Where to find true rest?-

Jesus said: “Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will strengthen you. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and lowly in heart; and you will find rest for your souls. My yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

It is the time of the holiday season, so looked forward to and eagerly anticipated by our pupils and students. It is also the time of summer vacations. yes, the time of vacations, rest and relaxation. I’m sure many of you have already planned where and how you will spend this year’s vacation to make the most of it. And it is necessary. There’s no denying that. One needs rest and especially in today’s hectic world.
If by any chance you haven’t decided how to spend this year’s holiday, you still have the opportunity to choose from the many offers from travel agents who offer them to you through advertisements on the radio, television, or various banners and posters.

Listening well and carefully to the Gospel, you will not have missed the fact that there was also an offer of where to seek rest. For Jesus speaks to us in today’s Gospel in this way: “Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest… and you will find rest for your souls!” (Mt 11:28-29).

Brothers and sisters, however, there is no rest like rest. Travel agencies offer us rest on holidays, whether it is somewhere by the sea, in the mountains, in a cottage, etc. A holiday takes us out of our problems and troubles for two or three weeks and then we are back in the hustle and bustle of work again. And again there are the same problems, again there are the same worries, again we have to struggle with them. A holiday will not solve these worries. Rest is only relative. Vacation only helps us in forgetting for a few days that one problem, that one worry. That is, not a solution, but just forgetting. But then is it real rest? I think you will all admit that such rest is really only relative.

But one longs for real rest. That is to say, if he has any worries and problems pressing on him, he wants to solve them and overcome them so that they do not press on him any more, and not just forget them. Only then can one attain real peace and rest when he gets rid of worries and problems permanently. What has been man’s greatest worry and the greatest problem that has prevented him from being truly content permanently and from being able to have true rest? What was probably the thing that most consumed, tormented, and gnawed him even today, causing him to be perpetually restless?

You may be thinking rightly at this moment – yes, it is sin!
Sin has disturbed the harmony between God and man, it has caused unrest in man himself. And by the fact that through man’s fault sin has come into the world, one can no longer speak of true rest, for man is always troubled with something, always has a kind of remorse, a restlessness in his soul. He could not and cannot find that true peace, true rest.

But here comes “Someone” who speaks to that afflicted, weary and suffering man in this way: Come to me, come with all your sins that torment you, afflict you, and cause you constant restlessness. Come to me with all your toils, with all your worries, with all your troubles and burdens, with me you will find true rest; only I will give you true peace!

Could that “somebody” have said that to you? Were they not empty words? Yes, he could have said that. For that “someone” was the Son of God Himself, and He came into this world to reconcile the righteousness of God by dying on the cross and to testify to God on behalf of man His original obedience. God no longer needs to be angry with man, but accepts him truly in friendly love. Peace in God is the prerequisite for peace in man himself. The removal of sin has removed all that corrupts the human being and created the possibility of harmony and true peace, and the resulting true rest in the heart of man.
Surely now we understand why Jesus can so boldly say that He will give and secure for us that true peace. For by removing the chief hindrance to peace, which was man’s sin, he has also removed the secondary ones which actually flow from that sin, either directly or indirectly.

But, brothers and sisters, some of you might now say this: Somehow it does not seem to me. Do these words of Jesus, that whoever comes to him will find peace and rest with him, really apply today? Is it not just the opposite? For if I follow Jesus, then I am the object of ridicule, scorn and contempt. Perhaps I am looked upon as a backward backward man. I am sorry and embarrassed. My colleague who is no longer following Jesus, he has already attained a higher status and salary, and I can’t attain that, my children didn’t get to go to school. And all because I am still following Jesus. But then where is his promised peace and rest?