Easy Does It

Sermon on Matthew 11:25-30

Title:  Easy Does It

Theme:  Christ lightens the burden of the law

Goal: to motivate Christians to follow Christ’s lightened burden

Need:  Many seek to add more rules and regulations to Christ’s lightened burden.

Outline:

1. Introduction about added rules and regulations.
2. The truth has been hidden from the wise and understanding
3. The truth is offered to whoever Christ chooses
4. The truth is that Christ’s yoke is not much of a burden at all.
5. Conclusion:  Follow Christ.  Endure his lightened burden

Sermon in Oral Style:

Congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ,

          Why are Canadians so crazy about hockey?  I figured from my Canadian friends at seminary that it was because Canada was cold all the time and there was nothing better to do than slap around on the ice.  I found out after I live up here for a little while that hockey was created in Canada.

          And I guess there is some debate over where the first game was played.  Either Nova Scotia, Montreal, or Kingston.  Those original games would have been incredible to watch.  Probably wouldn’t have been all that interesting to watch either.  It wasn’t like they were trying to create a national pastime and billion dollar leagues.  Especially the first game on the McGill campus, was just some good clean fun for kids on campus.  Of course it grew into much more than that.

          The very first written rules for hockey were so simple.  McGill’s first games apparently had seven rules total.  But its interesting as the game went on, it got refined further and further.  As you got more people involved, people tried new things.  Some new tricks became illegal.  You get some more rules in the rule book.  And all the rules are there to try and keep hockey as pure as it possibly can be.

          Now, if you pick up a copy of the NCAA university hockey rule book, it went from 7 to 150.  It went from 7 total rules to 150 pages of rules for the game of hockey.  Everything from penalties, to equipment, to the proper places for the referee to be on the ice in different situations.  7 rules for pure hockey to 150 pages for pure hockey.

          Over time we like to pile on more and more regulations to make sure that we do a good job of keeping the earlier rules in their purest form.

          Its not just in sports that rules tend to evolve and become more detailed.  It happens in our faith life as well.  We believe there are two great commandments that we need to live by.  Love God.  And love your neighbor as yourself.  We believe that the ten commandments show us a good lifestyle which pleases God as well.  But it is easy to add extra rules on to try and keep us on the straight and narrow.  We all can probably think of some rules about Sunday from when you were a kid.  I know some people weren’t allowed to ride their bikes on Sunday.  Today parents would probably love it if there kids would take a break from the internet and games to go ride a bike or something.

          Part of wisdom in our spirituality is to enforce some boundaries to keep us away from doing something that hurts God and our relationship with him.

          The Pharisees have made a science out enforcing boundaries to keep people away from breaking the law of God.  Actually, according to Christ, they have made a religion out of keeping these artificially legal and spiritual boundaries in order to keep them from breaking any of the ten commandments.  In fact, these extra boundaries aren’t just seen as helpful boundaries, the punishments for crossing these boundaries are about as serious as breaking God’s law itself.

          Now, in our passage Christ doesn’t start by berating the Pharisees, warning the disciples not to follow their legalism.  Actually, it starts with one of those mysterious and somewhat difficult sayings from Christ.  Verse 25 says, “At that time Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children.[1]

          Kind of a strange things for Jesus to be happy about really.  It says he praises God because he hides matters of judgement and grace from the wise but showed them to the children.

          When we read this, it might be easy for us to think that Christ is happy that some people won’t understand the coming of his kingdom.  But I don’t think he is praising God because some people will be left in the dark… eternally and some will step into the light. 

          Actually, he is praising God for how powerful he really is.  Christ calls the Father the lord of heaven and earth.  And has Lord over everything he is Lord over who understands about his kingdom and who doesn’t. 

          We would think the wiser you are, the easier it would be to understand the kingdom of God.  But God has the power to make the children wise to the kingdom and the wise on earth, just fools.  Verse 26 says it is all by God’s good pleasure.  Whatever God likes, that’s the way it is going to be.

          The next verse we find out that this Lordship power doesn’t just rest with the father.  Christ also has it.  Verse 27 says, ““All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.[2]  It’s kind of a divine chain of command.  The Father first.  Then the son who knows it perfectly since they are triune together.  And then it says that no one knows the father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.  First Christ is praising the Father for his power.  Now we see that Christ shares in that power as well.  He doesn’t waste his grace.  Whoever he reveals the father to, knows the father. 

          So its with all this praise to the Father and the Son for the way they choose who will know them more perfectly that we come to the last portion of the passage.  Verses “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, 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.”[3]

          These words are so assuring to us.  Christ’s burden is light.  It isn’t going to weigh us down.  This is especially powerful for those who feel oppressed in one way or another.  Christ’s burden is light.  It will not break our backs and hurt us.

          This also has to do with what Christ was talking about in the verses before.  He praises that God choses whom he gives understanding to.  In the meantime he has the religious Pharisees around him quite often.  These are some of those who are wise and have understanding but the truth has not been revealed to them by the Father or the Son.  So they think they understand God and his word, but really they are not so wise.

          That line in the passage that says “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me.”  Taking a yoke was language from the religious rabbis and of the day.  Many of them had different takes on the law and how to live it out.  Each one would set up a different set of extra boundaries laws that needed to be lived out to protect them from the law.  To take on the yoke of a rabbi meant that you were going to learn the law from him.  You would learn all those boundary setting laws from him.  You would live by that strict set of laws in order to be as perfect a Hebrew as was possible.

          Christ says take my yoke on you because it is light.  By saying that he is kind of slamming the Pharisees.  Don’t take all these heavy burdens, these extra laws.  They are like a yoke.  Heavy and hindering.  They slow you down and hold back your potential in the kingdom.  They are not necessary, and they are not good for your spirituality, or for God’s kingdom.

          Christ sees everything that is extra and he assures the disciples that his burden is nothing compared to what the other rabbis in town were offering. 

          In fact it doesn’t take long before the disciples experience what happens when they take on the easy yoke of Christ.  The Pharisees get upset about Christ’s observance of the law and especially the sabbath.  In the very next chapter we read that the disciples and Jesus are hungry on the Sabbath so they take some grain, take off the husks and grind it in their hands to be able to eat the wheat. 

          The pharisees consider this breaking the sabbath, so they take it very seriously.  But Christ isn’t about to turn back.  He knows how light the burden is supposed to be.

          In fact, the yoke is so incredibly light for us because of what Jesus did for us the cross.  The cross is all about relieving the burden of guilt that comes from the law. 

          The book of Galatians is full of explanations of how Christ’s yoke is easy.  It says in Galatians 3:13, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.”[4]  Because Christ hung on that tree, we are free from its curse.  We are free from the heaviest burden of the law.  We are free from its curse.

          For you and me, should this change a whole lot?  It should make a huge difference.  What Christ gives us is not a heavy rule book.  Here’s the first ten commmandments and don’t forget the fifty page supplement that explains what those ten commandments are all about.  Not at all.  Christ gives the Holy Spirit.  He gives forgiveness.  He gives motivation to live a grace filled life more than a law filled life.

          The way this works out for us involves what we expect from ourselves and what we expect from others.

          From ourselves, stop expecting perfection, stop expecting imperfection in your life.  Just live by the Spirit and keep in step with the Spirit.  The greatest gift that Christ offered to his followers was the refreshing breath of the Holy Spirit.  He enables us to enter into the process of being forgiven sinners who are constantly walking the path of sanctification, becoming more holy.

          What does living by the Spirit and not under the curse of the law mean for our expectations of others.  It means that we allow them even more grace than we allow ourselves.  When a person makes profession of faith we give them a little something to mark the occasion.  It would be crazy of us to tell young people growing up that professing your faith in Christ is all about accepting the free grace of God all through Sunday School and Faith Instruction, or it would be crazy of us to welcome in a new believer who has sensed the Holy Spirit in their lives.  As we help them grow in the faith we tell them you are saved by faith alone.  And then as they get done with their profession, as a momento, here are the rest of rules we are going to talk behind your back for not following.  But that is not what we give.  We give a devotional.   And that is very appropriate.  This person has taken on the yoke of Christ.  The light burden.  And now they walk ahead slowly in that faith to become a person changed to fit with the pattern God desires.

          With Christ it is about grace and an easy burden.  The church must not add burdens where Christ never intended.

          Instead, walk easily with the yoke of Christ, being harnessed to the holy spirit who changes hearts and lives in his time.

This is God’s will from his word.  And all God’s people say… AMEN!

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[1]  The Holy Bible : New International Version. Grand Rapids : Zondervan, 1996, c1984

[2]  The Holy Bible : New International Version. Grand Rapids : Zondervan, 1996, c1984

[3]  The Holy Bible : New International Version. Grand Rapids : Zondervan, 1996, c1984

[4]  The Holy Bible : New International Version. Grand Rapids : Zondervan, 1996, c1984