What burdens you? – Matthew 11:25-30

It was 12 years ago that I cleared a section of land using an old-fashioned scythe that my wife had given me for my birthday.  Everyone who saw me told me there was a machine that could make the work easier and faster, but I still used that scythe.  Perhaps I was just being stubborn but somehow it didn’t feel like a burden to use it.  Maybe that is because it was a new thing for me and I was 12 years younger. Perhaps if I had been using it all my life and was given a power tool to do the same thing faster, I might have decided to use it instead.

All of us choose to do certain tasks in certain ways. Even when we are shown an easier way, often we prefer or persist in our old ways.  No doubt we believe that the old way is better, that it produces more character and endurance.  But doing something in a way that is familiar to us gives us a sense of confidence in fulfilling the task rather than taking a chance on a new way.

Now think for a moment about a yoke of oxen.  That yoke is designed to enable the oxen to handle the task that is required of them. The yoke helps the animals to be effective in the task that they are asked to fulfil. A lighter yoke of more modern materials may accomplish the same thing as the yokes of old and be a lighter burden for the animals, but when Jesus was speaking to the people in that time, they only knew the yoke of wood and what that weight was.

Now Jesus was a master at taking everyday items and using them to teach people important lessons about life and about the expectations of God for their lives. One example of this is where Jesus reminds the people of the ten commandments which were just the tip of the whole law that they were expected to know and which probably was a significant burden to many. Jesus condensed those rules to two which made it easier to remember and so a lighter burden. And so Jesus gives them the simple commands: Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. Love your neighbour as yourself.

The people were encouraged to see this as a yoke that would rest on their shoulders. This gave them hope as they focused on these two simple and direct commandments. This made it possible for the law of God to be written on the hearts of the people for they only had two principles to guide them in their lives.

The yoke that they had been given by their teachers and priests had kept getting longer and more complicated. For the average person who was busy trying to make a living and provide for their family, the yoke was getting heavier and heavier. How could anyone even begin to fulfil the law of God? Yes, there was a real concern not to offend God by making a mistake but there were so many ways that a person could fail, hope of God’s blessing and forgiveness.

Now there is nothing wrong with striving to do everything right in the eyes of God; and there is nothing wrong with trying to help people understand what God expects of them; but Jesus makes it clear that God never intended the yoke of obedience to become an unbearable burden. The joy of following God, of trusting in the Word of God is sucked away and replaced by such a strong sense of morality and duty as to suffocate our spirits and push us to rebel and turn away from God.

I don’t know about you, but when I find myself in situations where too much is demanded of me, I just want to walk away.  Children can feel burdened by the expectations of parents; adults can feel burdened by the expectations of employers or spouses or friends.  In church, we can feel the burden of expectations upon us as professing Christians.  The loss of the yoke that Jesus seeks to offer us has led to situations where we have expected perfection from our leaders, from one another and even from ourselves. This has led to our imperfections becoming opportunities for others to reject faith in God or – at the very least – in the people of God and our communities of faith.

As much as Jesus has tried to impress upon us the lightness of his yoke, we continue to do our best to increase its weight.  As much as God throughout time has tried to reach out and take hold of us and assure us that he loves us and accepts us in all our imperfection, we have done our best to not believe that anything less than perfection will be acceptable to God. This has led many people to be afraid to disappoint God and so despair of pleasing him and turn away. Others have worked so hard to ensure they are leading the best life they can that they struggle to receive the gifts of forgiveness and grace.

I want us to consider carefully that much of the burden we may be feeling in our lives is not the burden that God has placed upon us but rather it is the burden that we have chosen to place on ourselves.

Perhaps that burden first came to us as children; perhaps it came as we became more committed in our faith. Jesus knows so well how we can burden ourselves unnecessarily.

Remember that one of the differences between the Old and New Testaments is this In the Old Testament, a lamb’s blood spilled was the mark for the angel of death to pass over. In the New Testament, it is God in the person of Jesus who allows himself to be sacrificed like a lamb for the eternal forgiveness of our sin. And this was done so that we might not have to carry the burden of our sin but know that we are loved unconditionally and acceptable and accepted by God. When we look at the lives of those God chose to be leaders and prophets, God never chose perfect people, but he chose people willing to listen and follow.  Each of them made mistakes but God loved them and stayed with them to the end of their lives.  And the message given by God from the beginning of time has been a lot simpler than we often allow it to be.

The prophet Micah summed it up this way: God has showed you what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God.  Our Lord Jesus Christ summed it up this way: Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, body, and soul and love your neighbour as yourself.  That is the yoke that Jesus seeks for us to bear.  That is the yoke that God always intended for us to bear.   That is the only yoke God prays we will bear.

I have found much strength for my faith in God through the example of the Celtic saints who lived their faith simply yet with great conviction. My morning ritual includes the following prayer which helps me to see the yoke Christ speaks of.  It goes like this:

My Father, I come to you at the beginning of this day to ask you to guide me and help me.  Give me courage to face the problems that lie ahead and give me a heart wide open to the joys you have prepared for me.  Forgive my many sins that I may start this day anew. And as you forgive me, may I learn to be forgiving and compassionate to others in return. My Father, I long to serve you aright. May all that I do and all that I say be pleasing in your sight. AMEN.