Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Tonight is going to be more of a conversation.
[00:00:08] I believe with all my heart that our God is who he says he is.
[00:00:17] But there is a human condition of the soul that sometimes when we seek him and. And we seek him with all our heart, we hear that there's a promise that we'll find Him. But how many of you have been seeking God in times of need and you just still feel the ache?
[00:00:37] You still feel the loneliness.
[00:00:41] You still are living through whatever hard circumstances are happening, and you are aching for God.
[00:00:51] But our heads and our hearts will not get into gear.
[00:00:59] There's times in my life where I can seek him and I feel him so profoundly. And I am so hungry for those moments. Amen.
[00:01:08] Those times when we seek him, when we feel him and we're refreshed and we're able to go about and do hard things.
[00:01:16] And then I have times where I seek God and I'm like.
[00:01:25] And I've showed up, but the ache is still there.
[00:01:32] I've learned something about myself that I'm really good at being the help for people.
[00:01:41] I'm really good at being strong when someone needs someone.
[00:01:47] What I am not good at is getting the help.
[00:01:52] You need help. I got you. I need help. I suffer silently.
[00:01:58] Anybody in the room like that, I will show up for you. I will be anything and everything that I can. But when my heart aches, I isolate.
[00:02:14] And I believe with all my heart that God is calling to us today.
[00:02:22] Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest today. I want to have this conversation because I know the human condition, I know the gap, and I know the ache of coming to God, but feeling like I can't find the rest that he's offering.
[00:02:51] Am I the only broken person?
[00:02:54] If you're online, give me an amen or something. So I'm not alone. This room's a little quiet tonight.
[00:03:01] Dear Heavenly Father, there is none like you.
[00:03:07] You alone are worthy and you are great. And you do wondrous things.
[00:03:14] And Father, tonight I pray for wondrous things.
[00:03:19] I pray that you teach us how to finally walk into the rest that you offer.
[00:03:26] I pray in the brokenness and the ache, in the things that stop us or keep us stuck. I pray that your great and mighty hand, your light will shine forth, Father.
[00:03:39] I pray that you will renew and you will strengthen your people because you are a God of promise and you do not fail.
[00:03:48] You are faithful.
[00:03:51] So, Father, when something's not working, I want to look within us and. And say, what is it because I know he is good.
[00:03:59] I know you are faithful.
[00:04:02] So today, will you help me clearly talk about this in a way that hearts can connect?
[00:04:08] Will you help me to be the friend that comes alongside Father?
[00:04:14] And will you do what only you can do?
[00:04:18] Will you shape us?
[00:04:20] Will you mold us?
[00:04:22] Will you let us behold your beauty?
[00:04:26] In your son's mighty name we pray. Amen.
[00:04:30] Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
[00:04:37] Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your soul.
[00:04:52] What I know about life is most of us can handle things when they come at us slowly, right? I can handle one fight with my spouse.
[00:05:04] I can handle one hard day at work.
[00:05:08] I can handle a sick kid. I can handle a lot of things.
[00:05:16] But what happens is life piles up, and it piles up, and it piles up, and that's what starts to cause the weariness.
[00:05:29] And I think about this year and where I'm kind of at right now, I just want to be so real with you because you never look to a pastor for who you want to be. You look to Jesus for who you want to be. Amen.
[00:05:44] So I feel like you are my people.
[00:05:49] I feel like I want to talk as openly and honestly with you and share with you what I'm learning so that in life, in the moments that we live, we seek Jesus.
[00:06:03] Jer, I'm hearing my breath a lot, and it's really bothering me.
[00:06:08] It's like, oh, does that work? Can you hear me now, though?
[00:06:11] Can you still hear me? Okay.
[00:06:14] I have a mic situation almost every week, which is real fun.
[00:06:17] Okay.
[00:06:19] I need you, Jesus.
[00:06:22] Okay.
[00:06:24] This year has piled on so heavy. And so I think all of us have seasons. We have seasons where we can handle things, and we're seeking God and we're getting strengthened by God.
[00:06:36] And so I've been looking back at this year and wondering, why am I so weary?
[00:06:44] Why am I so exhausted in my spirit?
[00:06:49] Why is my soul tired?
[00:06:51] It's not the tired that you can just go take a nap and feel better, right? Like, it's not just my. My. I worked hard and I'm tired. There. There is something within my soul that is tired. And I looked past this year and we had, I think, 21 funerals by the time it was February, and we lost good friends, and it was a heavy time.
[00:07:19] But you're the church, and this is what we exist for. And so you just keep showing up and you keep working the extra hours. And you keep loving and you grieve and you cry and.
[00:07:30] And I had kids that I was mentoring that it didn't go the way I hoped and planned and prayed, and my heart was broken.
[00:07:42] And I've had tough things in just. In my own personal life where things that I thought, man, we're over all this, right? Like, we've been doing this for a long time.
[00:07:55] Just keep sneaking back to. Just do a little gut punch.
[00:07:59] Anyone know what I'm talking about?
[00:08:01] And then there's blessings alongside of all this. So then there's these beautiful moments, and our family's living this great adventure that we're so excited about, and so there's good.
[00:08:14] But I look back and I just. I see the pain and I see the heart, and I see how I kept showing up, kept showing up, kept showing up.
[00:08:24] But I never stopped seeking God.
[00:08:29] But now today, I'm preaching a sermon that I so desperately need because I'm going to God. And I'm saying, I hear your call. I hear your promise come to me.
[00:08:46] All this isn't if you've got your stuff together.
[00:08:52] This isn't if you've worked out the kinks and now you need to go talk to God. This is everyone who is weary, everyone who is emotionally depleted, everyone who is spiritually discouraged.
[00:09:14] Come to me.
[00:09:18] And what I find is my human condition.
[00:09:22] I come to Jesus. But a tape plays in my head as I go to Jesus.
[00:09:28] Okay, I'm going to do a couple examples here because I want us to understand, and I think it's very relatable. So I want to do this as clear as possible.
[00:09:39] Let's say you.
[00:09:41] Let's say you are.
[00:09:43] You're in a relationship and you're not feeling loved in the kind of way you desire to feel loved. Or let's say you have just broken up and the relationship's over. And so there's this human need. There's a need not being met in your life. It's the ache in your heart. So you're depleted because there's a human need. And now I'm going to Jesus. But what happens in all of us is we tell ourself a story.
[00:10:11] So if you've been broken up with, it's. There's something wrong with you.
[00:10:16] It's deep rejection, like, what can I do to be better?
[00:10:24] If you're not loved in the way you desire to be loved, you feel like something is wrong with you.
[00:10:32] And so you play a tape of condemnation.
[00:10:37] Condemnation.
[00:10:38] You are in a world of Hurt.
[00:10:42] And then our human nature is to condemn ourselves even deeper so there's more hurt. Am I making sense?
[00:10:51] Okay, let's say that you're having a hard situation with somebody at work and you're depleted by it.
[00:11:01] And now you're telling yourself a story. You not of self condemnation, but of condemnation to them, okay? And so now the tape in your head is, this is a hard situation, but they are a jerk. And so the tape plays on repeat, okay? Now I need you to fill in yours here.
[00:11:22] What is the ache of your heart and what are you telling yourself?
[00:11:28] Because the tape plays if we listen or we don't. It's always playing.
[00:11:36] And there's this subconscious mind that you're constantly telling yourself something.
[00:11:42] You're constantly telling yourself something.
[00:11:47] And maybe it's not even a need or an ache. Maybe it's like, maybe it's a health issue.
[00:11:57] And you're sick and you're struggling with health. And now you just feel like, I'm never gonna feel better. And that's the story you're playing.
[00:12:07] So now Jesus says, come to me, all who are weary, and I will give you rest. But our coming to Jesus looks like here is my need. Will you help me?
[00:12:20] And then my tape plus place, Jesus, you said, if I come to you, you will give me rest. I'm coming to you. I need rest.
[00:12:32] And then my tape rewinds and repeats.
[00:12:37] And so instead of truly coming to Jesus, I'm letting the human condition. Because we all experience this, whatever it might look like, whatever you tell yourself.
[00:12:48] And you play, rewind, repeat, play, rewind, repeat. And so when you come to Jesus, when you seek him, you have this story going in your head. And instead of truly coming to him, you replay the tape.
[00:13:11] And then you say, man, I can't find rest.
[00:13:15] I'm in so much need of his kindness, of his mercy, of his grace. I'm in need.
[00:13:22] And then I say what a loser I am.
[00:13:25] Or I say how unlovable I am, or I put the condemnation on the person that is hurting instead of me saying, jesus, I need to come to you because I am depleted.
[00:13:42] There is a truth that I have an ache in my heart.
[00:13:48] There is a truth that I'm weary, that I'm depleted.
[00:13:55] And in your goodness, would you give me rest for my soul?
[00:14:01] It's good for us to come to Jesus. It's good for us to lay out what hurts us. It's good for us to say, this is the ache of my heart.
[00:14:10] And it's even good for me to articulate. Man, I've been telling myself a story.
[00:14:15] Will you help me replace this story?
[00:14:19] Replace this, repeat, replace this tape with some promises from you.
[00:14:27] See, there's a verse in Second Corinthians. It says. It talks about, when we behold Jesus, he starts to shape us and transform us into him.
[00:14:36] What we behold, we become.
[00:14:40] And too often we label ourselves by the ache, by the anxiety, by the depression. We label ourselves by the hard situation we're in, and we're exhausted and we're depleted because we behold it over and over and over again. And listen, I understand some of you are lonely. Some of you are hurt. Hurting. I don't want to take that away. But what I'm saying is there is a better way to seek Jesus.
[00:15:12] There is a better way to find rest for the soul.
[00:15:17] There is a better way than just replaying this tape on repeat, because I do it all the time. Today I was seeking him. I'm preaching the sermon today, and I was just.
[00:15:30] Can your kindness cover me?
[00:15:34] I just sat in silence and I ached for his kindness.
[00:15:40] My tape was playing, and all I could hear was the hateful things I was saying to myself.
[00:15:50] There is no rest for the soul.
[00:15:54] Do you understand that?
[00:15:55] There is no rest when we rob ourselves of what God is trying to do and just how we show up and come to him.
[00:16:06] Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest, Take my yoke upon you.
[00:16:16] Often when we hear this verse, you'll hear a pastor talk about a yoke, and they'll show you. Everyone in here know what a yoke is? Yes. Yeah. So back in the day, you would put two farm animals in it. They would have a plow attached behind them, and it was like a device for work to plow the field. So the animals would go. And so. And so it's heavy, it's cumbersome, it's wooden. And so a lot of pastures will give you that visual image. And like Jesus saying, take my yoke upon you.
[00:16:53] And my head has always gone to this visual image of my going into a yoke and Jesus coming into the yoke.
[00:17:01] And.
[00:17:03] But then you can't be unequally yoked, and then that makes it unequal, you know what I'm saying? So, like, I've struggled with that image a little bit in my lifetime. And I was reading Gentle and Lowly, and in it, the author was talking about.
[00:17:16] Oftentimes, back in the day, they would talk about this yoke with a teacher and a student, like a student Was yoked to the teacher. They came beside them, they were under them to learn.
[00:17:31] And it's like this picture of an apprenticeship. I've talked about this years ago when we first started midweek, but this idea of like, coming alongside somebody.
[00:17:41] And I got a new image in my head as I was reading this. And I remember when my son was like 8 weeks old, we had to take him to the hospital.
[00:17:51] Breathing issues. And so he was in and out of the hospital a lot when he was little.
[00:17:57] And I remember they couldn't get a vein. And every vein in his body, they blew.
[00:18:04] And the last vein left was the vein on his head.
[00:18:08] And all I could think is, well, what?
[00:18:13] Heck, that's not what I was thinking.
[00:18:16] Happens if that blows.
[00:18:18] What happens if that blows? And I remember just like wanting to throw my entire body over this little body, this love of my life, and say, God, give it to me. I will take it. I will bear it. And it's this image of coming alongside someone. When Lex was in labor, it was 25 hours.
[00:18:40] And it was 25 hours of crazy labor. Not easy, hard, uncomfortable labor. And so that meant in the wee hours of the night, she was up. So Mama was up. Any moms in the room?
[00:18:56] Okay.
[00:18:57] I'm not sleeping until that baby is out and she is safe. If she's awake, I'm awake. Okay? And so I sat next to her. And there was a time like, I think our knees were just touching and we were both just looking at each other.
[00:19:09] It's like three in the morning, but all I could think is, like, I'm in it with you. You are not alone.
[00:19:19] And when I get this picture of take my yoke upon you, it is so much greater than a mother's love.
[00:19:26] It is so much more beautiful, so much more holy, so much more spiritually enriching than any love we know.
[00:19:35] It is a partnership where we come alongside Jesus and. And he. He throws himself over us. And he says, I've got you. I will take the punishment. I will carry the blame.
[00:19:47] It's a love so deep that he. He says, I will never leave you. I will never forsake you. So whatever it is you are going to through in your life, I'm with you.
[00:19:58] I've got you. I walk with you. I hold your hand. I wrap my arms around you. And he's so magnificent and so wonderful that when we take his yoke, it's not.
[00:20:13] It's not a yoke for animals, Church.
[00:20:16] It's not a heavy yoke. So we can go Plow the fields.
[00:20:23] He tells us his yoke.
[00:20:26] He says, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
[00:20:39] This word for easy.
[00:20:43] In other scriptures, it also means kind of.
[00:20:47] And so I want to read it this way. Lex, would you mind coming up, babe?
[00:20:52] For my yoke is kind and my burden is light.
[00:21:00] When we come to Jesus, we have to ask ourselves, who is he?
[00:21:07] Who am I coming to?
[00:21:10] Because too often we have wrong opinions of God.
[00:21:15] Often we try to create the God we want.
[00:21:18] And that's why we so badly need the Bible, because we have to read about who Jesus is. So we don't create a God where it's the stuff we like and we take out the stuff we don't like. Amen.
[00:21:34] We have to read the Bible, and we have to ask ourselves, honestly, who is Jesus?
[00:21:41] Every time you pick up this book, read it, asking yourself, what does this show me about the character of God?
[00:21:51] Every scripture you're looking for, what does this say about God?
[00:21:57] And if it says this about God, then how do I apply this to my life?
[00:22:03] And in all of the Gospel, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, only one time does Jesus give us a description of his heart.
[00:22:16] Only one.
[00:22:19] And when you're reading ancient texts, it's easy to read it like we would read our books now. But that's not how the Bible wants to be read.
[00:22:31] We have to read it like it was intended.
[00:22:35] And so when they wrote these words that Jesus spoke, we have to understand that when he describes his heart, it's not just the organ, it is the main motivation of the entire body.
[00:22:56] When Christ describes his heart to us, he is saying, this is what motivates me.
[00:23:03] This is who I am.
[00:23:07] So when I think about what would Jesus say to describe himself?
[00:23:11] I think about power, and I think about majesty, and I think about holiness.
[00:23:18] I think about love.
[00:23:22] But here's what it says.
[00:23:25] Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart.
[00:23:35] He says he is gentle and lowly.
[00:23:39] And again, gentle is something we use so we can understand it.
[00:23:43] I've seen my husband be so gentle to my granddaughter.
[00:23:49] I've seen him touch his, her little face and show her kindness when she's rowdy and rambunctious, when she's mean.
[00:24:00] She's never mean. I'm just kidding.
[00:24:02] She's only perfect.
[00:24:06] I can know gentleness.
[00:24:09] It is a. It's a softness, it's a kindness. It's not harsh, it's not impatient, it's not easily aggravated.
[00:24:18] Christ is saying, I'm gentle.
[00:24:23] I don't know about you, but when I am struggling with the ache of life and then I condemn myself, do you know how badly I need someone to be gentle?
[00:24:41] He is gentle.
[00:24:43] And lowly is not a word we use anymore. It's not a word we would recognize.
[00:24:50] So some Bibles might say he's humble, but the very heartbeat of lowly is he is approachable, he is accessible.
[00:25:03] I don't want to get this twisted. When we hear that he is gentle and he's accessible, I don't want to think, who weak.
[00:25:10] He is the one true God.
[00:25:13] He is the name above every other name.
[00:25:17] He is at the very sound of his name, one day, every single one of us will bend our knee in reverence to Him. He is not weak, but he is gentle.
[00:25:32] He is approachable.
[00:25:34] And all that might and all that power and all that love and everything that he is, he says to you and I, my heart for you is kind and it's accessible.
[00:25:53] It's when you struggle, come, take my yoke, take my kind, and learn from me.
[00:26:07] I was really fascinated because I looked up what the Greek word for this learn means.
[00:26:16] Too often we're driven by emotion.
[00:26:20] Too often I'm saying to myself, I'm coming to you, but I can't feel you.
[00:26:24] And my emotion, it needs the feeling. Do you know what I'm saying, Church?
[00:26:30] But I don't want to be the Christian that says, even if I can't feel you, I'm not doing this.
[00:26:36] I. I want to be the Christian that has a heart for God, that says, you are gentle and you are accessible and you are good and you are kind. And so even when I don't feel it, I'm still going to learn from you.
[00:26:51] Church.
[00:26:52] It's mature Christian stuff.
[00:26:56] We are not babies that need milk. We are men and women of God.
[00:27:02] And so we choose.
[00:27:04] He chose us. He loves us. He says, come to me, all who are weary, and I will give you rest.
[00:27:14] And so I'm not driven by emotion. I'm driven by faith.
[00:27:20] I'm driven by trust.
[00:27:23] And here's what this learning means.
[00:27:28] Come to me, take my yoke, learn from me.
[00:27:32] It's this.
[00:27:35] This learning is we're gonna increase our understanding, all of our understanding of Jesus. This doesn't happen at once.
[00:27:45] It increases every time we come, every time we seek him, every time I feel it and I can live it, and my heart is on fire.
[00:28:01] I learn every time I feel nothing, I show up because I am a woman that trusts. I'm a woman of faith, and I learn from it. CHURCH it's this acquiring knowledge through instruction.
[00:28:23] But here's the part that gets me this learning. Come and learn from me.
[00:28:29] It's through personal experience.
[00:28:34] We learn through personal experience.
[00:28:38] That means life is going to come and you're going to have beautiful days, and there's going to be moments that your heart is on fire, but life is going to come.
[00:28:49] And there's going to be hard days.
[00:28:51] There's going to be feelings of loss and loneliness, feelings of ache and pain.
[00:28:58] But we are not driven by our emotion.
[00:29:01] We are driven by faith.
[00:29:04] And to learn from God is to know that I'm taking his yoke of kindness.
[00:29:10] He's kind, he's good, he is faithful.
[00:29:14] And I'm linking up with him, committing my life to him, saying, father, where I am broken, where I am in need, I can't do it on my own.
[00:29:31] Would you forgive me? Of all the things that have messed me up, would you help me change my mind about the things that I desire that are wrong?
[00:29:44] Can I come to you?
[00:29:50] Can I learn from you?
[00:29:55] Can I understand that you are gentle, you are approachable, and in every area of my life, I can come to you.
[00:30:12] I want to close this sermon with giving you the opportunity to come to Jesus.
[00:30:25] I just want you to close your eyes.
[00:30:32] I want you to tell him the ache.
[00:30:43] I want you to tell them the need of your heart.
[00:30:50] This is for every single one of us. It's time to come to Jesus.
[00:30:59] All who are weary, all who are heavy laden, all who have a need, Come to Jesus.
[00:31:15] For those of you who are tired, For those of you who desire something but you don't yet have it.
[00:31:34] Come to Jesus.
[00:31:40] He's kind and he is gentle and his arms are open wide.
[00:31:52] Ask to learn from him. Church.
[00:32:03] Ask for the rest that your soul longs for.
[00:32:12] If the tape keeps playing, ask him to change the tape.
[00:32:19] That we don't hear the condemnation, but we hear the voice of the living God saying, come, Come to me.
[00:32:30] And you will find rest for your soul.
[00:32:38] If your burdens feel more than you feel like you can carry, Come to Jesus.
[00:32:49] Come to Jesus.
[00:32:52] Everyone who is online. Seek him with all your heart.
[00:33:01] Scripture tells us when we seek him, we will find him. And we seek him with all our heart. He is there and he is waiting. CHURCH I want to break the curses of our mind and the way we've been thinking. And I want. I want the light of Jesus Christ to punch through the pain, punch through the confusion and the difficulty Come to Jesus.
[00:33:31] Come to Jesus.
[00:33:36] Come to jesus.
[00:33:41] Come to jesus.
[00:33:47] Come to jesus.
[00:33:53] Dear Heavenly Father, your name is great and mighty, and the human language doesn't even know how to talk about you.
[00:34:04] The scriptures give us pictures and images, but, Father, just at your. Your very name, there's no words to describe the majesty and the power and the splendor that you are.
[00:34:17] This is the God we are coming to.
[00:34:22] We trust that you are good.
[00:34:25] I thank you that you give us a picture of your heart that is gentle and it is approachable. And so we approach your throne tonight with confidence, Father, because Jesus Christ, we are yoked with him.
[00:34:40] We walk with him.
[00:34:43] We love him.
[00:34:45] We do life hand in hand with him.
[00:34:50] Father, the ache that people are feeling, I pray your grace, your mercy, your might, your gentleness would touch them.
[00:35:11] Pray for every person who feels it, Father. Thank you.
[00:35:16] Thank you.
[00:35:19] Pray for everyone who doesn't.
[00:35:23] Let them walk in faith.
[00:35:26] Let them be mature Christians who know who you are.
[00:35:32] And in your goodness and in your kindness will you bring us rest.
[00:35:40] In your mighty and powerful son's name, we pray.
[00:35:43] Amen.
