In Matthew's Steps: Burdened No More!

The First Steps: Read: Matthew 11

Focus Verse: Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest. 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. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. Matthew 11:28-30

Meditation: A Load Too Heavy To Hold

It’s amazing what a hernia can teach you!

Since having hernia surgery last June, I have learned how much pain a little weight can bring. Even now, I have a hard time carrying things heavier than twenty pounds or so. When I take on something too heavy I can feel it on my side, a pulling sensation and an ache that reminds me that I shouldn’t carry it. And I must call my sons to help.

We have all been weary and burdened at one time or another and yet, how often have we noticed? How often have we felt the pulling sensation in our bodies, the weariness of our souls? How often have we stopped to realize just how fragile we are?

In this chapter of Matthew, Christ reminds who he’s been sent for. He’s been sent to help “The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor.”(11:5) Christ has some “...eating and drinking and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and ‘sinners.’”(11:19)

But Christ has also come for YOU. Christ has come so that YOUR burdens might be light, YOUR weariness might be cured, and YOUR body might rest. Christ has come to give you a sabbath, a time off and away from yourself. And though there is a yoke to be taken on with Christ, though there is a burden to be carried when you follow Him, Christ himself carries the weight for you so that you may say “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

How freeing that is! How marvelous it would be if we just listened. If we just relaxed into the grace of God in Christ Jesus.

And yet we don’t listen. Instead these words from Christ are directed to us.

“Woe to you, Korazin! Woe to you Bethsaida! If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sack cloth and ashes.” (11:21)

We might as well substitute our names for the names of these towns. For Christ’s life is arrayed before us and we do not repent. We fail to come to Christ for mercy and compassion, for rest and healing, for a lighter burden and a yoke that is easy. Instead we burden ourselves with our own agendas and busy ourselves with our own lives. We forget about Christ. We make ourselves god over the universe, and work ourselves to death because of it.

Studies have shown, these centuries after Christ, that stress itself, the internal psychological burdens we and others place upon us, actually has a physical symptom in our bodies. Our bodies release cortisol, a chemical from our adrenal glands which actually damages our brain but enables our bodies to flee or fight. Then, when the event has passed, hormones come flooding back into our system to snatch up the cortisol and carry it away. Research shows this process, though it was designed to save us, is extremely harmful to both our bodies and our brains. And prolonged exposure to this can cause terrible health problems to occur.

If this is what both Christ and science tell us, then why do we do it? Why do we still subject ourselves to such stress for prolonged periods of time, knowing how much it will damage us? Maybe what Jesus says is true. God “...has hidden these things from the wise and learned and revealed them to little children.”(11:26). Little children need no prompting to rest. Perhaps we should take our cue from them.

Christ has invited us to rest. To lay down our burdens and let him worry about them. To unload our hearts and minds from the worries that weigh us down and place them at the foot of his cross. And from there He will take care of us, taking upon himself the burden of our death in the hope of our resurrection with Him. He offers to take it all from us? Why not take him up on his offer? Amen.

Questions to Ponder
1) How have you overburdened yourself? How have you taken on too much? What is your body, your mind, or your soul telling you?

2) Have you graciously received and have you rejected the rest that Christ gives you? Whose burden and yoke is around your neck?

3) How can you set aside your burdens? What is stopping you from truly resting in Christ?

A Prayer to Pray...
Almighty God, your Son offers us forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation as well as an easy burden and a light yoke. Dispel the gods we set up for ourselves. Dethrone us off the throne of our lives that your burden might be our burden and your yoke might be shared, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.