Rest

Come to me all who are weary and burdened and I will give your rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Matthew 11:28-30

Rest.

Such a simple word with a big meaning. I have been thinking a lot about “rest” in the last few days. I think it is because I do not feel very rested. Take at look at the definitions I found…

 the refreshing quiet or repose of sleep.

 relief or freedom, esp. from anything that wearies, troubles, or disturbs.

 mental or spiritual calm; tranquillity.

 to refresh oneself, as by sleeping, lying down, or relaxing.

 to relieve weariness by cessation of exertion or labor.

 to be at ease; have tranquillity or peace.

I do not know about you, but I am having a hard time finding rest for my soul. Most of the time I feel like I am carrying around the weight of the world…and I am longing for rest. The thought of tranquility and peace is so foreign when I can’t even seem to get a good night sleep. I long for quiet moments sitting by a peaceful stream, reading my Bible and sipping coffee. But how can you find tranquility and rest in the midst of our daily lives? Our days are filled with a thousand tasks. Our to-do list is so long that we are lucky in a day to complete half, and then it makes a longer list for the next day. And those are just the things that we know about…what about the unexpected, the things that pop up and throw our daily schedule out the window.

The car breaks down and we have kids to get to school and meetings to attend

The kids come down with the stomach bug in the middle of the night, now there is twice as much laundry and half as much sleep

Electricity bill has tripled…there went the “extra” money for the month

You never know what is going to be around the next corner or in the next phone call. These things are making it impossible to find the rest that our bodies and spirits so desperately need. Is there any hope?

The answer is in the verses in Matthew…Jesus clearly tells us what to do.

The first step – Come – He says “Come to me all who are weary.” It is that simple. We must come to Him. Now I know that we al came to Him when we came for our salvation, but I think that this is more of a daily time…Come to Him everyday. Seek His face. Come to rest in His presence. Sit at His feet. Be still, if even for a moment.

The next step – Take – “Take my yoke upon you.” Jesust wants us to take HIS yoke, His burdens, His plans upon ourselves. In order to take His, we have to lay ours down. You can’t have two sets of plans. You can’t see the world two ways. You can’t have two sets of priorities. In order to take on HIS way, we must lay down our way.

The Third step – Learn “Learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart.” We have to take time to learn from Jesus about resting and seeing the world the way He sees the world. We need to care about the thing He cares about. We need to learn His heart. We may find that things that take up our time may not be so important.

If we can do those steps, then Jesus says we WILL find rest for our weary souls. He longs for us to stop striving in our own power and take on his burdens because they are light…His way is easy…

Look at those verses in Matthew from the Message…
“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly."
I like where it says, “Keep company with me.” I think that sums it up pretty well. We need to spend time everyday getting to know Jesus and learning to see the world the way He sees it, to make His priorities, our priorities. When we do that our prospective will begin to change and we can find rest for our far too weary souls.