Easy Burden Sonlight CRC

Have you ever found yourself struggling spiritually? Ever been tempted and with full knowledge, wilfully given into it? Ever had doubts, worries, and concerns? Ever felt like chucking it all in, giving up, and living like everyone else, seemingly, without a care in the world?

Everyone, no matter how spiritual, struggles with temptation, difficulties, doubts, and concerns. It is hard to make sense of faith with all the suffering and unrest in the world. Why does God allow suffering, especially in his people?

Wherever you are in your spiritual life right now, whether you are on a mountaintop, or in the darkest valley—cruising along, struggling, wandering, waiting, wherever, Jesus comes to you and says simply, “come to me. Come to me, all you who are weary and heavily burdened and I will give you rest.”

Everyone needs what Jesus offers. Life is tough all over. It doesn’t matter where you are. If you’re flush with money, there’s a tonne of pressure on you to do something with it, invest, get rid of debt, donate, buy, spend, needs, wants, desires, must haves. Opinions inundate us from all over the place. Church, society, family, there’s pressure everywhere.

Jesus cuts through all the noise, all the blather, all the opinions, and all the stuff and says, “Come. Come to me, I will give you rest.” Everyone is weary and burdened. Whether it is the simple fact of original sin, which produces in us the desire to do the opposite of what God created us to do, which when we act on that desire, burdens us with condemnation, guilt and shame. Or whether people are burdened by false religions, or burdened by unhelpful rules and regulations, or burdened by a sense of just not being totally sure about anything, to all, to everyone, to us this morning, Jesus says, “Come to me.”

Jesus did it all. Jesus lived it all, perfectly. Jesus bore, Jesus took, all God’s wrath against sin. Jesus offers complete forgiveness. Jesus gives, Jesus offers his righteousness, his power, his ability, his Spirit.

By faith, we come to Christ. We come by walking in the doors of this building. We come when we started to participate in the service. We did it when, by faith, we participated in Lord’s Supper. We have already received everything we need from him. Did we realise it though? Have we really come to him in our hearts, in our minds? Examine yourself, ask yourself, have I really received Christ?

If you haven’t then come. Give him your doubts, your cares, your concerns. Let him take them from you. Trust him. Believe that Jesus loves you so much as to die to save you from your sins. Let go of who you were, or what you had, let go of your old identity that’s incongruent with Christ.

The answer is we just don’t trust. We don’t believe that he’s actually removed it. We hand it over only to take it up again, sometimes right after our prayers are over. We don’t actually believe that Jesus loves us so much as to die to save us from our sins. We want to hold onto who we were, or we want to hold onto what we had, we want to keep something of our old identity even if it is utterly incongruent with Christ. We still want to rebel. We still want to hold something back from God. So, one moment we’ll truly honestly mean it when we say, “I surrender all.” But then, a moment later, we actually take some of it back.

For, if, after finding rest for our souls, we go about our merry way, thinking we have it all figured out at last, we’ll find ourselves in the same spiral, the same cycle of being on the mountain top, then sliding down the mountain, into the valley, then back up the mountain and back down and up and down up and down, tossed to and fro by every wind and wave.

Come to Christ. Learn from Christ. Be yoked with him.

And all the while, we know, this isn’t it. This isn’t what it’s all about; this isn’t what Christ promises. This is not rest; this is not satisfying; this is not pasture life. This is wilderness living.

What then is the answer? What then is the solution? What can keep us where we need to be? What can save us from a mediocre Christian life? We need to yoke ourselves to Christ.

In Jesus’ day, they paired a young ox with an old one. The old ox actually did all the work. The young one was just learning how to be yoked, how to be in front of the equipment, how to obey the commands, left, right, stop, speed up, slow down.

That’s what being yoked with Christ is like. When we’re yoked with him, all he requires is for us to walk alongside him. All he requires is that we let him bear our burdens, for he already has and already is! Let him do all the work; let him work through you! That’s what he promises when he says his yoke is easy and his burden is light. Why? Because he’s the older, experienced ox! He’s actually doing all the work.

To be yoked with Christ means to offer your body, which includes your mind, your heart, your life, your work, your passion, your desires, and your addictions, everything to Christ and allow him to have dominion over everything. Don’t just say it, do it. Don’t wait until later, do it now. Come to Christ; experience the burden lifting, the weariness falling away. Then step next to him, put your shoulder to the yoke. Discover its easiness and lightness. Why is it an easy burden? Because Christ is the one doing all the work in you! Trust him, walk with him, each moment of every day! Amen.