Scripture: Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30; Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67
Preaching on Matthew 11’s invitation to the weary alongside Genesis 24 (Rebekah at the well), Wilson argues that Jesus’s generation responded to both John the Baptist and Jesus with pure ideology, judging them not on truth but on tribal priors. Against this, Jesus responds with gratefulness, revealing himself to ‘infants’ — the needy, undefended, and dependent — rather than the wise who are too busy arguing. Since everyone is burdened, Jesus’s invitation is universal; taking his yoke means actively doing the things of God (loving neighbor, praying, fasting) rather than passively resting, decentering our appetite for constant satisfaction so we can serve God and neighbor.
Illustrations: debate-team-spreading, greek-orator-pebbles, bob-dylan-serve-somebody, food-dieting-self-loathing
July 5, 2026
Ordinary Time
Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67 Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67
So he said, “I am Abraham’s servant. The Lord has greatly blessed my master, and he has become wealthy; he has given him flocks and herds, silver and gold, male and female slaves, camels and donkeys. And Sarah my master’s wife bore a son to my master when she was old; and he has given him all that he has. My master made me swear, saying, ‘You shall not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I live; but you shall go to my father’s house, to my kindred, and get a wife for my son.’ “I came today to the spring, and said, ‘O Lord, the God of my master Abraham, if now you will only make successful the way I am going! I am standing here by the spring of water; let the young woman who comes out to draw, to whom I shall say, “Please give me a little water from your jar to drink,” and who will say to me, “Drink, and I will draw for your camels also”—let her be the woman whom the Lord has appointed for my master’s son.’ “Before I had finished speaking in my heart, there was Rebekah coming out with her water jar on her shoulder; and she went down to the spring, and drew. I said to her, ‘Please let me drink.’ She quickly let down her jar from her shoulder, and said, ‘Drink, and I will also water your camels.’ So I drank, and she also watered the camels. Then I asked her, ‘Whose daughter are you?’ She said, ‘The daughter of Bethuel, Nahor’s son, whom Milcah bore to him.’ So I put the ring on her nose, and the bracelets on her arms. Then I bowed my head and worshiped the Lord, and blessed the Lord, the God of my master Abraham, who had led me by the right way to obtain the daughter of my master’s kinsman for his son. Now then, if you will deal loyally and truly with my master, tell me; and if not, tell me, so that I may turn either to the right hand or to the left.” And they called Rebekah, and said to her, “Will you go with this man?” She said, “I will.” So they sent away their sister Rebekah and her nurse along with Abraham’s servant and his men. And they blessed Rebekah and said to her, “May you, our sister, become thousands of myriads; may your offspring gain possession of the gates of their foes.” Then Rebekah and her maids rose up, mounted the camels, and followed the man; thus the servant took Rebekah, and went his way. Now Isaac had come from Beer-lahai-roi, and was settled in the Negeb. Isaac went out in the evening to walk in the field; and looking up, he saw camels coming. And Rebekah looked up, and when she saw Isaac, she slipped quickly from the camel, and said to the servant, “Who is the man over there, walking in the field to meet us?” The servant said, “It is my master.” So she took her veil and covered herself. And the servant told Isaac all the things that he had done. Then Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent. He took Rebekah, and she became his wife; and he loved her. So Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death.
Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
“But to what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another, ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.’ For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon’; the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.” At that time Jesus said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, 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.”
Come to Me, All You Who Are Weary
Sermon on Matthew 11
Spreading
When I was in high school, I was on the debate team my senior year. I did Lincoln-Douglas debate. I was okay at it. I think I won a tournament. My friends mostly did CX, or cross-examination debate. Lincoln-Douglas is a little slower, more deliberate, whereas CX was the blast-you-with-arguments style — full of all sorts of research.
In debate, I learned about this technique called spreading. You never have to do it with Lincoln-Douglas, because you actually want the judge to hear your argument. The goal is not to conquer your opponent but articulate an idea that is compelling.
CX was about conquering and using any technique you could to achieve your goal. Spreading is this idea that you tell your argument so fast that the judge understands, but your opponent doesn’t, because your opponent is trying to pick out aspects of your argument that they can counter.
And we would practice spreading by talking with a pencil in your mouth. It goes back to an ancient Greek oratorical tradition of this classic orator walking by the sea with pebbles in his mouth and shouting at the sea in order to work on the projection and articulation of his voice. But if you try it, if you try and talk with a pencil between your teeth and then try to talk out, you realize you’re much more— you are much more articulate really quickly, and you can speed up your voice.
A Counterargument to Every Argument
One of the things I learned in debate is that there’s a counterargument to every argument. Any claim can have a counterclaim. There is a naive way of understanding the world that if someone disagrees with you, they’re right and you’re wrong. Whereas the reality is that every action, every decision by its inception and creation creates the opportunity for a reaction, for disagreement.
John, Jesus, and Ideology
The first part of the Matthew passage for today gets to this: John came and his followers were very temperate. They abstained from eating and drinking. They fasted all the time. And the people said, “He has a demon.” Jesus came, and his disciples were eating and drinking, and they said, “He is a glutton.” The book of Ecclesiastes says there’s nothing new under the sun, and this kind of response is akin to how many people act in our world today.
In many facets of life today, you have your side and then there is the other side, and anything the other side does— If they’re temperate, you criticize them. If they are boisterous, you criticize them. Whatever they do, there’s an angle you find.
Jesus describes here what later people would call ideology. The generation had an ideological response to both John the Baptist and to Jesus. They weren’t receiving what he was saying. They were finding the bucket they could put him in, the right response. So it was no longer a question of whether he was the Messiah. The priors already decided that he was not on their team, therefore he was wrong. They had to find out why he was wrong secondarily.
Gratefulness
But here, Jesus’s response to ideology is gratefulness. It’s gratefulness. It’s very strange. He says, “I thank you, Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and revealed them to infants.”
Wisdom in Greek was the word sophos, or sophia. There were people in ancient Greece called sophists, which was a really tongue-in-cheek term. They were literally called “wise ones,” but it was really a description of a group of people who argued for argument’s sake. They just liked to argue. So they argued. The truth was not revealed to them, because they’re going to argue about it. They won’t receive it. It was revealed to infants.
The Wise and the Infants
Now, one major difference between wise and intelligent people and infants is that wise and intelligent people have a lot of expectations, habits, practices, standard of living — all these things already set out for them. Infants do not. Infants have modest expectations. They want to eat and drink and sleep. As they get older, they want to add being entertained. But it’s these basic life functions, over and over again. Infants, little ones, children — they’re great at receiving, great at including. Great at wondering, but also not getting hung up on the past. They can ask a really deep question and then two seconds later running in circles. They’re also very needy. Infants are the neediest. They’re not ashamed of it. They’re dependent, and they’re not ashamed of it.
The Universal Category
Jesus continues to flip things at the end of Matthew 11, because he makes clear what he’s been doing throughout this entire chapter: that the people he is seeking are the needy ones. The ones who are weak and burdened by the world. This doesn’t mean that Jesus is ignoring the healthy, wealthy, and wise. I think what he’s getting at — the reality he’s getting at — is that the most universal category of misery on Earth is people who are burdened and heavy-laden and in need of rest. For that is all of us. That is every person in existence. That is every person who has ever existed. That is all of us. We’re all burdened and in need of rest.
A Different Yoke
And what Jesus gives us isn’t simply that rest. The rest is not for now. Jesus gives us a different yoke — to put on our shoulders. Jesus gives us a different burden. Because, as with many things, it all comes down to the words of Bob Dylan: you got to serve somebody. It may be the devil, or maybe the Lord, but you’re gonna have to serve somebody.
This is why Abraham and Sarah sent Isaac back — to find a wife among their people. They’re going to have him serve another god.
Come to Me
Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden. Those who need God. Come to me, all you who need God — which is all of you. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me. I’m gentle. Humble of heart, and I will give you rest.
In taking on the yoke of Jesus, we find rest. In learning from Jesus, we find rest. Not in ceasing, not in stopping, not in “me time”.
Taking on the yoke of Jesus is doing the things of God in response to what God has given us. Doing it. Loving our neighbor, not thinking about loving our neighbor. Praying, not thinking about praying. Praying instead of seeking to be entertained or amused.Fasting. Fasting a meal, one meal, trying it, practicing, practicing it. Putting more faith in God than your desire to always be satisfied and content.
Food for us today is a source of pleasure but also self-loathing. We know what we should eat, but we don’t want to do that. We know what is “healthy” but that third dessert is just sitting there. We know the expectations around us. Our doctors may talk to us about it. This doesn’t even get to issues of body image and the challenges faced there especially by women and young people.
Fasting isn’t a way to fix your body. In the christian tradition, it is a way to remind you that you are more that your hunger. You are worth more than being constantly satisfied and amused because that desire to be constantly satisfied, to be constantly entertained, to fill every down moment, to never be hungry at all, this leads not to the good life but self-destruction. If we are constantly distracted, we can never pray, if we are never hungry, we can never serve. Fasting decenters our desires so that our expectations and goals can be filled with God and our neighbor.
When you finish a fast — a 24-hour fast, a 48-hour fast — you may be weary, and you find rest with Jesus. When you are in the midst of grief, you’re weary, and you can find rest in Jesus. To name yourself weary is not to name a failure, but to admit a reality — and an opportunity to come and put on a different yoke. You’re already carrying a burden. Let’s switch it up.
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I’m gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.