not a burden but a blessing…

matthew 11.28-30 (gnb), come to me, all of you who are tired from carrying your heavy loads and I will give you rest.  the yoke I will give you is easy and the load I will put on you is light.

how heavy is GOD’s yoke?  HE says, “the yoke I will give you is light and easy.”  it says, “easy”.  light, bearable, even easy.  you say, “but my CHRISTian life isn’t easy.  my CHRISTian life is heavy, a burden.  my life is a heavy duty burden.” 

then you’re out of GOD’s will.  i don't know any straighter way to say it plainer than that.  you’re out of GOD’s will.  you’re doing something that GOD never intended for you to do.  you’ve taken on more.  and some of those things you’re thinking GOD’s asking you to do, HE’s not asking you to do.  your conscious and your perfectionism are asking you to do them. 

you say, “are you saying that my relationship to CHRIST – the CHRISTian life – is easy?”  i’m not saying it.  JESUS is.  “MY yoke is easy, MY burden is light.”  “but my CHRISTian life has never been easy or light!”  then you’re missing the point.  JESUS did not come to give you a burden but a blessing. 

am i saying the CHRISTian life has no problems?  no, not at all.  you do have a lot of problems.  the CHRISTian’s life will have difficulties, i guarantee that.  but to live in the center of GOD’s will is a lighter load than to live out of GOD’s will.  to live in GOD’s purpose and plan for your life is a lighter, more relaxing, more enjoyable load than for you to live your own life any old

way you choose. 

if you say, “my CHRISTian life is a burden right now on me” then there’s some things in your life that you’re doing that GOD never intended for you to do.  one of the things you need to do is go and sit down and say, “what do i need to cut out of my life?”  i need to focus on the things that really count – my relationship to GOD, my relationship to my family, my relationship to other CHRISTians, my relationship to the world. that’s what counts.

so many of us are stuck on the cover of time magazine “how america is running itself ragged”.

just a thought from the front porch…