NOTES for Mat 11:25-30

It is strange to hear that what is inaccessible to the wise and prudent is revealed to infants. Of course, we are already used to the fact that Jesus' words contain not only a direct meaning but also a parable. And yet: how can infants contain what proved beyond the strength of the wisest?

Here Christ's words once again do not fit the logic of our everyday life. But human wisdom proclaimed already in antiquity: "I know only that I know nothing." Only by recognizing one's own limits can one hope to overcome them, and in order to begin understanding something, one must admit oneself to be ignorant. Meanwhile the scribes and Pharisees of every age find it hard to admit their own ignorance, and this pride blocks their ability to see something new with an unclouded gaze. And although the most important thing, as we know, cannot be seen with the eyes, much can be sensed by a soul not clogged with pseudo-knowledge, a soul that has preserved childlike openness.

When we hear Christ's promise to give rest to those who labor and are burdened, this rest first appears to us simply as relief from heavy labors. Only later do we remember the rest of the Seventh Day, communion with the Lord, who grants the possibility of entering His rest.

At first it looks paradoxical that Christ calls precisely those who labor and are burdened to take His yoke upon themselves. Yet this apparent contradiction is removed by the Savior Himself: He is the only One whose burden, when accepted freely, does not bend us down but straightens us up. His burden is light precisely because it gives strength and removes from us the unbearable weight of the burden of sin.