The Yoke of Christian Discipleship

First UMC Fort Dodge

January 13, 2008

Mark Haverland

Matthew 3 13 Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him. 14 John would have prevented him, saying, "I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?" 15 But Jesus answered him, "Let it be so now; for thus it is fitting for us to fulfil all righteousness." Then he consented. 16 And when Jesus was baptized, he went up immediately from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and alighting on him; 17 and lo, a voice from heaven, saying, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased."

When I was in junior high, we had regular swimming lessons as a part of our physical education program. I can remember one day the teacher, perhaps remembering his military training, yelled out for us to "fall in!" I suppose he wanted us to fall into order along the edge of the pool so he could give us instructions. But it was too delicious an opportunity to indulge my delight at irony. So, I fell in the pool, interpreting literally his instructions. As I recall, the teacher did not appreciate this visual joke. But teachers are like that - no sense of humor...

I tell this story to illustrate that people enter water in many different ways and for many different reasons. Think, for instance of the different ways that people approach the water at a beach. Some run full force, plunging right in, others wet themselves and slowly get used to the water. Others just walk or put their toes in. Some don't like to get in the water at all. Some have to be pushed or thrown in the water. Some fall in the water without realizing it or because they misinterpret or misunderstand instructions. And so it is as we approach the Jordan, the waters of baptism. Some are ready to plunge in with Jesus but others are cautious: am I really ready to risk this act of re-creation? After all, this is serious stuff. The waters of baptism take us down under to the depths, to chaos, to the place of no breathing, to death.

I heard a presentation a while back on the Yokefellow movement by a Quaker minister of some renown. Jim Newby spoke at a men's spirituality breakfast club I attend about how Elton Trueblood, a great 20^th century Quaker minister, was traveling to a preaching engagement and while en-route was reading the Bible as he did each day no matter where he was or what he was doing. He had adopted the spiritual disciple of reading through the books of the Bible noting in the margin the date, time and place ("on a train to Memphis," for instance) and his thoughts and meditations on the passage. He happened to be reading Matthew 11:29 which includes the line "Take my yoke upon you." As sometimes happens, it burst into his life with new meaning and changed him, and many others as it turned out, forever. His spiritual awakening caused him to start a movement called the Yokefellows Movement. This is a group of people who seek the spiritual rewards of commitment, fellowship, ministry and seven kinds of discipline: prayer, scripture, worship, money, time, service, study.

As we talked around my breakfast table about Jim's presentation and challenge to us to find a similar spiritual discipline, I remembered that in my study of world religion I learned the word Yoga is a Hindu word which is related to the English world yoke. Both mean to accept a burden of restraint. Yokes - such as the yokes used to connect horses or oxen to a wagon - force us to do work we otherwise wouldn't do. Yoga is a religion that tries to train the body, mind and spirit to do things they otherwise wouldn't or couldn't do. "Practice makes permanent," as my basketball coach used to say. If you want to do the right things, you must practice doing things right. Yogis and Yokefellows take this to heart.

Often when I wake in the morning, I lie in bed and do some leg and back stretches. I raise one leg at a time straight into the air, stretching the muscles and tendons on the back of my legs. I do versions of leg lifts and press my knees to my chest to stretch and strengthen my back. I rotate my ankles with my feet held straight - or as straight as I can, which is not very - in the air. I do this for only a few minutes, but I find that it straightens me up and out for the whole day. When I don't do this, it takes a lot longer to feel fit and ready to face the world.

This is a minor form of Yoga, a yoke or discipline to train the mind, body and spirit, which by the way are connected, to do things they wouldn't otherwise do. Baptism is a similar yoke or discipline that trains the mind, body and spirit. You may never have considered the connection between baptism and Yoga, but I think there is one. I think about this every time we baptize a baby. For most babies, baptism is like being pushed into the water, since babies don’t really have much choice in the matter. They neither fall nor jump into the baptismal font. They are pushed. But the discipline, the yoke, the Yoga of baptism was very much there in the promises made by parents and the rest of us. Baptism symbolizes on the one hand the washing of the soul clean of past sins. But that hardly applies to the young babies so we United Methodists don't spend much time on that part. But, you know, we also wash when we are about to go out somewhere. I'm one of those who showers in the morning in order to get ready for the day. It may be true that the world has two sorts of people. Those that shower when they finish work and those who shower to get ready for work. Baptism can be just as much one as the other. Baptism for United Methodists is a getting ready for life rather than a cleansing of the dirt from a life lived poorly.

In our worship tradition, we tend to be mostly interested in the fresh start baptism provides and the spiritual discipline toward which it leads. The parents promise to lead their child toward a life lived in Christian discipleship and to guide and instruct the child in Christian teachings. The child and the parent take on the yoke of Christ at baptism. Both have responsibilities as a result of baptism. Parents fulfill one of their responsibilities by forcing their kids to take confirmation. This is often a struggle in families and what kids usually fail to understand is that their presence in confirmation class fulfills a promise their parents made when their children were baptized. Kids who don't come to confirmation class cause their parents to break a promise made in front of God and a congregation of worshiping Christians. It's a very big deal, or so it seems to me.

And the congregation is not left off the hook either. We promise to do all we can to help the parents and the child handle the yoke they placed around their necks at baptism. This is not always that easy to do either. We take seriously our pledge as a congregation to do all we can to provide a place for the children we baptize to grow up and learn the lessons of Christian discipleship. I take this vow every bit as seriously as my wedding vows, which I also made in front of God and a worshiping congregation. This pledge we make each time we baptize a baby in worship cost us all a lot of money as we support a church, its building and Christian education program. But we take membership and participation in the church seriously because we have all promised to support and nurture the children so that they grow in the faith and come to know Jesus. At the heart of Christianity is not freedom. At the heart of Christianity is obligation – the yoke of Christian discipleship. It’s not popular to take on an obligation these days. We want to be beholden to no one. We like disposable contracts, valid only as long as we wish. Church membership, however, is the voluntary taking on of a yoke of obedience to a disciplined life in service to God. It’s hugely unpopular these days to serve anyone but ourselves. That’s why church membership is in decline. Nobody wants to be yoked to anything other than their own wants and needs. We like the love of Jesus, but we don’t like the yoke.

One time when my daughter Kate was in second or third grade, her math teacher tried to motivate her to work harder by suggesting that her parents would really be happy if she learned her math. "Oh, that doesn't matter," Kate said, "they love me anyway." Well, yes, we love her anyway, but we still want her to do her homework and pass the test. Every kid wants to be noticed and counted as good by his or her parents. That is their struggle. But just because we love our children doesn't mean they don't have to knuckle down sometime and study.

Baptism is a time when God says to us his children, "Yes, I love you anyway, but you still have to accept the yoke of Christian discipleship. "Take my yoke upon you," Jesus tells us. In other words, Jesus is saying, "God loves you, but this is not a license to do as you please." Freedom, for Christians, is not license. It is the great paradox of our faith that perfect obedience is perfect freedom. In baptism, God says, "I know your dreams for this child. But here are mine. Your task is to make your dreams and mine coincide."

Faith received a while back a tape of her father speaking to a group of ministers, for which he was in great demand. It was an amazing thrill to hear the voice of someone I have heard so much about. At one point he talked about a spiritual discovery he made while praying early one morning, as he did each morning. Every morning, he woke early and went through a rigorous physical and spiritual discipline to prepare himself for the day ahead. I think my morning exercises are in part an unconscious attempt to be like him, whom I never met. His courageous battle with rheumatoid arthritis was a legend in his family and among his close friends. His morning exercises were crucial to his ability to move about during the coming day. And his morning prayers were equally important to equip him to meet the spiritual challenges of the coming day.

Each of us needs to find such a daily source of renewal. We need to discover or recover each day a sense of what God wants from us. In short, we need to find a way to remember our baptism. We need to find a way to recommit ourselves to the promises we made or were made for us at our baptism. We need to accept the disciplines of faith anew each day. We need to understand each day that we have a meaning and a purpose and that life isn't just another wandering.

Our thought for the week, then, is to search for a way to remember our baptism. Whether we fell into the pool, were pushed, tip toed slowly into the shallow end, or ran with gusto into the deepest scariest depths, all of us have been washed clean by the waters of Jordan. All of us have taken that spiritual shower which prepares us for the life of Christian discipleship. All of us have shouldered the yoke of faithful discipleship. We pray anew each day that God will give us the courage to wear that yoke with pride.

Lord, hear our prayers… Help us to see you, and in seeing you to receive you, and receiving you to follow you, and in following you to be obedient to you, and in being obedient to you to receive eternal life in your name. Give us courage to accept the yoke of discipleship we receive at our baptism, just as Jesus accepted his call to follow you at his baptism. Help us to see you and to serve you in all things, so that you will not only love us but be well pleased with us. Amen.

Compassionate God, as Christ cared especially for the most needy of the earth, we are also called to care. And, as Christ gave of himself, we are also called to share the material and spiritual resources for life that are your gifts. Receive and use this offering as a symbol of our advocacy and support for the poor and most vulnerable. Amen