Meek and Humble; Of and From
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Matthew 11:28-30 NIV
"Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."
Matthew 11:28-30 RSV
28. Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 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."
Matthew 11:28-30 KJV
28. Come unto me, all [ye] that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. 30. For my yoke [is] easy, and my burden is light.
These verses have offered comfort to many people throughout the centuries. Whether we are going through dramatic, life-changing experiences, or we just have one of the days where we feel we’ve reached the end of our rope – the end of ourselves, Jesus assures us He is in the midst of it with us. Jesus is there to take up the burden for us when we can’t carry it alone any longer.
I included three translations this morning because they are each slightly different. I was struck the most by the difference between “learn from Me” and “learn of me.” Dictionary dot com defines from:
used to specify a starting point in an expression of limits and of:
used to indicate derivation, origin, or source. The two words create a subtle difference, yet an important one, I think, in terms of how we experience Christ in our lives.
Actually, I think the two translations express how we grow in our faith. When we are “new” Christians, we do learn from Jesus as revealed in scripture. We model our behavior after His and we attempt to examine our lives based upon His teachings. As our faith matures we learn more of Jesus. We begin to experience Him as a lifestyle. We become infused with the truth of the Risen Christ and allow ourselves to be guided, comforted, and strengthened by His life, death and resurrection.
Again, to dictionary.com, meek is defined: humbly patient or docile, as under provocation from others and humble as: not proud or arrogant; modest, courteously respectful. Wow, I guess since I’ve been out of commission for a while, I’m tackling scripture with a passion! I find it quite interesting that in the King James version, “meek” and “of” are used. I “retranslate” that version as “I am humbly patient with you as you learn to use my teachings as your guiding principles for life.” I hope no one considers me sacrilegious!
Bottom line is this: Jesus is the source, the continuum, and the end of everything we need to live in this world and His sacrifice won us the next world. No matter what we’re experiencing in our lives, no matter what the struggle, burden, sin, challenge or uncertainty, Jesus provides an answer – He is the answer!
My prayer today is that you learn a bit more from and of Jesus as you go through the trials and tribulations of your daily life. And that you remember His resurrection as the certain assurance that there is so much more than the here and now.
Mary
