My Burden is Light

Jesus said, “For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. (Matthew 11:30)

Right now you are probably thinking, “What is he talking about?” I will be happy to explain. God likes having fun too, the question is “Can God have fun with you?” There are only two options, either God is a living God or you are a dead head. Either you are being led of the Spirit as you walk in the light or you are getting bogged down with a dead soul in a world that operates by a dead informational system. Either you are alive unto God or you are dead unto God with all the other dead heads. Living life without God, your gifts and talents may be useful for a time but they won’t produce anything of eternal value. What do I mean you ask? Let’s look at the scripture in context.

At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in thy sight. All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him. Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. (Matthew 11:25-30)

This scripture doesn’t make sense to the natural man who lives for SELF, but it makes perfect sense to the spiritual man who puts his trust in God. Jesus said God is the Heavenly Father and He has hidden this truth from those who think they are wise and prudent, but He has revealed some things to those who walk with God like children and depend on Him like young children. Then He went on to say no human can figure God out but He reveals Himself to us through His Son, Jesus. Then He invites everyone who is tired of being their own gods and building their own kingdoms to come to Him and He will give them rest. Finally, He tells us how. He says, “Take my yoke upon you and learn of me and ye shall find rest for your souls.” The yoke is the burden carrying part of life that happens to everyone who wants to live life without God in order to be their own gods. However, when we learn of Him, we learn that when we take His yoke upon us, He carries our burdens and He heals our wounds like the good Samaritan, and we find rest for our souls. Then Jesus speaks plainly when He says, “For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Jesus did all the work for us and we get to rest. I’ve broken down this passage of scripture into an equation.

1. Take my yoke upon you
2. Learn of me
3. Ye shall find rest for your souls
4. My yoke is easy
5. My burden is light

Five is the number of Grace. If you don’t understand at first, just keep reading and you will understand. Those who walk with the Lord and know how to depend upon Him will enter into a spiritual rest. See if you can spot the reward in this puzzle of Grace.

1. Take my yoke upon you

What was the Yoke Jesus bore? It was the yoke of dependency upon God to fulfill the will of God’s love towards a dying world. Jesus depended upon God for everything. God walked with Jesus and told Him where to go, what to do, what to say, how to respond and how to love with God’s love. That is the yoke we are called to put on as believers in Christ. Jesus never did anything twice because God didn’t want Him to create some kind of a pattern we would follow instead of depending upon God in all our ways. The yoke Jesus is talking about is the burden of obedience so God can flow through us and bless others. The natural man lives by goals but the spiritual man lives by blessings. The natural man works to achieve his goals but the spiritual man works in obedience to God’s will and they see the power of God. Just having a scripture for everything is not being Led of the Spirit. The world says 20% of the work you do is accomplishing the work for 80% of your life. I think you can divide most believers with an 80/20 rule. With many believers, 80% of what they do is of the flesh and 20% of what they do is of the Spirit. That is just my opinion after 40 years of studying the Bible and five Bible School diplomas with my wife. We know that few are truly Led of the Spirit and experience the power of God. Jesus said to the rabbis of His day, “You know not the scriptures nor the power of God.” (Mark 12:24) That is the case with many believers today. They still listen to the voice of the flesh saying to them, “I am the power of my universe. I am all I need to achieve success. I am in the driver’s seat.” Then eternity comes and they find out I am nothing and can do nothing. We can accomplish much by the flesh and even call it spiritual, but the yoke of walking with God and obeying God is the only way to see the power of God.

2. Learn of me

As you learn about Jesus you will learn the following things.
1. Jesus came from Heaven to Earth to show us the life and to tell us the Truth.
2. Jesus walked with God and lived a perfect life fulfilling the Law for us.
3. Jesus never did anything of His own will but only did the will of the Father.
4. Jesus never said a word, did a deed or went anywhere without the direction and approval of the Father.
5. Jesus lived the perfect life, fulfilling the Law of God for us and earned God’s unmerited and undeserved favor towards us..
6. Jesus came to destroy him that had the power of death, which is the devil.
7. Jesus laid down His life into death for us that He might bear away our sins from us and raise us up again by His Spirit.
8. God raised Jesus from the dead for us that we might have fellowship with Him.
9. Walking in fellowship with God is eternal life and walking with God is how we enter into His rest.

3. Ye shall find rest for your souls

How is it that we put on His yoke, He takes our burden and we find rest for our souls. It is the lesson we must learn if we will walk with God. Those that are blind and cannot see God in their lives won’t understand this, but God will open they eyes of your heart if you will believe in Him. God wants everyone to live and to win in life. Without God all our success will have been a failure in the end. God sent Jesus from Heaven to earth to make fellowship with God possible. However, we cannot win in life when we are under the burden of slavery unto sin and bondage unto death. What do I mean “the burden of sin and death?” Don’t you know life without God is death? Without God the human is spiritually dead or half dead. His body is alive but his soul is dead unto God. Living life without God and carrying your own burdens is the lifestyle of death. The way of life is walking with God in dependency upon Him just like Jesus did. Jesus never did anything the same way twice because everything He did was in obedience unto God His Father. That is the yoke Jesus calls us to and it is the only way to find rest for our souls. When we believe in Jesus and we put on Jesus, the Heavenly Father hangs out with us the same way He hung out with Jesus. (Acts 26:18) That is the lesson of the Bible. You don’t have to know everything. All you need to know is that God loves you and He sent Jesus from Heaven to earth to die on the cross to pay the price for us to receive God’s forgiveness of all our sins and give us eternal life. God Hates sin but God loves sinners so Jesus was God’s gift to us. All you need to do is give your heart to God, commit your life to Jesus Christ and from now on, walk with God and trust in God and He will show you what He has planned for you. The Heavenly Father hangs out with His kids.

4. My yoke is easy

The tendency of dependency leads to ascendency. When we are dependent upon God, we are in a position of rest because we are no longer trying to make it happen but we are letting God be God knowing He will make it happen. He will make it happen by making the way before us straight. Just like it is easy for babies to depend upon Mom and Dad, even so it is easier to live life depending upon God as your Heavenly Father than it is to live life depending upon yourself for every morsel of meat. The only thing Jesus did during His whole life was depend upon His Heavenly Father. Jesus was teaching us and demonstrating unto us the way of eternal life. God was able to put the yoke of destroying death for us upon Him. The easy part was just doing what God told Him to do, going where God told Him to go and saying what God told Him to say. That is how easy it can be for us if we will take His yoke upon us. Here comes the good part.

5. My burden is Light.

Jesus is saying His burden isn’t heavy, but it’s light. Jesus is saying His burden is THE LIGHT. He’s talking about walking in the Light with God and not in the darkness of living life without God. When you are walking in the LIGHT, things become light (easy) for you because God is arranging things for you and you are just being blessed as you participate with Him. When we walk in darkness, living life without God, we are on our own. God doesn’t want anyone to perish, but without God we will perish.

For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. John 3:17-21

Here’s the Grace part of this message.

The next few scriptures after John 3:16 puts things into context of what I am talking about. Multitudes have heard “God so loved the world,” but what people haven’t heard enough of is that God never sent Jesus to condemn us but to save us. God didn’t just LOVE us but He also SAVED us. When the people of Israel walked through the Red Sea on dry land, God was loving them and saving them but they still had to walk with God through the Red Sea before their salvation was fully wrought. God stood the waters up and they walked through on dry ground. The ground was dry. It could’ve been wet and muddy, but God made everything easier for them as they walked on dry ground through the Red Sea. However, they still had to do the walking with God through the Red Sea. Jesus Loved us but He also Saved us, however we have to come to God and walk with God before our salvation is fully wrought in us. That means we have to change some of our ways and deeds so we can walk with God.

What the Bible is trying to teach us is how to walk in eternal life because that will save us. If we won’t walk with God in eternal life we will die. Jesus came from Heaven to earth to make eternal life  possible for us and He did that, but we must walk in His provision for it to work. We activate it in our hearts by faith. The Heavenly provision doesn’t just fall on us, but it works through us as we walk with God through Christ in us. We rest and the power of God works, but when we work, the power of God rests. Do you get it?

The context of (John 3:16) is the following verses of (John 3:17-21). It says the way it works is, we believe on the name of the Son of God and come to the light so all our deeds may be wrought in God and not in SELF. What do these phrases mean “to come to the light” and “my burden is light?” What happens when the light shines? All darkness goes away and things can be clearly seen. What God is talking about is the human coming to the place where he does everything in the sight of God and nothing is hidden in the dark. To come to the light and to walk in the light is the same as coming to God and walking with God and we aren’t hiding anything from God and doing anything to deceive ourselves. When the Bible talks about the darkness it is talking about the things that are hidden by deception. Darkness is deception. Light is Truth. Do you get it?

When the Bible talks about the light, it is talking about everything being done in the sight of God with His permission, His instruction, His correction, His approval, His guidance and His participation. God created us to have fellowship with Him, to know Him and to walk with Him but in the Garden of Eden, we were all separated from God in Adam and every soul born of Adam has inherited Adam’s spiritual nature of living life without God in darkness. We were born spiritually dead and that is why we physically die. When we come back to God we come to the light and when we depend upon God our only burden is light. The way of life is in the light and the way of death is in the darkness. When We allow God to correct us and instruct us, we are walking in the light. When we confess our sins to God we are walking in the light. We are no longer hiding anything in the dark or deceiving ourselves with darkness. We are taking His yoke upon us and His burden for us is that we walk in the light with Him.

This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. (1 John 1:5-10)

God created us for fellowship with Him and He wants fellowship with us. That is the nature of His divine love. He has promised to meet all our needs and care for us, even in this dark world. We don’t have to plot and scheme our lives in order to make it. All we have to do is learn of Him, come to Him, and walk with Him and if we do, we will see clearly in the light and we shall have joy unspeakable, full of glory the Bible says. When we walk in the light with God, we have fellowship with Him. The Bible says, If we say we know God and we still walk in darkness, we are lying to ourselves and not doing the truth. If we don’t think we have any sin in us, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not IN US. When God corrects us and we say we didn’t sin, we make God a liar and clearly His word isn’t IN US. If we walk in the light with Him as He is in the light, we have fellowship with HIM and that is when the blood of Jesus is activated to cleanse us from all sin. When we confess unto God that we have sinned, that is when the blood of Jesus is activated to cleanse us from all sin.

And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. (John 3:17-21)

The Bible says Jesus didn’t come to condemn us but to save us from the powers of death, but the one thing that condemns us before God is this, that light came into the world and we loved darkness rather than light, our evil deeds proving that to be the case. Those that hate the light won’t come to the light unless they let God reprove them of their evil deeds, but everyone that comes to the light makes it manifest that everything they are doing is being done in the sight of God. So, when you come to God, walk with God, have fellowship with God and do all things in the sight of God the way Jesus did, you are walking in the light and your only burden is walking in the light. Jesus said, “My yoke is easy and my burden is Light.” Again, what is His yoke, walking in obedient fellowship with God? What is His burden, that everything you do is being done in God’s sight? When God opens a new door for you, then you are willing to walk through it and when God closes a door you are willing to shut the door behind you. As you walk with God the things He has appointed for you will be exceedingly abundantly above all you can ask or think or imagine, the Bible says. God wants to do it all for you but it may take you a lifetime to learn how to stop being your own god and depend upon Him. The Bible says “For we walk by Faith, not by Sight.” (2 Corinthians 5:7) All our lives we’ve been trained to live by our five senses, but God teaches us through the Bible how to be Led of the Spirit through Christ in us.

When I first met Bonnie in Bible School, I noticed from the very beginning she believed God was with her and she had chosen not to do anything without God. This is not an automatic habit. This is a habit you must train yourself to walk in and it takes many years of practice to get good at because we are born with the tendency to do everything without God. She said the first thing she said to God after she was born again was, “God I’m not doing anything without you. If you want me to do anything, you must make it clear to me or I won’t do it.” After many years of her dependency this habit began to show up as “God was with her.” She has been misunderstood by many because of that tendency in her. I noticed God would show up for her and do things for her and it would just boggle my mind because it seemed like she was always are the right place at the right time. I would think to myself, how is this possible? That would never have happened if she wouldn’t have been there at that exact moment. With Bonnie’s example,  I began to learn to “acknowledge Him in all my ways,” as the Bible says. We’d go somewhere and the next thing I know is we would be shaking our heads and saying out loud, “Thank you God for blessing Steven and Bonnie Moore.” After many years I am still learning how to recognize God’s participation in my affairs. Bonnie has become an expert at it and she teaches it well. We had been taught about the inward witness and the inward voice, but never really taught how to watch God’s outward providence, but that is how God worked in the Old Testament, and really it is the same in the New Testament in our modern day. God actively walks with His people and blesses them and delivers them out of trouble. You can see God’s participation in your life in your natural affairs if you look for God and truly depend upon Him.

But though he had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on him: That the saying of Esaias the prophet might be fulfilled, which he spake, Lord, who hath believed our report? and to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed? Therefore they could not believe, because that Esaias said again, He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart; that they should not see with their eyes, nor understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them. These things said Esaias, when he saw his glory, and spake of him. (John 12:37)

Jesus talked about how people can see with their eyes and still be blind and also how they can hear with their ears and still be deaf unless they understand with their hearts and be converted and then He would be able to Heal them. What Jesus is talking about is that our hearts have spiritual ears and eyes and until we come to God with our hearts we will remain spiritually unable to hear or see God in our lives. Even though God is with us and does things for us, we will not know it is Him. We will just think it was a hunch and continue being deaf, dumb, blind and dishonest before God and unfit for Heaven. We will just be lost in our deceptions and die in our sins. God doesn’t want that. God wants everyone to live and to win in life and He wants everyone to come to Heaven, but many will be lost, choosing the “be your own god lifestyle” instead. the SIN program is the greatest religion ever invented by Satan. God has made provision for you. Learn of Jesus, take His yoke upon you and you shall find rest for your souls. Jesus will open your ears and your eyes and heal your heart and you shall walk with God in faith and leap for joy like all of the heroes of the Bible did.

So my last word is this. As my wife once said, “That’s all there is, there ain’t no more so close the book and get out the door, I will say something similar. Do the Truth and walk in the Light and God will give you spiritual sight. If you choose to walk in the light, your burden will become light, God will join you and He will show you Great and Mighty things you do not know. “That’s all there is, there ain’t no more so close the book and get out the door.” As you get going, God will start showing.

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Books by Steven and Bonnie Moore
You Can Be A Son, Secret of Eternity
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Death and Life, Secret of the Bible

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