Jeremiah 28:13 Go and tell Hananiah, saying, Thus said the LORD; You have broken the yokes of wood; but you shall make for them yokes of iron. I. MEN MUST WEAR SOME YOKE. In every stage of life — childhood, youth, manhood; and in every station of life — servants, masters, &c. 1. God has made and sustains us, and asks that we submit to His will 2. With our passions and propensities, if we break the yoke it is meet we should wear, and do not serve God, we at once bend our necks to another yoke and serve slavishly our own selves. II. CHRIST'S YOKE IS AN EASY ONE TO WEAR. 1. The yoke of Christ is a right one. Serve Jesus Christ, and it is found that the Christian law is perfection itself. 2. The yoke of Christ is framed in our interest. To believe in Christ is the highest wisdom; to repent of sin is the most delightful necessity; to follow after holiness is the most blissful pursuit; to become a servant of Christ is to be made a king and priest unto God. 3. Christ s yoke is not exacting. He, in His grace, always gives us of His bounty when He asks of us our duty. 4. It is an easy yoke. Never did a man wear it but he always loved to wear it. 5. The bright example of Christ makes the yoke pleasant to bear. He Himself has carried the very yoke we bear, and we have blessed fellowship with Him in this. 6. All who have borne Christ's yoke have had grace given equal to the weight of the burden. Wolsey regretted that he had not "served God with half the zeal he had served his king," but none has ever bewailed the zeal with which he followed Christ! 7. Christians who have borne this yoke always desire to get their children into it. Often men say, "I do not want my sons to follow my trade, it is wearying, its pay is small," &c. III. THOSE WHO REFUSE CHRIST'S EASY YOKE WILL HAVE TO WEAR A WORSE ONE. 1. Turning from the right road, from the cry of rectitude, because it threatens shame or loss, will entail vaster after-losses. 2. Backsliders, by putting off the yoke of Christianity, have not improved their condition. 3. They who refuse the Bible and follow tradition, Do these perverts of the true Christian religion get an easier yoke? No.; there are penances and mortifications, &c, 4. The self-righteous who attempt to work their own way to heaven. Self-righteousness is an iron yoke indeed. 5. Unbelievers, who will not believe the simple revelation of God, presently find themselves committed to systematic misbeliefs, which distract reason, oppress the heart, and trammel the conscience. 6. Lovers of pleasure. Pleasure often means lust, and gaiety means crime; and self-indulgence brings beggary and degradation, In the last tremendous day of Christ's coming to judgment, the Christian's yoke will be as a chain of gold about his neck; but sin, pleasure, will be as an iron yoke, a burden of enslaving woe. ( C. H. Spurgeon.) Parallel Verses KJV: Go and tell Hananiah, saying, Thus saith the LORD; Thou hast broken the yokes of wood; but thou shalt make for them yokes of iron. |
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