Don't Admire Him - Follow Him || Matthew 11: 25-30

Kia ora and welcome to the St. Francis Church

sermon podcast. We're so glad that you've joined

us. Our prayer is that as you listen, you would

encounter God's presence, be refreshed in your

faith and equipped for everyday life with Jesus.

As a church, we are learning to faithfully follow

Jesus by practicing His way at His pace. For

more info about who we are and what God is doing

among us, head to stfrancis .co .nz. Grace and

peace. Welcome again, family. It's great to have

you here on this Sunday, St. Francis feast day.

A year already since the last one that has certainly

flown by. Well, today we celebrate St. Francis

and his life following Jesus. And you've probably

seen him without knowing it, that small statue

which is tucked among the flowers in somebody's

garden. And that's St. Francis. Nihai concrete,

a little bird on his shoulder. maybe a rabbit

at his feet. He's lovely. He sits quietly among

the lavender, never bothers anybody. And that's

exactly the problem. Because the real Francis

bothered everybody. He bothered his daddy, bothered

the bishop. He kissed people everyone else crossed

the road to avoid. And in the middle of the crusades

he walked across the battle lines to the Muslim

Sultan of Egypt. And people honestly weren't

sure whether he was a saint. or a madman. Francis,

well, he wasn't remarkable because he liked birds.

He was remarkable because he took Jesus at his

word. And we carry his name. It's on our sign,

which is either a nice heritage for us or a challenge

staring back at us every Sunday. And here's the

thing about garden statues. We admire them. We

don't follow them. And it's possible to do exactly

the same thing with Jesus. Francis' whole life

kept pointing back to these words of Matthew

Matthew 11 · chapter mention

chapter 11. Notice that Jesus doesn't say Come

and admire me. He says three things come take

and learn That's not a spectator sport. That's

an apprenticeship with him So here's the question

that I want us this morning each one of us here

to carry this morning what would it look like

for us here in Hillcrest to stop admiring Jesus

from a distance and actually following him and

when I say from a distance that means if You're

watching someone doing something in Christ's

name in the community and you just stand back.

You are admiring Jesus working at a distance.

Admiring is easy. Admiring actually costs each

of us nothing. You can admire from the couch

or from the church seat. Following means you

actually have to move. And three things from

Francis's life and from Jesus's words this morning.

I want to share a bit about Saint Francis' life.

He was born around 1181 in Assisi in central

Italy, the son of a wealthy cloth merchant. Now,

he had money. He had charm. He had great clothes.

And he had one big dream. He wanted to be a knight

for the glory, the honor, and the name people

would remember. Bit like an influencer today.

But so he went off to war, Assisi against the

next town over. And today that would be a bit

like us going over to Frankton to war with them,

or Claude Lins or somewhere. So he went off to

war, and it went badly. He was captured, and

he spent about a year in a prison cell. When

he came home he was sick, and something inside

him had started to come loose, and it was slow.

He prayed and he wandered. And one day he found

himself in a half -ruined little chapel outside

town called San Damiano, kneeling in front of

a painted crucifix. And he sensed Christ saying

to him, Francis, go and repair my house, which

as you can see is falling into ruin. Now here's

where it gets awkward. Francis took that literally.

He sold a load of his father's cloth and the

horse, a stallion that he had been given, and

he tried to hand the money to the priest. And

his dad was furious. It ended up in front of

the bishop in the public square with half of

Assisi gathering to watch. And his father demanded

his money back, and Francis gave it back. Then

he took off his clothes, every piece of clothing,

and he laid them at his father's feet. And he

said something like this. Up till now I've called

you my father. From now on I'll say our father

who art in heaven. And then the bishop stepped

forward and wrapped his own cloak around him.

Now you don't need to accept every detail of

a medieval story to feel its weight. This is

a young man deciding what and who his whole life

will be built around. Everyone in the room faces

that question whatever they believe. Now, I'm

not asking anyone to do what St Francis did in

that square, but hear what's going on. Francis

stopped trying to become someone important and

started simply following someone. And Jesus says

it just before our passage this morning from

Matthew 11, again, that I praise you, Father,

Lord of heaven and earth, because you have made

these things from the wise and the learned. and

revealed them to little children. Francis called

his brothers the friars minor, meaning the lesser

brothers, the little ones. For the kingdom isn't

grabbed by the impressive, it's received by people

who know they need it. Paul says the same thing

in the Sunday's reading from Philippians, that

everything that he had once counted as gain,

he now counts as loss. He says this, because

of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus

my Lord. That's Francis in the square on that

day. And here's where it lands for us today.

We can admire his simplicity and still organise

our lives around getting more. We can admire

his compassion and still keep a safe distance

from anyone who's struggling. We can admire his

peacemaking and still hang on to the grudge.

even be flat out doing church things and not

be close enough to Jesus to hear his voice. Jesus

never said to us, come and admire me. He said,

come to me. Admirers, well, they keep everything

and they add Jesus. Followers, they let go to

hold on to him. Take my yoke upon you and learn

from me. Now, remember those words and the images

from back in August in the Slow Apprenticeship

series that we did? Most of us have only seen

a yoke in a museum, a heavy wooden beam across

the necks of two oxen, so they can pull together.

And once you yoke, you don't choose your own

direction. You don't set your own pace. You move

together, or you don't move at all. And notice

that's also what teams do. You move together,

or you don't move at all. And you find that in

church teams, you find that in sports teams,

that when you're not moving, you don't move at

all. Chaos begins to ensue. But here's a detail

that I love. An early Christian writer, Justin

Marta, about 100 years after Jesus, says that

when Jesus worked as a carpenter in Nazareth,

he made plows and yokes. So when Jesus says,

my yoke is easy, He's talking like a craftsman.

And the word easy means something that is well

-fitting. A good yoke was shaped to the animal

so it didn't rub it raw. And then he tells us

exactly what his pace is like. I am gentle and

humble in heart. Most of us, I say all of us,

are already wearing a yoke. Just not the yoke

of Jesus. We wear Maybe the yoke of hurry. The

yoke of proving ourselves. The yoke of keeping

everyone happy. Or the yoke that whispers, it

all depends on you. The yoke of fear. That whispers

of shame that tell us that we are not enough.

Those jokes promise that will matter. What they

actually do is wear our souls thin. Pastor John

Ortberg tells of ringing his mentor, Dallas Willard.

To ask what he needed to do to be spiritually

healthy, there was a long pause. Then Willard

said, you must ruthlessly eliminate Hari from

your life. Ortberg wrote it down and asked, what

else? And Willard said, there is nothing else.

Every week on our newsletter carries this line,

practicing the way of Jesus at the pace of Jesus.

And Francis shows us. what that pace looks like

in his life. From the time he was young, Francis

couldn't stand the sight of people with leprosy.

They lived outside town, you could smell the

sickness, he'd hold his nose and he'd ride past.

Then one day, when he was riding near Assisi,

there's a man with leprosy on the road, and everything

in Francis wants to kick the horse on. Instead,

he gets off the horse. He walks over, he puts

a coin in the man's hand and he kisses it. Near

the end of his life, Francis looked back on that

moment and he wrote this, That's what Jesus'

pace does. to someone's life. Harry would have

kept Francis in the saddle. Harry protects us

from the encounter. It lets us pass suffering

without ever really seeing it. And Francis was

only doing what Jesus had done first. When a

man with leprosy came to Jesus, Mark says that

Jesus reached out his hand and touched him. He

could have healed him with a word. But he chose

to touch, to show those around him watching,

that these were people too. Walking at Jesus'

pace also doesn't mean going slowly. Sometimes

love runs. It means we're no longer driven by

anxiety or ego, slow enough to notice a person

beside the road. So for you here today and anyone

that could be listening, watch your horse you're

on. What keeps you moving just fast enough to

ride past people? Now for some of us, it's a

diary with no gaps in it at all, going from one

appointment to another, filling it up with something

else to do. Admirers watch Jesus from the saddle.

Followers get down. Let's go back to San Damiano.

After the square, Francis went around Assisi

begging for stones. He carried them on his back

and rebuilt. that little chapel with his hands.

Only later did he realize Jesus was rebuilding

something far bigger, not buildings, people,

because others started to join him. First one

or two, then a dozen, then more. They prayed

together. They worked with their hands. They

shared everything. They cared for people with

leprosy. And they greeted everyone. They met

with the same words. May the Lord give you peace.

A young woman named Claire, well she left her

wealthy family to follow in the same way. Within

Francis's lifetime there were thousands of people

that were following. The Gospel didn't just make

Francis as nice an individual, it did this. It

made a different kind of community. Indeed, Dirk

Bonhoeffer in the book Life Together said it

this way. that Christianity means community through

Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ. Look again

at who Jesus invites. Come to me all you who

are weary. All. So what might that look like

here amongst us? Amongst Hillcresters, students

and retirees, young families and people new to

Aotearoa, neighbours who lived side by side for

years and never really talked. God was speaking

to his people who were in exile, and he gave

these words to Jeremiah in chapter 29. Seek the

peace and prosperity of the city. So when the

city is well and prosperous, everyone benefits.

Now Hillcrest, where we are planted, doesn't

need another event from us to put on. It needs

a community where the way of Jesus can be seen.

In an anxious neighborhood, We are a people of

peace. In a lonely neighborhood, we are a people

of belonging. And in a hurried neighborhood,

we are a people who are present to the moment.

In a divided neighborhood, we have a table where

people who normally sit together call each other

family. And it starts smaller than you and I

would think. It starts with Francis like gathering

stones, learning the names on your street. Opening

your table to someone on their own. Making room

for children, for older people, for people who

don't know when to stand and when to sit. And

we don't go out there as heroes to rescue everybody.

We go as neighbours. Expecting to meet Jesus

there as we take Jesus with us, He is there also.

Whatever we do for the least of these, He said,

we do for Him. And another thing about admirers.

admirers form an audience. Now followers become

a family and God calls us his family. So back

to our question, what would it look like for

us here in Hillcrest to stop admiring Jesus from

a distance and actually follow him? Jesus has

already told us, come to me. Before there's a

program or a plan or anything, there's a person,

come close to him. And then he says, take my

yoke. Let him set the direction. Let him set

the pace where to go. And he also says, learn

from me. Learn his gentleness, his eye for the

overlooked people, his courage to cross the road

towards suffering or loneliness. And he also

said, and you will find rest for your souls.

And that is not the rest of avoiding the world,

the rest of no longer having to carry it all

by yourself. Because we are yoked to Him. It's

possible to do to Jesus what we've done to Francis.

To keep Him in the garden. Lovely and quiet.

Never bothering anybody. Don't admire Him. Follow

Him. And this week, just one step from admirer

to a follower. Ask yourself this. Where do I

need to get off the horse like Francis? Who's

the one person I've been moving too fast to notice.

Stop and get down from the saddle and walk over.

And you might find, like Francis did, that what

seemed bitter turns into something sweet and

that Jesus was already there waiting for you

to arrive. Francis said the Lord gave him a greeting

to share with everyone that he met. So I speak

this over you today. The Lord give you peace.

Amen.