We need to come to the Lord with our toiling and burdens, and He will give us rest; we need to take the Lord’s yoke (the Father’s will) which is easy and His burden (the work to carry out the Father’s will) which is light, and always serve with a burden from the Lord.
First we need to come to the Lord and open to Him, giving Him our burdens and toils and problems, and then we need to take His burden and serve Him with a burden from the Lord.
As Paul tells us in Phil. 4:6-7, in nothing do we need to be anxious, but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, we should let our requests be made known to God.
All the things that come to us, all our troubles, all our problems, all our difficulties, and all the things we can’t break through on our own – all these we need to bring to the Lord and commit them to Him.
We should come to Him and talk to Him about all the things that bother us and put us down, having open and honest conversations with Him in everything; then, by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, we commit all these to Him.
As we make a motion toward God, moving toward Him through prayer and petition, He moves toward us and into us; we move into God in our spirit, and He moves into us as peace.
The peace of God will guard our heart and thoughts in Christ Jesus.
The way to have the peace of God, which is Christ Himself, is that in everything we confront we would commit all things to Him one by one, talk to Him about the things that are disturbing us or we can’t handle, and unclog the arteries of our heart so that He may infuse us with Himself as our peace. Amen!
God wants that we would come to Him and rest with Him, enter into His enjoyment, and have Him as our satisfaction; we can do this when He releases us from our burdens and all our toiling.
We need to enter into Christ as our Sabbath rest; He has already done the work and is now resting, and we can enter into His rest and satisfaction.
Then the work will issue out of our enjoyment of God and being filled with God. On the seventh day, after He created all things and even man, God rested and was refreshed; God’s seventh day was our first day.
Before we can touch anything of God’s service we need to enter into His rest and satisfaction.
We need to enjoy Christ, be satisfied with Him, be infused with Him as our perfect peace an dour full satisfaction, and then the work will be the overflow of this life that fills and saturates us.
When we work, we will not work by ourselves or in ourselves, but we will work with the very One who infused Himself into us as our rest and refreshment; we work by fully depending on Him.
Receiving God’s Word, His Vision, and His burden, and Serving with a Burden from the Lord
The Lord calls all those who toil and are burdened to come to Him, and He assures us that He will give us rest; in coming to Him we receive rest for our souls (Matt. 11:29-30).
He further encourages us that we would take His yoke (which is easy) and His burden (which is light) upon Him; the Lord’s yoke is the Father’s will, and His burden is the work to carry out the Father’s will.
This shows that, after we come to the Lord and rest and are satisfied with Him, entering into the real Sabbath rest, we need to work with the Lord and for Him; we must always serve with a burden from the Lord.
We need to have an open spirit to God to receive burdens from God; we must learn to receive burdens and release burdens through prayer in our intimate fellowship with the Lord (Luke 1:53; Psa. 27:4; Isa. 59:16; Col. 4:2).
When we open to the Lord in fellowship in our intimate and private time with Him, He infuses His burden into us.
Whenever we are about to serve the Lord or take care of others, we should always pray,
Lord, infuse Your burden into me; infuse me with Your up-to-date burden, and infuse the burden on Your heart into my heart!
In Isa. 1:1 we see the vision that Isaiah saw, in 2:1 the word which Isaiah saw, in 13:1 and 15: the burden which Isaiah saw. What God gives us is both the word, the vision, and the burden.
The revelations that the prophets received were the burdens that they received; without burden, there’s no ministry of the word, no prophesying, for the building up of the church (Zech. 12:1; Mal. 1:1; Acts 6:4; 1 Cor. 14:4).
Before we can serve the Lord and do something for Him, we need to come to Him and be infused with Him, saturated with Him, and filled with Him; furthermore, we need to receive His word, His vision, and His burden, and we need to serve with a burden from the Lord.
The vision we see from God is the word He speaks to us, and this word becomes the burden He gives us; this burden will cause us to carry out the Father’s will in His way and in His time, and we will do so with the burden that He gives us.
The revelations we receive become our burden; the vision that is imparted into us is through the word, and this vision conveyed by the living word becomes our burden, which is the Lord’s burden, the word to carry out His will.
Our burden is to release God’s revelation to man, and God’s revelation is released through the words of revelation that God gives to us (1 Cor. 2:11-16).
When we minister the word of God, our concern shouldn’t be primarily that we speak eloquently and that those who hear understand what we say; rather, our concern should be whether we have God’s speaking in our speaking.
In a sense the topic of our speaking is not as important as having God’s speaking in our speaking; we need to minister the word with a burden from the Lord (Mal. 2:7).
Before we speak the word, we need to have God’s speaking; we all minister God’s word in different portions and in different ways, and we need to have a burden from the Lord when we speak.
As priests of God, we are the messengers of the Lord; we need to have the Lord’s living, fresh, instant word, so that we may speak one with the Lord what He as the Spirit speaks to the churches.
If the Lord gains us as His messengers today, those who speak the word of God with a burden from the Lord, the church will have God’s speaking and the saints have a way to go on.
Lord Jesus, we want to have an open spirit to receive Your vision, Your word, and Your burden; speak to us and give us Your burdens in our prayer time with You. We open to You, Lord, and we want to spend much intimate time to fellowship with You, so that You may infuse us with Your word and with Your up-to-date burden. May our speaking be Your speaking, and may we have a burden from the Lord as we speak the word of the Lord. Amen, Lord, make us Your messengers in the churches today; make us those who are filled with the instant, living, fresh word of God, so that we may be one with You to speak what the Spirit speaks to the churches!
Bearing People’s Condition before God and Speaking with a Burden from the Lord according to the Need
As believers in Christ we are priests to God, and we minister the word to others in different ways and in different portions.
As we minister the word to others, we must bear their condition before God; we must sense their condition and know what God wants to speak to them.
Just as the high priest bore the names of the children of Israel before God on his heart, so we need to bear people’s condition on our heart, being intimately concerned for people, even for those we speak to.
We need to continue steadfastly in prayer and the ministry of the word (Acts 6:4), and as we meet with the saints, we should seek the Lord concerning what we speak and how to release His word.
We need to bear others’ condition before the Lord and receive a burden from Him what to speak to meet the need.
If others are not saved, we may receive a burden to bear their souls by the Lord’s grace to sow the seed of salvation into them when we speak something.
If others are saved but do not love the Lord, we need to speak something from the Lord to help them love the Lord.
If others are not willing to receive the Lord’s dealing, our burden before the Lord should be to pray and minister to them something that will help them willingly give themselves to the Lord and be dealt with Him.
Paul was such a person with a burden; he didn’t merely wrote about doctrines but bore the saints’ condition before the Lord, and he spoke a word according to the need.
In 1 Cor. 5:1-13 he didn’t merely ignore a sinning brother in the church in Corinth but dealt with that situation before the Lord, and his speaking touched the saints’ feeling and situation.
Even though people may react or have a negative reaction to our speaking, as long as we speak to them with a burden from the Lord, they will be stirred up, and they will be touched by God’s speaking.
If we merely speak what we know and we prepared, without having a burden from the Lord or His speaking in our speaking, this is a void speaking, not touching their feeling or conscience.
On one hand we need to give ourselves to prayer and the ministry of the word; on the other hand, we need to be before the Lord to know others’ situation and condition, and to minister something to them with a burden from the Lord and according to the need.
If we take care of a new one and his heart is not stirred up to love the Lord, accept His dealings, and to build up the church, we need to check with the Lord if we have His burden and His speaking in our speaking.
We cannot merely speak words that sound nice and are according to the Bible; we cannot merely impart moral teachings, ethical advice, or spiritual knowledge into others.
We need to pray, fast, seek the Lord’s heart, and bear people’s condition before the Lord to receive a word from Him, see a vision from Him, and have a burden from the Lord; then, we can speak in oneness with Him, and our speaking will be with a burden to touch their heart.
Lord Jesus, save us from merely speaking spiritual things or ethical teachings as we minister the word to others. May we be before You concerning our situation and concerning others’ condition, so that we may receive Your word, Your vision, and Your burden concerning them. Amen, Lord, we seek to have Your assessment of the real situation of those to whom we speak, and we want to be one with You and speak to them with a burden from You concerning what’s on Your heart. May we spend much time with You and consider the saints, the new ones, the ones around us, and our family, so that we may receive a burden from the Lord and speak the word of the Lord to touch their hearts and bring them onward with You!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Ed Marks for this week, and portions from, CWWL, 1957, vol. 2, “The Administration of the Church and the Ministry of the Word,” chs. 2-3, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Will of God (2020 spring ITERO), week 7, Taking the Lord’s Yoke (the Father’s Will) upon Us and Learning from Him to Find Rest for Our Souls.
- Hymns on this topic:
– Lord, in Thy presence silent I would be, / That in the inmost I to Thee may come; / I would not in my own way pray to Thee, / But let Thy prayer in me my prayer become. (Hymns #764)
– How sweet, how heav’nly is the sight, / When those who love the Lord / In one another’s peace delight, / And so fulfill His Word: / When each can feel his brother’s sigh, / And with him bear a part; / When sorrow flows from eye to eye, / And joy from heart to heart. (Hymns #857)
– I long to have such fellowship / To read and pray and blend with Thee; / I long that Thou wouldst saturate / Till Thou may overflow from me. (Hymns #813)
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