“All ye, beneath life’s crushing load, whose forms are bending low, who toil along the climbing way, with painful steps and slow, Look now! for glad and golden hours come swiftly on the wing: O rest beside the weary road, and hear the angels sing!”
You don’t have to look long to find examples of what Edmund Sears was referring to when he wrote that Christmas carol less than a hundred and fifty years ago. You don’t necessarily have to know that he was thinking about the gathering storm clouds of civil war or that he was reflecting on the upheaval brought by the industrial revolution in his native New England. All you need to do is to listen, to listen to your own heart, to listen to the feelings expressed all around us. There are plenty of people today who can testify to crushing loads and painful steps, plenty who are asking for just a little bit of rest beside the weary road.
If there is any one thing I’ve heard this Christmas, from more people than ever before, it is this: “I’m exhausted. I’m tired” There is a weariness of soul, an exhaustion of the heart, it seems, everywhere. The whole world seems tired, worn out, poured out, disappointed, drained. Haven’t you said it too, “I’m exhausted, just plain exhausted”? It’s only a couple of days until Christmas, we’ve been mauled in the malls, we have more month than money, we have not yet found “Tickle Me Elmo”! We’re exhausted, aren’t we?
How shall we replenish our energies? How shall we recover from our exhaustion? It seems deeper than what a night’s rest will cure. It seems more profound than merely the kind of relief you get relaxing in the evening after a day of hard work. There is something more exhausting than ordinary labor, and thus something more powerful is needed to bring us back to life. Something more thorough is needed to revitalize us and revive us. How shall we deal with our exhaustion?
The Bible has a wonderful image for the condition I am speaking about. The Bible uses something which everyone in Israel would have grasped instantly. It fits neatly into what I’ve been doing this Advent season, talking about the images of Christ expressed in flowers and plants. The Bible speaks of exhaustion as a time when the olive trees would no longer flourish, a time when the ripe olives which had sustained the people for so many years would not grow and the blossoms would fly from the olive trees. Listen to this description of a weary, exhausted life, an exhausted world, from the Book of Job:
Job 15:17, 20-24, 28-33
Not a pretty picture, is it? An altogether depressing image of despair and unhappiness. And the image, there at the end of the passage, of the olive blossoms being cast off, is the worst of all. To us, you see, the olive is a funny little fruit that brightens up a salad or is sliced on a pizza. I am told, that it may even float in some decidedly non-Baptist beverages! To us the olive is a small thing, a little delicacy, an extra. You and I could very well live without olives. But not so in ancient Israel! Not so in the world into which Jesus came! Olives provided not just food, but oil for heating and light, ingredients for ointments and medicine, and the olive tree provided a fine wood for carpentry. The olive was a great boost to the economy because it was easy to grow, it did not require much water, it grew luxuriously even in rocky soil. A good olive tree could be counted on to be productive for more than a hundred years. If there was any one symbol of something inexhaustible, it was the olive tree. If there was anything that spoke of living in bountiful times, it was the olive.
But this nagging image of exhaustion. This warning that the people will cast off the olive blossoms and be barren. The ultimate threat. If the olive tree, the source of our sustenance, be cut off, how shall we live? We shall indeed be exhausted!
I
The world into which Jesus was born two thousand years ago was a weary world. It was an exhausted world, in which it seemed that everything valuable was gone and nothing for which people had hoped was ever going to come. The world into which Jesus was born was a world in spiritual, social, and political crisis. Everything on which people had depended was crumbling. All over the civilized world the old gods seemed to have shriveled up and died. No one had faith in them any more. The temples were deserted, the old religious practices of Greece and Rome were sneered at, and in the place of the old faith there almost nothing.
Some found strength in superstitions. They followed, at least for a while, anything that appeared to have a spiritual base, strange cults with bizarre practices, mystery religions, they were called, only to be disappointed when nothing happened, nothing bore fruit. Exhaustion.
Others tried politics. They gave up on democracy and self-rule, and turned to mere men, Augustus Caesar and the like, who set themselves up as gods and demanded worship. Men against whom charges of immorality didn’t seem to stick. Who cared if the emperor had his mistresses and used the poor for sport? Teflon Caesar. What an exhaustion of soul there must have been for otherwise intelligent people to have fallen for such a deception! An exhausted world.
Even in Israel, even among the people of God, though there were many who remained faithful to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, still there was a spiritual emptiness, an exhaustion, even there. Some had taken God’s wonderful relationship with His chosen people, and had turned it into a barren, lifeless legalism. They had multiplied rules and regulations and had thus squeezed the life out of their faith. Others had transformed the hope that Israel would be a light to the nations into a kind of exclusive club. They had made God’s efforts to reach all humanity into a closed corporation, for the privileged few, and looked down their noses at all others. You know, it’s only so long that you can get any life out of being the only game in town; after a while, it’s tiring to be the only person who has the truth, and so these folks too felt exhausted. They felt worn out, spiritually. Like the olive tree had cast off its blossoms.
The world into which Jesus was born was a weary, exhausted world. Not unlike our own. Not at all unlike our own. For I hear the voices of weariness, spiritual weariness, right here in Washington, two thousand years later. I see some olive branches here that are all pressed out and exhausted.
II
We are exhausted by conflict. Conflict breaks out all over the place. I am not speaking only of international conflict, although that certainly is a source of weariness. Who can get a grasp on how to resolve ancient conflicts in Bosnia, in Zaire, in northern Ireland? The world is indeed weary of the failure of peace to break out.
a
But I am thinking more of the ongoing atmosphere of conflict that permeates every sector of our society and every facet of our lives. Our city continues to be stirred by conflicts that have an underlying theme of racial suspicion in them. A school principal and a reporter get into a tiff; it should have been a nothing, let go and let live, kind of thing. But suddenly it’s a lawsuit and grand jury kind of thing, and it has this racial undertone that, frankly, makes me weary. It makes me feel as though everything that has been done to create understanding and trust is for nothing. It’s exhausting, isn’t it? The very thing that gives life to this city, to this nation, its rich diversity, keeps on being transformed into a source of conflict. I feel that olive blossom being cast off and lost, I feel that thing which is the very thrust of our nation’s life being squeezed to death.
b
Our world is exhausted by conflict, yes, and our world is exhausted by its own moral uncertainty. We find that there is no real understanding any longer of what is right and what is wrong. Moral confusion reigns everywhere. And we find ourselves forced to swallow things that once were unthinkable. We’ve found out that we cannot drive into a shopping center parking lot and walk into a store without first looking over our shoulders to see who’s out there, hiding our packages in the trunk, setting the “club” in place, and turning on the alarm system. We’ve found out, some of us, that parking our cars in front of the church on Aspen Street is not safe. We’ve found out that the person who calls at our door and offers to repair our driveway or our leaking roof is likely a fraud. On and on it goes. Moral confusion and uncertainty and a whole lot of frustration. Exhaustion at what it takes to keep going in a world like ours.
And only this morning we hear that one of our national leaders has admitted that he gave “inaccurate information” some while ago. Inaccurate information? Sounds like a fancy word for a lie to me! It makes us want to give up on politics, just as they did in Jesus’ time! I feel exhausted, don’t you?
Oh, preacher, lighten up! Well, maybe so, maybe we do need a lighter moment right now. Hey, did you know that even Santa Claus feels frustrated and exhausted?! Did you know that today’s world even gives old Saint Nick a hard time? I found this item the other day, and thought I’d share it with you. We could use a light moment in this sermon right about now!
You’ll recognize the rhythm if not the precise words:
‘Twas the night before Christmas and Santa’s a wreck...
How to live in a world that’s politically correct?
His workers no longer would answer to “Elves.”
“Vertically challenged” they were calling themselves.
And labor conditions at the north pole
Were alleged by the union to stifle the soul.
Four reindeer had vanished, without much propriety,
Released to the wilds by the Humane Society.
And equal employment had made it quite clear
That Santa had better not use just reindeer.
So Dancer and Donner, Comet and Cupid,
Were replaced with four pigs, and you know that looked stupid!
The runners had been removed from his sleigh;
The ruts were termed dangerous by the EPA.
And people had started to call for the cops
When they heard sled noises on their roof-tops.
Second-hand smoke from his pipe had his workers quite frightened.
His fur-trimmed suit was called “unenlightened.”
And to show you the strangeness of life’s ebbs and flows,
Rudolf was suing over unauthorized use of his nose
And had gone on Geraldo, in front of the nation,
Demanding millions in overdue compensation.
So half of the reindeer were gone, and his wife,
Who suddenly said she’d enough of this life,
Joined a self-help group, packed, and left in a whiz,
Demanding from now on her title was Ms.
And as for the gifts, why, he’d ne’er had a notion
That making a choice could cause so much commotion.
Nothing of leather, nothing of fur,
Which meant nothing for him, and nothing for her.
Nothing that might be construed to pollute,
Nothing to aim, nothing to shoot.
Nothing that clamored or made lots of noise.
Nothing for just girls, or just for the boys.
Nothing that claimed to be gender specific,
Nothing that’s warlike or non-pacific.
No candy or sweets, they were bad for the tooth.
Nothing that seemed to embellish a truth.
And fairy tales, while not yet forbidden,
Were like Ken and Barbie, better off hidden.
For they raised the hackles of those psychological
Who claimed the only good gift was one ecological.
No baseball, not football, someone could get hurt;
Besides, playing sports exposed kids to dirt.
Dolls were said to be sexist, and should be passé,
And Nintendo would rot your entire brain away.
So Santa just stood there, disheveled, perplexed;
he just could not figure out what to do next.
He tried to be merry, tried to be gay,
But you’ve got to be careful with that word today.
His sack was quite empty, limp to the ground;
Nothing fully acceptable was to be found.
Something special was needed, a gift that he might
Give to all without angering the left or the right.
And gift that would satisfy, with no indecision,
Each group of people, and every religion;
Every ethnicity, every hue
Everyone, everywhere .. even you.
So here is that gift, it’s price beyond worth ..
“May you and your loved ones enjoy peace on earth.”
Well, that’s whimsical, but it also makes my point. And it leads to another. It makes the point that we feel exhaustion, like the olive branch whose blossoms are cast off, we feel exhaustion and frustration because the world keeps shifting ground on us, and the things we used to give ourselves to just aren’t the same any more. “Cast off ... blossoms, like the olive tree.”
But this bit of whimsy points us to something else. To the hope for peace and to the source of peace. The source of refreshment in the midst of our frustrations. The source of renewal despite our exhaustion.
III
John 1:10-14
He came and was not known. He invested himself with us and was not accepted. God too has had His frustrations. God too has had a hard time getting things done, getting things to stay put. God too had every right to feel exhausted, like the olive tree with its blossoms cast off.
But God acted. God did not wring His hands in mere frustration. God acted. And the word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen His glory .. full of grace and truth. We have seen His glory .. and to all who received Him, who believed in His name, He gave power to become children of God. Power and peace.
The word was made flesh, and in Jesus God has tasted our frustrations and limitations. He has felt what we fell and known what it is like to live in weariness. We are not alone in our exhaustion; the Lord of Lords has walked this way too. He understands.
You and I try so hard to use our own words to make things happen. You chastise that child for something, and five minutes later he’s completely forgotten. We feel exhausted. I read this week that one survey shows that by Wednesday the average church member has forgotten 95% of what he heard preached on Sunday. Don’t you think that makes me feel weary about words!
But this word, God’s word, was made flesh, and in Jesus God has come to how us how to live in His presence and power. He has come to give us a living demonstration of integrity and compassion, of hope and of healing. In Jesus God has entered into the realities of pain and suffering, anguish and frustration, and has reached out a healing hand. In Jesus God has painted a picture of human life as it was intended, a little lower only than the angels, full of grace and truth. And God has said, follow Him, and you can live above your frustrations. Follow Him, and I will give you power to become. Your weariness can be healed and your exhaustion can be replenished. The word made flesh, power to become.
The word was made flesh, and in Jesus God has acted even to redeem our suffering and to give meaning to our deepest disappointments. In Jesus Christ God has acted to bring significance even to the worst that can happen to us. For He, born in a stable just a few miles south of Jerusalem would three and thirty years later climb a hill just east of that city, and there pour out his heart, his soul, and his very life for us. To the Mount called Olives He would go and pray for us, pray for the strength to follow the Father’s will, pray for the power to give His precious life for the life of the world. On the Mount of Olives he would pray, out of His own grief and exhaustion, until the hour would come when He would give Himself for the sin and the need of the world.
What a picture! What a pageant! That out of the exhaustion of a people, described as like an olive blossom cast off, God would send His own son to the Mount of Olives to pray and to find strength to do what must be done. That out of the exhaustion of a people, who found no more to sustain them in the old dependable ways, God would so love the world that He might give His son to us, freely give Him up for us all, and cause Him to walk through the Mount of Olives to the Mount called Calvary. What wondrous love is this, that caused the Lord of bliss, to come from heaven’s height, for my soul?
It may be today that you feel exhausted. It may be that today you feel weary, and think that the things you’ve given yourself to are of no account and don’t matter. It may be that sometimes you feel discouraged and think your work’s in vain. But I want to tell you there is a balm in Gilead, to heal the sin sick soul. I want to tell you that the Holy Spirit is here to revive your soul again. I want to tell you, in the words of one of the prophets, that “though the fig tree does not blossom, and no fruit is on the vines; though the produce of the olive fails, and the fields yield no food; though the flock is cut off from the fold and there is no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord. I will exult in the God of my salvation.”
For the word has in Christ become flesh, and still dwells among us, and still gives us power to become the children of God. In Him our weariness is healed and our exhaustion replenished.
“Long lay the world in sin and error pining, ‘til He appeared and the soul felt its worth. A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices, for yonder dawns a new and glorious morn. Fall on your knees, O hear the angel voices, O night sublime, O night when Christ was born.”
