Thursday of the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time
This world keeps moving faster and faster. Do you ever feel like it’s tough to keep up? There is always another urgent task getting added to the list. Is this the way it was meant to be? The Lord has something to say about the ‘forced labor’ that humanity gets caught up in. For the Israelites, it became literal slavery. They came to Egypt as a free people, but were caught up in the fears of the powerful. After enslavement, their time, energy, and hard labor didn’t benefit them. We are similarly enslaved by sin. Some sins are obvious because we have clear rules against them: lying, stealing, violence. But a common modern sin that is less obvious (while enslaving many) is the sin of ego, of failing to rest in God because of something that seems ‘more important.’
Some of us are caught up in a type of work- the many demands placed upon us feel good because they tell us we are needed and important. It strokes our ego. But many more of us are caught up in the fast-moving connectivity, news, and social media storm of information. There’s always another video or post prepared for us to see, another click-bait story that we needto know. Taking in information can also stroke our ego (‘I know something new that others don’t’), but without producing any work. Of course good information can be useful for making smart choices, and if we ruminate and pray, it can even produce wisdom. But so much of what we take in is an empty waste of time and brainpower; we don’t do anything with it, and it doesn’t humanize or elevate us like art. It’s just… interesting. It’s not oppressive like the slavery of the Israelites, but it does spend our time and energy in a way that doesn’t benefit us.
Whatever the sins you and I struggle with and against, there is a clear message in all of today’s readings: God stands by us. As the Lord told the Israelites, “I am concerned about you and the way you are being treated…” The Lord tells us the same thing today. God is concerned about the ways this world treats us, enslaving us in sin, stealing our time and energy. Like the Israelites, God desires to free us. We have a part to play in our redemption, just as the Israelites did. But the majority of the work will be accomplished by God. The great signs and wonders of the exodus were accomplished by God; the people just had to have a special meal and walk. God promised to deliver us, and as the psalm reminds us, the Lord keeps his covenant. Jesus’s yoke is easy. He has defeated sin for us through his life, death, and resurrection; we simply need to walk with him along The Way.
Since God is accomplishing our redemption, we just need to humbly cooperate without feeding our ego. The antidote to this type of ego-centered sin is not to struggle against it, but instead to rest in God’s providence. We must take up Jesus’s light burden and find rest for ourselves. May we trust that God will deliver us. God’s power is enough. Whatever else concerns us, it will be taken care of. May we take a Sabbath from radio, TV, lists, and endless media feeds, and rest in God.
- Chris Neiport