To start with, I want to recommend some readings that may be helpful in this:
1. "Judging" by Derek Prince
2. "My Utmost for His Highest" (June 22) by Oswald Chambers
3. "Release of the Spirit" by Watchman Nee (the book I'll be going through starting next week)
Jesus' call to "Come to me, all who are weary and heavy-laden" (Matt. 11:28) is, among other things, the invitation to exercise our God-given drive to judge/govern with Him under His yoke (which implies trust and dependence on Him rather than on our own independent ways - Prov. 3:5). The truth is that operating out of the tree of knowledge is very wearisome; it makes us think we have to have an opinion about everything (Derek Prince does a good job of pointing out the areas of life in which we do have and do not have jurisdiction for judging); and in the areas where we should exercise judgment, the tree of knowledge drives us to draw conclusions based on our own subjective ways of seeing things. After awhile of living and ministering in this way, we get burned out, because we are not meant to bear the heavy part of the yoke but to come alongside Him who can bear it and simply add our trust and faithfulness and love to the equation.
So how do we live and function out of the tree of life (Jesus)? How do we trust in Him with all our heart rather than trust in our own subjective understanding (which, by the way, is shaped by our upbringing, our personality, our culture, our race, our gender, our environment, our preferences, our life experiences, etc.)?
Jesus Himself answers this over and over again, using different pictures and metaphors, such as being branches of a vine, taking up a light yoke that He's bearing the weight of, drinking from a well of water, etc.
I'll use the one from Matthew 11:28-30:
- First Jesus says, "Come to Me" - this is simply an acknowledgement that I need Him and that my way of judging is burning me out. It's taking a conscious step away from living and acting compulsively from my own ideas of what is right and wrong (i.e., knowledge of good and evil) to surrender to His understanding of what is right and wrong. Though this first step may appear simple and easy, it is devastating and disorienting to the mindset that we have developed by living consistently from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. "Coming to Jesus" will take us to ways of seeing and thinking that we had previously judged as "wrong". His promise is to give rest, but don't be surprised if at first you feel lack of peace and rest while you transition into a lifestyle of thinking and feeling and acting based on the tree of Life. (It's the discomfort and disorientation that we all experience when breaking a bad habit or ceasing to use a coping mechanism that has held us together for a long time.)
- Secondly, Jesus says, "Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me for I am meek and lowly of heart" - it's not enough to cease from my own judging. He wants me to learn from Him how and when to exercise judgment that is life-giving, possible only IN HIM. He wants a partner with Him in "bringing many sons into glory", and that process of discipling others into His likeness will always include the need for discernment and judgment (both negative and positive). So He invites us to deliberately place ourselves under His yoke; in other words, as I remove myself from under my own hard yoke of subjective judging, I must place myself under His easy yoke of judging which implies that I do it His way. Again, at first this doesn't feel easy but the more we stay with Him under His burden, the more we realize how life-giving and restful it is.
In enterneity and throughout it, we are a canvas, once white at the begging with sin, to be painted forth by the colors of God, that will sit forever in his gallery to be enjoyed. We are a painting where sin can't be seen, that covers that canvas from a most boring white, into the colors or joy rapped in glory's good.
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