I am meek and humble of heart.
Matthew 11: 25-30

At that time Jesus said in reply, “I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike. Yes, Father, such has been your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him. “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.”

“The way to rest, is to yoke yourself to Jesus. This means to undertake Jesus’ disciplines and learn form him. The rest will be granted through serious discipleship.” – John Shea

Discussion Questions:

1. The reflection says we all yoke ourselves to something. What do you think most shapes your thoughts, decisions, and priorities these days? Has that changed over different seasons of your life?
2. When in your life have you felt most “wholehearted”, living with a sense of unity and purpose? What made that possible?
3. What kind of weariness do you experience most these days—physical, emotional, spiritual, or something else? What do you usually turn to for relief?
4. What does “resting in God” look like for you? What helps you quiet yourself enough to simply be with God?

5. If someone observed how you spend your time, energy, money, and attention over the last year, what would they say is the primary “yoke” you are wearing? How close is that to the person you want to be?

Biblical Context

Sr. Mary McGlone CSJ

As Matthew set up his Gospel, the selection we hear today is part of a general presentation of resistance to Jesus’ teaching. Immediately before our opening line, Jesus had reviled the cities that had seen his works but rejected his message. Then with his next breath he said, “I give praise to you, Father … you have revealed [these things] to little ones.” It seems as if his prayer of praise gives us a glimpse of Jesus’ own attitude adjustment, his discernment of how God’s ways were as surprising as rejection was distressing.

However, much Jesus would have wanted the authorities to accept him, that wasn’t happening. Instead, simple folk flocked to him. Jesus clearly believed that if he was preaching God’s word, God’s will must have been hidden in those responses. Jesus’ prayer, spoken out loud in the presence of his disciples, revealed how he saw God working – in, in spite of, or far beyond his own hopes and plans.

Thinking of Jesus’ prayer as revelatory of his relationship with God sheds light on his next statement. Scholars refer to Jesus’ declaration about the complete mutual sharing of power and knowledge between Jesus and the Father as a Johannine thunderbolt in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. Nowhere else in the synoptic Gospels does Jesus make any claims like these. But, this may say something very different from John’s presentation of Jesus, something much more in tune with the lower Christology of the first three evangelists.

Jesus introduces his description of his intimacy with God saying, “Such has been your gracious will.” As he says that, he seems to be simultaneously discovering and accepting the will of God. Following that line of thought, when Jesus talks about knowing and being known by the Father, he’s not referring to a settled body of knowledge or something like a divine facial recognition program. He’s talking about the knowing that happens in relationship, the kind of knowing that is growing and ongoing.

Seen in this light, Jesus’ prayer in today’s Gospel presents an early and less painful illustration of the kind of discernment Jesus went through at Gethsemane when he asked to avoid the cup but accepted God’s will (Matthew 26:39, 42, 44). This prayer reveals Jesus as the obedient teacher. His search for God’s will as well as his acceptance of it surely taught the disciples more than any sermon he preached. Or, better said, Jesus allowed his disciples to see how his own process of prayer put flesh on every sermon he preached.

Taking into account the idea that Jesus was discovering the will of God and accepting it with joy, we can interpret the last verses of today’s Gospel in a new light as well. Jesus says: “Take my yoke … learn from me.” What is the yoke Jesus has just shown us? It is the yoke of learning from the Father, the yoke of unmet expectations countered by the discovery of grace in unexpected places.

Jesus says “I am meek and humble of heart.” In the Gospels, the word “meek” appears only here and in Matthew’s beatitudes. According to Daniel Harrington in The Gospel of Matthew, the meek are the anawim of the Hebrew Scriptures, that is the poor, the vulnerable, the marginalized, those who had no one on whom to rely other than their God. What the idea of being humble of heart adds to meekness is the element of choice. To be poor is an involuntary condition and everyone is poor in the face of God. Because the heart is the source of volition, being humble of heart indicates a choice to recognize and accept one’s innate poverty.

When Jesus invited his audience to take his yoke and learn from him, he was inviting them to learn from his prayer, from his discernment and from his rejoicing in God’s surprising will. What he implied without saying so explicitly was that to learn from him meant to learn how to discover, accept and do God’s will. Those who can give themselves to God, who can take on Jesus’ yoke and imitate his humility of heart need no longer worry about carrying out their own agenda or being a success or failure. They can rest in the assurance that God’s gracious will is being accomplished even when, or perhaps especially when, they do not see the results. That is, indeed, an easy yoke for which we need do no more than simply thank God.

The Yoke of Christ

Reflection by
Fr. Michael K. Marsh

I wonder what Jesus would say to us today as individuals, as a parish, as a nation. Are we different from Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum? How have we responded to Christ and his gospel?

Reflecting on this question raises a deeper and more fundamental question. To what or whom are we yoked? To what or whom do we give ourselves? What or who takes priority in our lives, orienting how we live and relate to others, how we make decisions? We all harness our lives to something: another person, work, family, success, reputation, our country, our political party. Sometimes our yokes are more interior like fear, anxiety, anger, particular beliefs and opinions, the losses and tragedies of our lives. Regardless, they are the relationships and attachments that we depend on for meaning and, for better or worse, they give us our life’s direction. We’ve all got them and usually more than one.

What yokes do you wear? Which one is primary? We know the right answer. Jesus. But is that really how we live? Is it reflected by our deeds and in our relationships? Apparently, it was not for Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum.

If we are going to call ourselves Christians, we must fully yoke ourselves to Christ. He must be the primary and determining yoke. We cannot simply come to church, hear the gospel, say our prayers, and then go to lunch. The gospel of Christ demands a response. That’s why Jesus is so harsh with his words. The people have seen God among them, they have witnessed the signs. Jesus has cleansed their lepers, healed their sick, calmed the sea, cast out their demons, forgiven their sins, preached and taught in their cities. Still they reject Jesus and, before him, John the Baptist.

Sometimes we are like those little kids in the marketplace, unhappy with whatever is offered us. We want the gospel to fit our beliefs, desires, and agendas rather than shaping our beliefs, desires, and agendas to fit the gospel. That simply is not an option for Jesus. We can either dance, celebrating and giving thanks for the coming of God among us in Jesus, or we can mourn our sins, the brokenness of our lives, and the pain of the world. But we must respond. We must choose one or the other. Either one is to wear the yoke of Christ. Both will reorient our lives and priorities.

What does that mean for us? It means we take seriously our life of discipleship. Our prayer is more about intimacy with God than getting what we want. We work for justice and the dignity of every human being. We care for the poor, feed the hungry, and defend the oppressed. We love our enemies. We offer forgiveness before it is asked for. Our faithfulness should be evident by how we live and speak. We live day by day praising God and giving thanks for his gifts and blessings. We let go of anger. We don’t live in fear and we trust that daily bread will be provided.

To be yoked to anything or anyone other than Christ will only leave us weary and burdened. This is a spiritual condition, a disease of the soul, as much or maybe even more than it is a physical one. Our lives will be frenzied and fragmented. We end up comparing, competing, and judging ourselves and each other. We act as one person in one situation and another person in a different situation. There is no internal integrity. The reserves run dry and we live exhausted with nothing of depth or substance to offer. Soon relationships become superficial and utilitarian.

Are we weary? Burdened? If so, maybe this means we are not fully wearing the yoke of Christ. Too often we treat our weariness and medicate our burdens with retail therapy, addictions, a new toy, a vacation, a nap, a day off, busyness and perfectionism. Interior voids cannot be filled by exterior things. More often than not we are just as weary and just as burdened afterwards as we were before. These are not the antidote to our exhaustion. The antidote to our exhaustion begins with wholeheartedness. That wholeheartedness is only found in sharing the yoke of Christ, the heart of God and the heart of humanity beating as one.

To take on the yoke of Jesus is to take on his life. “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me,” he says. “Let you heart love like mine. Let your mind be filled with the same concerns as mine. Let your feet walk in step with mine. Let your hands touch the world like mine. Let your eyes see the Father like mine. Live and move in tandem with me, as one, and you will find rest for your soul.”

Reflection excerpted from; “Interrupting the Silence”, Fr Michael K. Marsh. used with permission.