SERMON SERIES
FOR LENT
When the Going Gets Tough…
Matthew 11: 28-30
Pastor
The
Yoke of Christ......Matthew 11:28-30 “Come to Me, all you who labor and are Heavy
laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I
am gentle and lowly in Heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My
yoke is easy and My burden is light.”
There is a wonderful legend concerning the ‘quiet
years’ of Jesus, those years between the ages of twelve and thirty-three, prior
to His public ministry. The legend claims that Jesus the carpenter was one of
the master yoke-makers in the
When customers arrived with their team of oxen
Jesus would spend considerable time measuring the team, their height, their
width, the space between them, the age of the animal. Within a week, the team
would be brought back and He would carefully place the newly made yoke over the
shoulders, watching for rough places, smoothing out the edges and fitting them
perfectly to this particular team of oxen.
That’s the yoke Jesus invites us to take.
Do not be misled by the word “easy,” for its
root word in Greek speaks directly to what we would call “tailor-made” yokes: literally,
the word means “well-fitting.”
The yoke Jesus invites us to take, the yoke that
brings rest to weary souls, is one that is made exactly to our lives and hearts.
The yoke He invites us to wear fits us well,
does not rub us nor cause us to develop sore spirits and is designed for two. His
yokes were always designed for two. And our yoke-partner is none other than
Christ Himself.
Running throughout all scripture from the
beginning to the end is the theme that ours is a burden-bearing Christ. The
Messiah is not a Lord whom we burden (although we do when we continue to repeat
the cycles of sin and defeat that trip us up) but a Lord who actually solicits
our burdens.
Others tell it this way….
Younger, smaller animals were placed next to an
experienced animal. Often times the younger was so small that the yoke did not
even touch the animal therefore the older one did all the work. As the newer
animal grew into the yoke he or she began to share the load of the more
experienced animal.
And so, the yoke joins two oxen together to work
as a team.
When Jesus invites us to take His yoke and to
learn from Him, He is inviting us to join Him in harness, to allow Him to take
the lead, to let Him help us through difficult places, to let Him show us how
it is done. “Take My yoke upon you, He says.
There’s
a story about a little boy who was out helping dad with the yard work. Dad
asked him to pick up the rocks in a certain area of the yard. Dad looked over
and saw him struggling to pull up a huge rock buried in the dirt. The little
boy struggled and struggled while Dad watched. Finally, the boy gave up and
said, “I can’t do it.” Dad asked, “Did you use all of your strength?” The
little boy looked hurt and said, “Yes, sir. I used every ounce of strength I have.”
The father smiled and said, “No you didn’t. You didn’t ask me to help.” The
father walked over and then the two of them pulled that big rock out of the
dirt.
We
forget that part of the strength that the Lord provides is to ask Him for help.
He has not placed a yoke on our backs only to watch and evaluate how well we
do. No, He invites us, “Come to Me, all you who are weary. Come to Me,” He
says.
The term “yoke of the law” was familiar to the hearers.
Jesus even criticizes the Pharisees for making the load more than the people
could bear (Matthew 23:4). Yet, Jesus’ invitation is not an invitation to
unbridled freedom, but rather to experience rest by accepting the yoke of
Christ.
This stole that I wear is intended to be a
visible sign to remind me and to remind you that I am yoked to the Gospel of
Jesus Christ. I am not yoked to the church, to the PCUSA or even to you
wonderful people who make up this spiritual community. I am yoked to Christ. In
fact, so are you.
So how
about this…If you feel uncomfortable wearing a cross at your place of work or
where you volunteer, how about wearing a stole or a long scarf around your neck
to remind you that you are yoked to Christ? It could help.
Jesus implied
that all humankind are in some way burdened.
There is the burden of our anxieties and of our
fears. There is the burden of our
temptations and our responsibilities. I think of the burden of our loneliness,
maybe after bereavement, and the burden people have when they sense that life has
no meaning, and above all, there is the burden of our failures and of our
guilt. What a burden they can be!
But Jesus promises to ease our yoke, to lift our
burden and to give us rest.
He is
the world’s supreme burden-bearer. His burden is light. He indeed, helps us
carry our load, walking with us, sharing our pain, our joy, our life
experience. He invites us to “take that
yoke”. No only that but Jesus will ask us
to then bear another’s burdens and so fulfill the way of Christ.
This day, receive the mantle, the yoke, the
stole of service. It is made just for you. Jesus says, “…for My yoke is easy
and My burden light.” This week I want you to intentionally ask Jesus to help
you with that one burden that has come to your mind while listening to this
sermon. We’re like that young boy trying to lift the rock out of the garden all
by ourselves. Jesus will never turn us away when we come to Him. He has asked
us to do so. So, let’s ask His help. I’ll do the same and then when we are
together next, we can share how Jesus has helped us.
I look
forward to hearing the stories.