Enter into His rest

Matthew 11:28-30 28) “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, 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.”

        At 2AM this morning my light bulb went on! While in prayer for a roommate, the understanding of these 3 verses hit me! Of course it is easy comparing my life to these verses. In the months leading to my confession and arrest, my life revolved around getting more and porn. And the burdens that accompanied that grew. But the end came and here I am. So allow me to now explain my understanding of these verses.

          The burdens we carry, for he most part, are past mistakes, past situations of failure, past hurts. Anger, resentment and, possibly, huge amounts of shame. We had learned that Jesus died for us.  His blood covers our sins. He took our burdens with Him to the cross. “This was to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah: ‘He took up our infirmities and carried our diseases.” Matthew 8:17 (NIV). But I really did not believe He would do that. In my thinking, and the world’s also, is that I needed to do something in order that the Father would love me.

          My world came down, crumbling all around me. I soon was sitting atop a heap of ash, crying out for God’s help. He came, not having to come from afar, since He was actually walking with me. So I turned to Him slowly at first, because the ingrained self, wanted to continue to control. But I soon began to give more and more control to Him. And I began to feel a peace inside. The clamor of the world began to fade. And the small voice of Jesus became more prevalent. The peace I felt inside enabled me to internally slow down, not having to keep up with the world any longer. As faith grew, my “rest” opened my ears so to better listen to Christ instructions, given to me through the word. I started to comprehend, that through the study of His word, His “yoke,” the power contained within, gave me greater faith to follow His ways. Which now has afforded me “rest” in my life knowing that the love of Christ lives in me in a greater way now. Rest in knowing He is in control and that my obedience in following His ways is something that I do not want to lose.

          With the continued cleansing of myself through the study of His word I throw my selfishness, worry and fear away. I uncovered a strength and courage I never knew I had. My spiritual gifts, long ago given, but never unwrapped. “But whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” John 4:14 (NIV). So now I began to realize the love my Father has for me. And I begin to more fully see how much Christ loves me as I was and as I am. The indwelling of the Holy Spirit in my hearts, through my study of His word, my heart began to swell up, hardly being able to contain the joy, peace and praise I have for the One who WILLINGLY died for me, to save me from the eternal destruction I were headed for. “I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh.” Ezra 11:19 (NIV).

          As I walk with Christ, I fall into step with Him. I now intently listen to Him speak, through the Holy Spirit, to my hearts as I pray. And as I continue to study the word my life has begun to be that of how Jesus also lived. By denying self and putting the concerns of others ahead of myself, I now pray diligently for others. “Then Jesus said to his disciples, ‘If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” Matthew 16:24 (NIV). “I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.” John 13:15 (NIV).

          And so I continue to grow in my faith, with courage and boldness to share my testimony. And I now see that the yoke Christ has us wearing now is not as burdensome and heavy as we were lead to believe. The world, and its teachings, had us believing that it’s ways were better, less restrictive. The happiness it promised never happened. We turned to Christ, out of desperation, and we found peace and the happiness we had been searching to find. In our greater understanding of Christ, we find out that He had our peace and joy and happiness all the time, ready to freely give it to us at any time. We know now that we were unable to carry the burdens of our past hurts, mistakes or pains. The world has us believing that if we worked hard enough, in order to gain God’s love, that our burdens were be easy to carry. At our conversion our eyes were opened and we learned that our past burdens were heavy, but that we no longer HAD to carry them. Christ’s death allowed us to lay them at His feet. To take them OFF our backs and lay them on His, because Jesus has the strength. Out of our desperation and despair we cried out to God and we finally heard His sweet small voice. The voice that put all the lies of the world out in the open, exposing them as they are……LIES!!!! Christ took our burdens that allowed us to finally walk unimpeded keeping our eyes on Him. The world had turned us upside down. Jesus has re-righted us so that our lives reflect the love that He has for not only us but for ALL people. We now live a life, a life where we shout praises and thanks to the Lord Jesus.