Step by Step

Meditations for Seeking the Life in Christ

Daily Thoughts 

January 28, 2025

Step by Step

Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

Matthew 11:29

Read Matthew 11:25-30

My attention was first drawn to verse 29 because Sunday is my favorite day of the week. On this day, we get to join our friends for worship and study and for partaking of the Eucharist at the Lord’s Table. And, because we truly look forward to our Sabbath Rest. We very rarely schedule any activities for Sunday afternoon and evening. Throughout the week we look forward to our Sabbath time. Truly the Lord intends for us to have this Sabbath rest, but that is not what the Lord was teaching in today’s passage.

Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe points toward Jesus’ teaching in his poem, True Rest:

Rest is not quitting

The busy career;

Rest is the fitting

Of self to one's sphere.

 

'Tis loving and serving,

The highest and best;

'Tis onward, unswerving,

And this is true rest.

Jesus’ point is within a word he used twice: yoke. (Matthew 11:29-30)

For Jesus, the yoke represents obedience to God. To take Jesus’ yoke is to be obedient to His commandments about the Kingdom of God. It means a willingness to serve others with humility and mercy. His yoke is easy, and his burden is light, not because there is little to do for His followers; this is a yoke he is offering, not a hammock. Being yoked with Jesus means, in a world that can be very hostile to God’s Kingdom, we will affirm each day our desire to fulfill God’s will in our lives,

My Takeaway: Even though Jesus’ yoke calls me to a self-sacrificial life, it is appealing to me because his yoke is the only place my soul has found true comfort, rest and satisfaction. That’s because yoked to Jesus is where I was created to be.

Sē’lah

My book on prayer,

First Think, Then Pray

is now available on Amazon Kindle.

 

(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

 

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com.

 

Copyright © 2025 by Alex M. Knight

 

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.