Matthew 11:25–30
Raise your hand if you’ve ever wanted to bottle up a child’s boundless energy? That’s the million dollar idea no one has figured out how to do. We think we come close with energy drinks, coffee, and any combination of sugary sweets, but those don’t work, not very long. And when we crash after the sugar, caffeine, or who knows what they put in some of those energy drinks, we are more exhausted from overexerting ourselves when we thought we had real energy. Oh, but that of a child, that can run and not grow weary, that can walk and not be faint.
What happened? Life happened. You might blame old age, but it’s more than that. Think of it this way, we know too much. We know that if we play too hard today that tomorrow work will be miserable. We know that if we pull a muscle we’ll be laid up for weeks. But it’s more than that. We know too many life experiences, too many negative, energy draining, heart-breaking, soul sapping experiences, that after many years in this life we slow down, not because we got weaker, but because life caught up to us. We are weary and burdened because we are caught up in a life that weighs us down.
One after another we hear, “Here, now you carry this and don’t you dare forget the guilt of it the rest of your life.” “Here, here’s another and one with a sinful nature so crude and so capable to create misery for you,” one you may even have promised faithfulness to ‘in sickness and in health’ on your wedding day not realizing just how sick they can be. “Here, here’s your daily do’s and don’ts you are guaranteed to mess up without any hope of making it up with God, and if your own heart doesn’t remind you of how judgmental your God is, here’s plenty of so-called friends on social media to remind you of how burdensome your religion is. ‘That’s why I left the church,’ they say. ‘You’ll feel so much better to get out from under that for sure. Live your life how you want and don’t let anyone tell you how to live.’”
And while a statement like that sure sounds liberating, it is nothing short of the opposite. The irony there is that by telling you to not let anyone tell you how to live, they are telling you how to live. The double irony is that by coming to a so-called “free” life, you are yoking yourself with a whole new set of expectations, of do’s and don’ts, where as long as you walk the line of societal norm, you’ll be fine. But that is a hard line to keep up with. Society changes its demands as quickly as the blowing winds or rising waves. And a misstep off that line will not find you a gentle and humble helping hand, but a harsh and arrogant whipping, where after a thorough reputation wrecking and a flurry of unfriending you have never felt more alone.
These are the weary and burdened Jesus calls out to today. We are the weary and burdened Jesus calls out to today. Jesus does not call out to the lazy and carefree. They have no need of rest from Jesus. They have everything they want in their pointless lives. But the weary and burdened are in need of rest, desperate need of rest for the soul, the rest the world cannot offer or give even on its most generous of days, rest to lift the sin and guilt and punishment you were never meant to carry in the first place, rest that comes from Jesus who carried the soul’s heavy burden to the cross and grave.
For every, “Here carry this one,” Jesus stepped in and said, “No, here, put it on me.” The guilt of past sins, the curse of the sinful nature in all of us, and the judgment our souls deserved, Jesus said, “No, here, put it on me.” When we had no way to ask him of such selfless sacrifice, when we had no way to pay him in exchange for blood he shed, when we had no way thank him for all his acts for us, to those who are with Jesus Jesus freely gives us rest. If you’re weary of your sin today, come to Jesus for your rest. If you’re burdened by sin’s curses, come to Jesus for your rest. If you’re fearful of God’s judgment and want a way out, don’t retreat to the world, come to Jesus for your rest.
Where the world would whip and wreck you for failing to carry the burdens it demands, Jesus tells you he is gentle and humble in heart. When he sees you weary and burdened he does not crack the whip harder, no, he shoulders up the yoke more. Do you know the picture of a yoke? It’s always two, a tandem effort two large animals share making the effort half as difficult. Where, while the one gets tired and needs a rest, the other pushes on until the first can join the effort again. Jesus says, “Take my yoke,” not the yoke of the world that would leave all the work for you to do alone, but his yoke, meaning you are connected to him. Jesus says, “Come to me,” and the closer you get to Jesus the lighter and easier the work and effort become.
This is what Jesus means by yoke today. When he says yoke, he means rest. And when he says rest, he doesn’t mean we put all work aside and curl up for a nap. If that were the rest Jesus offers you, then instead of pews in church we’d have serta mattresses with MyPillows and Giza dream sheets so we can have the best night sleep in the whole wide world. You don’t need Jesus for that. You can be lazy and carefree on your own time. I enjoy a good refreshing nap as much as the next guy, but that’s not what Jesus wants us to learn when after saying, “I will give you rest,” he says, “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me.” When you are yoked with Jesus, his rest happens in a different way.
It’s more like the rest of an elite athlete. Sure they need a lot of sleep to recover from very hard workouts, but they rest too. A rest day doesn’t mean more sleep; it means still working, just not as hard or at something straining different muscles. We do the same when we go on vacations. Some vacations are a lot of work. We come home tired for sure, but rested because we did different work. It may have even been an entirely stressful time away where we may say, “That was no vacation,” but it was stress in areas different than a normal day. When we come to Jesus for rest, this means we lay aside the work and stress of day-to-day life and take up a different focus, a different strain, a different yoke.
When we hear yoke, we think of all the work it takes to be a Christian. “Oh, it’s so hard to learn everything I need to know, so hard to have all the right answers, so hard to get it right all the time.” This is false. Whenever the devil tries to convince you that being a Christian is such hard work, spit this passage in his face. Verse 26 says it was the “Father’s good pleasure” to, verse 25, “reveal this to little children.” Little children! Not the wise and learned, not the gifted and super talented, not the righteous and mature, or even after a certain age of accountability. Little children! Why little children? What does that tell you about the wonders and mysteries and work and yoke and rest of God?
I see three reasons. One, it’s simple. Two, it’s easy enough for even a child to do. And three, it’s about as close as you can get to bottling up a child’s energy. First, it’s simple. Children don’t understand complicated tasks. “Tie your shoe laces.” What?! “Clean up your toys.” Are you kidding?! “Stay here while I go over there for a minute.” Nope, not gonna happen. But the simple acts of “Let’s hold hands while we cross the street safely,” or “Let’s put our hands on this toy box together” when you know you’re doing all the lifting, or “Let’s climb up on my back so I can give you a piggy-back ride” when you see that the road is long and their little legs are already tired. That they can do. The yoke of Jesus you can do when it’s Jesus whose hand you hold, whose strength lightens loads, and whose back carries us when legs get weary.
Second, it’s easy enough for a child to do. Every time a child calls out “I can’t” is an opportunity for a parent to ask, “Did you try?” When God promises to those who learn from him that anything is possible through the strength of Jesus, he’s serious. There is rest when instead of a master’s whip there’s the hand of the helper who says, “Here, let’s try this again, this time you’ll see how much help I can be.” And that’s hard for some people to let happen. For others it’s easy. Any handout is a welcome handout. But if you’re a giver and someone wants to give you a gift, if you’re a care-taker and someone wants to take care of you, if you’re a doer, a “do it yourself-er” and someone wants you to rest so they can do it for you, it takes a lot to let yourself rest what you think you could have or should have done alone. It takes a lot to let yourself rest and let someone share the effort. It takes a lot to let rest any desire to turn this gift of rest into a debt to pay to somehow make it back up to them when all they wanted was for this to be their gift to you, without saying, “You didn’t have to,” because of course they didn’t have to, a simple “Thank you,” is all it takes to accept with a grateful heart what they wanted you to have. This is revealed by God to children because children are our example. Children receive so much of what they need from those who are pleased to give it to them. The more we see ourselves as children resting in the arms of our Heavenly Father, the lighter and easier our yoke will be. We can learn from Jesus how easy the yoke becomes when instead of considering all that must be done as though it must be done alone and declaring “I can’t” we listen to Jesus say, “Here, let’s try this together.”
And third, God chose to reveal this to little children because the yoke of Jesus is about as close as you can get to bottling up a child’s energy. Children can run and not grow weary. They can walk and not be faint. To get from here to heaven we have a lot of walking and running yet to do. Sometimes that rest will be a complete time-out under the shade of a tree curled up on our Savior’s lap. The wearies and burdens that catch up to us in life get so heavy that at times the best rest is time curled up with Jesus, close to him in prayer, learning from him in his word, refreshed by him in his sacrament. Sometimes that rest will be a different kind of stress, a different focus of our energy as we climb up rocks instead of sprinting down the path. We’re still making progress, but our sprinting muscles are resting while our climbing muscles get to work. And in that moment you can think, “Well, at least we’re not doing sprints.” And while you’re doing sprints you can think “Well, at least we’re not climbing rocks.” And the rest Jesus gives while you work hard at one new challenge in life will make you ready and stronger to face the other challenge waiting for you when you’re done with that. And still sometimes that rest will be a piggy-back ride at the end of the day. When little legs have simply had enough and no matter how much our heart still wants to say, “Let me try,” your Jesus says, “It’s okay, I’ll take it from here.” And yoked to Jesus, not like two beasts of burden but like a child in the arms of a father, he will carry you to the end of your day where you will sleep in death only to wake up in heaven where you will not only walk and run again but soar on wings like eagles.
I cannot bottle this up and present it to you in any other way than for you to hear Jesus say, 28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Amen.
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