Oftentimes, we, Christians, are trapped in situations where we no longer want to move forward because the weight of the cross is overwhelming us. It's heavy. It's tiresome. It's consuming all our energies. It's draining. It's exhausting. For most of us, we can only complain and asked, "Isn't His yoke easy? Isn't His burden light? Why this distressful feeling?" The Prophet Jeremiah (15:18) also uttered similar words, perhaps, in a very snivel tone, "Why is my pain continuous, my wound incurable, refusing to be healed?" Even the Lord Jesus Christ, when He was crucified on the cross, spoke of similar lamentations to the Father, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" But, unlike the Prophet Jeremiah and the Lord Jesus Christ, we try to escape by diverting our attention to worldly things - power, money, promiscuous sex, drunkenness, etc. The great Saint Augustine, in his confessions, had a similar situation, "You were within me, but I was outside, and it was there that I searched for You." But these diversions, no matter how ecstatic, will only give us superficial and momentary happiness. They will never give us the true happiness and rest we are longing for. It will just leave us empty and more distressed. So, what, then, can bring us rest? Who, then, can give us true and lasting happiness? We are at a cross-road. Confused, and most of the time, feeling alone. In the words of the Apostle Peter, we ask the same question, "To whom shall we go (cf. John 6:68)?" The Holy Scriptures will point us (again) to JESUS as the Way, Truth and Life; He is, even, referred to as the Prince of Peace and Lord of the Sabbath (Rest). So, if we will come to JESUS "again," the weight of the cross will burdened us again, and the cycle will continue unless we give up our faith, and search for rest and happiness somewhere else.
