Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

• Matthew 11:29

Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.

• Ephesians 4:2

“ ‘We shall now consider some tokens of true lowliness, which is never without meekness  He who sincerely desires to become lowly of heart must not be ashamed of performing any outward office such as the worldly heart thinks mean and humiliating. Just as it is a sure sign of conversion from sin that it becomes hateful to the man, so it is a sign of true repentance when he is ready in all things to take the meanest place.  He must always be ready to acknowledge himself in fault towards whomsoever it may be, and esteem others better than himself. By doing this the loving heart can best soften men’s dispositions and touch their hearts and win them over to meekness … ln the third place. it belongs to a lowly heart to be kindly affected towards all, not with a partial love — that is, not to show more kindness to one rather than another, to friends more than to strangers. but to do good to all for God’s sake, as our neighbours.  ln the fourth place, it is necessary to lowliness of heart that we divest and disencumber ourselves of all things, that we may cleave only to our merciful God and become one with him. For God will not and cannot unite himself or dwell with a worldly heart.  May God help us to learn thus to be meek and lowly of heart. Amen!’ (Sermon on Matthew 11:29).”

• Tony Lane, A Concise History of Christian Thought

John Tauler (1300-1361) was a priest and theologian.  He was the first or near the first of the German mystics.  Mysticism, with the church, was a type of theology where the theologian tried to find the “hidden” meaning in Scripture.  There is good mysticism, but when you force a meaning that just is not there, you can introduce heresy.  Tauler’s writings inspired two different branches of mysticism, both German and English.  Martin Luther admired Tauler’s train of thought.  And the Modern Devotion movement (Thomas à Kempis, as one) was influenced by Tauler’s writings.

The quote above is from a sermon on the first Scripture above.  Jesus offers a yoke that is light.  The key is that we must be humble in order to accept the yoke.  Light or not, the yoke is still the yoke.  You are submitting yourself to be led by others.  The photograph above is from India, showing oxen pulling a cart.  One ox is much larger than the other.  Jesus taught to not be unequally yoked, meaning the bigger ox does all the work and the other ox never develops the muscles to drive the cart.

But in this case, Jesus is the other person in the yoke, and He ensures we are not overburdened.  Note what Jesus says of Himself.  “I am gentle and humble in heart.”  Jesus is the King of kings and Lord of lords.

Our biggest act of rebellion is that we want to be the driver of the ox team.  We refuse to humble ourselves enough to do the mundane things that need doing.  But Jesus has already strapped the yoke over his shoulders.  He is waiting for us to join Him.

As an example of not humbling oneself, have you ever gone to a church dinner?  It might be catered.  It might be potluck.  It might be a blend of the two.  But regardless there is always clean-up afterwards.  Our church has a scullery system.  Shove trays of dishes in one side and close the door, hit the button, and then pull a very hot tray of washed and sanitized dishes out the other side.  Great system, but only two or three people knew how to use it.  One when I was there had a masters degree in engineering.  He could have designed and built the system, but he humbled himself by being the guy that got the dishes washed.

We also had the standard triple sink that many restaurants have.  One sink was for washing.  The next sink was for rinsing.  The third sink was for sanitizing.  In our case, and unfortunately, from right to left.  But there were only 2-3 people trained in how to use the sinks, and what solution to put in each hand pump (soap or sanitizer).  I found food particles in the sanitizing sink all the time, and the food prep sink was at the far end of the kitchen, not in the scullery at all.

But although training was short in supply, for three-four years, I was responsible for the church dinners.  When the meal was over, almost everyone ran for the exit.  There was one woman, however, who always put an apron on and started washing dishes.  People assigned to clean up might put the tables and chairs away, but then they walked past the mountain of dirty dishes as they left.  I worked the triple sink as it was supposed to be used, and people chided me.  I was the leader.  I should delegate.  But each time I turned around to delegate, there was no one there.  We had assigned people to the task, but where were they?

Everyone wanted to be the elder in charge of something.  No one wanted to wash the dishes, or mop up the spills, or remove the decorations once the party was over.

But John Tauler devoted this sermon to the spirit of meekness and being lowly.  People can play with the word humble.  C. S. Lewis said that we might face humiliation better if we were humbler.  He also said that we have a hard time in becoming more humble because we are too proud.  My mother said often that she was proud of her humility.

But lowly?  Let’s forget wordsmithing new definitions of humble.  To be lowly puts the pieces in place.  Heap the piles of dirty dishes, filthy clothes, and wet, nasty floors upon me in my lowly condition.  I will do my best to clean the mess up.  You cannot be lowly without using the proper meaning of the word humble.

Let us not have Jesus pull the cart on His own.  The yoke is light, but we must become lowly and meek to be yoked next to the very humble and gentle King of kings.

If you like these Tuesday morning essays about philosophy and other “heavy topics,” but you think you missed a few, you can use this LINK. I have set up a page off the home page for links to these Tuesday morning posts. I will continue to modify the page as I add more.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.