When you need to lift more than you can lift and there is no one to help, how does that feel? What burdens have been more than you could deal with by yourself? Which have brought you to your knees or simply worn you out?
My family moved from Maryland to St. Louis when I was in college. They drove the family car and I had to follow two weeks later with my dad’s VW beetle and for the first time made a cross country trip all by myself. As I drove through the hills of Pennsylvania the car slowed down so much as I climbed each hill I feared I would never get to the top. I didn’t think I would ever escape Pennsylvania until I learned to get close enough to tractor trailers to allow their draft to pull me up the steep inclines. Without such help the car would have overheated and I never would have made it to our new home. And in fact, the engine gave up the ghost one week after I made it to St. Louis.
There are some loads too heavy to get out from under no matter who is around. What is the burden for a parent who has lost a child to death, or a child whose parents are too busy to hug and say, “I love you?” How intense is a struggle for a young woman living far away from family and friends or when a parent with a mortgage and kids in college loses a job? What help is there when your friends or family disappear when you need them the most, or you are barely managing to keep it together and one more surprise threatens to put you over the edge?
How have and do you handle such heavy loads? And more importantly, do such moments undermine or strengthen your relationship of faith? How is one to find rest and peace when it is difficult to carry a burden any further?
Our culture has all sorts of gadgets and suggestions to help make life easier and give us more time to rest. Software supposedly makes bill paying, scheduling, and finding products online real time savers. IPhone and internet can access soothing music or a meditation for whatever is ailing your spirit. And yet, even such searches create stress and often are temporary help, at best. We have all had to deal with illness, death, betrayals, and fear that is more than we can find enough help to endure. And we all know how impossible it is to catch your breath or find rest when such moments thunder and threaten your peace.
If someone assured you they could lighten your load and ease your burden, wouldn’t you perk up and listen? One day, as he was surrounded by people with all the heavy loads we all must face, Jesus said, “Come to me (when you are tired from carrying more than you can handle) and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for my yoke is easy and my burden light.”
What do you think about that? In Jesus’ day there were no such things as lazy boys, babysitters, vacations, a 40 day work week, hospitals, care facilities, social security or retirement funds and government assistance. People worked from sunup to sundown just to scratch out a living, fearing plagues, famines, and death. The intensity never ended, and yet Jesus offered to bring peace. Of course Jesus had their attention as no one would refuse such an offer.
But what did Jesus mean by taking his yoke? There were two types of yoke in Jesus’ day. One was a wooden plank, placed over the backs of two oxen, tying them together so that together they would pull equally on a wagon or plow. The other was a carved piece of wood, placed on one’s shoulders to equally distribute the weight and balance of two buckets. They understood how a yoke distributes a burden or weight and eases the effort needed to do what needs to be done. For a simple community of farmers this is a wonderful illustration to explain how Jesus’ offers to help. For people used to unending heavy loads this was a breath of fresh air, like the warm days of spring when winter’s harshness if finally over.
The real question is whether Jesus has our attention today as the same promise is still a guarantee from him to you and me? What can that mean for you?
Jesus’ promise is to help with weight limits that have been exceeded! His loving concern is to ease burdens that have stretched us to the limit. He offers to shift the burden. He doesn’t promise that the burden will disappear but that he will help carry the load. The weight might still exist, but He promise he will help.
By explaining it is HIS yoke, he reveals he already is equipped for such a burden, and ready to start sharing our load. If our burden feels like 500 pounds on our back and we could probably handle only some of it, he says he will carry the rest. If we are frozen in place and can’t even move he says, “I will pull with you and get you moving!” Whether grief, pain, or fear is our load he begs us to let him help with whatever we cannot escape.
Even if we are coping, and capable, and doing well, his promise is to walk alongside should we suddenly exceed our limit. What a change that makes as we face what we face, knowing Jesus not only understands our limits, but will overcome them. It is like traveling late and night and finally reaching a rest stop and realizing it is open, and the highway exit offers exactly the service we are looking for. This is what Jesus means by saying he invites us to receive the rest stop we need. He makes it possible to rest even when the burden remains.
How often have you heard someone offer “Call if you need anything?” And when you did, you realized they really didn’t have the energy or time or gifts to help? Or someone has said, “I know the feeling,” as if that would help and then walked away. Our earthly experiences with heavy loads aren’t always great, and that is why God’s loving offer to us is so out of this world.
His promise has credibility because he has done what he says he will do. His manger was a yoke that tied him to you and me. He carried on his back the weight of an entire world as he was nailed to a yoke called the cross. He embraced the oppressive darkness called death, lifting that dark curtain with the miracle of Easter morning. Because he has carried these burdens alone — and triumphed – why doubt his promise to deal with all the smaller burdens of life?
Our question no longer is “how much are you able to carry?” Or, “what is your weight limit or breaking point?” For there is no weight or burden our loving God cannot handle, and when you are willing to let go, you will find what he means. When we are overwhelmed and just need a rest, surrendering our burdnes to God’s help brings a peace the world cannot give, even as the weight remains.
If you have played baseball, you know how much easier it is to catch a ball with a glove already broken in. Well, Jesus’ gifts are offered in love and broken in by his blood, sweat and tears. When you go to a surgeon or a therapist for the first time, you don’t want it to be their first time, right? In the most perfect way, Jesus offers us the experience of his passion and the skills of a God who has created a universe and conquered even death. His experience is our gift.
Where would you rather live – struggling with a load that you just can’t move or resting after having help in finishing the task? When Jesus promises us the gift of peace, what he is really talking about is the rest of body, mind and spirit that comes because he shares the burden of every weight, care, and concern, all from the gift of his love. Giving God what we cannot handle is not giving up, but accepting help beyond what we deserve or could expect. The peace that follows is nothing short of miraculous. Such rest is the gift faith brings and the peace that is beyond human understanding.
There is a difference between leisure and rest, and too often our culture assumes they are both the same. But they are not, and we have become people accustomed to leisure who often don’t know how to find true rest. Never forget his promise: “Come to me and I WILL give you rest!”
Jesus never promises burdens won’t exist, but that whatever and whenever, we never again have to pull or carry or struggle alone! Now that in itself is a burden lifted! That is the gift of God’s rest. And that alone brings true peace.