The Heavy Yoke of a Rushed Life

Jesus said His yoke is easy and His burden is light. He wasn’t just referring to the tasks He gives us as our Lord (though that is part of it). He was also describing His experience as He worked harder and more effectively than anyone had ever worked. It’s an indictment against us Christians, obsessed with working harder and optimizing performance, that we don’t consider how our Lord worked.

His self-description is simple. He uses two analogies—shockingly—which compare His work to that of an animal. Oxen were yoked together to plough fields. “Beasts of burden,” as they are sometimes called, were used to carry loads too heavy for humans. In comparing Himself to the oxen, He says the ploughing He does is “easy.” As He walked along the life the Father had prescribed for Him, every single step was work for Him. Everything was intentional, and each inch was progress in the field of the Father’s design. The result was the burying of the seed and the first fruits arose at the end of Christ’s ministry—He died and rose again.

Of course, the end of this process was difficult. Hence, He sweat like great drops of blood (sweat being an indication of hard, not easy, work) and prayed, “Father, if it be possible, let this cup [task] pass from Me.” When He described his yoke as “easy,” He didn’t mean there are never difficulties. If He did, He would be describing a life in an unfallen world. Being born of Mary’s corruptible body, Jesus inherited a body that was subject to the difficulties of life. His life was by no means easy. His easy yoke was an orientation to work that found the work—in general—to be easy. Though we all—including Jesus—must work “by the sweat of our brow,” we all—if we’re in God’s Kingdom—participate in His eternal sabbath rest. This means that the general tenor of Christ’s life and ours should be one in which our work is easy. Christ spent a few days in abject and utter agony. But He spends years, decades even, rejoicing in the gifts of the Father, giving thanks to Him, and serving Him with joy.

The same is true for Christ’s burden—it was “light” in the sense that He was not constantly huffing and puffing. He didn’t need to take breaks because the burden was too heavy for Him. Jesus never said, “I need a break, guys. I just can’t do this anymore.” Yes, He retreated to be alone with the Father more than anyone, but these retreats were always conducted from a place of ease, never burnout. Jesus never thought, “This is too hard,” collapsing into a self-loathing puddle of exhaustion. His retreats were intentional, like taking sips of water while carrying a modestly weighted backpack through the Swiss Alps. This is not to say Jesus’s burden was insignificant. Rather, it is to say that, for Jesus the King, it was, indeed, easy.

Again, the burden, like the yoke, increased in weight to the point that it was, literally, the weight of the world upon His shoulders. The weight of our eternal punishment was the greatest weight possible; such a weight only God Himself could carry. Yet, that was not the general theme of His life. He did not carry the burden of our sins for 33 years. If He did, He would have never rejoiced. That sin-burden elicited cries of abandonment, yet He spent His 33 years, in general, “glorifying,” “praising,” and “confessing” the almighty majesty of the Father.

Therefore, our work must be, generally speaking, light and easy. Yes, we will have moments of great sweat, like drops of blood, and we will ask God to remove our work from us. But those should be rare moments. If we are tilling God’s field and carrying the burdens He gives us, feeling constantly exhausted, anxious, and ungrateful, there is only one culprit—us.

If the tasks God has given you are too heavy for you, the only solution is this—slow down. What makes a yoke not easy but hard? It could be the soil, but it could also be the pace at which the oxen are walking. Each situation will cause the yoke to press more sharply into the shoulders. Similarly, a 5-pound backpack is almost insignificant to the person strolling through the countryside. But that same pack is unbearable to the marathon runner, bringing her from first place to last. The solution to this “hard” yoke and “heavy” burden is not to look at the Father and curse Him for giving us something we cannot bear. It certainly is not to falsely grin and bear it while we mutter under our breaths about the unfairness of it all. We must carry these burdens while thanking the Father for them. They are privileges given to us by the Master. We get to serve Him. If we do so begrudgingly, we risk His casting us out of His house of praise.

No, the answer is not white-knuckling our yokes and burdens when they are too much. The answer is opening our hands, confessing our weakness, and walking at a pace set for us by God. What is that pace? It is the one that fits your abilities. God made you and gave you your talents. Discovering the pace He has set for you is nothing more complicated than working at a pace that enables you to say, most of the time, “this is easy, light.”

How does this avoid spiritual lethargy and laziness? We must ensure we’re actually yoked to Christ and are carrying His burden. If we are not “slowing down,” it will really mean doing more of what we want and less of what we should. If your “yoke” is chasing promotions in order to buy a boat and slowing down means reading your Bible less, you aren’t yoked to Christ. But if your yoke is being a godly parent, child, student, employee, witness, etc., and you can honestly say, before God, you are doing these things for His glory and not your own, then you are yoked to Him. If you are, He will not have you walk at a pace that isn’t easy and light. If you are yoked to Him and it’s not generally easy, it’s a clear sign you need to slow down.

Amazingly, modern psychology shows us that such a posture (often called “flow state”) is actually the most productive. Hence, Jesus was more productive than you, I, and the entire world put together. Why? His yoke was easy and His burden light. If yours is not, slow down.