“THE YOKE’S ON YOU”

MATTHEW 11:16-30

16  "But to what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another,

17  'We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.'

18  For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, 'He has a demon';

19  the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, 'Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!' Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds."

20  Then he began to reproach the cities in which most of his deeds of power had been done, because they did not repent.

21  "Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the deeds of power done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.

22  But I tell you, on the day of judgment it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon than for you.

23  And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? No, you will be brought down to Hades. For if the deeds of power done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day.

24  But I tell you that on the day of judgment it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom than for you."

25  At that time Jesus said, "I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants;

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 you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.

29  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.

30  For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

I’m afraid Jesus wouldn’t last very long these days. That’s because he talked a lot about our need to repent. Now, that word says you did something wrong.  It says something about you just isn’t good enough and that’s a no-no these days.  You’re not supposed to say anything that could hurt someone’s feelings.  It’s the reason we have politically correct speech.  It’s the reason why teachers aren’t supposed to use red pens when they correct their papers. You see, red is associated with failure and that could be damaging to a child’s self-esteem.

So, you have to be careful what you say and do these days. A father found that out one day when his son came home from school with his report card. The father didn’t know what to think when he read a note on the card from the teacher.  So, he called the teacher up and asked her about it. “I don’t understand what you mean when you say he’s very creative in the use of visual aides.”  “Oh,” the teacher said cautiously, “That means he copies the answer off the paper of the kid sitting next to him.”

That’s a word that you can’t get around if you’re serious about following Jesus. Repent. You have to take a good hard look at yourself from time to time.  In self-help groups it’s the challenge of taking a thorough moral inventory.  Now we’re not talking about the silly little things that you do from time to time. We’re not talking about the innocent mistakes that you make from time to time.  A man found himself on the receiving end of one of those innocent mistakes one day.  It happened while he was driving home from work. He saw these two boys selling Kool-Aid along the side of the road.  The sign said, “Kool-Aid 10¢.”  So, he pulled over to the curb.  In no time at all one of the boys came over and asked if he wanted strawberry or grape Kool-Aid. The man asked for grape and then gave the boy a quarter. The boy in turn gave the man a Dixie cup full of Kool-Aid and then went back to the stand to get him his change.  When the boy returned, he gave the man his change and then asked if he had finished drinking the Kool-Aid. “Just about,” the man said.  “Why?” “Because,” the boy replied, “that’s the only cup we’ve got and we need it to stay in business.”

Some time ago, a motivational speaker started his seminar by holding up a $20 bill.  “Who would like this $20 bill?” he asked. Everyone in the room raised their hand.  The speaker continued. “I am going to give this $20 bill to one of you,” he said, “but first I need to do something.” At that point he crumpled the bill up, dropped it on the floor and stepped on it with his shoe. He ground the bill around a little and then asked, “Who still wants this $20 bill?”  Once again, everyone raised their hand. “My friends,” he said “you have all learned a very valuable lesson. No matter what I did to this bill, you still wanted it because it did not decrease in value. It was still worth $20. Many times in our lives, we are dropped, crumpled and ground into the dirt by the decisions that we make and the circumstances that come our way. We feel as though we are worthless. But no matter what has happened or what will happen, you will never lose your value in God’s eyes.”

Jesus talked about repenting because he cares about you.  That’s the first thing you need to remember. The second thing you need to remember is that Jesus talked about repenting because he knows you can change. Jesus wouldn’t tell you to do something that he knows you can’t do.

Recently I came across a story about a man in Australia who knew that you can change.  The man was known as Mr. Eternity.  Early on in life he fell into the clutches of alcoholism and lived the life of a derelict.  All that changed though when he was literally “saved” with the help of a rescue mission.  Shortly after his conversion, the man heard a sermon entitled “Echoes of Eternity.”  He was so captivated by the importance of the word “eternity” that he began to use his free time to spread the one-word message.  Even though he could scarcely write his own name he said he felt a “divine urge to write this word.”  So, every morning for over thirty years he got up very early in the morning and wrote the word “eternity” in chalk 50 times on the sidewalks all over Sydney.  When he died the morning newspaper carried a story about this unique man who changed, who went from being a derelict to being an evangelist; who made people think about Christ and what he did by writing the word eternity over half a million times.

Jesus talked about repenting because he cares about you.  He also talked about repenting because he knows you can change. The third thing you need to remember when it comes to repenting is you don’t have to do it alone.  In fact, you can’t do it alone.  That’s why the words that Jesus spoke after he got done with all of that woe are so important.  The words are very comforting.  “Come to me,” Jesus said, “all you that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you 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.”

The image you have here is one that is easier to understand if you’re a farmer.  When there’s a difficult task at hand the farmer always yokes two of his horses together.  It isn’t just any two horses though. It’s always an experienced horse with an inexperienced horse; a horse that knows what it’s doing with a horse that doesn’t know what it’s doing.  What this means is that Jesus isn’t going to put that yoke on you and then get the whip out to make you work harder.  Jesus is going to get into that yoke with you; you on one side and him on the other.  That’s why his yoke is easy and his burden is light.  It’s easy and light because he’s going to work with you to get you going in the right direction.  He’s going to pull with you to help you change the things about yourself that need to be changed.  It’s always a team effort which will lead you to success.

One day a father was out in his back yard working with his six-year-old son.  The father asked the son to pick up all the rocks in one particular corner of the yard while he worked on the other side of the yard.  After a while the father noticed his son struggling to pull a huge rock out of the ground.  The son wasn’t that big himself. So, he struggled and struggled.  Finally, the son gave up. “I can’t do it,” he said. “Did you use all of your strength?” the father asked.  “Yes sir,” the son replied.  “I used every ounce of strength that I have.”  “No, you didn’t,” the father said with a smile. “You didn’t ask me to help.”  At that point the father walked over and the two of them pulled the big rock out of the dirt.

My friends like it or not the yoke is on you. The glad news is that you’re never in that yoke alone.  Amen

Rev. Dr. Richard A. Hughes

July 3, 2005