My Yoke Is Easy
“Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart, and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy and my burden light.” Matthew 11:28-30.
Today’s gospel reading of Matthew 11: 28-30 is only two verses but it is packed full of guidance from Jesus to His disciples and us on how to live our lives. Let’s unpack some of its meaning.
Years ago, I simply thought Jesus was telling us in coming to Him as someone who labored and was burdened, His rest meant no more work. However, I was incorrect. When I was working as an HR professional, I spent so much time in prayer just weary from all the demands of the job. I'd ask Jesus for that “rest” He was promising. I wanted Him to take away the “labor”, the job I was burdened with so I could have His rest. Yet I was misunderstanding what He meant by rest. I knew on one level I had to work to help do my part to support and provide for our family’s needs. That was reality. I also knew that my job was quite a burden. HR constantly handles other people’s problems day in and day out. (Anyone who has ever managed people understands this.) It was my profession and not something you just walked away from. I know that God put me there for a reason. I was skillful at it, a talent God gave me. On the other hand, I longed for the rest Jesus promised and it took a long time in my faith journey to understand what Jesus meant by “I will give you rest.”
“Come to me all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.” Jesus is speaking to people who are weighed down by the Romans who oppress them. Demanding unfair high taxes on their wages from their labor. They are also weighed down by their religious leaders who complicate and burden them with rules impossible to live up to. This completely distorted their understanding of God. They saw God as a tyrant, demanding obedience from them that they couldn’t possibly give. The leaders added so many more rules to the laws God gave to Moses which ladened them with unrealistic demands to follow. Jesus knew this when He spoke these words to the people, and He is speaking to them and to us. He is inviting us to see a side of God that we haven’t seen before.
Jesus is inviting us to put down the heavy yoke, our heavy burdens. In following Jesus, He leads us to His Father, and we will find rest in His labor. He is inviting us into a life free from unnecessary burdens. He is inviting us to a path of obedience through Him to a loving, compassionate Father who is just waiting for us to turn to Him for help.
“Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart, and you will find rest for yourselves.” This is where I used to misinterpret Jesus to mean to have rest mean “no yoke”. But Jesus isn’t going to take everything away. Jesus didn’t say there would be no yoke. He said, “Take my yoke” and “Learn from Me.”
He wants us to learn to be meek and humble of heart. But who wants to be meek? We often understand meek to be gentle, weak, and timid which goes against everything our culture tells us to be. We are told to be strong and assertive. Jesus is anything but weak and timid. The Greek word for meek means strength under control. The Greeks used to train their warhorses to be meek; strong, powerful yet under control, and willing to submit. Jesus is definitely that!
We must be willing to submit our lives to Jesus and we will have strength under control. It is power and courage under control, perfectly combining strength and gentleness. This is the meekness I learned.
When I laid down my yoke and turned to Jesus with my burdens, He filled me up with His love and compassion. He gave me the ability to have the strength and control to go on. I learned through prayer, that while nothing changed in my job or the demands before me, my ability to handle the job completely changed. I didn’t feel alone. I had Jesus walking with me, giving me strength. I learned to be more gentle, more humble of heart, listening to those around me and actually being the one to give them strength. I learned to share Jesus’ love with others which helped them turn to Jesus and lay down their yokes.
“My yoke is easy and my burden light.” To understand this illustration Jesus used, we have to know what a “yoke” is. A yoke is a wooden crosspiece that is fastened over the necks of two animals so they can pull a cart or a plow. Did you catch that? A yoke was carried by two animals. Jesus is saying to us when you put on My yoke, I help you carry the load. With Jesus, our load isn’t removed but it becomes easier to handle and lighter to carry. I can honestly say that every time I turned to Jesus and let myself be yoked to Him, my job and the demands of my life were always easier to handle.
If you are feeling weary and burdened, put down the yoke you are carrying at Jesus’ feet. Take up His yoke and let Him help carry your load. His yoke is easy and His yoke light, You will find rest in Him. You will have the strength to carry on and your burden will be lighter.
©2023 Kendall Berry Lasseigne
