Finding rest

“Come to Me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. All of you, take up My yoke and learn from Me, because I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for yourselves. Matthew 11:28-29 HCSB http://bible.com/72/mat.11.28-29.HCSB

Have you ever thought about these couple verses? I have. I have even taught them and given them as advices to people. But at the same time, I have to admit that I have never been truly impacted by what these verses really convey and mean.

Life always seems to be unstopping. Life is always stacking up. There is always so much to do. When you think about it, the 24 hours in a day just isn't enough to get everything that needs to be done done. Especially when you are balancing kids, relationships, work, volunteering, eating and health, there just isn't enough room to make it all happen nor is it healthy to. I have tried it. And I failed miserably. I stretched myself so thin that I wasn't effectively doing any of the things I'm trying to accomplish. In the end, having done it but poorly was as good as having not done it. What made it worst was the deterioration it actually caused upon my relationships with my wife and kids, my ministry, my health and most importantly my spiritual health. I was trying to do it all but I was actually doing nothing. How many of us are like that? With good intentions, we pave the way for destruction. We end up working against ourselves.

As I was reading and pondering upon these verses, I realized something. When Jesus told us to come, He was telling us to take up his yoke and to learn from Him. With that He promises us rest. The yoke was essentially the harness that pulled the till for the farmer. Often times, a farmer will use a set of animals linked together to pull the till. This was the imagine of yoking together. Christ was telling us to take up His yoke, as in to be harness and linked to Him. Linked to Him because He is willing to share our load, burden and toll. He is also there to guide us along. When the farmer yoke two animals together, if they are uneven, the larger and strong animal will become the dominant one and the one that ends up leading the pair and carrying the bulk of the burden and task at hand.

This is the imagery that Christ is giving us. When we pull life along on our own, it will be heavy and often times we can't do it all. But He is offering us another way, He is telling us to submit and be linked to Him. He will carry the load. He will guide us on the path of life. He will teach us.

No, we may not get everything done in life like we have anticipated. Nor will we create a life as we imagined. And that is fine. It is fine because God loves us and He wants the best for us. When we are yoked to Him, He will guide us down the path that we need to go. He will carry us through the hard and tough times. He will in a sense, restructure our priority in life. We will start to see that some of those things that we viewed as important in life is actually not as important compared to something else. We learn that life is never too heavy because He is already there carrying the majority of the load for us.  What we need to understand and this is what will ultimately give us rest is that God is already handling it for us and we just need to tag along. This is not to say we don't have to work at it but rather what we are doing now is joining into what God is already doing in all aspect of our life.

It is the idea of letting go. Letting go of the need and want of controlling life. Let God take the wheel of your life. Let His love and grace bring you rest as you know He is here with you in the midst of it all.