From Restless to True Rest

“Don’t burn the candle at both ends,” my father would tell me often while I was in college. I tended to say “yes” to every opportunity that came my way. I can recount specific times where I would go straight from class to work, to church, to dinner with friends, to cramming for an exam, to getting three hours of sleep, to repeating it all again. Whew! Are you as exhausted reading that as I am just typing it? I would wind up feeling burnt-out by the end of it all, and inevitably stressed out and burdened in response to my schedule.
 
There came a day and time where all my busyness and trying came to a screeching halt, because I got very sick during my fourth year of college. I developed a severe case of mono that lasted for months. My once-busy schedule all of a sudden disappeared and my sole focus was on resting. However, the first month of my “rest” felt even more depleting as I was overcome by sickness and worry. I was shocked that what should have been a relaxing change of pace wasn’t any different because I was still striving in my own strength. It wasn’t until I invited Jesus into my rest that I finally started to feel the burden lift and my yoke lighten.
 
It is important for each of us to learn to rest, but rest on its own can sometimes leave us restless. It is not enough to just sit and be; we must learn to rest and abide in Christ.
 
In Matthew 11 Jesus speaks directly to all of us who have ever felt this way when He says “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.” (vv. 28-30, NLT)
 
This yoke Jesus speaks of was, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, attached as a crosspiece to the necks of two animals, then attached to the plow they were intended to pull. When they worked together, it lessened the load and made the burden light. When Jesus says to “take His yoke upon us” what He means is that He carries and shoulders the burden of our load with us. We do not have to pull alone. He is our strength.
 
We are not promised that the load will disappear, but that Jesus will carry it with us. Jesus Himself told us: “Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33) We can be confident that when we exchange our striving and tireless trying for His strength, our load will become light. No self-help book, meditation routine, stress hack, dietary supplement, or relationship can lift and ease our burdens. Only Jesus. He forever is and will always be the only One who can change our load and give us true rest.
 
Do you need this kind of beautiful exchange today, friend? If so, there is no better time than now to run to Jesus, repent of your striving, and take His yoke upon you. In Christ alone do we truly and always find the rest we so desperately need. 

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 Scripture is quoted from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.