This is part of a series Dr. Aikens taught on being Stuck in No Change. The next part is entitled “Stuck & Our Yes.”
In the first part of this series, “A Look at Being Stuck,” we reviewed what being stuck can look like using David from I Samuel. And in part two, continuing with David and 1 Samuel, “Looking Good, Yet Still Stuck,” we saw that a grand army standing before the enemy looked mighty, made no impact on the enemy they faced. We need to understand that how we look or even feel does not change us from being stuck in no change; it can even become a “Yokes of No Change.”
So what is a yoke? A yoke implies something plural like two animals yoked or working together. It is also something that implies that it requires the involvement of a third agency. Therefore neither of the ones in the yoke are setting the course. The farmer is the guide with two oxen. The Lord is the guide in an equally yoked marriage. But when we yoke ourselves to something or someone not of God, who then is the guide or the lead?
Now we all know being stuck by its very nature is no easy thing. I am not making light of the situation. I am well aware that becoming free from such situations often takes a superseding power beyond our own ability to prove to our challenges or enemies that change can free us from those yokes. God has, He can, and He will do it for you!
Galatians 5:1 amplified
In this freedom, Christ has made us free and completely liberated us. Stand fast then and do not be hampered and held ensnared and submit again to a yoke of slavery which you have once put off.
Yokes of No Change
John 5:1-5
After this, there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. At Jerusalem, the sheep market a pool called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting … for the moving of the water. For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had. And a certain man was there, who had such an infirmity 38 years. When Jesus saw him lie, and knew that he had been now a long time in that case, He said unto him … Wilt thou be made whole?
We don’t have to be blind, halt, withered or lame to be stuck impotently waiting on God or someone else to come and move or help us when our experience is one of No Change.
Luke 10:38-42
As they went, it came to pass that he entered into a certain village: and a certain woman named Martha received him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, which also sat at Jesus’ feet, and heard his word.
But Martha was cumbered about much serving, and came to him, and said, Lord, dost thou does not care that my sister hath left me to serve alone? Bid her therefore that she help me! And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things: But one thing is needful: Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her.
We can also experience the yoke of being stuck when our serving the Lord makes us so anxious, careful, troubled or encumbered as if bound by chains that responsibility becomes too weighty. Or when we allow anything or anyone to cleverly cling to and entangle and become a dreaded yoke of bondage about us again.
Being yoked does not always require that what we are yoked to is seen by others. We can be yoked by feeling we need to balance everyone’s needs, serve on every committee, or deliver every inquiry’s answer. We can be yoked by warped expectations that others or even we ourselves have placed on us. No matter the who, the yoke can still be too much, and maybe not at all what God would have you to carry.
I say again because, for those of us in Christ, all these will be yokes from which we were already made free. They came challenging our freedom by thinking to exercise mind binding power over us that had no real authority over the power we’re given by God to be and remain free. We may need to read that again. We are already free!
Luke 10:19 amplified
Behold! I have given you authority and power to trample upon serpents and scorpions, and physical and mental strength and ability over all the power the enemy possesses, and nothing shall in any way harm you.
Yokes that are presented to us by God are not heavy or burdensome to us. The key to this is “to us.” What others think of what God yokes us to or with may look like we are stuck in no change, but not so! For we know the truth of God’s yokes, they are light.
Converting the yokes of no change to taking His yoke and finding His rest in your life comes from our saying yes to God and no to all that is not God. Saying yes requires we move past our comfort zone and embracing the sometimes unknown of God.
God extends His hand to us in many ways. Sometimes we know what we are saying yes to, and sometimes we do not, but saying yes to Him, always leads us to the freedom we already have and the freedom we seek.
This is part of a series Dr. Aikens taught on being Stuck in No Change. The next part is entitled “Stuck & Our Yes” Coming Soon Selah!
Click here if you would like Dr. Aikens teachings to be sent to your email as they are published.
