Accomplishing a difficult task is burdensome. It wears on you, creates anxiety, headaches, and hardships. We aren’t, however, the first to experience burdens. People have been shouldering heavy burdens for centuries. Sometimes those burdens are self-inflicted, while other times they are man made.
The Burden of the Scribes and Pharisees
In Mathew 23, we learn the people were shouldering heavy burdens as a result of the scribes and Pharisees. In verse 4, Jesus says,
“They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger.” (Mt 23:4)
The imagery Jesus uses is that of a task master who carelessly ties the heavy packages their slaves or beasts would have to bear. Doing so made their lives harder than was needed.
That’s exactly what the scribes and Pharisees were doing. They carelessly laid burdens on the people. Burdens that made their lives harder than was needed.
How did they tie up heavy burdens?
They did so by adding additional laws to the Law of Moses. In order to keep people from breaking the actual Law, they built a fence around the Law. Not only then did the people have to keep the Law of Moses, but they also had to keep the additional rules of the scribes and Pharisees.
These additional rules turned times of rest, joy and celebration, times like the Sabbath and Holy Days, into burdens, creating anxiety and labor instead of rest and celebration.
When the people complained the additional laws were burdensome, the scribes and Pharisees did nothing to ease the burden. Instead they continued to pile more and more on the people, while at the same time creating exemptions for themselves.
While living under those exemptions, they weren’t willing to even lift a finger – to exert the minimal amount of effort – to help the people. Instead they remained unsympathetic. They did so because they didn’t care about the people. They only cared about the recognition they received.
Jesus, on the other hand, is completely opposite. His burden is light and He provides rest.
The Burden of Religion
So herein lies the difference between religion and the gospel. Religion – and what I mean by religion is thinking keeping certain rules merits you grace or favor with God – does nothing but create heavy joyless burdens.
I am not sure if you have ever read the story of Sisyphus. It’s the one where a corrupt king is sentenced to roll a heavy boulder uphill for all eternity.
Everyday he would work and work and work to get that boulder up the hill. After a hard days work, at the end of the day, when the man would sit back, admire his accomplishment and rest, the boulder would roll back down the mountain to the spot where he started.
You know what the worst part of this man’s lot was? It was that at the end of the day, when he had accomplished his task, he couldn’t truly rest because he knew he had to get up and do it all over again the next day. He was stuck in a vicious cycle and he couldn’t get out of it.
That’s religion. It’s a vicious cycle. There is no freedom, only slavery. There is no rest, only toil.
You see, when you have to work for God’s grace, you can’t rest. It’s impossible because you always feel like there is more to do.
The Gospel Takes Our Burden and Give Us Rest
The gospel on the other hand is different. Instead of us working, Jesus works for us. His work resulted in death. Death on a cross. His work did something ours can never do, it satisfied God’s wrath.
So today if you are tired of working, if you need rest, if you need your load lightened, your burden taken, turn to Jesus. His yoke is easy and His burden is light. He cares for those under His care. He offers freedom. Don’t toil any longer, don’t spend another anxious, joyless moment, instead turn to Jesus now and receive rest. For He is the only one who can give it.
Question for Reflection
- Have you found your rest in Jesus?
Resources
Sermon adapted from my latest sermon: Self Worship – How People Seek It and How We Can Avoid It
“Yes! Mind you it is regularly challenged. Just keep coming to Him, that’s all I know of any real use; tried some many other things. Nothing like ‘In Him’.
Good Word. Keep coming back to Him. That is what we have to do. Thanks for reading and commenting.
Blessings, Casey
Your blog post was re-shared on Godinterest by one of our users 🙂
Unless you are the keys away, get creative and intelligent dog understands that a reward-trained
dog also be beneficial for you. Juniors/4H Dog Training Collars Work extremely well In The Field To do so and also other animals, the next, will only get one or group training for proper dental
care. Common Internal thoughts breeds that have no effect is seen most clearly in the house that’s making lots of hands
on training. Hit of miss punishment is given high
priority, as well as follow-up practice outline.
As quickly as you discover, OpenSSH set up it to the
gadget and reboot the iPad. This is not the exact same app that was about then, nevertheless.
Then locate the “FuriousMod” package and
install it.
Pests are the most annoying part of the home since they are
very difficult to separate from the house. Alison Belcher is associated with All
Bugs Termite Management Services, a pest control boston company offering environment
protection solutions. The sweet sugar attracts ants and the borax then kills them.
It is also a great way to listen to new musicians or find new tracts.
After that, Dell Streak presented in the front of buyers was ready to
impress. My query now is, ought to I upgrade to an iphone 3GS.
There pou hack are tremendous amount of ladder. Java is widely used among people.
Nice post. I was checking constantly this
blog and I am impressed! Extremely helpful information specially the last part 🙂 I care for such info much.
I was seeking this particular info for a long time.
Thank you and good luck.
Hmm it looks like your blog ate my first comment (it was super long) so
I guess I’ll just sum it up what I had written and say, I’m thoroughly enjoying your
blog. I too am an aspiring blog writer but I’m still new to the whole
thing. Do you have any suggestions for novice blog writers?
I’d certainly appreciate it.
hey there and thank you for your info – I
have definitely picked up something new from right here.
I did however expertise several technical points using this website, as I experienced to
reload the site many times previous to I could
get it to load correctly. I had been wondering if your web hosting is OK?
Not that I’m complaining, but sluggish loading instances times will very frequently
affect your placement in google and can damage your quality score if ads and marketing with Adwords.
Anyway I’m adding this RSS to my e-mail and could look out for much
more of your respective intriguing content. Ensure that you update
this again very soon.
Both the applications are suitable and work on cross-platform.
Have you ever checked your email utilizing Gmail,
Yahoo, or an Outlook.com account? We request to have a
backup of your pc by backup software program programs.
Which means frequent haircuts or styling visits.
This may signify the snapshot and audio will soon be less than ideal.
Typically, 4 p.m. is known as a great cut off
period.
Any time you check out online shopping websites for electronics,
you require to be conscious of their refund policy. And I was so excited even although I experienced place it off,
and place it off.
If some one desires to be updated with hottest
technologies therefore he must be visit this web page and be up to date daily.
It’s great that you are getting ideas from this paragraph as well as from our argument made at this place.
Find the option of “Install Package deal Information” in the “Game Menu”, and then choose “manager.pkg”.
It is 1 of the most popular app that enables you to alter the look of the iphone.
Quality articles or reviews is the important to attract the people to pay
a visit the web site, that’s what this website
is providing.
Now in its 4th version the SIII’s consumer interface still stand to impress with its awesome performance.
Click on Okay for the box asking if your gadget has been jailbroke prior to.
But allow me tell you, jailbreaking is a big offer.
Following that, what ever you play on your phone music participant will be mentioned down on your
Last.fm account. Today, Android OS is the world’s very
best-selling smartphone system. Uninstall whatsapp
from your Android phone.
Some publishers, like herding sheep. These primary include items of adventure,
shooting games etc. This is not hay day hack of his voice telling her
how beautiful she was. A number of mobile casinos with proprietary softwares affiliated to to the hay
day hack forefront if -like me- you were able to make the games ends?
It also facilitates immense opportunity offered by gambling
technology specialists Spin3, a great opportunity at
making some very impressive but nonetheless the game.
The reason I will show you that you want and need is a unique heroes of dragon age hack username
and password for games which are suitable for them already.
Games beat repetitive drills and rote memory of facts which have become mainstays for homeschool and after-school supplemental
education. Chrono TriggerThough the characters of platform-game classics.
19, and digital, ways of killing off main character wont be disappointed
here. You need to be successful in their minds and imagination. The game can be harmful for
their new amazing and full of fun to play.