When Jesus calls to us, “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden,” he gives us himself. When we come to the altar, we receive Jesus himself, for the Eucharist is nothing less than the real presence of Christ. He replaces the burdens loaded upon us throughout the week with a burden that is meek and lowly in heart.

Humans are like donkeys. The Bible’s word for “donkey” is, literally, “burden-bearer” (hypo-zugion). Like donkeys, you and I are “burden-bearers.”
Our burdens are numerous. Some seem random: a freak accident, a horrible sickness, a loved one’s sudden death. Others people place upon us, like the scribes and Pharisees who, Jesus says, “bind heavy burdens (phortia) and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men’s shoulders” (Matt. 23:4). Often we are scribes and Pharisees to ourselves, for not infrequently our burdens are self-imposed: We are stubborn, making our own lives unbearable at times.
It is with good reason, then, that Jesus treats us like donkeys. “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest” (11:28). These are what the Anglican Prayer Book calls “comfortable words,” leading people into Eucharistic celebration.
Our God is a gracious God, who cares for donkeys—including actual donkeys. “Six days thou shalt do thy work,” God commands the Israelites in the Book of Exodus, “and on the seventh day thou shalt rest: that thine ox and thine ass (hypozygion) may rest” (Exod. 23:12). It is not just people who get Sabbath rest; donkeys get to share in it as well.
We are in need of Sabbath rest. Our burdens make us long for it. That is why we go to Mass week after week. For it is there, at the altar, that Jesus gives us rest.
But does he truly? Jesus himself seems to question it, when he says, “Take my yoke (zygon) upon you. . . . My yoke (zygos) is easy, and my burden (phortion) is light” (Matt. 11: 29–30). The yoke may be easy and the burden light, but for all that, we are burden-bearers still, far removed from enjoying comfortable rest. It is small comfort if the difference between Jesus and the Pharisees is merely one of quantitative weight—his burden just a little less oppressive than what we suffer elsewhere. Less burdensome, perhaps, but hardly the rest for which we long and which he says he’ll give.
It is true: Once a donkey, always a donkey. No matter what, we are burden-bearers world without end, even in the eternal Sabbath rest. But the difference between the burdens imposed by scribes and Pharisees and the burden placed by Jesus is not just one of degree, but of kind.
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Perhaps today you are experiencing a difficult season and you feel like the Lord is asleep instead of coming to your aid. Let Psalm 44 encourage you. Look with eyes of faith to the Lord and affirm, “You are my King, O God” (v. 4). Take comfort in the truth that He ordains your suffering (v. 19). And cry out to Him, “Rise up; come to our help! Redeem us for the sake of your steadfast love” (v. 26). 

It had been a hot summer in the south, but the heat didn’t match that of my own heart. I felt like I was trying to walk through a desert with no water, or slug through mud without getting anywhere. Years of battling chronic pain had worn me down. A ministry plan that didn’t materialize the way I had hoped had eroded my confidence to continue writing, teaching and speaking. I was raising four children, ranging from ten years to six months, and I was homeschooling the older two. I felt very much in need of help. Thankfully, by God’s grace, I cried out to the Lord and I studied Scripture. Through the study of the psalms, like Psalm 44, the Lord came to my aid.
You also know what it is to like to be in need of help, don’t you? Whether it’s a strained relationship, financial difficulty, unemployment, illness or injury, a hard season of ministry, parenting challenges, or marital strife, all of us have cried for aid at times. Perhaps even today you are crying for someone to assist you. Be encouraged, dear believer. Our great King will come to our help in the midst of difficulty.
Delight in the Past
Psalm 44 begins, “O God…our fathers have told us, what deeds you performed in their days…for you delighted in them” (vv. 1, 3). The psalmist’s confidence in the Lord is rooted in the delight He showed Israel in the past. He chose them as the apple of His eye and entered into a relationship with them. The Lord chose Israel to be His treasured possession because He loved them and had made a covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He delivered them from Egypt and gave them the land of Canaan. They won victories by His strength, not their own. Such magnificent stories of redemption were passed from generation to generation in order to encourage the people’s faith.
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God created your marriage covenant all of those decades ago. He was with you when you said, “I do,” and he promises to carry you until death do you part. But he doesn’t just promise to help his people grin and bear it; he is also the God who can bring hope and joy. He loves to bring renewal. He resurrects marriages just as he resurrected Lazarus.

“Do you have a few minutes to talk during my break?” the twenty-something barista asked me as I took my cup of coffee from him in one hand, balancing commentaries and my laptop in the other hand. I could see strain on his face. I had first met him just a few months earlier. We worshiped at different churches in different communities, but he knew I was a pastor and I could see he needed to talk.
Thirty minutes later, he sat across from me in the coffee shop and poured out his broken heart to me: his dad had just announced his unfaithfulness and that he was pursuing a divorce. This hit my new friend hard. He had only been married a couple of years, and he had always looked up to his dad; his parents had led him to the Lord.
A couple of days later, I sat in a church member’s home during our small group. When it came time to share prayer requests, he asked for prayer for his parents. His mom had just announced she had a boyfriend and was pursuing a divorce. This set of parents was in their early sixties. He was shocked and saddened.
What this pair of circumstances days apart showed me yet again is that unfaithfulness—or faithfulness—in marriage affects those around us in profound ways. My friends, both married men who had been out of the home for years, were nonetheless deeply affected by their parents’ marital drift. The majority of my marriage counseling is with empty nester and retired couples, a common trend.
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