You children of the 70s will recognize the title of this blog referencing the song, “Easy” by the Commodores. Frankly, church girl that I was, I couldn’t relate to the metaphor of Sunday being easy back then because Sundays were the hardest day of the week (Sunday morning church, people for Sunday dinner, choir practice at 4, Sunday night church, etc), but it was intriguing.
Sometimes I still cannot grasp the truth of what Jesus said about life following Him – that to follow Him would be to find rest for our souls (our minds, our wills, our emotions – our very personalities!) He even said that His yoke (which was a wooden beam used to tie two oxen together as they trudged forward in their very hard labor) would be easy. Easy. Seriously? When? Where?
What is the essence of what Jesus really said? Well, here it is 3 ways (Mt. 11.28-30):
“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.” NIV
“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to Me. Get away with Me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with Me and work with Me – watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with Me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.” THE MESSAGE
Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy-ladened and are overburdened, and I will cause you to rest [I will ease and relieve and refresh your souls]. Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me for I am gentle (meek) and humble (lowly) in heart, and you will find rest (relief and ease and refreshment and recreation and blessed quiet) for your souls. For My yoke is wholesome (useful, good—not harsh, hard, sharp or pressing, but comfortable, gracious and pleasant), and My burden is light and easy to be borne. THE AMPLIFIED
Following Jesus is following REST!
Following Jesus and His plan for my days is NOT: ill-fitting (having a job to do but being stripped of the resources or authority to do it), heavy, harsh, hard, sharp (pain-causing), or pressing (can’t seem to stay ahead – losing your breath, feeling pushed), wearisome, burdensome, hard work (work is good, a blessing, but there is a work that is just nothing but hard and life-sapping), loud and abrasive.
Following Jesus and His plan for my days IS: go to Him, run, maybe. Because He is gentle and I will find rest for my whole being because He is going to give me rest! In Him? Real rest, recovery, living the abundant life freely, lightly. Ease. Relief. Refreshment. He’ll re-create me. And blessed quiet for my mind, my will, my emotions. Quiet for my emotions! I am sensing/feeling freer and lighter already!
And His call on my life? The work (good works) He prepared for me before time began (Eph. 2.10)? Easy. Light. Comfortable, gracious, and pleasant. Not to mention wholesome (whole, not fragmented, and holy).
I’ll trade this for all the churchy titles and religious service I have done all my life any day. Where do I sign up?…Jeanie
NOTE TO SELF: I am going to Him. I am going to follow Him and watch how He does this thing. I want to do life the way Jesus did…this is vital to life…”Why in the world would anybody put chains on me…”
Such confirmation to me…I am memorizing two Scriptures a month, along with 3,000 other women who read Beth Moore’s blog, and the next one I chose to post, tomorrow, is Matthew 11:28. I love the NLT –
“Come to me all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you because I am humble and gentle and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke fits perfectly and the burden I give you is light.”
No chains for me either.
With Jesus its all ‘easy’…not as in, “Free from toil or strife,” but as in, “easy rider!” Seek peace…………………………AND, pursue it! Riding the storms of life is exactly where we conduct the flow of God’s provision of strentgh to any who will look on. It is the ‘drive in theater’ of heaven which just happens to be showing the main attraction- “MY grace is sufficient for you!” Will you get on the ride? Most of us spend a lot of time pushing our way through the masses to avoid having to take the scary plunge…
perfect fit
Hey I’m essentially an 80’s child and I recognised the title so don’t age discriminate. Interesting, He says to yoke up with him will ease the burdon not remove it He also says becoming a Christian isn’t going to make life suddenly easy and that there will be troubles. So where is this rest he speaks of? For me it comes from not having to go it alone and to have blinders on so to speak so that we can just focus on the job at hand and not get distracted by the surroundings knowing that when it’s done then we will get the FULL rest. I hope that makes sense.