Journal Entry // January 19, 2022
For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
Matthew 11:30 ESV
My feelings are a curious part of me. How I perceive and interpret the world around me is influenced by my feelings and my emotions. The reality of truth is easily distorted through the lens of my feelings or at least how I think I’m feeling. This verse is one that trips me up along the path. This verse is simple and easy to understand. This statement from Jesus is there to bring me comfort and to draw me into his very heart. Yet, I don’t always feel the truth of this statement.
My feelings want to interpret this easy yoke and light burden as a simple carefree life. I want to look around and see the world with it’s hard yoke and heavy burden. But I don’t. As I look at the world around me, my feelings interprete my life as difficult and heavy. The opposite of what resting in Christ should be.
I want my life to be worry free. I want to see adversity and troubles banished from my life. I want to walk without a care in the world. I want the world to center around me. I take this promise from Christ and twist it around to match my own selfish desires. I want easy and light to provide laziness and apathy.
Jesus wants me to lay aside my self-righteousness. When I come to him with a humble heart, Jesus brings rest and comfort. There is a yoke. It’s easy to be sure, but there is still a yoke. Obedience is still required. Holiness is to still be pursued. But the burden is light. The burden of faith and trust and patience.
So I live moment by moment in the heart of Christ. I center myself upon Christ. All the ancillary things of life are off in their proper place. I focus all my heart, soul, mind, and strength upon loving Jesus alone. Everything else fades in comparison. All of my life being consumed by Jesus. My feelings, my emotions, my desires, my pursuits, my joy, my happiness, my possessions, my standing before others, my time, my talents, my treasure, my family, my goals, my everything. All of this is laid before Jesus and consumed by my savior and redeemer.
An easy yoke and a light burden… What a beautiful picture of life in Christ. O Lord, please change my heart and mind to come humbled before you. To cast away from my heart everything that is not of you. That you will cleanse me of all that is dishonorable and make me a vessel of honorable use to serve you faithfully with a humble heart and spirit.