What are you carrying?

A sermon for Education Sunday
Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost: Proper 15
August 24, 2025, at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Hot Springs, AR

Readings: Isaiah 58:9b-14; Psalm 103:1-8; Hebrews 12:18-29; Luke 13:10-17

My mother was worried I would end up hunched over. I don’t remember how old I was, but maybe it was the start of junior high. My backpack was heavy with books, and at that time it was popular to just use a single strap instead of both straps of the backpack. My mother was worried that the heavy pack would hurt my back. She worried it would bend my back, induce scoliosis, like the woman in today’s gospel. She insisted I use both straps. And why, she wondered, was the school requiring us to carry so many heavy books? More on backpacks in a moment. 

“There are six days on which work ought to be done.” This is the complaint against Jesus today. He performed a miracle; that’s work. But the Sabbath, the complainer says, is about refraining from work. But Jesus is not having any of it. Jesus responds by asking if his listeners do not lead their livestock to water for the day? Do they not take their donkeys to the source of life, to keep them in health, to make sure they are getting what they need? 

It’s not unusual for Jesus to get in trouble for healing on the Sabbath. It drives the religious authorities crazy. We should be clear: Jesus wants to uphold the Sabbath. He is not trying to do away with the Day of Rest. But in these Sabbath healing disputes, we see a fundamental disagreement about what the Sabbath is for. For the religious authorities, the Sabbath is all about not working for the sake of not working. For Jesus, the Sabbath is about not working, or resting, for the purpose of reconnection. Reconnection with God and one another. 

With that framework in mind, let’s look at today’s conflict yet again. In the eyes of religious authorities, Jesus is in trouble because he worked. He didn’t rest. He broke the commandment. But in Jesus’s way of seeing, he is fulfilling the Sabbath. He is making it possible for this woman, so long bound and crippled, to participate in the Sabbath. Now healed and whole, she can reconnect to God and to her community. She is no longer defined by her bent-over, oppressive condition; she is set free. For Jesus, before rest is possible, liberation is necessary. 

Back to backpacks. My mother had been worried about my physical backpack, the health of my back. “Stand up straight and use both straps,” she might say. But the truth is we all carry packs around, invisible packs like yokes on oxen. We carry things around. Some of it is good, but plenty is not. I wonder what you’re carrying around? 

For many, we carry around shame. Shame for what we’ve done or where we’ve gone or who we have been. We carry it around for years. But the gospel tells you you are forgiven. 

Maybe we carry around dashed hopes. We wish we could have done that; we thought this might transpire; we are disappointed that it did not all play out the way we thought, and now there is no going back. But hear the gospel: You are not defined by what you’ve done or not; where you’ve been or not; what you’ve accomplished or not. You are only defined by the voice from heaven at your baptism that said this is my son, my daughter, with whom I am well pleased.  

Maybe we carry around fear–fear of what might happen, fear of not being good enough, fear of not living up to expectations. But the gospel tells us we are loved, and that the perfect love of God casts out all fear. 

Our soul-backpacks, as it were, can be so heavy with these things and more. Leave it all behind, and hear the words of Jesus. “You are set free.” Upon hearing those words spoken to our souls, we, like the woman, can stand up straight and praise God. And we can repack those bags we carry. We can pack our soul-backpacks with a new identity: child of God, no matter what. We can pack our bags with faith, hope, and love; with prayer and true communion with God. We can pack our backpacks with the Holy Spirit, who empowers us and carries us on even when we cannot see the way forward. And then, liberated, we go forward, always, together. Connected to one another, connected to God, we find our true rest, our true restoration, our true Sabbath.