Sticks and Stones
“Is this not the fast which I choose, to loosen the bonds of wickedness, to undo the bands of the yoke, and to let the oppressed go free and break every yoke?” Isaiah 58:6 NASB
Every yoke – Do you want to be yoked with the Lord? Ah, that’s a sign of pleasant comfort—the confidence of knowing you aren’t alone pulling the load. But there are other yokes, aren’t there? Yokes that oppress. Yokes that constrict. Yokes that hold us captive to destructive patterns. They are not the pleasant yoke of Yeshua and they are not the yokes YHVH wishes us to experience. In fact, breaking every one of them is the purpose of fasting according to YHVH’s words in Isaiah. What good is a fast that does not release those who are oppressed under the bonds of wickedness? What kind of extraordinary spiritual exercise pleases the Lord? The “fast” of dividing your bread with the hungry, bringing the homeless poor into the house, seeing the naked and covering them and not to hiding yourself from your own flesh (see Isaiah 58:7). A fast for personal religious gain, a fast of superficial obedience, is pointless. The real fast of the Lord is found in the care of others. And first among those caring acts is breaking all the yokes of bondage.
Kal motsah reads the Hebrew text. Motsa is a pole placed over the shoulders of animals so that they pull together. It is a pole of restraint, something that forces the animals to follow the owner’s direction. Yokes of wickedness have the same consequence. We are forced to follow. We are constrained, powerless to break free of the path before us. Try as we might, the yoke holds us. We see where we really want to go, but we can’t turn aside from the wickedness that holds us. Someone else must break the yoke or we will live out our lives circling the gristmill of sin. The true fast of the Lord breaks us free.
Did you know that once you have trained an animal to work under a yoke, you can make that animal perform even without the yoke? Once the pattern is ingrained, it takes only the slightest reminder of the previous yoke for the animal to respond accordingly. You can remove the heavy collar and get the same results with the lightest pole. Why? Because the animal thinks no other way. Once the pattern is put in place, the steps are ordered by expectation, not the actual situation. The yoke of bondage stays in place without physical restraint. The mind has been altered.
Are we not the same? Practice the pattern long enough and it will become routine expectation. The yoke is invisibly in place. Who can break such a thing? Not you. Not I. We can tell the victim that the restraint is gone. There is nothing there. But it won’t matter. The mind is captive to the yoke of wickedness and only God can break its power. Only God. Until we cry out from our oppression and turn toward the true fast of the Lord, the yoke remains.
Topical Index: yoke, fast, motsa, Isaiah 58:6
Yoked to sin or yoked to YHVH. There is no yoke to ”Me”, “Myself”, or “I”. There is no such thing as ‘my way’. If you think there is, I have a bridge out in a certain prairie state….
…that got sold to me cheap, once upon a time. All I had to do was to believe that there was such a thing as my way… That ‘bridge’ to the Secret Knowledge was, curiously enough, shaped like a yoke…. and the ground under it was a dry and thirsty land. Not a sign of any water of Life in sight… I almost perished. If the Lord had not helped me then the ground would have swallowed me up quick. Selah
The Plowboy
This is His invitation (not mine) to “whosoever will:” ~ 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 ~ (Matthew 11.29)
This “command” issued to us, by Him, – awaits our response. This is mandatory, yet voluntary – because the choice is ours to “do it.” Will we? Will we take His yoke (of disicipleship) upon us and learn from the Master (Himself)? He is (still and ever) our LORD and our Leader, but with Him by our side (our Emmanuel- *God with us) and with us “following Him”- our labors in the field will bring forth fruit, for ~ without Him we can do nothing! ~
There is work (abad) to be done! Put off!- and put on! – Put off all other yokes and put on His! And, (as an added attraction!) if (or since) we are “yoked together,” with Christ, He is not very “difficult” to find!
(Yes!) Let us labor for the Master from the dawn till setting sun,
Let us talk of all His wondrous love and care!..
~ through Love, with new eyes and with a heart that is pure, let us serve and love one another – fervently! ~
Isaiah 58, this chapter is what our ministry is about. Now, how many children have been victimized and traumatized by yokes of abuse and molestation? So many, it would make your head spin! The same yoke applies, childhood trauma rewires the brain. And, in places of generational poverty and households where abuse and chaos remain, the yoke remains.
What really frustrates me is when our society which likes to live on the surface with each other gets aggravated with the behaviors that come out of these kids, youth and adults, and want victims to “Get over it already” “or can’t you just put it in the past?” People don’t realize that our brains can’t submerge trauma forever. The trauma has to go somewhere, which it starts working against the body or comes out in all kinds of behaviors. Why is healthcare such a powerful need today?
God is the only One who can heal this kind of trauma (yoke), but many have a hard time truly trusting God because He let the abuse happen. Also, many victims are used to people being frustrated by their needs. It’s easier to create a new system to control everyone than to walk alongside people. So, trust is shattered. People won’t truly trust others who aren’t real and aren’t going to be there. They’ll just use them (which happens a lot). The poor know when people have agendas. Our mental health system is taxed. There is not enough medical personnel for the need. And, they can’t heal these major issues which have so many lies attached to them. Abusers love to threaten and manipulate which instills fear, rejection and confusion on top of the abuse.
These are not simple yokes. They are very complicated. They require believers who are willing to lay their lives down and get involved in peoples mess. And, are willing to let God use them as a guinea pig in the process; a Philippians 2 style of follower. Because trust doesn’t happen if you try to control someone who is already under oppression. And, the kind of solutions that are needed for this type of yoke, are so beyond us we need a holy God to intervene and bring shalom.
So the question about the fast to me is, are we willing to get involved with what God cares about?
Failure to address arising issues of the day leaves a society susceptible to the trends, patterns, and mores of a shifting populace; functionally eliminating all restraint, purpose, or direction.
Eliminating substitutionary sources, throwing off unwanted weights, and denying distracting voices not only cleanses; but elevates an authentic appetite and refines a discretionary pallet. Without the bread of affliction there is little respect for the new wine.
Hi Roderick,
In the interest of being discretionary and preserving our wonderful English language, I think the word you intended to use in your post is “palate” rather than “pallet”! Palate means a “sense of taste” while pallet is something you might store your cases of beer on. :-))
Yes, but storing cases of wine is also quite necessary, and for that I need a discretionary pallet.
Absolutely
Thank you John. I know the difference; but my mobile device is a bit rebellious. 🙂
Nice to see you back again, Roderick. I missed your insights.
Are the naked those without a covering or exclusively those who don’t have any physical clothing for their bodies and cannot obtain them? In America, I don’t see the latter. Are we simply to state that we don’t see the emperor’s new clothes and risk looking like fools? Are the hungry also those who show signs of malnutrition even though they are actually obese? Are the blind those who know they can’t see or the ones who think they see better then anyone else? It’s hard when people want a “cure” that’s cheap and easy, both for the doc and the patient. They’re willing to spend lots of time and money on the right labels but not the fabric.
Correction: better “than” is the proper spelling for comparison. I didn’t catch that mistake before I posted. Sorry
What comes to mind in reading this is “But, God”. The yoke cannot be broken, but God breaks it. The pain cannot be driven away, but God drives it. The unforgivable cannot be forgiven, but God. Do a search for that 2 word phrase through your Bible app and be reminded that every time we think something is inevitable, “but God” proves that it is not.
How blessed are we to be chosen to have the chance to choose YHVH to free us, through Jeshua, to live?