The Cure for Being Heavy Burdened in Life

Matthew 11:28-30

“Come to Me, all 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. My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” 

The Cure for Being Heavy Burdened in Life

With the New Year just around the corner, we are often finding ourselves making resolutions to refresh and start anew with better goals in life. So often those goals involve going to the gym more frequently, eating less junk food, spending more time with family and friends, etc.. Now, those things are not bad at all. They are good goals to have, and I hope that you have success with all of them. 

What if we went further than that and took to heart what this verse is truly saying. In these verses, it creates a word picture that I had not thought of before. In Jesus’ day, the yoke was a collar like a frame that joined two animals together to bear the burden of the load. I remember as a child watching oxen pull the weight sled at the county fair. They both carried the massive load from point A to point B. If one ox failed, then they both failed. They could not go it alone. They were bound together to complete it in unison.

What an incredible word picture this is. Jesus is saying to us that he knows our burdens, and he is calling us to yoke ourselves to Him, the Savior, and He will give us rest. He will take the burdens of sin in our lives and bear the load with us. Why, because He wants to! He is so much stronger than we are and by His might, he will make our burdens light.

Wouldn’t that be just incredible to have all of our burdens eased? However, wait, not just eased. Jesus goes further to say that He will give us rest. Oh, how we often long for rest but feel like we never have any. I love the next line here that describes how Jesus is gentle and lowly in heart.

What is that word lowly? Lowly is low in status or humble. So, Jesus is asking us to come to Him and is telling us that our sin has caused us many burdens in our lives and that He will not deal harshly with us because of our sin. He will be gentle and humble! There is a sense of extreme compassion that is being displayed here toward us because by all rights He could deal with us differently than He is offering. His offer is to love us and not hold our sin against us!

Jesus wants us to come to Him. He delights in our coming to Him. It is amazingly freeing that once we have come to Him and cast all of our burdens unto Him that He gives us rest and then tells us how we can learn directly from Him. We can learn how not to be overburdened by the world around us and how to put off old thinking and put on new thinking. Thinking that is directed towards our Savior Jesus Christ.

So, do you see Jesus Christ yoked with you, caring for all of your burdens in life. Have you gone to Him while you are heavy laden? Do you long for rest daily and feel like you have not gotten any? Go to Him, right now and pray for Him to ease your burden and change your mind to one that looks vertical to the Father of the Universe and the Savior of the world.

Cast everything upon Jesus not in a complaining manner about the things that you do not have, but acknowledging the fact that Jesus Christ is the one and only one that can truly give you rest and teach you how to overcome the world’s distractions and burdens. I leave you with this, what if you do not do this?

Look at this verse in reverse.  “Avoid me, all you that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will deny your rest. Refuse my yoke of fellowship and abiding, and refuse to learn what I am like in order to become like Me, and you shall find noise in your soul.”

Wow, so this is a description of what happens when we ignore Jesus and refuse His call to help us. This should give all the more reason to go to Him because the burdens will keep piling up and we will never find rest without him.

The cure for being heavy burdened in life is receiving the rest that Jesus provides. You are a sinner but Jesus loves you with a divine love that has every inch of your life planned out with a heart of compassion, mercy, grace, love and forgiveness. He is the cure for our soul. Let’s make our New Year’s resolution one that is resting in Christ! He is the only rest for our souls as we were created to only rest in Him!