3-4-24

Addictions are there to protect and sooth inner wounds of the soul.  Finding and allowing God to heal the wounds, will heal the addictions.

My yoke is easy and my burden is light.  Surrender or submission?

Matthew 11:28-30 NIV1984

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.”

In taking on Jesus’ yoke, is it surrender, submission, or both?  I lean towards both.  I surrender by taking on His yoke.  I submit by learning from Him.  The result?  Rest for my soul!  Where is my wound?  Hidden in the very depths of my soul.  Where does Jesus want to go?  To the depths of my soul to giving me relief from being weary, burdened, and “heavy laden.”  Jesus is gentle and humble in heart.  He is the great physician.  His word is a healing balm.

Can an oxen put the yoke on himself?  No. Jesus, with my permission, puts His yoke on me when I surrender my will to His will.

Surrender has to do with fighting, conflict, or a battle.  It is yielding to a superior force so that fighting can cease.  In so doing it is giving up one’s rights, relinquishing control or possession to this superior force.  To surrender to God is to take Christ Jesus’ yoke on me recognizing it is from God’s benevolence.  It is coming to salvation, where my rebellion ends and His mercy and grace abound. His desire is to intimately know me and I Him.  Surrender is not about Him controlling me but for me to have intimate fellowship with Him becoming more like Christ Jesus as a result.

Submission is to submit or yield my will to someone else’s will and authority.  In so doing I agree to undergo whatever that authority desires.  I defer to that authority’s knowledge, judgment, and will.  When I submit myself to God’s will and authority it is done willingly recognizing that His knowledge, judgment, and will are far greater than my own.  Yielding and deferring to God is always in my best interest even though I may not understand.

What’s the difference?  Surrender is to cease fighting God and come to a place of salvation which He lovingly provides.  Submission follows surrender.  It’s a willingness to set aside my wants and desires, yielding my will to His perfect will, trusting that He has the best in mind for me.  I do not enter in and out of salvation (when I surrendered to God) but I can enter in and out of submission.  At any given time day to day, moment to moment, I can become willful, walk in my own strength, knowledge, judgment and understanding, and suffer the consequences of my sin.  But if I then walk in repentance, confessing my sin, submitting my will to His, I am restored to fellowship with Him.  I surrendered once for all time but I must daily, even moment to moment, submit to His will as revealed in His word and through the conviction of the indwelling Holy Spirit. 

Am I unequally yoked?  Not if I’ve taken His yoke on me!

2 Corinthians 6:14-18 NIV1984

14  Do not be yoked together  with unbelievers.  For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness?  15  What harmony is there between Christ and Belial ?  What does a believer  have in common with an unbeliever?  16  What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols?  For we are the temple  of the living God.  As God has said: “I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.”   

17  “Therefore come out from them  and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you.”

18  “I will be a Father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters,  says the Lord Almighty.”

Kick against the goads

Acts 26:14 NIV1984

We all fell to the ground, and I heard a voice saying to me in Aramaic, ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.’

According to gotquestions.org goads were used to steer oxen when plowing.  It was a sharp piece of iron on the end of a stick that would prick the ox telling it which way to go and keep it on the right path.  Sometimes the ox would kick at the goad.  In its rebellion, the metal would be driven into the oxen’s flesh even further adding to the pain and discomfort.  The more it rebelled, the more it would suffer.  This was what Jesus taught Saul on the road to Damascus.  Saul, who was later called Paul, was on the road to destruction persecuting believers.  Jesus set him on the right road as the apostle to the gentiles.  He was converted, trained, and sent out winning many to Christ Jesus and eventually writing nearly half of the New Testament. 

Do you “kick against the goads” or have you taken on Jesus’ yoke? His yoke is easy and His burden is light.  Are you tired enough and burdened enough to not have that sharp piece of iron driven into your flesh anymore?  Are you ready to find rest for your soul?

Father, thank you for your mercy and grace.  Thank you for the “goads” in my life that have steered me to you.  As I have surrendered to you entering into your salvation you have so richly provided, I submit my will to yours that You would be glorified.  Let everything be done to the glory of your name.  I pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.