Skip to main content

This baggage called life...

Matthew 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” 

One thing that I’ve realised in these last couple of months is that life happens. I’ve seen ‘life’ happen to those around me, and I’ve seen ‘life’ happen to myself. When I say life, I don’t merely mean the act of living or the breath in your lungs, but rather everything you experience outside of that. ‘Life’ could be synonymous to that problem your facing, or that circumstance that you're in. ‘Life’ is a common thing that we all share, and if you’ve lived long enough it’s likely you faced a problem that you carried. Maybe you are carrying that problem right now, but I want to remind you that someone is there to carry it for you.  

Looking at the verse, there’s a couple of things to learn. We see that the rest God promises for our lives isn’t exclusive. It says, “all you who are weary and burdened”, not some of you or most of you, but “all”, and so it’s our decision whether or not we want to be passive. Some of you reading this may feel like your problems aren’t worth going to God, but it is: your ‘life’ is never too big or too small to take to God. 

Another part of the verse I wanted to focus on was the idea of “yoke”. The first thing that may come to mind when we read this is an egg yoke, however a biblical “yoke” is much different. In context, the yoke the bible is talking about is the wooden frame placed over the necks of two animals, usually oxen, and was used as a way to pull a cart together. Essentially, the purpose of the yoke is to walk side by side, in the same pace, with the same weight.  

In correlation with the verse, the “yoke” refers to our life. It’s an analogy to depict how our lives are experienced. In our lives, we sometimes carry things alongside with us: in the same pace, with the same weight. Maybe you’re carrying that financial issue alongside with you, maybe you’re carrying that heartbreak with you, maybe you’re carrying that family struggle alongside you, whatever it is, someone is there to carry that weight, and that someone is Jesus.  

And so, with Jesus saying, “all who are weary and burdened” He is also saying, come to me all who are carrying their issues by themselves: “come to me all who” are carrying this baggage called ‘life’, and He will give you rest. Jesus is much more than the issues you are facing, or the problems you are going through. 

When Jesus says, “For my yoke is easy and my burden is light”, He is saying if you carry Him along your journey called ‘life’, He is lighter than whatever you're currently carrying. Whatever issue you may be facing, bring Jesus alongside with you.  

Above anything else, let’s carry Jesus into our lives because not only is His burden light but also when we carry Jesus, He carries us and our problems. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Identity built through Christ

John 1:12    “ Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed his name, he gave the right to become children of God”   Identity is always something I have struggled with. I believed that if I did not act a certain way with certain people I would not be accepted. I built my identity on the perception of others: letting other people's opinion of me dictate my value as a person. One thing I didn’t realise was that my value had already been written , something established long before I was even born. My value: your value, is built through Jesus. And so, we can’t let the opinion of others affect us, whether positive or negative because our identity is not built on the perception of others but of God. We are all seen di fferently by different people , maybe your someone’s brother or sister, a mum or a dad, or something else. The most common association t o our identity is our names. It’s what our friends , teachers and family refer to us by: an associat...
Post a Comment
Read more

Being intentional with Joy

James 1: 2   “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds”   Have you ever not been in a good mood? Have you ever felt like things are just not going your way? If you answered yes to any of those questions, it shows that you are human. Problems occur and things happen that can make us upset, and that is an unfortunate reality we have to face in this world .   For me, one of my resolutions this year is to be more joyful. If I had to make a book about the year of 2024, the title of it would be “ A sequence of difficulties” . In my life, it seemed I was experiencing problem after problem and issue after issue. I couldn’t escape them. The bitter truth is that problems and issues are inevitable, but our attitude towards them isn’t .   At th at time, I was angry at God for allowing all those things to happen to me, but in retrospect I can be grateful to see the work God was doing inside of me, the resilience he was building, ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Dealing with Fear

2 Timothy 1:7 “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind”  Fear is a universal emotion we all feel.  It comes in different formats, affects different people differently and is an unavoidable aspect of life.  For me, as I’ve progressed in my relationship with God, fear has been the hardest thing I’ve had to deal with.  Whether it was certain dreams, visions or the enemy trying to play with my mind: they were all spiritual attacks.  You may not deal with spiritual attacks, and maybe your fear is embedded of people’s perception of you.  Maybe you have fear of rejection, or fear of failure, nevertheless we should all identify our fear, but let us not make it our identity.  Don’t hold your fear hostage, set it free by allowing Jesus to use his keys of comfort.  Looking at the verse, once we have given our lives to Jesus and have accepted him as our lord and saviour, w...
Post a Comment
Read more