MISSIONARY RESTING

Refletions on the Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Jeremiah 23:1-6, Ephesians 2:13-18, Mark 6:30-34)

Mission could be fatiguing. It is no surprise then that terms like mission burnout, compassion fatigue, ministry exhaustion, etc. have become common parlance. Jesus personally knows the weight of missionary fatigue and the importance of rest. How tired he should have been when neither a raging storm nor his panic–stricken disciples could wake him up from his deep slumber on a boat? In today’s Gospel, Jesus watches his disciples experiencing their share of mission fatigue. He sees them work with no time to rest or even eat. He hears their report about all that they had done and taught that day. He knows they are tired and so he intervenes and invites them to rest. This is no ordinary resting or simple relaxation but is tailor made by Jesus, the missionary par excellence, for the missionaries that he nit-picked for his mission to employ in times of their fatigue, exhaustion, or burnout. In order to practice this missionary resting, we reflect on its method, place and purpose.

Missionary Resting: The Method

How does Jesus want his missionaries to rest? His method is quite unique and is based on personal experience. We know from the Gospels that Jesus’ preferred way of resting, was to withdraw to a quite place to pray in solitude sometimes early in the morning and sometimes late at night (Luke 4:1-2, 14-15, Mark 6:30-32, Matthew 14:1-3, Luke 5:16, 6:12-13, 22:39-44). Jesus proposes the same method for the missionary resting of his disciples. He tells them, “Come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while”. Therefore, even when “people were coming and going in great numbers, they went off in the boat by themselves to a deserted place”. Missionary resting is therefore pausing everything else to prioritise spending time with the master of our mission, listening to Him speak to our situation, and surrendering everything to his care. The twelve practise this method on the boat resting the missionary way, spending time with Jesus, listening to him, learning from him, sharing their experiences with him, and discerning their future mission with him.

Missionary Resting: The Place

We notice that the many biblical instances of missionary resting mostly happen in desolate places. Accordingly, in today's Gospel, Jesus invites his disciples to 'a deserted' place to rest. A desolate or deserted place is technically a remote place, away from the crowds and noises of the cities, towns or villages. However, when the Bible speaks about desolate places, it does not only mean geographically distant regions. They are also special and privileged places of communion, revelation, and dialogue. As the Old Testament testifies, ”wilderness” is a deserted place that is difficult to live in but it is also the place where we experience God’s abounding presence, providence, and revelation (Exodus 16, Numbers 11). Deserts can become places of human-divine encounter and dialogue. What matters, therefore, is not the physical place as such but the spirit of interiority and communion. Missionary resting is possible in the silence of an adoration chapel as it is in a crowded train as long as we are able to withdraw to the silent place of our inner profound selves that is at times too ‘distant’ than we imagine or realise.

Missionary Resting: The Purpose

The second part of the Gospel clarifies that missionary resting is not an excuse to evade our missionary engagement. Withdrawing in prayer does not mean withdrawing from the responsibilities of our mission. As Jesus takes his disciples away in a boat for a practical and theoretical session on missionary resting, the mission continues to follow them. People who saw them leaving on the boat hasten on foot from all the towns and arrive at the place before them. Disembarking from the boat, Jesus shows his disciples the true purpose of missionary resting. He meets those waiting to see him and is overcome with pastoral compassion. Mark notes, “His heart was moved with pity for them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd“. The word for mercy that Mark uses here is the Greek term "splangma", a strong word which could be better translated as "he was moved to his very core". The same term is also used in the parable of the Good Samaritan, who is 'moved to his very core' when he meets a half-dead man on the road. Faced with the distress of this crowd, who are lost like sheep without a shepherd, Jesus recognises that they are hungry and feeds them first with his teaching to satisfy their spiritual hunger and then goes on to feed them with bread and fish (Mark 6:35-44) to satisfy their physical hunger. Missionary resting enables Jesus and his disciples to further engage in their mission of healing the world of its spiritual and physical hunger.

Let us face the reality of fatigue in mission by resting with Jesus the missionary way, in the silent and desolate depths of our inner selves so we can recommit ourselves to the mission at hand.