully experienced churches that exhibit this unhealthy atmosphere of judgmentalism. For her, fellowship is undesirable because she has not been in a church where genuine Christian fellowship is practiced. She is very sensitive and uncomfortable in an environment where she might be criticized for any reason. She is even uncomfortable when there is conflict around her, even if she is not in the middle of it. I do pray for her to be stronger in her ability to forbear and put up with the imperfections of others. But surely we all understand how uncomfortable a church can be where there is no love.
Now think of what kind of fellowship we could have if every person came to Christ according to the invitation Jesus is giving in this text. If all who come who are weary and burdened, then none will be haughty or proud. All will be humble. None would look down on anyone for everyone would be aware of his or her own need for grace and mercy. And as we dared to speak of what is troubling us, we would be surprised, but also comforted to hear people around us saying, “What, you too? I thought I was the only one.”
This is the difference between religion and the gospel. Religion is a system of belief and behavior that can be mastered so that the one who learns it and lives it can think of himself as wise and learned. But the gospel dwells in the hearts of those who simply trust in Christ, the good shepherd. The contrast is between those whose pride and self sufficiency have caused them to reject Jesus' message and those whose humility and recognition of their own neediness allow them to be open to God's unqualified care through Jesus' announcement of the arrival of the Kingdom. Which group of people do you think would be more likely to be loving and accepting of you and your foibles?
The invitation Jesus gave is itself an expression of His own loving acceptance of all who would trust him for salvation. He is not looking for the cream of the crop. He receives all the weaklings who are aware of and willing to admit their weakness. The world's way of acceptance is definitely in contrast with Jesus' invitation. To go to an extreme for a moment, a pastor friend of mine was telling me about his son's efforts in the army to go to ranger school.
That is an elite crop of soldiers. I was told that for each class of students entering the program, they have already been through basic training and many hours of instruction and physical conditioning. Only the strong are allowed to apply for admission to ranger school. But even among them, on the first day of admission there is a test for physical fitness and some are rejected as failures, after their very first day. It seems the instructions try hard to find something wrong. Those poor soldiers who get rejected might be told that they failed on a detail as small as doing their push-ups wrong.
You nearly have to be super human to make it through ranger school. I was told that nobody makes it through on the first try. And only the very best are allowed to try again. That is the extreme form of acceptance by earning your place in the group. But we humans actually like it that way. We don't all enter groups requiring such high standards. But we do all want to be proud of what we can accomplish.
On the other hand, hear the invitation of Jesus. He only accepts into his presence that special group of people who will praise God for His accomplishments. He is not interested in those who think they can do anything without him. Because the truth really is, “without him we can do nothing.” But there are so few people who really believe that. As long as we keep trying to do better, as long as we keep saying, “One day I'll get it right,” as long as we keep holding out hope for ourselves and not looking to Jesus, we will remain in the religious group, and we may very well feel like failures but we will be afraid to say so. When we are ready to humble ourselves, swallow our pride and admit our weakness and inability to impress God with our own good character, then we are ready to move in to the gospel group. That is when we will accept Jesus' invitation, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”
In the book of the prophet Zephaniah there is an Old Testament picture of the same grace. It is the promise of redemption for the city of Jerusalem because that is so much the focus of God's Kingdom work in the Old Testament. But the city is filled with God's people and it is really the people that Zephaniah is talking about. So hear just this very short section from Zephaniah 3:11-12. “On that day you will not be put to shame for all the wrongs you have done to me, because I will remove from this city those who rejoice in their pride. Never again will you be haughty on my holy hill. But I will leave within you the meek and humble, who trust in the name of the LORD.”
You read that and it sounds so much like what Jesus said that you might think this is where Jesus got the idea, except that the truth is Zephaniah got it from Jesus by divine inspiration. God wants his people to be a collection of meek and humble people, a fellowship of believers. But that is just the entry point. As we will learn as we continue to look at the topic of fellowship, God builds us up form the ground up. Outside of Christ we are nothing, dead, and to accept Jesus' invitation we have to know what we are and why we need him. But once we enter into his rest and take up his easy burden and light yoke we become something special. Once we humbly come to him, he makes us into “a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.”
Instead of trying to make something of ourselves or trying to save ourselves, we should be accepting Jesus invitation to receive his grace, and letting God make something of us according to his will and pleasure. For we know that he who began a good work in us will be faithful to complete it. And we can rest in his care, and rest in the fellowship we have with one another. The rest of fellowship is knowing that you are not alone. It is a relief to know that we can support each other and bear one another's burdens in Christ.
