Holy Means Whole: According to Yoke is Easy and Burden is Light



Do we need to correct something in espousing hard work? Jesus once said, "My yoke is easy and my burden is light." It has become fashionable in our day to promote the virtue of "work hard" versus the "yoke is easy" philosophy. Have we lost something in promoting hard versus light? Is it desirable for the meaning of holy to be hard to determine?


There are things in life called hard or heavy. One of those things is hard problems to solve. Hard problems believe it or not have similar characteristics. They are: 1) Complexity, 2) Disconnected goals, 3) Action constraints and 4) Lack of clarity. To put it in simpler terms, they are: 1) too much in amount, 2) disconnected in relationship, 3) stillness in action, and 4) unclear on things. We call some problems difficult or heavy rather than easy or light because of the burden of responsibility we bear to solve problems. Defining holiness is one of those difficult problems in life. We know this because there are so many differing views on its meaning. It creates a complex situation. Yet we must not despair.


There are a host of problem solving techniques, but fundamentally we have to face the fact that the problem is difficult. So to remove the difficulty, we need to remove the characteristics of difficulty. This is a virtue. This is not harmful. Jesus, in saying His yoke was easy, was not a softy.


We need to make the solution light and easy over heavy and difficult. We need to bring the right amount to bear that means starting with little amounts before taking on the big amounts. We need to find a true relationship that develops ties between things and closeness between things versus disconnections and distance. We need to create loving action that is skillful and busy in action rather than unskilled and a sluggard in action. And finally, we need to produce good things like clarity versus obscurity in words and in things.


For brevity, you could say it all the following ways in terms of the process of action:



The responsible whole is start with the light to lighten the heavy.
The right amount is start with the little to make smaller the big.
The true relationship is start with the joined or connected to connect what is disjoined.
The loving action is start with the easy to make create ease for the difficult.
The good thing is start with the clear to clear up the unclear.

I think this process is important to bring out in the clear and not keep concealed. As it says in Proverbs 2, better is open hatred than concealed love. Openness is very important. I want to make it very clear what process I have used overall in approaching the heavy burden of the meaning of holy.

This process has in the end made the statement of Jesus make sense. He does in fact make the yoke easy (the work) and the burden light (the overall responsibility). I praise Him for that. I don't think the meaning is hard to derive when a person using the process above. That is overall how I arrived at holiness means wholeness. May God bless your day.

In Christ,

Pastor Jon