Jesus invi­tes us to come to him with all our tired­ness and bur­dens and to find true rest with him. This rest does not come through per­for­mance or ful­film­ent of the law, but through trust and per­so­nal fel­low­ship with him. His «yoke» is not oppres­si­ve, but car­ri­ed by mer­cy and love – it suits us. Tho­se who ent­rust them­sel­ves to him learn to live a life of free­dom, gent­le­ness and inner peace.

Last Sun­day I pre­a­ched a ser­mon on suf­fe­ring. Towards the end, I read the invi­ta­ti­on of Jesus Christ from the Gos­pel of Matthew. Today I would like to go into this bibli­cal pas­sa­ge in more depth.

Jesus» prayer

The­se three ver­ses, which begin with «Come unto me…», are famous. But the pas­sa­ge beg­ins three ver­ses ear­lier with a pray­er by Jesus Christ. This is exact­ly whe­re I would like to start. Jesus pray­ed often, and this tells us a lot about him and his rela­ti­onship with God the Father. «Then Jesus said the fol­lo­wing pray­er: «O Father, Lord of hea­ven and earth, I thank you that you hide the truth from tho­se who think them­sel­ves so cle­ver and wise. I thank you that you reve­al it ins­tead to tho­se who have a child­li­ke mind» (Matthew 11:25 NLB). I always find it fasci­na­ting how my child­ren imi­ta­te me and my wife. Hosea, our eldest, knows exact­ly what I do and how I do it. At home, I’m respon­si­ble for the salad dres­sing. He now knows all the ingre­di­ents for my salad dres­sing by heart! So he always asks: «What do I need?» and I rep­ly: «What do I need?» Then he adds an ingre­di­ent that is still miss­ing! Jesus lear­nt from his Father like my child­ren learn from me. He lear­nt by living clo­se to his Father and lis­tening to his voice. By wat­ching and imi­ta­ting. Adults often stri­ve for great­ness. We then con­sider our­sel­ves to be par­ti­cu­lar­ly wise and cle­ver. This is not neces­s­a­ri­ly lin­ked to a level of edu­ca­ti­on. What does it mean to have a child­li­ke mind? It is trus­ting, trusts the par­ents to do ever­y­thing and lives from the expe­ri­ence that the par­ents mean well. This pray­er shows that God’s stan­dards are dif­fe­rent. Not tho­se who think they are cle­ver and wise, but tho­se with a child­li­ke dis­po­si­ti­on. But why? For this reason: «Yes, father, that’s what you wan­ted!» (Matthew 11:26 NLB). For they put God first and not themselves.

Jesus con­ti­nues to pray: «My Father has given me aut­ho­ri­ty over ever­y­thing. No one real­ly knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and tho­se to whom the Son wants to reve­al the Father» (Matthew 11:27 NLB). Wit­hout Jesus Christ the­re is no know­ledge of God! Jesus has been given aut­ho­ri­ty over ever­y­thing. But what does this «ever­y­thing» mean? It means access to eter­nal life (John 3:35), jud­ge­ment (John 5:19ff), accep­tance for sal­va­ti­on (John 6:37), aut­ho­ri­ty over the church (John 10:29), com­ple­ti­on of God’s plan of sal­va­ti­on (John 13:3) and he is the brin­ger of sal­va­ti­on to all peo­p­le (John 17:2).

Come to me, everyone…

In his pray­er, Jesus makes it clear that he is the repre­sen­ta­ti­ve of God. He and the Father are one (John 10:30). The­r­e­fo­re he says: «[…] Come to me, all you who are wea­ry and car­ry hea­vy bur­dens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. I will teach you, for I am hum­ble and kind, and your soul will rest with me» (Matthew 11:28–29 NLB). Coming means belie­ving (Acts 16:31), recei­ving (John 1:12), eating (John 6:35), drin­king (John 7:37), going through a door (John 10:9), ope­ning a door (Reve­la­ti­on 3:20) and accep­ting the unde­ser­ved gift of God, eter­nal life (Romans 6:23). This invi­ta­ti­on is not about accep­ting any par­ti­cu­lar tea­ching, hea­ring words from Jesus, but it is about ente­ring into a per­so­nal fel­low­ship. The other things are a result of this. The list abo­ve shows what «coming» means – it is first of all about fel­low­ship. The object of faith is Jesus Christ – his person!

Let all who are wea­ry come. This refers to all tho­se who labour with phy­si­cal and men­tal effort. It is about all tho­se who seek fel­low­ship with God in vain, who long for God’s king­dom, accep­tance by God and do not find it. Yes, ulti­m­ate­ly it is about all tho­se who set them­sel­ves the wrong goals in life. What are you tired of? From the pres­su­re to suc­ceed at work? Your child­ren? Your flat/house, which is so busy? From see­king reco­gni­ti­on on social media? Per­cep­ti­ons in socie­ty? What is it with you?

«[…] Come unto me, all ye that are wea­ry and hea­vy laden, and I will give you rest» (Matthew 11:28 NLB). When we come, Jesus Christ pro­mi­ses us rest. But two words are par­ti­cu­lar­ly important: «I» and «give»! Rest is a gift that can neither be ear­ned nor acqui­red. It has always been God’s natu­re to give it. «For I will give ple­nty of drink to tho­se who are thirsty and satis­fy tho­se who are weak from hun­ger» (Jeremiah31:25 NLB). This rest is two­fold: on the one hand here on earth, and on the other in the per­fect, eter­nal king­dom of God. This rest does not take away ever­y­thing, but in the midst of suf­fe­ring, Jesus streng­thens us. As descri­bed in the won­derful Psalm 23: «He gives me strength. He shows me the right path for the sake of his name. Even when I walk through the dark val­ley of death, I am not afraid, for you are at my side. Your rod and staff pro­tect and com­fort me. You set a table for me befo­re the eyes of my enemies. You recei­ve me as a guest and anoint my head with oil. You show­er me with bles­sings» (Psalm 23:3–5 NLB).

Taking the yoke upon yours­elf means fol­lo­wing Jesus. To learn from him in a hum­ble and fri­end­ly atmo­sphe­re. This should also be a cha­rac­te­ristic of fol­lo­wers of Jesus: Humi­li­ty and kind­ness. The image of the yoke was a fami­li­ar one. The Pha­ri­sees, the reli­gious lea­ders of the time, spo­ke of the yoke of the Torah. By this they meant the hea­vy bur­den of the Jewish law with all its 248 com­mandments and 365 pro­hi­bi­ti­ons. Jesus» reproach to this group of men was that they impo­sed a hea­vy bur­den on the peo­p­le (Matthew 23:4). But Isra­el was never able to bear this bur­den (Acts 15:10). In con­trast, the yoke of Jesus Christ is roo­ted in mer­cy and love. I like the defi­ni­ti­on of mer­cy that Har­ry Graf gave in a ser­mon: Mer­cy is to have com­pas­si­on when someone is to blame.

The burden is sweet

Jesus ends his state­ment with: «For my yoke fits you per­fect­ly, and the bur­den I lay on you is light» (Matthew 11:30 NLB). Is it real­ly that easy? In other inci­dents, Jesus also says that tho­se who want to fol­low him should give up their fami­ly, their pos­ses­si­ons and even their own lives! The­se calls to lea­ve ever­y­thing behind are often seen as a gre­at loss. But Jesus says «my yoke». We are all under a yoke that crus­hes us. As a rule, it is pre­cis­e­ly tho­se things that we do not want to lose under any cir­cum­s­tances that are the source of moral, phy­si­cal, emo­tio­nal, finan­cial or other bur­dens. A bur­den remains a bur­den. Jesus does not free us from it. But his bur­den is light becau­se it is taken on vol­un­t­a­ri­ly, wil­lingly and in the know­ledge that Jesus never bur­dens us bey­ond our strength. This is prac­ti­cal discipleship.

Howe­ver, the yoke is not an instru­ment of tor­tu­re, but enables and faci­li­ta­tes the ani­mals» labour. It does not allow any obsti­nacy. Taking the yoke upon ones­elf means reso­lut­e­ly doing one’s will, just as we pray in the Lord’s Pray­er: «Thy will be done». This decis­i­on brings peace into our lives. The fact that the bur­den is light does not mean that the­re are no pro­blems. But we are yoked tog­e­ther. «The worst mista­ke a belie­ver can make is to try to car­ry the bur­den of life under a sin­gle harness. God never wan­ted anyo­ne to have to car­ry his bur­den alo­ne. That’s why Jesus only deals with yokes! A yoke is a harness for two, and the Lord hims­elf wants to be one of the two. He wants to share the work of every dif­fi­cult task with us. The secret to vic­to­ry and peace in the Chris­ti­an life is found by dis­car­ding the sin­gle harness of ’self» and accep­ting the libe­ra­ting yoke of the Lord» (John Hen­ry Jowett). The yoke of Jesus Christ is mild. To put it blunt­ly, it could also be said to be sweet. Becau­se the yoke of Jesus (disci­ple­ship) leads to free­dom with God. This is how Mar­tin Luther sum­ma­ri­sed it: «A Chris­ti­an life is a bles­sed and joyful life, and the yoke of Christ is gent­le and sweet» (Mar­tin Luther). The peace that Jesus gives us is his peace. «I am lea­ving you a gift – my peace. And the peace that I give is not like the peace that the world gives. The­r­e­fo­re, do not worry and do not be afraid» (John 14:27 NLB). How do I get the­re? By coming to him, to his per­son and being with him. That’s how I get the rest that gives my heart peace!

Possible questions for the small group

Read the Bible text: Matthew 11:25–30

1. What is making you tired or weig­hing you down at the moment? Are the­re are­as of your life whe­re you feel exhaus­ted – phy­si­cal­ly, emo­tio­nal­ly or spiritually?
2. How do you expe­ri­ence Jesus» invi­ta­ti­on: «Come to me… I will give you rest»? Is this more of a com­fort­ing pro­mi­se for you, a chall­enge or dif­fi­cult to accept?
3. What does it mean for you to have a «child­li­ke dis­po­si­ti­on» – in faith and in ever­y­day life? Which cha­rac­te­ristics of a child (e.g. trust, depen­dence, authen­ti­ci­ty) help you to come clo­ser to God?
4. What do you under­stand by the «yoke of Jesus» – and how does it dif­fer from other bur­dens in your life? Are the­re things that you should per­haps let go of in order to come under the yoke of Jesus?
5. How can you learn from Jesus in your ever­y­day life (Matthew 11:29)? What habits, spi­ri­tu­al exer­ci­s­es or decis­i­ons help you to stay with Jesus?
6. In which moments have you expe­ri­en­ced God’s rest or peace in a very prac­ti­cal way? What has hel­ped you to ent­rust yours­elf to Jesus in such situations?