Rest For The Weary (Matthew 11)
Then, we get to the story of Cain and Able, and things are elevated. After Cain fails to give an acceptable sacrifice, he gets upset. God encourages Cain and tells him that he can do better. But Cain is restless because he failed. He gets angry with his brother and kills him thinking that will solve his problem. If there is no one to compare him to, he will easily succeed at being the greatest. But, once again, God punishes evil. He curses Cain and tells him that he will be a “fugitive and a wanderer all of his days.” The NIV actually says he will be restless.
As we move throughout the Bible, we find story after story of men and women who become restless as God tries to give them rest. They sin, and they lose the rest that God wants to give them. We see this with Jacob and his sons, all of Israel as they are about to enter the promised land, all of Israel after they enter the promised land. But God keeps coming back, and he keeps offering rest if they will repent and trust in God. God starts restoring the rest when they repent.
The problem comes when Israel doesn’t care about that rest.
Jeremiah 6:16--21 (ESV) --- 16 Thus says the Lord: “Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’ 17 I set watchmen over you, saying, ‘Pay attention to the sound of the trumpet!’ But they said, ‘We will not pay attention.’ 18 Therefore hear, O nations, and know, O congregation, what will happen to them. 19 Hear, O earth; behold, I am bringing disaster upon this people, the fruit of their devices, because they have not paid attention to my words; and as for my law, they have rejected it. 20 What use to me is frankincense that comes from Sheba, or sweet cane from a distant land? Your burnt offerings are not acceptable, nor your sacrifices pleasing to me. 21 Therefore thus says the Lord: ‘Behold, I will lay before this people stumbling blocks against which they shall stumble; fathers and sons together, neighbor and friend shall perish.’ ”
When we read in Ezekiel and Jeremiah about Israel and Judah, God offers rest, but they don’t want his rest. They are looking for rest by trusting in other nations and by trusting in themselves. God casts them out, but he promises to bring them back and give them a rest that will never be taken away.
Promises
In Micah 4, we read about a time when God would restore the nation of Israel and give it rest. It gives us a vivid picture.
Micah 4:1--5 (ESV) --- 1 It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and it shall be lifted up above the hills; and peoples shall flow to it, 2 and many nations shall come, and say: “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.” For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. 3 He shall judge between many peoples, and shall decide disputes for strong nations far away; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore; 4 but they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree, and no one shall make them afraid, for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken. 5 For all the peoples walk each in the name of its god, but we will walk in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever.
Notice that the people don’t need swords or spears to fight anymore. They walk in the name of the Lord, their God forever and ever. These people are living on the highest mountain. They live in the greatest kingdom, and they need more tools to gather all the blessings that God is showering upon them. This is a picture of peace and prosperity forever. There will be no end to their rest.
Jeremiah 31:2--3 (ESV) --- 2 Thus says the Lord: “The people who survived the sword found grace in the wilderness; when Israel sought for rest, 3 the Lord appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.
Zephaniah 3 tells us that God will remove all of the proud and arrogant people, make sure that those who are humble can live in peace, and give his sheep a nice field to lay down in. God wants to give his people praise and prosperity among the nations. Amos 9 and Zechariah 14 tell us that God will destroy all of the enemies of his people. He will bring plagues upon them as he did in Egypt.
Ezekiel 34:13--16 (ESV) --- 13 And I will bring them out from the peoples and gather them from the countries, and will bring them into their own land. And I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, by the ravines, and in all the inhabited places of the country. 14 I will feed them with good pasture, and on the mountain heights of Israel shall be their grazing land. There they shall lie down in good grazing land, and on rich pasture they shall feed on the mountains of Israel. 15 I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep, and I myself will make them lie down, declares the Lord God. 16 I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak, and the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them in justice.
Here we again see the imagery of God providing rest to his people like a Shepherd giving his sheep a field to lie down in. Sheep won’t lay down if they feel threatened. They need to feel secure to relax. That’s what God wants to do for his people.
Fulfillment
When we come to the New Testament, it is evident that everyone is expecting that to happen. They want Rome to be destroyed and Israel to be established as the greatest nation. They want the land to flow again with milk and honey, as we have seen in studying other promises. But they want to live without fear of any nation. They want to experience the complete and total rest that God promises to give to them.
What’s going on? Is God failing to fulfill his promise? Certainly not. We need to understand that no eternal rest is possible because this earth is not eternal. Eternal rest only happens in heaven. That is the location of this promised rest.
Acts 7:49 (ESV) --- 49 “ ‘Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me, says the Lord, or what is the place of my rest?
There is an eternal place of rest in heaven where God sits on his throne, having completed his work through Christ. That rest is available for us!
Hebrews 4:9--11 (ESV) --- 9 So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, 10 for whoever has entered God’s rest has also rested from his works as God did from his. 11 Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience.
Revelation 14:13 (ESV) --- 13 And I heard a voice from heaven saying, “Write this: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.” “Blessed indeed,” says the Spirit, “that they may rest from their labors, for their deeds follow them!”
Revelation 22:1--5 (ESV) --- 1 Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb 2 through the middle of the street of the city; also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. 3 No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him. 4 They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. 5 And night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever.
No Physical Rest Yet
When John the baptist comes onto the scene, he says, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand.” In other words, it’s close to happening. Then he points to Jesus as the Messiah, saying, "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world." But Jesus is not even close to a military leader. If the Israelites want a man who will conquer Rome, Jesus doesn’t seem like he fits the bill.
Later on, John was imprisoned. Maybe he expects Jesus to come and save him from prison. I don’t know, but he is disappointed with Jesus's progress in building the kingdom. He wants to know if Jesus is the one who was promised or if they should look for another. John wants a Messiah that is going to do what those promises say. He wants a king who will kill and remove all wicked people so that we don’t have to suffer for doing good anymore.
What’s interesting to me is that Jesus doesn’t tell John’s disciples to wait until after he is beheaded. Then, he will see the judgment. Instead, Jesus says, “Tell John what you hear and see.” Jesus is healing the blind, lame, lepers, and deaf and raising the dead. Jesus is preaching good news to the poor. Somehow, this news of Jesus’ healing and compassion sends the message that he is the Messiah.
After that, he tells the people that John is the greatest man born of women. Then, he says the people have refused to listen to John, they have refused to listen to Jesus, and judgment is coming on all who do not repent. But then, he says something fascinating.
Matthew 11:25--30 (ESV) --- 25 At that time Jesus declared, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; 26 yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. 27 All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. 28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 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. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
Spiritual Rest
In this Chapter, Jesus reveals that his first step is not to judge and destroy. He will do that. He even says in this text that all things have been handed over to him by God, but he wants to save, not destroy. He wants to turn people's hearts to him and give them rest. Notice the way he talks about rest. He says, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden.” This sounds like a fulfillment of the Old Testament promises. Jesus is going to give rest from labor. But he goes further and says, “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.” This doesn’t sound like rest. He is telling them to take a yoke upon them. We don’t want to have any yoke. That’s not rest to us. But, perhaps even more troubling to us, as we go through this text, it becomes evident that this is not about physical rest. This is a promise for spiritual rest.
When we look at the Old Testament promises for physical rest, we don’t expect Jesus to come in and offer spiritual rest. What is spiritual rest? What does it look like to labor and carry a heavy load in a spiritual sense? Jesus came to make that spiritual burden manageable. We, of all people, should know a thing or two about a spiritual burden. In our society, we don’t have to worry about the physical. We can do very little physical work and enjoy a luxurious life in our digital and machinery age. But we have a spiritual burden that is too much to carry.
How Do We Find Spiritual Rest?
Think of all the spiritual burdens that people bear. We all feel spiritual burdens to be happy, content, good enough, fulfill some purpose, have some identity, and be forgiven of sin. These burdens are heavy. He uses a yoke because that is what a beast of burden wears to join himself to another and put the load on his back instead of tying it around his throat. How do we typically handle those burdens? In our society, they tell us not to carry them. They tell us to take off the yoke, give up on morals, and feel no shame or guilt. That doesn’t work because we end up feeling empty and guilty anyways. We know deep down that the burden is there. We will be held accountable for the evil we have done.
The truth is that we all try to carry this burden. We put on our own yoke, and we try to join ourselves to different things to pull the load to the finish line and find rest. We join ourselves to a spouse because that meets some of our needs. But often, that places an additional burden on one of the two of us instead of removing our burden. Sometimes we yoke ourselves to a career, and we think it will bring us purpose, and the money from it will bring happiness and contentment. Have you ever felt like it’s not enough? Even if we are relatively successful in our career, it’s not a magic bullet. Sometimes we yoke ourselves to a belief or a system of being good enough. One of two things happens when we do this. Either we will ignore our failure, as I mentioned earlier, or we will beat ourselves to death because we never measure up. In both circumstances, we will be restless and lost in our sins. We cannot carry our yoke. There is nothing other than Christ that can help us carry this load. It’s just getting heavier every day.
What Christ Offers
Jesus offers to let us join him and take his yoke. We don’t like that idea because it means we don’t have control, but he promises that all who come to him and take his yoke will find the load much more manageable. He says that the yoke he offers doesn’t result in burnout or spiritual restlessness. It results in rest for our souls.
What does it mean to wear his yoke? He tells us that wearing his yoke means learning from him because he is gentle and lowly in heart. Earlier in this text, he thanks God for revealing the truth to little children and not being wise and understanding. Do we approach Jesus, telling him the way things work? That’s so easy to do. If we are following Jesus and still feeling spiritually restless, maybe this is the problem. Have we bought into all of the promises from the world again? They say, “Take your own yoke back and join yourself to this career, this belief system, this spouse, or this purpose. If you just do it this way, you can have control again and find rest” It’s not true.
Do we have Jesus’ yoke around our necks? Are we learning from him or telling him how things have to be? Little children are constantly looking up at their parents to be held. They know they are helpless. They are constantly learning from them and wanting to be like them. They want to walk like them and talk like them, and they eventually become the spitting image of their parents in many ways. Jesus teaches us to be gentle and lowly in heart. He teaches us to stop forcing things to go our way. We are restless because we think things have to match some ideal life in our minds. Jesus doesn’t try to force the world to match his ideal. He serves others with gentleness and humility. He leads the way to spiritual rest by loving each individual and giving them his example.
Why is it so hard to wear that yoke? Why is it so hard for us to trust that gentleness and humility will result in spiritual rest? He offers us happiness, contentment, purpose, identity, and forgiveness. He makes us good enough to enter into a heavenly home with physical rest from all our labors. We resist this yoke over and over again. Why? Because we want physical rest now, and we believe that there is an easier or funner way to get spiritual rest. Don’t be deceived.
Conclusion
If we were living for God and yoked to Jesus, we have nothing to fear. Our souls can rest in his grace and mercy. We don’t have to find rest in our success, spouses, children, or possessions. We can be content in all of those things, knowing that when things are going well or poorly, God is still our heavenly Father, and Jesus can still provide an eternal home for us.
There is rest and security in all of God’s promises. Satan wants to burden us with a focus on temporary things on earth, but Jesus wants us to let go of the burdens and set our eyes on the things above. Joining ourselves to him and letting him lead us will provide what our souls desire.