“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” Matt. 11:28
These past few months the Lord has been making it clear to me that one of the emphasis of this coming year is to explore the question, “What does faith look like?” I find myself spending more time teaching about what faith is (and is not) and what it looks like. The number one struggle that believers have with faith is that they want to wrap feelings and experiences around it. In other words, if I can’t feel or experience God’s love, then the conclusion is, “God doesn’t care or doesn’t love me.” We are all guilty of this in some way because we feel and experience life every moment. However, God is asking us to live in a realm called “faith” which may not necessarily have feeling or experience attached to it. I simply define faith as “allowing God to do what only God can do in my life.” God initiates in grace, and our part is to receive His grace in whatever form it might come. In other words, faith says, “God, I believe that You are who You say You are, You will do what You promise to do, and I am giving You permission to accomplish Your work in my life.”
A critical part of faith is starting with two words, “I can’t!” We must admit to God that we can’t change it, fix it, handle it, control it, solve it, or make it work. When it applies to us or others it translates into, “I can’t change me/them, I can’t fix me/them, and I can’t transform me/them.” If we can arrive at “I can’t, but God can,” then we have opened the door for God to accomplish what He only He can accomplish. The one critical thing that believers have missed is that man was never designed to change, fix, control, or solve anything. It has been God’s responsibility from the beginning! You and I are designed for dependence. This is why the Lord in Matthew 11:28 says, “Come to Me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” God never intended for you to do what only He can do. This is nothing that you have not heard before, but examine your life and see what you are holding onto that is creating a burden or conflict in your life. It could be a circumstance, relationship, past woundedness, etc. This situation is causing you soulical turmoil. It may be constantly stirring up your flesh in some area.
You see, the phrase, “Come to me,” is a faith phrase. If you do come to Him, you are agreeing with God that you can’t resolve the issue that is burdening you. So what does “Come to me” look like? The “faith” word that comes to mind is “entrust.” Entrust is a pro-active faith word which means “giving something or someone that you are holding onto over to God to allow Him to change, fix, solve, or transform.” Another way to define entrust is “offloading your problems to God for Him to deal with.” God is trying to persuade us that we are too weak and too finite to deal with problems that we were never designed to solve in the first place.
What does entrustment look like in our life? In marriage faith looks like entrusting your spouse to God to change what only He wants to change. Or, it could involve coming together and entrusting the problems that you are having to Him. At your job you can entrust your boss and co-workers to God , or you can entrust your negative attitude toward your job or co-worker to God. In your family you can entrust the struggles of your children or your struggles with your children to God. You can entrust your financial and health struggles to Him. Jesus is beckoning us to “come to Him” so that we can offload the problem and enter into His rest. The rest that the Lord is talking about is to cease from the struggle (due to your inability to solve the problem) and to give it to Him for Him. There is no situation that He cannot handle.
