The Lord Jesus is our Rest: come to Him, Take His Yoke and Find Rest for your Souls

The Lord Jesus is our rest; we can come to Him as we are, with our toil and burdens, and He will give us rest, and we can learn from Him, for He is meek and lowly in heart, and we will find rest for our souls as we take His yoke upon us. Amen!

What a wonderful Savior we have, our dear Lord Jesus!

He came to be our rest, and today we can enjoy and experience Him as rest in our soul.

How much we need rest in our soul!

The Lord is everything we need, and He is so much to us in our daily experience.

We have seen that He is our Shepherd. We are like sheep without a shepherd, being cast off and scattered, sad and unfed. But praise the Lord, Jesus came to be our Shepherd!

He is our Good Shepherd. He takes good care of His sheep. He is the Shepherd calling His sheep by name, and His sheep hear His voice and follow Him.

He doesn’t jump over the fence to get into the sheepfold; He opens the door, He is the door, and He comes in.

Thank the Lord that He came and called us out of the fold so that we may be with Him in the rich pasture, which He Himself is.

Christ as our Shepherd leads us to waters of rest, and He is with us even as we walk through the valley of the shadow of death.

Wherever we are, He is there with us, protecting us from evil and supplying us inwardly for us to live a proper Christian life on earth for the fulfillment of His purpose.

When we are in front of our adversaries, the Lord is there with us; He spreads a table before us even as the battle is raging on, and we eat and the enemy destroy! Praise the Lord!

Day by day we can enjoy the Lord’s shepherding, open to His shepherding, and follow Him wherever He leads us.

He shepherds us into the full enjoyment of Himself, and He leads us into the lifelong enjoyment of the divine goodness and lovingkindness in His house.

On one hand, each one of us is His sheep; on the other hand, together we as His flock are His house, and in His house we enjoy goodness and lovingkindness. This is our portion for eternity.

We love to dwell in His house with the saints, partaking of His diving goodness and lovingkindness so that we may become His corporate expression on the earth! Amen!

How wonderful it is that the Lord has come to be our Shepherd for us to experience and enjoy, and also for us to express!

We can become the expression of our Shepherd by allowing Him to shepherd us and by cooperating with Him in His heavenly ministry to shepherd others according to God!

Enjoy the Lord Jesus as our Rest by Coming to Him with our Toil and Burdens to Receive Rest

Matt. 11:28-30 reveals a wonderful aspect of what the Lord Jesus is to us – the Lord Jesus is our rest.

Christ is rest to us. We may take Christ as our wisdom, but as we have Him as our wisdom, we may be quite busy; for this reason, we need to also take Him as our rest.

The Lord Jesus sounded out a call two thousand years ago saying that all who toil and are burdened can come to Him and He will give them rest.

We may think we are ok and we don’t need rest, but the more we go on with the Lord and the more we advance in our human life, the more we toil and are burdened.

We toil not just for the Lord and for the church life but we also toil for our family life, at work, and in society.

Many times we may strive and struggle to keep the commandments of the law and religious regulations, while other times we toil and struggle to be successful in our work or in our hobby.

Human life is full of labor and toiling; nothing comes easy, and if we want to obtain something, we need to work at it.

The Lord calls those who toil and are burdened to come to Him for rest.

Many times we find ourselves that, even though we love the Lord and pursue Him with the saints, we are full of burdens; we are so burdened that we feel very heavy within, having no rest. Oh, Lord Jesus!

The Lord calls us to come to Him so that we may have rest, for the Lord Jesus is our rest.

Rest refers not just to being set free from the toil and burden under the law and religion or any under work and responsibility but also to perfect peace and full satisfaction.

The rest the Lord gives us is not like the rest in the world; He gives us rest for our soul.

We need rest in our soul, for our soul is many times weary and troubled. Our soul is toiling, striving to please people, chase after its dreams, and even please God.

We may serve the Lord and labour in the church life, which is something very good, and we may be involved in the service of the church; however, we may soon discover that we toil and are burdened.

We are full of burdens and we are heavily burdened. Oh, Lord Jesus!

We may even feel enslaved to doing this and that at work, enslaved to serving in this particular aspect in the church, and enslaved at home with our family, taking care of so many things.

We need the Lord Jesus as our rest. We need to come to Him with our toils, and He will give us rest.

The rest He gives us includes being set free from the toil and burden under religion and law, and under any work of responsibility.

The rest the Lord is to us and the rest He gives us is perfect peace and full satisfaction.

As we do this and that for the Lord and in the church life, we may get tired; it can be tiring to labor diligently for the Lord or in any kind of work.

We become burdened and we are tired. So we need peace and satisfaction.

Our soul is troubled. Because our soul is troubled, we have problems with other people, blaming them for our troubles or seeking to find rest in them or in other things.

Only the Lord Jesus is our rest, and only He can give us rest for our soul.

We still have to bear the responsibility to do this and that, and we need to take care of many things in our family life, our church life, and at work, but the Lord Jesus is our rest.

May we come to Him again and again, especially when we feel that we are burdened and toil, and may we take Christ as our rest!

Lord Jesus, we come to You so that we may find rest for our soul. We open to You. We come to You with our toils and with all our burdens. Only You can give us rest. Lord Jesus, You are our rest. Thank You for calling us to come to You with all our toil and burdens. Thank You for being our rest. Oh Lord, our soul needs rest! Only You can give us full peace and perfect satisfaction. We just open to You. We come to You. We acknowledge that we toil and are heavily burdened. We answer Your call today and come to You. Only You can set us free from the toil and burden under the law and religion and under any work and responsibility. Only You can be our real rest and satisfaction. Amen, Lord, we take You not only as our wisdom but also as our rest. We rest in You. You rest our soul. Our soul takes You as our rest. Amen, Lord Jesus, be our rest today!

Take the Lord’s Yoke upon us and Learn from Him to Find Rest for our Souls Today

How can we find rest for our soul? It is by coming to the Lord. More specifically, we find rest for our souls when we take the Lord’s yoke upon us and learn from Him (Matt. 11:29).

His yoke is easy and His burden is light (v. 30).

The Lord is meek and lowly in heart, and when we take His yoke upon us and learn from Him, we find rest for our souls. The Lord Jesus is our rest in our soul.

What is the Lord’s yoke? The Lord’s yoke is to take the will of the Father; His way of living was to do the Father’s will in all things.

When the Lord Jesus was on the earth, He cared for nothing else but doing the will of His Father (John 4:34; 5:30; 6:38).

He submitted Himself fully to the Father’s will (Matt. 26:39, 42), even unto death, drinking the cup that the Father gave Him to drink.

He is now asking us to learn from Him.

To learn from the Lord doesn’t mean that we outwardly imitate Him and try to do the things that He did.

To learn from the Lord is to copy the Lord in our spirit by taking His yoke – God’s will (1 Pet. 2:21).

May we learn from the Lord today and take the Lord’s yoke upon us.

When we learn from Him and take His yoke upon us, we find rest for our souls.

It may be easy to find rest for our body and whenever we touch the Lord in spirit, we have rest in our spirit; however, it is not so easy to find rest in our soul.

Our soul many times is so bothered that we cannot even sleep.

But when we take the Lord’s yoke and learn from Him, we share in our soul His rest and satisfaction.

When we serve the Lord in the church life, we need to take the Lord’s yoke as we serve Him; we take the Lord’s will upon us. God’s will is our yoke.

We cannot be free and do as we please; rather, we are yoked, and we are not so liberated but we depend on the Lord and seek to do His will.

Today’s world thinks everyone should be free, liberated, and do whatever they want; however, they do not know that they are yoked to something else, the yoke of the enemy, which is harsh, hard, bitter, and sharp.

Whenever we find ourselves that the yoke we bear is hard and bitter, we need to come to the Lord, take His yoke, and learn from Him.

The Lord’s yoke to do the will of God is not heavy or hard but good and easy; it is kind, mild, gentle, easy, and pleasant.

Whenever we are in our spirit and live one spirit with the Lord, we spontaneously take the yoke of the Lord to do the Father’s will, and we find rest in our soul.

Humanly speaking it is impossible to be yoked with someone or something and at the same time find rest, but spiritually speaking this is the reality.

We can all testify that, when we exercise our spirit and one in spirit with the Lord, we bear His yoke to do God’s will, and we find rest for our soul.

We are not just regulated or controlled by something, even by some work; we are constrained by the will of God.

This supplies us, energises us, and causes us to go on with Him in a proper way.

The Lord said that, if we take His yoke upon us and learn from Him, we will find rest for our souls.

He is meek and lowly in heart.

He did not oppose those who were persecuting Him, nor did He fight for His rights when He was being criticized or put to death.

Many times when others oppose us, we resist them and fight back, and we have no peace.

But if instead of resisting we submit to the Father’s will and testify that even this opposition is from the Father, we will have rest in our souls.

For example, John the Baptist was in prison and was hoping the Lord Jesus would release him, since He performed so many miracles, but the Father’s will was for John to remain in prison until his death.

The Lord may imprison us in a certain situation for a period of time, and there may be much limitation and constriction around us and even in us.

In such a situation, we need to take the Father’s will, the Lord’s yoke, and learn from the Lord, and we will find rest for our souls.

When we submit to the Father’s will, learn from the Lord, and take His yoke upon us, our soul is at rest, and we have perfect peace and full satisfaction.

The Lord Jesus is our rest. We can and should experience Christ as our rest in our souls by coming to Him, taking His yoke upon us, and learning from Him.

Lord Jesus, we come to You and we take Your yoke upon us. We want to learn from You, for You are meek and lowly in heart. Grant us to have rest in our souls! Oh Lord, we cannot find rest for our soul unless we come to You! We put aside any other yoke and we come to You out of every toil and burden to just take You as our rest. We want to learn from You. You are meek and gentle, not resisting opposition. You are lowly in heart, not esteeming Yourself highly than You ought to think. We take You as our life and our person today in our spirit. We exercise our spirit to live one spirit with You! Amen, Lord Jesus, we submit ourselves fully to the will of the Father. We acknowledge that everything that happens to us is because of the Father’s will. We do not want to change our situation or get out from where we are: we simply come to You and we take You as our rest! Hallelujah, the Lord Jesus is our rest today in our soul! We love You, Lord Jesus! We love to be yoked with You to do the Father’s will! You are our rest!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother Minoru Chen in the message for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Matthew, msgs. 29, 31, and 36, by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Experiencing, Enjoying, and Expressing Christ (2024 July Semiannual Training), week 2, Christ as the One with the Heavenly-ruled Deeds, Our Shepherd, Our Rest, and the Sower.
• Similar articles on this topic:
  – A life of rest, a portion from, The Kingdom, Chapter 22, by Witness Lee.
  – Jesus Lord, We’re Captured by Your Beauty, via, New Jerusalem blog.
  – Psalms, James, and the Divine Inspiration of the Bible, via, Shepherding Words.
  – What is the Soul and How Does God Heal Soul Sickness? More via, Holding to Truth in Love.
  – Taking the Lead to Be Patterns, via, Living to Him.
  – Come to the Lord and Find Rest for Your Soul, via, Bibles for America blog.
  – The key to experiencing Christ – the human spirit, via, The Key to Experiencing Christ–the Human Spirit, Chapter 1.
  – The rest of victory, a portion from, Collected Works of Watchman Nee, The (Set 1) Vol. 17: Notes on Scriptural Messages (1), Chapter 11, by Watchman Nee.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – Rest, rest thee, weary heart, / Let toil and anguish cease; / Take from Thy Savior’s hands / Thine heritage of peace. / Lie low before His feet, / Too low thou canst not be, / For sacred calm is here, / And here is liberty. (Hymn #653 stanzas 1-2)
  – My Savior, Thou hast offered rest: / Oh, give it then to me; / The rest of ceasing from myself, / To find my all in Thee. (Hymns #414 stanza 1)
  – Jesus! I am resting, resting / In the joy of what Thou art; / I am finding out the greatness / Of Thy loving heart. / Thou hast bid me gaze upon Thee, / And Thy beauty fills my soul, / For, by Thy transforming power, / Thou hast made me whole. / Jesus! I am resting, resting / In the joy of what Thou art; / I am finding out the greatness / Of Thy loving heart. (Hymns #579 stanza 1 and chorus)