Learning the Unforced rhythms of grace

Be encouraged by a word from Mark Gauthier, one of Cru's national directors:



“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”   

 --Matthew 11: 28-30, The Message

 I don’t know about you, but for me, this has been a long year. As I read this recently, I realized that the answer was “yes, I am tired.”   The weariness in the more familiar translation really resonates right now. I long to experience freedom and lightness, but I come to the end of this ministry year, and I’m not sure those words describe what I’m actually feeling and experiencing.

But Jesus wants to give us that freedom, be our burden bearer. He wants us to learn from him what it means to experience that freedom.

Life offers us so many ways to get bound up and worn out. It is good to go back and remember where we are meant to find our life and strength – in Jesus. It is for freedom that Christ sets you free. He is the cornerstone on which we build our lives, the foundation on which we build our faith. On Him we can put our full trust, and from Him we learn to live freely and lightly.

Like so much of the Christian life, living freely and lightly isn’t something that happens in an instant. It’s a process, part of our journey of sanctification. I love the image of walking with Jesus and falling into step as friends do when they walk and talk together. When we keep company with Him, following Him, we naturally pick up those unforced rhythms of grace.

And we will teach those lessons as we learn them. You and I - we were made for something great, not to live in fear and bound up.  We were made to live freely and to be a blessing in the world. I am really looking forward to this summer as an opportunity to live into that freedom, to continue to give back those areas of angst, tiredness,weariness that this year exposed.  


 If you’re tired, ask God what it means to live lightly, freely. Spend time in the Word, in prayer, walking and talking with the One who is able to carry all your burdens.