The purpose of a yoke is to help an animal such as an ox pull a cart more effectively. An ideal yoke is strong, light, and fits comfortably as it evenly distributes around the neck and shoulders the pressure of pulling a load. A heavy and ill-fitting yoke makes pulling any load much more difficult than need be.
In Matthew 11, Jesus spoke to His potential followers about His yoke when He said:
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.” (Matthew 11:28-30)
If Jesus offers a yoke that is easy, what can that yoke be? A key to understanding His easy yoke may be found in the apparent contrast between His yoke and that of the religious leaders at that time.
The Yoke of the Religious Leaders
The idea of a yoke being worn by followers of a religious leader was familiar to Jesus’ listeners, and it implied that followers would join and become a replica of their leader. From Jesus’ offer, it is clear that His listeners were weary and burdened, and they needed rest. When He said, “learn from me” and that He was “gentle and humble in heart,” the implication is that His listeners had already learned laws and rules from their demanding religious leaders who were neither gentle nor humble. It is also apparent that the yoke of the religious leaders did not provide rest for their souls, and in fact made their lives even more difficult and burdensome.
It is also likely that the yoke of the religious leaders did not meet the needs of the poor and the outcast. Perhaps the laws and customs were originally implemented to bring about spiritual maturity and to honor God, but evolved gradually into a religious system of control and manipulation that served the needs and desires of the religious leaders rather than easing the burdens of their followers. Either way, Jesus was so impressed by the yoke of the religious leaders and the replication of their lives in their followers that He said later in Matthew 23,
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.” (Matthew 23:15)
Jesus is not offering an easier and lighter religion. To the contrary, based on what He said about adultery in Matthew Chapter 5, He raises the bar of performance standards for righteousness even higher.
“But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Matthew 5:28)
You can be born into a religious yoke, but you cannot be born into Jesus’ yoke. He says, “Come to me” and “Take my yoke upon you.” This is an intentional act of your will to come to Him and receive from Him. He did not say, “I will chase you down and strap this thing around your neck.” Jesus expects wearied and burdened people to come to Him with any yokes they are currently wearing, and take His.
Removing a Yoke
Removing a yoke and exchanging it for the yoke of Jesus is not easy. When I was a practicing veterinarian, a client brought me her half-shaved dog from the groomer. Every spring he would get his “lion cut” that left a full mane on his head and a small tuft on the end of his tail. The justification for this stylish makeover was that he would be cool in the summer. From a temperature perspective he was definitely cooler, however, from a dog’s perspective when he saw his friends at the park, I’m not sure he or they would say he looked all that cool.
The reason for his visit was that several months earlier someone had placed a rubber band around his neck, and it had gone unnoticed until it was discovered by the groomer. Sections of it had cut into his neck and there were areas where the skin had healed over with significant scarring. The owner was shocked that it was there because she had not noticed him having any discomfort. I anesthetized him, reopened the scarred areas, removed the rubber band, and sutured his wounds.
Religious, cultural, social, and family yokes can be a lot like that rubber band. They get put on our neck without our consent, are difficult to remove, and we eventually get used to them along with any discomfort they cause. Unfortunately, when it comes to removing these yokes there is no anesthesia for the surgery.
[Side note: While the dog was waking up from anesthesia, a high school student who had just arrived to observe for the afternoon was stunned to see what appeared to be a continuous line of sutures around the dog’s neck. My explanation that I had successfully completed a head transplant was rudely interrupted when my assistant returned and gave assurances to the contrary.
Questions
1) Have you ever worn a difficult and heavy yoke that was placed on you by someone else? If so, what made it difficult and heavy?
2) If Jesus offers an easier yoke and a lighter burden, what does “easy” and “light” mean to you?
3) Were you born into any yokes that are in conflict with what Jesus is offering? If so, are they still on your neck? Are you experiencing any shortness of breath? What scars have they left?
Oneness and Separateness in Our Relationship With Jesus
While the religious leaders expected their followers to join them and become replicas, Jesus wants a different kind of relationship with us. Some illustrations in the Bible portray this relationship from a separateness perspective as between two separate individuals, while others emphasize a oneness perspective.
Our separateness in our relationship with Jesus is portrayed in the following illustration from the book of Revelation where He says,
“Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.” (Revelation 3:20)
This passage is written about a believer, and reflects a sense of individual separateness in our relationship with Jesus because we must respond to His knock and intentionally open the door in order for Him to come in and eat with us.
A passage that describes both our intimate separateness and oneness with Jesus is found in John Chapter 15 where Jesus is talking with His disciples and says,
“I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” (John 15:5)
Jesus plainly states that He is the vine and we are connected to Him as branches. This illustration emphasizes our separateness because we are not the vine, nor is He our branch. On the other hand, when He talks about us remaining in Him and Him remaining in us, that is about as oneness as it gets. On top of that when He says, “apart from me you can do nothing,” from a spiritual perspective we are functionally one with Him as well.
Our oneness in our relationship with God and the importance of our life to Him are described in 1 John.
9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
13 This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15 If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. 16 And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. (1 John 4:9-16)
God first loved us by sending His Son “that we might live through Him.” It was not our good works that motivated God, rather, it was our need and His love. God sent Jesus “as an atoning sacrifice for our sins,” and what does He want in return? The answer is in verse 11, “Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” Doesn’t that seem a bit odd? Shouldn’t it say “we also ought to love God in return.” No, in this passage John is saying that our response to God’s love for us should be to love His other children. If you are a parent, this makes perfect sense. You no doubt appreciate it when someone helps you when you are in need, but how much more do you appreciate it when someone helps your child?
Our importance to God and His purpose for us is made clear in verse 12, which states, “No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.” Not only is God willing to live in us, His love “is made complete in us.” And then, as if we might still not understand our oneness in God, John writes verse 15, which presents the basis and truth of our oneness in a single sentence. “If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God.”
Is it not strange that our oneness with God results in Him living in us, yet our understanding cannot fully comprehend Him? This means that we are adequate enough to be His dwelling place and to be used by Him, yet inadequate when it comes to understanding Him fully. It seems that from God’s perspective we are His sufficiently inadequate children. As we will see later, He also transforms those who accept His Son’s sacrifice for their sins into a temple of the Holy Spirit.
Questions
1) What is your experience of oneness and separateness with Jesus?
2) Why would Jesus want to live His life through you, and how could that bring rest to your soul?
A Single Opening Yoke or a Double?
From a oneness and a separateness perspective, what do you traditionally picture in your mind when you think of Jesus’ yoke? Do you envision a single yoke, which has an opening for one ox, or a double, which has openings for two? Matthew does not specify either, but several authors have proposed that Jesus was referring to a double yoke. One reason for this interpretation is that Jesus said, “learn from me,” and one approach to training a young ox is to yoke it with another that is more experienced.
When interpreting His yoke as a double, there is a positive implication for oneness which is, we are not alone when yoked with Him because He is walking with us step by step. That said, there is a negative implication of separateness which is that Jesus has His side of the yoke and we have ours. There is also a performance implication of a double yoke which is that Jesus has His work to do on His side of the yoke, and we have our work to do on ours. I could more easily accept the interpretation of a double yoke if there was any indication that the religious leaders at that time were equally yoked with their weary and burdened followers.
While a double yoke has negative implications for separateness and performance, a single yoke seems to have even more. What could be more lonely and difficult than a single ox with a single yoke pulling a cart that contained a heavy load? If a double yoke is bad and a single is worse, what kind of yoke is Jesus offering? The answer lies nestled in the vine and branches of John Chapter 15. Let’s read it again.
“I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” (John 15:5)
Jesus Is the Yoke
I assert that Jesus was offering a very personal single yoke that is none other than Himself. I propose that His yoke can be seen as His arm around you that helps you pull your load and overcome the difficulties in your life as you lean into Him. From this perspective, everything Jesus says about His yoke makes perfect sense. His arm is easy and the burden of His arm is light. He does not add weight or difficulty to your life.
Seeing Jesus Himself as your personal yoke is consistent with the intimate relationship He describes of being united with Him as a branch is to its vine. It is from this intimacy that He makes all things possible, including learning from Him and finding rest for your soul. In addition, if His arm is around you, and His arm is around me, we are yoked together in His body and He is our head. Being united in Him enables us to help each other. So how many openings are in His yoke? One for each of His followers.
Questions
1) If Jesus is your yoke, what does that mean to you, and what do you think He should feel like?
2) Is it possible that the arm of Jesus could replace and heal you of the yokes that were placed on you by others? What about the yokes you willingly stepped into?
In the next chapter we will look at Jesus’ disciples along with the mission he gave them because if anyone was expected to wear His easy yoke and carry His light burden it was they.