For My yoke is easy and My burden is light

At that time Jesus answered and said, "I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and have revealed them to babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight. All things have been delivered to me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. Come to Me, all you 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. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."

- Matthew 11:25-30

In yesterday's reading, Jesus continued to upbraid the people -- especially the leadership -- for their rejection and criticism of both Himself and John the Baptist. He compared them to children sitting in the marketplace, playing an ancient game, in which one group of children would play or sing for dance or lamentation, and the other group would have to respond properly. Their criticism of John, the ascetic, and their criticism of Jesus, who ate and drank and dined with sinners, was equal for both, disparaging first one way and then the other -- as if the crowds called the tune. But Wisdom is justified by her children, her works. The fruit of both John and Jesus' ministries is good. Next, Jesus condemned the cities of Galilee in which His mighty works, preaching and healing, have been rejected. In Gentile cities of Tyre and Sidon, He said, they would be sitting in repentance in response. He compared Capernaum, His ministry headquarters, unfavorably even to Sodom, because Sodom did not have such revelation within itself to look to.

At that time Jesus answered and said, "I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and have revealed them to babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight." John the Baptist is in prison, the tide is turning also against Jesus with opposition from the leadership, and the crowds are fickle -- even those in the Galilean cities of His ministry fail to turn to Him. But here, Jesus turns to the Father with thanks for those who have responded, and the thanks goes even deeper than a simple gratitude for His followers. It is gratitude for the way in which the Father has revealed Him to hearts who can hear and see. They are the hearts of "babes," and not the "wise and prudent." There are all sorts of eloquent speakers, those skilled in rhetoric, in the schools of famous rabbis, but Jesus' followers are not these. My study bible points out: "In Jesus' prayer of thanksgiving, the Father alone is the source of knowledge, and He alone opens the hearts of men to receive it. He communicates in a hidden way to responsive hearts. The paradox: the veiled reality of the Kingdom which Jesus reveals is seen by babes, simple fishermen, and sinners, not the wise and prudent, the Pharisees, Sadducees and scribes."

"All things have been delivered to me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him." Everything, clearly, works through the Father. At some point, all is down to the deepest and highest Source of all things. The Father is at work in our very hearts, even of the "babes." But the revelation, the deliverance of "all things," and all knowledge is in the hand of the Father, and the Son to whom the Father has delivered all things. Thus, anyone who knows the Father is "the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him." It is a clear statement of relationship of Father, Son and human beings who can receive. My study bible says this is another clear statement about the deity of Christ, the Son of the Father, who knows the Father and reveals Him. It says, "The Son reveals only as much as we have the capacity to receive."

"Come to Me, all you 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. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light." I'm reading the first part of Genesis for a class, and it strikes me here that the power of the Seventh Day of rest is at work in Christ, and in His words. Rest is not merely a freedom from labor; it is rather a kind of couch of love, at work within us, feeding us, giving us the spiritual nourishment we need for both body and soul, for all things in our lives. Thus, we can take -- in His rest -- Christ's yoke and learn, and "find rest for our souls." My study bible points out Jesus' yoke is submission to the Kingdom of God. . . . "In Him the soul is refreshed and sees that the Lord is gracious." It adds, "A sign of Jesus' lordship is His meekness -- He is gentle and lowly. King David emphasized that the Lord would teach His ways to the meek. Meekness is the mother of love, the foundation of discernment and the forerunner of all humility. Jesus finds rest in the hearts of the meek, while the turbulent spirit is home to the devil." But, in a sense, what Jesus points out here is the capacity to learn that is in His followers, as well as His own meekness. This is a Lordship that is not abusive and oppressive: rather it is in the spirit of humility and service and love that the Lord comes to us, and from which His yoke is derived and placed upon those who will take it on. In Greek, the word for "light" is perhaps better translated "worthy" or "good." It is all worthwhile to take on, a gift. And this is what we are to learn from His words.

Jesus' yoke, then, is His loving shepherding of those who are His sheep. In the Greek, the words for "gentle and lowly in heart" teach us about a kind of humility, not those who, in words He will use elsewhere, "Lord it over them." Jesus' teaching is with kindness, infinite understanding, humility, and love. To be "lowly in heart" is somewhat similar to what it is to be "poor in spirit." Ultimately, we learn of His great empathy, His compassion. No matter what it is that our cross to bear brings us in the world and in our lives, His yoke is that of a loving brother, a confidant, a mother. He embodies the love that teaches one to love others as oneself. Let us consider, then, the things that can keep us from an experience of that yoke, that love, that teaching that He has for those who respond. An arrogant heart, one puffed up with itself, one who cannot learn, a heart into which He cannot enter. The "wise and prudent" may keep Him out, while the meek allow Him in. Indeed, all those things we think we know, that make us important with material power, just might be the burdens we need to drop in order to find His rest, and the refreshment in it. Another facet of the meaning for "evil" in the Greek is toil, and the burdensome pain associated with it. What do you hang onto that keeps Him from your heart? That keeps you from hearing His knock? From taking on His yoke of guidance, and the valuable burden He gives? Even so, we thank the Father for all the ways in which He is revealed to us, in which His love works in us, in which we can rest in Him.