Dr. A.R. Bernard- 5 may 2012

I want to link 2 particular passages from scripture, one from the Old Testament and one from the New Testament. The first one is Genesis 1:26.

Genesis 1:26-27 (English standard version)
26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”
27 So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.

Matthew 11:29
29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

What do these 2 passages have in common? Both speak of relationship with God. Now notice what He said. Not only to take My yoke upon you but He also says to learn from Me and you will find rest for yourself. Notice the relationship Jesus makes between knowledge and rest. Rest is a state of peace. So knowledge brings peace. Specifically the knowledge of God brings peace. So Jesus is saying get to know Me and if you get to know Me, it will bring you to a place of rest. He talks about peace in the other gospels. Says “My peace will I give you, a peace that the world cannot give you nor can the world take it from you.

I’ve been walking with the Lord in ministry for 34 years and relationship with Christ close to 40 years as well and the more i know about God, the more rest i experience in my life. Things that i used to fret over be concerned about even as a Christian, as a believer navigating in society, especially bringing the message of the culture mandate. Learning, understanding God’s purposes plans for human society.

I’m today at a place where i experience a greater degree of peace and rest and it’s not because of my faith, it’s because of what i know. Faith of cause plays a very important part of our relationship with God because without faith it is impossible to please Him but my rest in Him. And Paul talks about that getting to a place where you find rest in God that comes in what you know about God.

So Jesus’ invitation here is a relational invitation because He said something “take My yoke upon you and learn from Me”. A yoke symbolizes a relationship, a very close relationship that I’ll speak about a little later.
So what does this passage in Matthew have to do with Genesis chapter 1? Let me give you a term and i love terms, definitions and things.


Imago dei- Latin term for the image of God.

Genesis 1:26 says that God created men in His own image so men became the imago dei. The image or reflection of God. Just like in Matthew 11:29 it is relational as Genesis 1:26 is. The reason why God made men in His own image and in His own likeness is because He had an objective in mind and that objective was relationship and fellowship. It’s God’s desires. That’s why it puzzled David. God’s interest in humans to the point that David said what is men that You are mindful of Him or the son of man that You visit him. And David continues in that psalm. He was fascinated by this love, this connection that God has with the human species. So much so that when God had to bring judgment on humanity called the flood, He still preserved Noah and His family because it was not a complete end to the human species. It was simply a major adjustment that had to be made to human history and experience. So He made men in His image and in His likeness so that He could have relationship, communion and fellowship with men.

God created men in such a way so that that relationship and that fellowship could take place, so He is very careful. He had to create something call compatibility. It’s the very same you look for in human relationships because you want to know that the person you’re having a relationship with have a degree of compatibility between you and that person. It simply means that you have things in common. We tend to have relationship with people that we have certain things in common. If the imago dei is the image of God and God purposely and specifically designed men for fellowship and communion and relationship, it means that He designed men so that men would be compatible with God.

What does God and men have in common?

Let’s begin to explore the image of God and understand why it is so special. God call forth to the ocean for the creatures to come about created all the fowls of the air, beasts of the field, fish of the sea and He did that with His words. He said let the ocean be filled with all types of sea life, the sky to be filled with the birds of the air, let the land be filled with the beast of the field. All these other things He created with His spoken words but when it came to men, He created men with His own hands. Because this creature will be different will be distinct and hold a special place in God’s heart. So the fact that His hands were involved in shaping and molding and fashioning this distinct creature means that God consider this particular creature and species out of all the other creatures to be the most compatible with Himself.

There are 3 attributes of God that is commonly understood if you take theology or any other Bible study.
And these 3 attributes of God are that God is omnipotent.
1) God is omnipotent – God is all powerful
2) God is omniscient – God is all knowing. His knowledge extends beyond time and space.
3) God is omnipresent – God is present everywhere at the same time

These are the primary and major attributes of God but you and i are not omnipotent, we are not omniscient and we are not omnipresent so that means that whatever attributes that God shared with us had to be communicable. It means it had to be attributes that God could share with men. So another words, He did not make us gods or gods to compete with Him so He only shared with us His communicable attributes. So when God breathed into men the breath of life, it was God sharing with men His divine nature but limited to communicable attributes. He breathed into men the breath of life; He breathed into men those attributes of Himself that He could share. So we don’t carry these attributes but we do carry certain attributes that make us like God.

How are you the image of God?

1) Reason – The power of our mind, our ability to think, to understand and to form judgments.

Our ability to reason is one of the things God shared with us. The purpose for all of these is communion, fellowship that’s why you read in Isaiah 1:18
18 “Come now, and let us reason together,”
Says the LORD,

God could say that because He gave men that attribute. The attribute to think, to understand and to form judgment. That’s why when men sinned, Adam sinned, men’s reasoning capacity was affected, it changed the way he thought and you see it immediately because before the fall, Adam was strong in his relationship and communion with God but after he sinned. Now he is hiding himself because he is afraid. Fear takes over the mind and it affects his reasoning. So instead of his reasoning being strong and open towards God it is now hidden and secretive. Fear takes over where there was faith and boldness. So that’s why when we are born again, the Bible says you will be transformed. Transformed what? Into the image of Christ who is the expressed image of God, the original intend in the mind of God for the human species. You’ll be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Because the mind has gone astray so we no longer think like God. But in the beginning He gave us, shared with us the power to reason and to think like Him. That is why the word of God is so important. The word of God, the scriptures helps us to think like God. When you think like God, you are really operating in the realm of faith and creativity is released. Creativity is set free because you are now thinking like God.
When you think like God, you have a set of values and a sense of purpose. The values guide your actions, your thinking. Purpose gives you a sense of awareness that there is more to your life than you experienced in any one moment, there is still more.

2) Creativity – The ability to imagine new things and give meaning to old things

I’m like God because I’m creative and I’m most like God when I’m creative. This is why this ministry strives, has grown, and continues to grow because it employs the attribute of God call creativity. How can we creatively minister to people? How can we creatively create an environment for spiritual growth and development and personal mission in Christ? The power of creativity. What God loves the most of His own attributes is His creativity. You can tell when you look at creation on earth. We have the power to create first of all with our words. Your words create your world. What you are experiencing in the world that you’ve built around you was created by the words you spoke. We have creativity in our actions, the things that we do. 2 Corinthians says that God spoke through faith and we also speak through faith. Creativity is our ability to imagine, to come up with something new.

Genesis 11:6. God came down to see human species building a tower and God testifies, witnesses the power that they had by saying “Nothing that they imagine to do can they not do”. God was testifying, bearing witness to His creative power in His imago dei. Even though He brought judgment to that power because you can have power but use it for the wrong things.

3) Speech – The ability to express our thoughts, our feelings and our perceptions.
How many times we want someone to understand how we feel and we struggle to find the right words to express it. Whether it’s to express our love, our hurt, our anger or our joy. Speech is a special gift. The fact that we can actually communicate it, actually take words and say I love you. I understand some people abuse this attribute, they talk too much but it’s still beautiful to have the ability the power to communicate. In fact communication is still the basis for life. We build life on the foundation of our ability to communicate our feelings, our perceptions, our thoughts, and our ideas.

4) Self-awareness

God designed us to be aware of our own individual identity. In fact we are so aware of our own individual identity that we do everything that we can to make sure that we are uniquely different from someone else.

5) Self-determination – Free will

The will to choose. The power to choose our own destiny was given to us by God.
Deuteronomy 30:19 where He gathers Israel and He gathers the whole spiritual realm and He says:

19 I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live;

The fact is that God lays the facts before them and gave them the power to choose. That is self-determination. So I can determine to do one thing or the other. And in so doing I’m like God. The power to choose one’s destiny.

6) Self-transcendent

God transcends time and space and we do also. Not in the same way that God does in terms of His ability to move into the future, present, past all before Him. But we are self-transcendent. We can transcend ourselves. In our minds we can visit the past, with our minds we can analyze the present, and with our minds we can transport ourselves into a possible future because we can imagine the future.

What was God doing when He gave these attributes to men? He was fitting men for relationship. But instead of fitting we look for someone who fits. We are looking for someone who is compatible. Especially when you want to get married, you want to spend your life with someone with whom you share the same interest, the same values, the same goals, the same objectives, the same sense of purpose. That’s why Bible says that the believer should not be unequally yoked with an unbeliever. Why? Because you don’t share the same destiny, the same values, the same sense of purpose. So it creates an antagonistic relationship of tension that cannot be removed and even the Holy Spirit at work in that believer, problem is that the unbeliever with the absence of harmony, that unbeliever can undermine the work of the Holy Spirit in that believer in that unequally yoked situation. And why God tells us all these things in scripture is so that there will be spiritual harmony. It begins in the spirit.

What does it have to do with “come to Me all you who labor and is heavy laden”? Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me?


What is a yoke?

There is this wooden contraption that is around the neck of the oxen and usually there is 2 oxen yoked side by side together. The reason they yoke them together is so that they can pull something but pull it in a way that it doesn’t tip over. So there has to be a compatibility of size and strength between those 2 oxen and the yoke actually brings their strength together. That’s why marriage is a yoke. But a yoke that is intended to bring the strength and creativity and all the other attributes of the bride and the groom together to make one powerful union. So the oxen are yoked together.

So the yoke no.1 is a support consisting of a wooden frame across the shoulders













And the other yoke is the one used with oxen.

What makes a yoke maker special? And what makes a yoke work is because the yoke has to be fitted. You cannot just take any yoke and put it around the neck of 2 animals and expect it to work. The yoke has to be designed in such a way that it fits just right so the relationship is not heavy or burdensome, it’s easy and it feels light because the yoke is working. The yoke speaks of a relationship with Jesus but it also must be fitted.

So when Jesus says take my yoke upon you, understand that it means that Jesus has taken the time to appreciate who you are as an individual and in creating your yoke. It is a yoke that fits only you. No one else can wear that relationship that you have with Jesus, only you.

He fits that yoke according to your personality. So when you get saved, Jesus doesn’t want you to become somebody else because the yoke He created for you is fitted to your personality. The yoke He’s created for you as a believer is fitted to your learning style. Jesus knows how you learn. It also had to be fitted to your experiences. Jesus created that yoke taking your experiences under consideration. Your good experiences and your bad experiences. He fits it also to your knowledge. Jesus doesn’t expect more of you than you know. He’s considered your personal characteristics, your intellectual characteristics, your social characteristics, your spiritual attributes. If you are one of those people who uses the communicable attribute of speech a lot then Jesus fits that yoke in such a way that you become an evangelist. That means when He releases you to ministry and to fulfill your calling He put you in a context where that speech becomes a positive attribute for the kingdom.

He fits you for the service He calls you to. He doesn’t try to make you into someone that you are not. He takes you understanding who you are and He designs that yoke to fit you uniquely and personally. So that’s why we have to be very careful how we criticize other believers for not being like us. Because every believer has their own specifically designed, especially crafted yoke that Jesus invited them to wear.

When you are in the right relationship you can be who you really are. But when it’s not compatible and you are unequally yoked in a relationship, you have this need to constantly adjust yourself and operate yourself self-consciously because you don’t want to do anything to offend. But when you are amongst those you are compatible with and yoked together with in the right way, you can be who you really are.

So when Jesus says “Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me” He is asking us to accept something that He has specifically fitted for you to love Him, to be in a relationship with Him, to serve Him and to bring glory to His name and no one else can fit what Jesus created for you to wear in your relationship with Him.

It is liberating because for so long in the church there was a thinking that we all had to be alike and the same. No. We are all uniquely different and designed by God. I have my own self-identity and my own self-awareness, my own unique experience of walking with the Lord.
Jesus knows in fitting that yoke of relationship between us to make it easy and not a burden, it’s only a burden when you don’t understand this. So you can never say “Lord you’re calling me to do something that I’m not designed to do”. God will never call you to do something He’s not already fitted you for. You just might not know that, that fits you.

I’m doing things today that I never thought I would do. So His invitation to you and I is always one that fits us because He knows everything about you so you can freely and boldly go to new places and do new things. Because He will not place upon you more than you can bear. That’s why He said My yoke is easy, it’s not choking you. It’s not trying to make you into someone you are not. It’s not calling upon you to do something that you can’t do. It’s easy and the burden that the yoke is pulling is light. Why is it light? Because when something that fits you and fits you well, there is no struggle with it.

Too often, we want to wear someone’s yoke because it looks good and when it comes to ourselves, it’s “oh it’s just me”.

Not true. Each person has a purpose and God has fitted you for that purpose considering everything about you. Everybody doesn’t grow at the same pace, some people take a little longer but in His entire relationship with you as a believer, God has fitted you. So you come and you take His yoke and you move with ease. Knowledge of this set you free.