Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden

Tabernacle of David

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest; take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls; For My yoke is easy and My burden is light (Matthew 11:28-30).

Here Jesus is not just saying a word, He is making a proposal. This is not a word that you need to listen to and think what to do with it. The Lord specifically says: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”

For us, as Russian speakers, this phrase sounds somewhat mysterious. It seems that the meaning of these words that Jesus spoke to the church is encrypted. But did the Lord want to be encrypted? Some are trying to create new translations of the Bible to make the Word more understandable. But a person thirsting for truth will himself seek to understand what is written.

So, “come to Me” - everything is clear in this phrase. Next – “all who labor.” Working people are people who have taken on the hardest work. They work in the most difficult way, that is, they do not just work and finish working, but they are in a state of constant hard work. These are working people and also burdened ones. What is a burden? This is an outdated word and is hardly spoken nowadays. A burden is a burden, a load, something that burdens a person, and it is also a responsibility. That is, a burden is a responsibility that a person bears on himself. I think you already understand that in this place the word “responsibility” denotes a state in which it becomes very difficult due to the fact that you are responsible for something.

And a picture emerges: we see before us a person who works a lot, who has taken on a lot of responsibility and bears this burden. And this does not mean that today he carries it, but tomorrow he doesn’t. This person constantly feels this burden and responsibility on his shoulders; he is in constant work and in constant worries. When you constantly feel responsible, it weighs heavily on your soul. Men know this especially well, because the burden of responsibility that they take upon themselves is sometimes unbearably heavy.

The Lord is speaking to people who have taken on so much that it becomes very difficult to bear. And he doesn’t just address, but from the very first words he makes an offer: come to Me, all those who work hard, who have taken on a lot of responsibility, who carry unresolved problems that they cannot figure out. It is to such people that the Lord turns and says: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”

A person is always looking for an opportunity to calm down. Usually people who want to calm down from everything try to forget themselves, for example, by drinking. Let's go, have a drink, and forget. Or they drank valerian and calmed down. This is how the world calms down. Burdens deprive a person of peace, they displace him. A person works, he is burdened with worries, he carries burdens because of problems - and cannot deal with them. This burden on the shoulders is very heavy and constantly makes itself felt, because of this, people are deprived of all peace, because they need to resolve their situation.

I have very rarely met people who are indifferent to the fact that they have many problems. I saw how people became alcoholics, they simply washed away their grief, their inability to solve problems, trying to find this peace through alcohol. All these burdens have such a property that as soon as you place them on your shoulders, take responsibility for something, you can no longer calm down until the situation is resolved. Until you reach the end, you are always in a restless state. People are deprived of sleep, deprived of peace and rest. And even if they are in another place, in their thoughts they cannot part with their problems. Responsibility is so deeply embedded in them that it is very difficult not to notice it; it constantly reminds itself of itself in the mind, because the enemy is already behind it. A person would like to forget about it, but he cannot, every problem constantly makes itself felt.

The problem may concern people you know - they know how to talk and make themselves known. If the problem is within the family, then the owner of the house will be bald by his loved ones, relatives and everyone who knows about it. As soon as a person takes on the problem, he will not be given peace, the enemy will use everyone and everything. If this is work, then the boss will not give you peace. That is, there will always be someone who will stand on top, constantly remind you of this problem and literally press this burden into you, weigh it down with words. Jesus addresses people with this problem.

There is also such a meaning in the dictionary: “burdened with affairs,” that is, a person is burdened precisely with affairs. They say about such people: “They don’t see the white light” - they are busy, overloaded with work. The man is busy, “he has no time to breathe, he’s up to his neck with work,” he’s overwhelmed with work. And all these are phrases in which a person expresses his pain and the heaviness that he carries within himself. These are the people Jesus knows and to whom He speaks. For some reason, the Lord is not interested in other people, namely these people who put everything on their shoulders and sometimes don’t even know when it happened.

In the modern world, all this burden has become even heavier. The progress that has approached people makes it possible not only to develop technology and everything else, but along with it the burden also develops that falls on the shoulders of people, on their brain, nervous system, and it becomes very difficult for the human soul to bear all this.

Further: “Take My yoke upon you” - this is an interesting point. The Lord offers a deal. He says: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest,” and makes the following offer: “Take My yoke upon you.”

What is a "yoke"? We know everything about it from history: the Mongol-Tatar yoke, the Turkish yoke, the Persian yoke... “The yoke is an oppressive, enslaving force; in the narrow sense, the oppression of conquerors over the vanquished” (Wikipedia). Jesus practically proposes oppression. This is an enslaving force, the oppression of the conqueror over the vanquished. The Lord makes an offer based on Him becoming the winner in your life and you being the losers. The Lord makes an offer to everyone to be defeated, He offers you His victory over you.

The Lord first said: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden,” He promises such people to calm them down. As I already said, people around the world are sure that in order to calm down, you just need to drink a glass of vodka - and you will calm down. But the burdens and problems will not be solved. How is God going to calm me down? Moreover, He further says: “Let Me conquer you. Let Me become the winner over you,” invites you to learn: “And learn from Me.” What to learn? He says, “For I am meek and lowly in heart.”

This is where the secret is revealed that leads us to the very peace that the Lord speaks about. When He says “I will calm,” He says this to those people who are deprived of peace, whose nervous system is already shaken, because when a person has a hole, the enemy attacks the nervous system, Satan destroys it. Its target is the human nervous system. Burden, work, anxiety, problems that a person takes upon himself - all this hits the nervous system.

So, the Lord in this situation says: “I will give you peace.” With God there is true peace, and there is none anywhere else. David said: “Rest in the Lord, my soul,” because it is the soul that suffers. Because of this suffering, doors open through which anger, irritation, anger enters - precisely because a person works too hard. The word about work that was spoken to Adam was given as a curse to man because he had turned away from the Lord his God. As a result, a person without God took upon himself a lot of all sorts of responsibilities, which brought him neither joy nor peace. He could not become a god as he dreamed. He became a burdened man with a destroyed nervous system, irritated, angry, angry, because nothing works out due to lack of wisdom and much more.

The Lord says: “Learn from Me” - this is an important point, because it is important to learn from Him so as not to carry these burdens on yourself. He says, “For I am meek and lowly in heart.” This does not mean that we are offered a Teacher who is meek, lowly in heart, and we will be very good with him, because he is very kind. He will be so good, meek, humble, like a lamb, and we will be so pleased to study with him. No. To find peace, you need to be meek and lowly in heart, that's the thing. A meek person, close to God, humble, is one who has allowed God to defeat him. This is the position of the heart when you surrender before Him more and more, surrendering all your positions in which you once fought with Him while being in them. What has the Lord called us to? First of all, He called us to make peace with God. We need to be reconciled to Him in order to have a meek heart, close to God, a humble heart that can bow before Him. A heart that allows itself, if necessary, to be tied up like a sheep and placed on the altar. And if necessary, harness and plow. No matter what the Lord does, He will always do it with love. It will not be the same burden that you carry without Him, a burden that destroys you.

When you carry all these burdens, you must understand that they have enslaved you. And Satan is always behind this, because it does not happen that we are left without a master: either the Lord Jesus Christ will be our master, or Satan. When a person bears responsibility to someone: to another person, to himself, to his family, he carries burdens that are controlled by Satan.

And when you come to Jesus and give Him all these burdens, He first of all says: “In order not to carry these, you need to allow Me to conquer you, conquer you, your character. And you need to learn. If you learn from Me, you will become meek and humble.” Whatever the Lord gives you, it all leads to meekness, closeness to Him and humility. It is important to allow yourself to be made a different person, a new creation in Jesus Christ.

The Lord says: “For My yoke is easy.” Again the yoke. He continues to invite us to conquer us. What does it mean to conquer? From history you remember that this is complete enslavement. Enslavement is when people cannot do everything they would like. And at this moment no one else dares to appropriate what they have won. This conquered property belongs only to the conqueror, be it people, their property and everything else. The Lord invites us to allow ourselves to be conquered. Not to take on His burdens, as some understand, but to accept His conquest.

How is the world usually? To conquer something, you had to go to war - kill someone, conquer, take possession. And the Lord says: “Take My yoke upon you”—namely, take it, accept the yoke, agree voluntarily, without militant conquest.

When the Lord says, “Take My burden upon you,” He is showing that the burden He has on our shoulders will no longer look like the burden of responsibility that we carried on ourselves. His burden is all that the Lord offers, what He invites us to learn, what His Word promises us, what He invites us to have. This is the concern that follows precisely from His words: “I will teach you.” This is the very burden for us, because He teaches how to be righteous, holy, how to learn to live in the Kingdom of God. He proposes to take this burden on your shoulders - to learn.

The Lord offers us His studies so that we learn and bear this responsibility and duty, which is always accompanied by our own efforts. We must take His learning upon ourselves, place it on our shoulders as people who have made the decision to learn and who carry this very burden on their shoulders. And the Lord says that it is easy.

The Lord can take possession of us only through love. Although the Lord does not tell us that we are slaves, nevertheless the people whom He calls voluntarily become slaves, and the law allows this to happen.

People who really want to be at peace need first of all teaching, learning, because all burdens come solely from ignorance. The Lord offers to take on the burden of learning - to learn from Him, and then people will find peace and tranquility. What the Lord offers is wisdom, wisdom, prudence. People taught by the Lord will not take on a lot of unnecessary responsibilities, will not walk in paths where burdens will be placed on them that they cannot bear. The Lord will heal the nervous system.

If, when you look at this word, you see in yourself a person who has truly taken upon himself all these heavy burdens, I advise you to thank the Lord for this word and say:

Lord, I accept Your offer. You said, “Come,” and I come to You. You said: “Those who labor and are heavy laden”—I am such a person. My nervous system is completely destroyed, I find no peace, I have taken on a bunch of burdens and problems that I cannot solve in any way. They torment me, I get nervous because of it, I get irritated, I get angry, it’s all present in me.

Lord, based on the word You spoke today, I admit that I am ignorant. It is because I am not trained that all this happens to me. Although I am called by Your name, I do not live as a person who has learned from You, who knows how to follow You. I am a person who has not yet accepted Your yoke upon myself; I have not allowed myself to be conquered by You. From now on I allow it to You, Lord, conquer me, be my Conqueror. I take upon myself this burden of being taught by You, and I know that it is You who will help me bear it and lead me to victory. I also ask You to lead me to meekness and humility, because in order to obey You, I need to have this. And then I will find peace for my soul. I thank you and praise you. Amen.

The Yoke and Burden of Christ

“My yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:30).

When we hear the words “yoke”, “burden”, we associate with it the idea of something heavy, overwhelming us, undermining our strength.

But there is a yoke that the Lord calls good, and a burden that is light! This is the yoke of Christ's commandments. This is the burden of fulfilling His will in the earthly life of each of us. Christ calls us: “Take My yoke upon you” (Matthew 11:29).

This yoke is good, because bearing it brings us in soul closer to the holy saints of God, makes us related to them, to our Heavenly Mother, to our Savior Himself.

The yoke under which the Lord calls us is a good yoke, because it brings us true, eternal happiness; it gives peace and tranquility to the multi-rebellious human soul. “Take My yoke upon you, learn from Me, and you will find rest for your souls,” says the Savior.

The burden of Christ is a light burden. Why? Because none of us, whom Christ calls to take His yoke upon ourselves, are left by Him alone in bearing this yoke. The Lord surrounds us on all paths of life with His help, His Mother, all the saints to whom we sigh with our hearts. After all, when we hear or ask in prayer: “Most Holy Theotokos, save us,” or: “All saints, pray to God for us,” we not only say the prescribed words of prayer, but we believe that the Mother of God with Her Maternal care about us will help us in the most dear task of saving our souls and that the holy saints of God will be our prayer books and guides of Divine help to us in all earthly needs. Oh, we are rich in the help of Heaven, and thousands of invisible hands are stretched out to us from there to strengthen us, support us, lead us, to ease the cross of life and labors for the salvation of the soul and for the sake of the Kingdom of God. No wealth and treasures of the earth, no glory, no honor, no intelligence, no beauty, no talents - nothing in comparison with the happiness that eternal life gives to the immortal soul of man with its joys bequeathed by the Lord to each of His faithful servants, the executors of His covenants in earthly life, to the one who lives with faith and dies with it.

The burden of the Lord’s commandments is light because all these commandments are not something alien to our spiritual nature, imposed on it from the outside, but correspond to the innermost aspirations and aspirations of the human spirit - that which is innate in us and constitutes the urgent need of our soul. When a person accustomed to physical labor needs to work in the field of mental labor, it is not easy for him to accustom himself to a new type of labor. And vice versa: for a mental worker, physical labor can be too hard and, often, completely unbearable. But the work of fulfilling God’s commandments is within the power of everyone, accessible and easy to everyone, because it is made up of exactly what our nature requires: mercy, non-judgment, bodily and spiritual purity, freedom from anger, truthfulness - but this is what the soul wants to live and breathe! After all, lies, malice, anger, fornication, etc. alien to our spirit, the spirit resists them as something that defiles and stains it. Each of us is well acquainted with the torment of the conscience that denounces us after such falls into sin.

To the one who has taken upon himself the burden of fulfilling the will of God, the burden of life becomes easier!

Let us all bow with love before the covenant of the Lord: “Take My yoke upon you.” This yoke, this burden will lead us to eternal life, into the family of God’s holy people.

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Orthodox Life

Often in the Church we hear in litanies - petitions proclaimed by the deacon - a prayer for those who work: “We also pray for those who bear fruit and do good in this holy and all-honorable temple, those who work and sing...” Who are the workers?

It would seem that everything is simple: these are people who do some kind of work in the church, and the Church prays for them. However, those who sing and those who bear fruit also work to some extent, and yet in prayers they are named according to the type of their activity. Maybe the working people are everyone else, representatives of seemingly insignificant, secondary professions, who do not bother to separate them by professional skills? Just not.

In the ancient Church there were many categories of clergy, one of the categories and the Church honored them by calling them “toilers.” These are representatives of one of the psychologically and physically difficult professions: those clergy who buried the bodies of dead Christians, gravediggers. “The veneration of the remains of Christian martyrs gave rise to a desire to counter the murder of Christians and the dishonor of their holy relics with concern for the proper burial and protection of the relics.”

What was the work of gravediggers? "Gravediggers in the first centuries of Christianity were those who were responsible for the maintenance of cemeteries, including excavating catacombs." We can imagine that these people were engaged in creating burial places (digging a grave like modern diggers or hollowing it out in stone), decorating them, creating inscriptions (epitaphs), in a word, they had to possess different professional skills. Hence the generalization “toiling” in the Greek text of the liturgy: κοπιώντων, derived from κοπιάω, “to grow weary,” “tired,” “toil hard.” Let us step back from our subject and turn to the Bible and note that where Jesus Christ says: “Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28), there is also the word κοπιώντες, a derivative of κοπιάω , and is used here in its direct meaning.

In Latin, for gravediggers, copiates (from the Greek κοπιάται) there is the term “fossors” (Latin fossores, “diggers”, “miners”, from “fodere”, to dig).

Starting from the 2nd century. The Fossori were engaged in the arrangement of catacombs, as well as specially equipped cemeteries for the burial of dead Christians. “We must not think that the catacombs were the only burial places in Christendom during the first three centuries; most likely, they were created in certain cities and regions of the Roman Empire; Rome, Naples, Syracuse, Malta, Tunisia... in the most important cities. In all other parts of the empire the dead were buried above ground in mausoleums or in simple graves.” Actually, the catacombs of the first three centuries of Christianity (although the catacombs were created before the 410s) were the fruit of the Fossors. Each cemetery had its own associations of fossors, whose hard work Christians considered as a religious feat, paid for it and respected it. The arrangement of graves is dangerous due to heavy physical labor, persecution of Christians (cases of vandalism), when the activities of fossors were prohibited and declared criminal. The work of the fossors was long and required patience. “With pick and shovel they dug in the dim light of oil lamps. Baskets or bags were used to remove dirt."

The first book mention of the Fossori dates back to 303 and is found in the Christian church document “Gesta purgationis Caeciliani” in which, among the lower clerics (ordinis minoris), the Fossori are also mentioned. In the East, fossors appear later. Emperor Constantine approved 1,100 burials in the Church of Constantinople, added them to the church clergy, and Emperor Constantius in 357 exempted them from the trade tax. “In this rescript they are called clerics. However, they were clergy in the sense that they were church officials. Probably only the leaders of the colleges of copiates were appointed through hirothesia. Most scholars believe that only in certain communities did copiates constitute a special degree; The custom of placing copies on clergy degrees did not become widespread either in the East or in the West. This degree was not included in the later hierarchy of clerics.” The decrees were subsequently confirmed by Emperor Anastasius (491–518) and Justinian (525–565) (novella 43 and 59).

Blessed Jerome (432–420) in his book “On the Seven Church Degrees” (chapter 9), writes: “The first order among the clergy is that of buryers (Fossariorum), who, in the likeness of Saint Tobias, are “encouraged to bury the dead.” Blessed Epiphanius of Cyprus (d. 403) in his “Book of Faith” (chapter 20) calls the Fossori “laborers (κοπιαταί), caring for the bodies of the dead.” Under Emperor Theodosius II (408-450), there were over 1000 fossori in Constantinople. “Because of their numerous and difficult class, the Church did not forget to remember them in her prayers.”

Archpriest Andrei Ukhtomsky

"Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden..."

On January 24, at the Sunday service, the Gospel of Matthew (11:27-30) was read. We are publishing a sermon delivered in the St. Nicholas Church in Kyiv on the theme of one of the verses read: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”

Dear brothers and sisters! Many of us are carrying a miserable burden that only Christ can lift from us. The heaviest burden is the burden of sin. If a person tried to carry it alone, it would simply crush him. Therefore: “The Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all” (Isa. 53:6).

It is Christ who removes the burden of our guilt, it is He who gives peace to our restless soul. Why does He call us to cast all our worries on Him? Yes, because we are dear to Him.

He was tempted in all respects, but committed no sin—so He has the authority to say so. That is why He “heals the brokenhearted and heals their sorrows” (Ps. 146:4). And the more deeply we realize our weakness and helplessness, the sooner we will find support in Him. The heavier our burdens, the more blessed the peace will be when we turn to Him who bears all burdens.

Remember the Gospel story about those invited to the feast (Luke 14:13-24). We are all called to God's feast. It should have begun here on earth if man had not betrayed God. Now everyone can grieve for themselves, for society, for their orphanhood in the world, but only a believer in God can turn to Christ with the power of this feeling, knowing that he is loved by God, that God became incarnate, became Man in order to save us - life, teaching, death and, of course, His Resurrection; At the same time, He does not talk about us being “the best we can be,” but He is talking about something completely different.

St. John Chrysostom says: “...if you want to know what man is, do not raise your eyes to the thrones of kings and nobles, but lift your gaze to the Throne of God, and you will see a Man sitting in glory... The only Man Who is completely, completely Man, this is the Lord Jesus Christ, because in Him the fullness of the Divinity dwelt bodily, because His very corporeality is permeated with the Divinity, because He is God-Man, and this is our calling.”

Our coming to Christ must begin with spiritual hunger, with longing, with a quest or with the miracle of the Meeting. Every person has such depth, such spaciousness that can only be filled by the divine presence. Into this depth, into this bottomlessness, we can throw everything that the earth can give: knowledge, beauty, and living feelings - but at the same time, our soul is never completely satisfied - hunger, longing and desire remain. But this is the most precious state that we can have, for only from this feeling can a real, serious ascetic search for that without which we cannot live be born. Such hunger evokes in a person’s soul the consciousness that anything can be sacrificed in order to find the One Whom the soul is looking for, the only One who can fill, fulfill, transform the soul, body and our entire being. It is no coincidence that the Savior says: “I am the way, the truth and the life” (John 14:6), and: “No one comes to the Father except through Me” (John 14:6).

Many people today, striving to achieve well-being in this world, groan under the weight of worries. They chose to serve the world, accepted all the difficulties associated with it, and submitted to its rules. Here, again, it is appropriate to recall the parable of Those Called to the Feast. At the beginning of this parable we are given three images that apply to each of us in this fallen world, which we have chosen as our homeland, while our true homeland is the Kingdom of Heaven.

So, the first of those invited says to the messenger from the Owner: I have acquired a piece of land for myself and I need to inspect it. What does this mean in spiritual light? This is that I chose the land and want to develop it. After all, she is mine, so I want to possess her to the end. Man does not notice that in trying to hold on to the earth, to make it “his own,” he himself becomes its slave, because what controls our heart invades the strength of our soul, for “Where our treasure is, there will our heart be also” (Matt. 6:19). So this person himself becomes a slave of this land, henceforth belonging to it. He cannot tear himself away from her, completely immersing himself in her, as if growing his roots into this earthly dust, so as to no longer look up. And, in the end, we belong to this earth in such a way that we lie down in it with our bones, never having time to look at the sky; we are buried in it, our body dissolves in it, and what we thought was OURS now already POSSESSES US. We never had time for the feast of God, for the feast of Faith, for the joy of the Meeting, because we only hurried to develop the land, which as a result swallowed us up...

The second man in this parable says to the messenger from the Master: I bought five pairs of oxen - I need to test them. A number of the Fathers of the Ancient Church pointed out that these five pairs of oxen symbolize our five senses - sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste. But these five senses are applicable only to earthly life, since they cannot grasp the sky. Even earthly love is not covered by these five feelings - what then can we say about Divine love or eternity?

And so this person, as it were, starts bargaining with God: he points out to the Creator these five of our senses and, accordingly, acquires “something” from them, but only earthly things. And “he who sows to the flesh will from the flesh reap corruption...” (Gal. 6:8).

The third of those invited says that he got married. His joy is overflowing, and if so, how can he also accommodate someone else’s joy? Attachment and love on this side of eternity, depending on how we treat it, can again become an obstacle - after all, it holds me firmly on earth and I have nowhere to go (“Whoever loves his father or mother more than Me is not worthy Me" (Matthew 10:37)). Eternity is later, someday, at leisure or in old age (“For you know neither the day nor the hour when the Son of Man will come” Matthew 25:13)), but now you need to fill the time with this joy of yours, your happiness, your delight of closeness with your now dear person!

And we, too, like this man, do not go to God’s feast, for we are afraid that temporary joy will leave us, drowning in Eternity.

So, dear brothers and sisters, one clings to the earth, another to the “oxen,” the third to his temporary joy... Who will come to the call of Christ: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest”? After all, He advises that we should seek first of all the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and promises that everything we need for earthly life will be given to us. After all, vanity blinds, and a person no longer thinks about the future.

“Take My yoke upon you,” Christ also says. A yoke is a yoke, which is a tool that is put on an animal so that it can work for its owner. We must take His yoke upon us to become His fellow workers. The yoke is His Law, the great law of love, first revealed in Eden in the single Commandment of obedience and fulfillment of His will; then proclaimed from Sinai (the Decalogue), and finally sealed into hearts with the New Testament.

And if we voluntarily renounce this “yoke” of Christ, then sooner or later we will be reached by mental pain, which is only a signal fire with which Providence has protected the edges of gaping abysses and marshy swamps in order to preserve man in his ways. But the soul does not tolerate emptiness, and this emptiness cannot be filled by any material fantasies, for only the Creator Himself can satisfy the immortal soul.

“Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden...” When we read the Gospel, especially the call of Christ to bear His yoke, then we honestly admit to ourselves that only these covenants of purity, prayer, love make up all the beauty of life, and where they are trampled upon - and because they are really trampled upon, life becomes boring prose, to say the least - it becomes hell and a devilish vaudeville, life ceases to be joy, inspiration, life ceases to be life. Outside the high air of the ideals of Christ, outside the boundless blue distances of the Sermon on the Mount, outside His call to learn His meekness, we will always suffocate in the stuffy cellar of philistinism and materialism.

The highest strings of our spirit vibrate from the call to collaborate with Him, and in this inner “consonance” there is new proof of the authenticity and reliability of His words!

“Learn from Me,” says Christ, “for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” And we must go through this school of Christ in order to learn meekness and humility from Him.

The cause of all anxiety in us is selfishness. The “science” of Christ presupposes liberation from thoughts, sinful habits and established stereotypes in the lives of the majority, acquired in the school of the prince of darkness. Man must be free from everything that is contrary to the will of God.

Christ is the axis of the world. He is also the axis of our soul. If the axis is not in place, then we experience hesitation, doubt and confusion. On the contrary, by finding Christ, we find ourselves, we find a solid anchor that will securely moor us to the shores of Eternity.

Let us, dear brothers and sisters, hasten to this call with the hope of joyful collaboration in accordance with His will, for “the will of God is our sanctification” (1 Thess. 4:3). Amen.

Commentary on Matthew 11:28

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Commentary on Matthew 11:28 / Matthew 11:28

Gospel of Matthew 11 verse 28 - synodal text:

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest;

Basil the Great (329/30−379)

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Why are those who labor in good deeds called burdened? Because “those who go walking and weeping, throwing their seeds, but those who are coming will come with joy, taking hold of their hands” (Ps. 125:6), are full of fruits, which are returned to them according to the amount sown. Therefore, those are called burdened who, because they “sowed for blessing, also reap for blessing” (cf. 2 Cor. 9:6) and prepare for themselves with eternal joy handles of spiritual fruits.

Conversations on the Psalms. Discourse on the forty-eighth psalm.

“Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest ,” says the Divine voice, pointing either to the rest there or to the rest here. But without a doubt, calling us, he exhorts, firstly, to throw off the burden of a lot of acquisitions, passing it on to those in need, and then, rejecting the whole multitude of sins that come from a lot of acquisitions, through charity and confession, flow to the crusader life of monks. Therefore, he who intends to obey Christ and hastens to a poverty-loving and unentertained life is truly worthy of surprise and satisfaction.

Source: The ascetic word and exhortation about renunciation of the world and spiritual perfection.

John Chrysostom (~347−407)

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Then, having aroused in them a disposition toward Himself through His preaching and showing them His ineffable power, He calls to Himself, saying: Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest . Do not come one or the other, but come all who are in worries, sorrows and sins; come not so that I may torture you, but so that I may forgive your sins; come not because I need glory from you, but because I need your salvation.

I , he says, will calm you down . He did not say: I will only save; but, what is even more important, I will place you in complete safety.

Source: Conversations on the Gospel of Matthew.

Cyril of Alexandria (376−444)

Art. 28−29 Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest; take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls

The one who heard the call, approached and clung to the Commander will rest in peace. “Depart,” He says, “from sinful plans and adherence to the flesh and, turning to deeds worthy of praise, draw near to Me in order to become partakers of the divine nature and fellowshippers of the Holy Spirit.” And He calls everyone, not just the children of Israel, being the Creator and Lord of all. He calls the Jews laboring, who were unable to bear the yoke of the law, and the idolaters, burdened, because they are burdened with the devil and burdened with a multitude of sins. So, “you, O Jews,” He says, “incline to the truth, know Me, your Guardian and Master, and by drawing close to Me, you will profit from My coming. After all, I free you from legal slavery, in which you endure many hardships, since it is not easy for you to fulfill this law, and you are preparing for yourself the greatest burden of sins, which [the more] the more [prescriptions] of the law you should have fulfilled and observed.”

Source: Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew.

Ignatius (Brianchaninov) (1807−1867)

Art. 28−30 Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest; take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls; for My yoke is easy and My burden is light

The yoke and burden of Christ are the “gospel commandments.” They require self-sacrifice, and therefore are called a yoke, but they free and revive the soul, fill it with inexplicable peace and pleasure, and therefore are called a good and easy yoke. Each of them is fragrant with meekness and humility, imparting these virtues to the executor of the commandment. The skill to fulfill the Gospel commandments makes meekness and humility a property of the soul. Then Divine grace introduces spiritual meekness and spiritual humility into the soul through the action of the peace of Christ that transcends the mind.

Source: Ascetic experiences. About the Gospel commandments.

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Come to me , the sacred mother of all virtues invites us - prayer, all who labor under the yoke of passions in captivity of fallen spirits, burdened with various sins, and I will give you rest . Take my yoke upon you, and you will find rest for your souls (see Matt. 11:29), healing for your wounds. For my yoke is good (see Matthew 11:30), capable of healing from sins, even the greatest ones.

Source: About prayer.

Justin (Polyansky)

How touching is this commandment, with which the Lord - the Way, the Truth and the Life - calls to Himself all those who labor and are burdened, and promises to give them rest! He seems to ask and beg them: take My yoke upon you: it is good; Learn from Me meekness and humility: this burden is light. And the beloved disciple of Christ, St. The Evangelist John the Theologian, of course, speaks from experience that the commandments of Christ are not burdensome (1 John 5:3). How happy is he who fulfills these commandments! Meekness and humility are also inseparable: where there is meekness, there is humility; and where there is humility, there is meekness.

Source: Commandments of our Lord and God Jesus Christ.

Luka Krymsky (1877−1961)

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

I know, I know how burdened you are with life and work, how much you need peace. Let us go to Him, our Savior, Who Calls us, let us learn from Him - and we will find the only true and blissful peace.

Let us learn from Him humility, which was so clearly manifested already at His birth in the cattle pen, in the manger of Bethlehem.

Let's think about what kind of persecution He was subjected to throughout His life: already as a newborn baby, He fled to Egypt from Herod, who wanted to kill Him.

After He preached the full truth in the synagogue of Nazareth, He was led by a riotous crowd to the edge of a high cliff in order to throw Him into the abyss. More than once the Jews grabbed stones to beat Him for preaching about Himself.

Have you ever been persecuted with such fury? Think about Him, so often insulted. Those who reviled Him said that He performed His great miracles by the power of demons.

Remember this - the insults and dark suspicions that you hear about yourself will seem petty and insignificant to you.

You have many sorrows, and it is difficult for you to endure them. Illnesses torment you, and you bear them faint-heartedly. But didn’t Isaiah call Him, our Lord, a man of sorrows and acquainted with pain?

His humility was so immeasurable that He, the sinless Son of God, received the baptism of repentance from John the Baptist for the remission of sins, for He had to fulfill all righteousness. Let us learn humility from Him. Let us love and fulfill all righteousness.

You are tired of constant work and long for rest. And He and His holy apostles were always in such constant labor that they often had no time to even take food.

You are burdened with worries about yourself and your families. And He was always concerned about the huge crowd of people who accompanied Him, waiting from Him for the words of His Divine teaching and the healing of their countless sick.

You need rest... But He did not have it and only sometimes left even His disciples somewhere on a high mountain, so that there, in the deep silence of the night, he could rest his soul in prayerful communion with His Father.

You often get tired... Wasn’t He more tired than you, walking 200 miles from Jerusalem to Galilee?

It is difficult for you to endure insults and insults, strangulations and dishonor... Remember how in the Garden of Gethsemane He was tied up like a thief; how at the trial in the house of the high priest even the servants beat Him on the cheeks with dirty hands and spat in His face; how they covered His face with a handkerchief, beat Him on the head with a stick and said: “Tell me, Christ, who hit You?”

Think about the fact that all your insults and insults compared to this dishonor of the Son of God are as insignificant as the slightest grain of sand compared to the highest mountains.

Think about this - and your indignation and indignation will subside, and you will find peace for your souls (see Matthew 11:29).

Remember how they mercilessly beat the Lord Jesus with terrible Roman whips, tearing off pieces of his body; how He fell under the weight of His cross.

And first of all and most of all, always have His terrible cross, His crucifixion before your spiritual eyes; the blood that flowed over the cross and dripped onto the ground, the blood with which He washed away our sins.

Source: Sermons. Volume III. Word for the week of the Cross.

Macarius the Great (~300−391)

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Just as God then commanded that even the most dumb animals should rest on the Sabbath, an ox should not be dragged under the yoke of necessity, and a burden should not be placed on a donkey; because the very animals rested from hard work: so the Lord, having come and bestowing the true and eternal Sabbath, gave rest to the soul, burdened and burdened with the burdens of lawlessness, unclean thoughts, doing deeds of unrighteousness out of need, because it was in slavery to cruel rulers, and eased it from unbearable burdens, from vain and unclean thoughts; removed from her the heavy yoke of deeds of unrighteousness, and gave her peace, weary in unclean thoughts.

For the Lord calls man to rest. saying: “ Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest .” And those souls who submit and come, He gives rest from these heavy, burdensome and unclean thoughts; they become idle from all lawlessness, keep the true, pleasant and holy Saturday, celebrate the spiritual holiday of unspeakable joy and joy, perform from a pure heart service that is pure and pleasing to God. And this is the true and holy Sabbath. Therefore, let us also beg God that we too may enter into this rest and be freed from shameful, evil and vain thoughts; and thus, come to the opportunity to serve God with a pure heart, and celebrate the feast of the Holy Spirit. And blessed is he who enters this rest.

Source: Collection of manuscripts type II. Conversation 35.

Seraphim of Sarov

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

If a person has no concern at all for himself for the sake of love for God and acts of virtue, knowing that God cares for him, such hope is true and wise. But if a person himself cares about his affairs and turns to God in prayer only when inevitable troubles have already befallen him, and in his own strength he does not see the means to avert them and begins to hope for God’s help, such hope is vain and false. True hope seeks the one Kingdom of God and is confident that everything earthly, necessary for temporary life, will undoubtedly be given. The heart cannot have peace until it gains this hope. She will pacify him and fill him with joy. The venerable and most holy lips spoke about this hope: come to Me, all who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest , that is, trust in Me and be comforted from labor and fear.

Source: Teachings.

John of Kronstadt (1829−1908)

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Oh! When I look carefully with the eyes of my heart at myself, at my inner weaknesses and struggles with myself, when I reflect after your confession about you and about your sins and iniquities that you revealed to me, then I do not find the most suitable for me or for you. to the depiction of our state of words, like words: toiling and burdened . Truly - those who labor and are burdened ! What work, endless work we have with our sins and iniquities, and often with what sins and iniquities! It's embarrassing and scary to say! What a burden, an infinitely heavy burden for us - our sins! Tears involuntarily well up in your eyes when you imagine this infinitely great disaster of humanity, groaning under its own, inside, in the heart, hidden and constantly multiplying burden, when you imagine these terrible machinations of the enemy over poor people! How Satan did not mock us, how he did not laugh at us! What evil, what abomination of sin he has not plunged us into! But, my friends, do not despair, despite the greatness of evil in you; you who labor and are burdened with your abominations! come to the Lord with heartfelt repentance, open your heart wounds to Him, bring your sinful burden to Him, and He will give you rest, having taken away your sins. Come to Me... and I will give you rest .

Source: Diary. Volume IV. 1860−1861.

Augustine (354−430)

Take My yoke upon yourself, and learn from Me : not to create the universe, not to create everything visible and invisible, not to perform miracles in this world and not to raise the dead, for I am meek and lowly in heart . If you want to be great, start small. If you plan to erect a building of great height, first begin with the foundation of humility. And everyone who wants and intends to erect a structure of impressive size digs the deeper the higher the structure is. When a building is erected, it goes up; but he who digs the foundation sinks down. Thus, the building is humbled before it is raised, and the roof is erected after the humiliation.

Source: Sermons.

Hieronymus of Stridon (~347−419/20)

And the prophet Zechariah testifies that the severity of sin is great when he says that iniquity sits on the talent of lead (Zechariah ch. 5), and the Psalmist exclaims with tears: My iniquities have gone beyond my head, like a heavy burden has weighed me down (Ps. 37: 5). Or maybe here He calls to the grace of the Gospel those who were under the yoke of the very heavy yoke of the law.

Source: Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew.

Theophylact of Bulgaria (~1078−~1107)

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

He calls everyone: not only Jews, but also pagans. Under the laboring ones we mean the Jews, since they go through the difficult regulations of the law and labor in doing the commandments of the law, and under the burdened ones - the pagans who were burdened with the weight of sins. Christ calms all these, For what work is it to believe, confess and be baptized. But how can you not calm down when here you no longer grieve over the sins that were committed before baptism, and there peace will overtake you?

Source: Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew.

Evfimy Zigaben (~1050−~1122)

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Laboring to commit sin, and burdened with its weight. Do you see how He showed that sin has both work and burden? Labor comes before completion, and burden comes after it.

You can say it another way: those who labor over the futile and are burdened with worries about it. And I will give you rest , i.e. I will free you from this labor and from this burden.

Source: Interpretation of the Gospel of Matthew.

Lopukhin A.P. (1852−1904)

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

This and subsequent verses to the end of the chapter do not have the slightest parallel in all other evangelists and are found only in Matthew. The speech in the original is distinguished by its extreme softness and love, but at the same time by its extreme energy and brevity. There is a depth of theology here, reminiscent of the Gospel of John and bringing the Gospel of Matthew closer to it. Instead of the less bright ἔρχεσθε - the imperative δεῦτε, unexpressed in translations and meaning: here, to Me! The words spoken here by the Savior, as is rightly noted, would have been blasphemy if they had been uttered by the lips of an ordinary person. But in the mouth of the Son of Man they are natural. “A small word has a vast meaning.” Here is the most important and final answer to the question: σὺ εἶ ὁ ἐρχόμενος… δεῦτε πρός με πάντες. These words are reminiscent of Isa. 45:22, where similar speech is put into the mouth of the Most High Himself. But even more similarities are observed with several places in the book of Jesus son of Sirach (cf. Matt. 11:25 = Sir. 51:1, 14; Matt. 11:28 = Sir. 51:31, 35; Matt. 11:29 = Sir. 51:34, 35; in Greek LXX according to Tischendorf's edition the count of verses is different).

Source: Explanatory Bible.

TEMPLE OF THE HOLY DUCHESS OLGA IN OSTANKINO

Sermon of St. Luke of Crimea for today's Gospel reading (Matthew 11:27-30)

“All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father;
and no one knows the Father except the Son, and to whom the Son wants to reveal it.” Oh, what amazing words, what immeasurable boldness to say something like that!

Only the true Son of God, our Lord and God Jesus Christ, could say such words.

“All things have been delivered to Me by My Father.” What is this that was handed over to Him by His Father?

Everything, everything: the entire universe, all the countless star worlds, all care for the ranks of angels, for the human race, all historical events in the life of peoples - everything, everything is given into His hands, all providence for the world, for humanity. It is not for nothing that He, the Almighty, is called so, for everything is handed over to Him by His Father, He contains everything in His hand. The last Last Judgment is also committed to Him, the Almighty. Is this not the clearest testimony from the lips of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself about His Divinity? Oh, of course it is, oh, of course it is! Only God, God the Word, could God the Father betray everything.

“And no one knows the Son except the Father; and no one knows the Father except the Son, and to whom the Son wants to reveal it.” Again the second testimony about the Divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ: He is incomprehensible, incomprehensible to anyone, and only God can be incomprehensible.

He is incomprehensible until the Father Himself deigns to reveal Him to someone, to reveal that He is the True Son of God. So it was with St. the Apostle Peter, for when our Lord Jesus Christ asked His disciples who they thought Him to be, then blessed Peter answered: “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God! Then Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah, for it was not flesh and blood that revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 16:17) - not flesh and blood, not men, not the mind of man, but His Father who is in heaven.

So, our Lord Jesus Christ is incomprehensible in His Divine essence, so He is the true, authentic God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity. And He cannot be known by anyone, just as His Father cannot be known.

“Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). Again, what amazing words of boldness! Do any human lips dare to say anything like this! Do they dare to call everyone to themselves, all the endless, countless multitudes of those who are toiling and burdened, do they dare to promise them peace?!

And He was bold, He opened His arms, which were wider than from the end of the earth to the end of the earth, and into these arms He called everyone, all the countless toilers and burdened ones.

Oh, how infinitely many there are! Oh, how many are depressed by need, bent by old age; how many are defenseless, how many are hungry, how many unfortunate sick, how many are humiliated and offended, how many are suffering from the malice of the powerful of this world!

If we were to gather everyone since those amazing words were spoken, there would not be enough space on earth for everyone to stand shoulder to shoulder. And our Savior calls to all these countless toiling and burdened ones: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.”

Peace, peace, which the souls of the unfortunate - and not only the unfortunate - so thirst for, which the souls of all of us so thirst for, this peace He promises to give to everyone.

Oh, how all-embracing is His love, how infinite is the breadth of His embrace, extended to all who labor and are burdened. Oh, our Lord, Lord! How great You are, how holy You are, how infinitely merciful You are!

“Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls...” Only then, only then will we find peace for our souls, when we take upon ourselves the yoke of Christ, when we learn from Him meekness and humility, for without humility and meekness we cannot follow Christ, we cannot be His disciples, we cannot be close to Him, we cannot be His brothers, His children. Only when we take this yoke will we find peace.

“For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light” (Matthew 11:27-30). These words may surprise you; you will ask: how, Lord, do You say that Your yoke is easy and Your burden is light, when You Yourself said that the path to the Kingdom of God leads through narrow gates, along a narrow path, when You Yourself said : Will you be in a world of sorrow when your holy Apostle Paul says: those who want to live godly will be persecuted?

You ask: Lord, Lord! Is it easy to be persecuted, is it easy to walk through narrow gates on a narrow and rocky path?

You will ask in bewilderment, perhaps doubt will creep into your heart: is the yoke of Christ easy?

And I will tell you: yes, yes! Easy and extremely easy.

Why is it easy? Why is it easy to follow Him along the thorny path? Because you will not walk alone, exhausted, but Christ Himself will accompany you, because His immeasurable grace strengthens your strength when you languish under His yoke, under His burden; because He Himself will support this burden, this cross.

I speak not only from reason, but I speak from my own experience, for I must testify to you that when I walked along a very difficult path, when I bore the heavy burden of Christ, it was not at all heavy, and this path was a joyful path: because I felt absolutely real , it is absolutely tangible that the Lord Jesus Christ Himself walks next to me and supports my burden and my cross.

It was a heavy burden, but I remember it as a bright joy, as the great mercy of God, for the grace of God is poured out abundantly on everyone who bears the burden of Christ.

Precisely because the burden of Christ is inseparable from the grace of Christ, precisely because Christ will not leave the one who took up the cross and followed Him alone, will not leave him without His help, but walks next to him, supports his cross, strengthens him with His grace.

Remember His holy words, for the great truth is contained in them: “For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light.”

Christ calls all of you, all who have believed in Him, to follow Him, taking His burden, His yoke. Don't be afraid, go, go boldly. Do not be afraid of the fears with which the devil frightens you, preventing you from following this path. Spit on the devil, drive away the devil with the cross of Christ, in His name. Lift up your eyes and see the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, who walks with you and lightens your yoke and your burden.

Amen.

January 28, 1951