Quiet Day
Preached on 8/2/26 at St. James' Episcopal Church, Goshen, IN. Adapted from a sermon preached at St. Luke's Episcopal Church, Cleveland, TN on 7/21/24.
The propers can be found here. St. James and St. John’s are following Track 2 this year.
Sewanee, where I studied for my Master of Divinity, is a school with many proud traditions. I knew about some of them before I visited for the first time thanks to the priest who first put me forward for ordination, who is also a Sewanee graduate, but learned even more when I became a student. Some of these traditions include tapping the roof of your car when you enter or leave the front gates to call or release your “Sewanee angel,” students wearing academic gowns around campus, carefully avoiding trampling on the University’s seal on the floor of All Saints Chapel lest you fail to graduate on time, and walking the entire perimeter trail around the domain at least once before you graduate.
One of the traditions unique to the School of Theology is having a mandatory quiet day once a semester. In the fall, it is held on the Monday before the first day of classes, and in the spring it is held on Ash Wednesday.
During my first year at Sewanee, I arrived at the first fall quiet day bright and early, looking forward to a contemplative time of silence and prayer. After all, I had just spent two years hanging out with Quakers, who have perfected the art of silent waiting worship. Surely, I would start my Episcopal seminary formation with a deep experience of the nearness of God.
After an hour or so I started to get bored.
By the time lunch came around, I desperately wanted to talk to someone about something.
By the time quiet day finished mid-afternoon, I was actively fighting the urge to stand by the scenic bluff at St. Mary’s retreat center and scream as loud as I could because it was
Just.
Too.
Quiet.
After that experience, I followed the advice of some of the upperclassmen who also struggle with silence, and always remembered to pack a pair of headphones for quiet day, just in case.
Silent retreat days are hard for me. And yet I appreciate that Sewanee modeled for us the importance of setting aside time from our busy ministry schedules to spend a time of rest alone with God.
In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus has just learned of his cousin John the Baptist’s death. And, the first thing Jesus does when he hears the news is head off by himself to find a quiet place to be alone. Scripture doesn’t explicitly tell us why he did this, but I can imagine a few different reasons.
His cousin, the one who baptized him at the start of his earthly ministry, has died at the hand of a tyrant! I’d imagine that he was grieving. And to carry that grief on top of a traveling ministry!
Jesus here is modeling the importance of rest and retreat for his followers. When things get overwhelming, it is ok to step away for a little bit and reconnect with God. It’s not lazy, it’s being like Jesus.
The Eastern Orthodox study bible puts it this way. “Christ gives rest to His disciples to show those engaged in preaching and teaching that they must not labor continuously, but must also take rest.” That doesn’t just apply to ordained clergy, but all who are called to share the Gospel.
Which is all of us.
So far, Jesus is passing his practical ministry exam with flying colors. He recognizes his need to be by himself to grieve and intentionally takes time away to rest. He is taking all the appropriate precautions to avoid burning out.
What an important example for us to have in scripture! After all, you can’t care for others if you are not taking care of yourself.
But then Jesus goes and messes it all up.
To be fair, it’s not totally his fault. People found out that he was leaving on retreat and rushed to follow him on foot. I’m not sure how they knew where he was going since all Matthew says is that he took a boat to a deserted place. Maybe they saw the boat and could tell where it was going to land. Or maybe one of the disciples leaked it to the public ahead of time. However it happened, by the time Jesus arrived at the place where he is planning to take a quiet retreat there is already a crowd.
And Jesus doesn’t get upset or tell them to go away. He doesn’t say “This is my sabbath time. Unless it is an emergency, please come back tomorrow after I’ve had time to rest.” He sees them, and the scripture tells us “he had compassion for them, and cured their sick.”
This seems to go against everything I was taught while in formation to become a priest. Why isn’t Jesus taking this opportunity to demonstrate for his disciples the importance of setting healthy boundaries? Surely it won’t be the end of the world if the people have to wait a day or two until he is ready to get back to healing and teaching. He’s not being called to give last rites to someone who is dying, to comfort a family in crisis at a hospital, or to be a calming presence at some other emergency.
I don’t know if this resonates with your vocational experience, but I imagine that no matter what your career you also have or had lines between public and private times that you don’t want others to cross.
Yes, it would be frustrating for the crowd to have come a long way seeking Jesus’ healing presence only for him to tell them to leave. But surely he can work something out. He has already raised the dead after all!
Is Jesus, our perfect example, really telling us that we should sacrifice our own real needs to care for others?
Isn’t that a recipe for burnout?
There is an important piece here.
Seeing that it’s getting late and the people are going to need to head back to town to buy food, Jesus blesses five loaves of bread and two fish. And those five loaves and two fish feed over five thousand people, with twelve baskets full of leftovers afterward.
I think there is something important in the fact that Jesus performs this miracle that feeds so many people after heading off on a retreat.
Things did not go as planned. Instead of having a quiet day, Jesus spends his time healing and teaching thousands of people. But at the end of it, when I imagine he must have been exhausted, he not only has a chance to eat his fill but is able to share that meal with others.
Soon, we will have the opportunity to share another meal with Jesus when he offers us his body and blood in the Eucharist. Even in the midst of grief and exhaustion, the Good Shepherd meets his flock where they are and leads them to green pastures and still waters. After feeding the five thousand, Jesus finally gets his quiet time and goes up a mountain to pray.
In this passage, Jesus isn’t telling us that we need to give and give and give until there is nothing left. He is not saying that we shouldn’t have boundaries or take care of ourselves.
But at the same time, he shows us that things aren’t always going to go according to plan. We won’t always be able to get a full eight hours of sleep, unexpected crises will happen, and we will find ourselves in situations where we need to act but are running on empty.
And in these moments the Good Shepherd will supply our need.
That doesn’t mean we should go around neglecting these needs. Jesus still took time to pray in silent retreat.
But when plans change on a dime, and we feel like more is being asked of us than is humanly possible, Jesus comes alongside us and invites us to take a seat at his feast.
This is not a paid endorsement, but recently I have been reading the book The Hunger Inside: How the Meal Jesus Gave Transforms Lives by Bradley Roth. I’m currently about halfway through. Roth, a Mennonite pastor, writes about the importance of the Lord’s Supper/Eucharist/Communion and makes a case for the real presence of Christ in the rite in a way that would rival any sacramentally minded, High-Church theologian. I’d highly recommend it for those seeking more on the Eucharistic themes this sermon touches on.