Matthew 11:28-30

Merry Christmas! I decided to look at Matthew 11:28-30 today in honor of Christ's birthday. I started thinking about this scripture because one of my favorite pieces from Handel's Messiah is from this passage. And it is surely one of the most loved of the entire Bible.

²⁸ Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
²⁹ Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.
³⁰ For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

This is Jesus speaking to a large crowd of unbelievers.  He has just rebuked the cities where most of His mighty works had been done because they had not repented. And so when He says, "Come unto me," He is talking to unbelievers, though I think it also applies to believers but in a different way. He is calling on the unbelievers to come, believe His words, and be saved. Without Jesus, we labor and are heavy laden with sin and guilt. When we truly come to Him, He gives us rest. However, it's true that even after we have the promise of eternal rest, we may still be burdened down with the cares of this world. And so we as believers are also to come to Jesus with our burdens and troubles, and he promises us peace and rest.

"Take my yoke upon you," speaks to us about serving the Lord. The yoke was a heavy harness used by oxen in order to pull some piece of equipment. Jesus tells us His yoke is easy and His burden is light. It requires discipline and structure which all need, but Jesus' teaching is in contrast to rules and regulations which tend to be burdensome and heavy.

When Jesus says, "Learn of me," that's exactly what He means. We are modern day disciples, and we need to get to know Jesus. Be careful of relying on what you've always been taught or what some trendy author has to say. These things may or may not be accurate. The best place to learn to know Jesus is from His Word.

Here is a recording so you can see how Handel interpreted these verses. I couldn't find it separate from the rest of the oratorio. For "Come Unto Him" and "His Yoke Is Easy" go to approximately minutes 52-58. Interesting boy sopranos in the chorus.

I can't seem to get the link to work on here. The recording I referred to is "Messiah/ The Choir of Kings College, Cambridge." on youtube.com.  Maybe there's an easier way to do this! You will notice that if you want to listen to the whole thing, you will need to set aside 2 1/2 hours!