TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH, INC.

YOKES OF BONDAGE 

August 25, 2012 

Today, we are going to talk about “yokes of bondage”. My prayer is that this message will be something that will open our eyes and help us to see that these “yokes of bondage” are chains that shackle the people of YHWH, thus causing them to be unproductive in their lives. 

Part 1:  What is a Yoke? 

Are we talking about that yellow part that is in the pan that is sometimes “sunny-side up”, or are we talking about something else? How about it when you crack the egg and the yoke runs freely, as in soft-boiled eggs or even raw eggs? How about a hard yoke as found in hard-boiled eggs? How about it when the white and yellow are mixed together and then cooked…you have scrambled eggs. 

What did YAHSHUAH say? 

Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me…for My yoke is easy and my burden is light… 

YAHSHUAH’S YOKE is easy, light, and can be taken on. 

The yoke of the oxen was attached to the harness and became something that the plow or other object was tied to so that the oxen would do the required work… 

Are you heavy laden with yokes of bondage? 

Part 2: Whose Yoke Do You Wear? 

Do we wear a yoke as an ox wears it? 

Do we wear the yoke of YAHSHUAH, but has been doctored up by the words and teachings of men, so that what we think we wear is a yoke when in fact, it is not…it is an unnecessary weight that burdens us down? 

Do we wear the yoke of YAHSHUAH in that He frees us and gives us life and a constant supply of fresh oil? 

Part 3: Quicksand is a Yoke 

I mention quicksand because as I was coming down to my office, this thought came to my mind, and it needed to be included. The slippery slope of sin leads us to a place where we fall into quicksand, and it becomes the yoke of death, first to the sinner, and second to the saved. If there is no one to help us, we are there to die, physically and spiritually, because the scriptures teach us that we are guilty for our sins. 

Part 4: The Yoke of Religious Instruction 

How many times have you been involved in some sort of ministry that teaches you one thing, when in fact you feel that you have become trapped and are performing life-less deeds? This is indeed a yoke of religiosity, and it is man induced to keep you from knowing the Truth, and remember what it says, “You shall know the Truth, and the Truth will set you free”. Notice that freedom brings life. Think of a tiny shoot of a vegetable that grows up through the ground and as you water it and take good care of it, it produces a harvest. There is also a harvest of righteousness that springs up from the ground with rains from above, a passage in Isaiah, chapter? “Drip down O heavens from above…” 

Part 5: The Yoke of Discipleship 

Notice that I say that there is a yoke attached to “discipleship”. This is a yoke of discipline and it is placed there so that we learn to walk in obedience. For instance, taking vitamins/pills or remaining on a diet: these are my two most common weaknesses, as I start out good for awhile, and then something happens and I forget what I am supposed to be doing. We need to keep our eyes focused at all times to what is around us, and if we have to, we need to make a schedule to help us stay on track. Now, although this is a “Yoke”, it is not a bad yoke…it is meant to cause us to grow spiritually and to walk in righteousness and holiness before YHWH. 

Part 6: Which Yoke is Good and Which Yoke is Bad? 

Notice that there are yokes that produce the peaceable fruit of righteousness…now, as I write, there are yokes that have been placed on us, or put there by ourselves, and they show us the error of our ways. Consider the yoke of prison to which we are incarcerated for many years because of something we either did or did not do…yet we are there and have to remain there until the end of our sentence is over. We have to toe the line and walk a good path. We need to avoid the evil people and the gangs and the drugs, and get along with the guards who are there to whip us should we get out of line, and we have to keep our focus and count the days, the weeks, the months, and the years until the day when we see freedom once again. We need to train our thoughts so that we do not fall into the same traps that produced this yoke of bondage, so that we can taste true freedom. 

So the question remains: Which yoke is good and which yoke is bad? 

The answer remains in what we do with the yoke and what the yoke produces. If it produces waste and wantonness, then it is bad, if it produces a change in our behaviors and we are forced to walk in righteousness before YHWH, then it is good. 

Part 7: Different Types of Yokes 

In this session, we will look briefly at the different types of yokes that are placed on us…for instance, we have been in the messianic movement for 13 years, and have found that the typical Friday night to Saturday night Shabbat is out because it tends to be founded on wrong concepts, and that the Muslim calendar uses the Friday for their Shabbat. 

The Saturday Shabbat follows “saturnalia” a pagan day of the week. 

So, then we discovered through various teachings that there was another calendar, called the Solar-Lunar calendar, to which we began to follow, and that was from the evening to the evening or one complete 24-hour period. 

Then, there were those that came along and taught that the day is 12 hours and the night is 12 hours, so that the Shabbat is only 12 hours, instead of the 24-hour period. So, we adopted this new Shabbat procedure. 

Now, there is another teaching that teaches that the Shabbat follows the Full Moon calendar, in which the Rosh Chodesh or the beginning of the month falls on the day of the Full Moon, and the Shabbats are determined from this point. 

The topic for this teaching is called “yokes of bondage”, and I find that all of these teachings are merely yokes or unnecessary shackles that are placed on the people of YHWH. 

Do we really know which one is right? 

Has YHWH revealed the Truth of this to us according to keeping the calendar His way? 

What about the people that follow the Friday/Saturday Shabbat…are they spiritually deceived? 

What about the others, the Rosh Chodesh of the Dark Moon, and the Rosh Chodesh of the Full Moon…are they deceived, and are they right. Who is to know? 

To me, this is a “yoke of bondage” that is putting an unnecessary burden on the people of YHWH in that we are being pulled this way and that way and every which way, and when we think that we are walking in freedom, we find that we are chained to something that will be shared in the next part. 

Part 8: The Yoke of Confusion 

We all know who the author of confusion is and it is his desire that we stay confused. Confusion is a yoke of bondage, and this bondage separates us and alienates us and makes us feel that we are doing things His way and in His time, when in actuality we are being controlled by men that are trying to manipulate us. 

You want to know what manipulation is: Look at the upcoming elections that will be held in November. We know who the candidates are, but we do not know what the underlying motives are behind each of them, and who the controlling forces are and what the ultimate vision is that will earmark the ruin of this nation. But we do know that those that will not serve YHWH will fall into ruin, and that Satanists do not serve YHWH, and here, we again, we are being manipulated by satan, and by leaders that want to bring us to utter ruin through “confusion”. He said, he did, the other one said, the other one did, back and forth, more and more confusion with the help of the press who make their money by keeping the people at bay, and out of curiosity, we are forced to buy newspapers to which we try to find out the news, but it is so polluted that we cannot know the truth. 

The yoke of confusion will not lead us to the Truth. Only a walk with YHWH through the Blood of YAHSHUAH will lead us to the Truth, hopefully…I say this, because the Truth has been so doctored up, and my thought here and prayer is that: 

“YAHSHUAH will You set me free so that I can know what is bondage and what is freedom? 

Will You deliver me from the yokes of slavery and the yokes of bondage? 

Will You keep me in Your path of righteousness and holiness? 

Will You keep me out of the path/yoke of the unrighteous whose desire is to trick me and to take my oil and make me as one that never knew You? 

Will You give me fresh oil and renew me, and give me wisdom and discernment to know what is right and what is true, so that I can walk with You and talk with You and worship You and sing praises to You? 

Will You give me Your yoke that is easy and Your burden that is light and may I grab hold of this and hold onto this for the rest of time, so that no man or beast or demonic force can snatch this out of my hands, as I want to walk with You for the rest of time and throughout eternity, le-olam-va-ed.