The Pressure to Perform
Do you have someone in your life who is impossible to please? Maybe that someone is you. Whether you are laboring under the pressure of unrelenting critics, or you’re your own worst critic, the pressure to perform and fear of failure can create strength-sapping anxiety.
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Philippians 4 promises the peace of God that will guard your heart and mind. In Matthew 11, Jesus made the same promise with an even more beautiful phrase.
“You will find rest for your souls” (Matthew 11:29).
The twenty-third psalm promises quiet waters and restful, green pastures. Unfathomable peace, soul-rest, quiet waters—how is it that God makes those promises, yet millions of Christians are in continual inner turmoil?
In Matthew 11, Jesus revealed the pathway that leads to all that wonderful peace and rest.
Justifying Your Existence
In the movie Chariots of Fire, Eric Liddell sacrificed an Olympic gold medal because his event (the 100 meter) was held on Sunday, which he considered to be the Sabbath. The second-best runner was Harold Abrahams, who had spent his career working toward winning the gold in the 100 meter. 
Before the race, Abrahams was racked with anxiety because if he can’t even win when his strongest competitor is out, his whole life’s work a failure. He told his trainer: “In one hour’s time … I will raise my eyes and look down that corridor, four feet wide, with ten lonely seconds to justify my existence.” 
Sound a little melodramatic? Perhaps. Most of us don’t lay all our worth on a single event. However, most of us have our own version of the 100 meter where we must succeed to justify our existence. 
For many women, it’s the nagging question, “Am I a good mom?” She can ask other questions—Am I a good athlete?  Am I a good speller? Am I a good citizen? And if the answer comes up “no,” she shrugs her shoulders and says, “Oh well—can’t win ‘em all.” But the question, “Am I a good mom?” presses on her soul. She needs the answer to be yes. It’s her justification—the difference between her life being successful or being a waste.
For a teenager it might be, “Am I good looking?” Or “Are people impressed with me?” 
For a man it might be, “Am I successful?” 
For you, it could be about your character, your competence, your accomplishments—some area in your life that must be an A or B+ for you to be a worthwhile person. That’s your justification.
We cling to our justification to cancel out our inadequacies. “Yeah, I blew it over there, and other people outshine me over here, but at least I’m good at _______.” Whatever word you place in that blank is your justification, and so you can see why that is a source of fear. Fall short in that area and your whole life is down the tubes. And even for extraordinary people like Harold Abrahams, the threat of falling short always looms.
The Burden of Self-Justification
When we try to prove ourselves, the central question is, to whom? 
If you’re a Christian, you know you can’t earn justification in God’s sight by good works (Romans 4:1-6). We read about the Pharisee in Luke 18 who labored so hard to justify himself (I fast twice a week and give 10 percent ...) and went away unjustified in God’s sight (Luke 18:9-14).
We learn early on as Christians that we are not saved by works. We would never dream of trying to justify ourselves in God’s eyes by our own efforts. But are you trying to justify yourself in the eyes of people by your good works? Perhaps you’re laboring to use good deeds to justify yourself in the sight of the harshest judge of all—yourself. In those moments when you question whether your life is worthwhile or a waste of space, what criteria do you use to answer that question? Your works?
Abrahams did. Mothers do. Fathers do. Students do. Almost everyone does. But if God doesn’t see your performance as a valid criterion for your acceptance, why would you? Why use a different standard for judging yourself than God uses? Shouldn’t we assume his standard is best? Your justification in your own eyes should be based on the same criterion as your justification in God’s eyes. Are you in Christ or not in Christ? That’s the only factor that justifies your existence. 
Losing Your Justification
You may not even realize that you are resting on something besides Christ to justify your existence until that thing is lost. When I abruptly lost my career as a pastor, I felt worthless. I had never done anything else, never cared about anything else, and I had no idea what my place was in the kingdom of God. I felt like God must be about to take me to heaven because my life seemed devoid of value.
The fact that I felt that way made it painfully obvious that I had been getting my sense of worth from my ministry. But if you had asked me while I was a pastor if I was justifying my existence through my ministry, I would have said, “Of course not. My only justification is in Christ alone.” God had to take it all away for me to realize how much I had been using my ministry to justify myself—not before God, but in my own eyes.
It’s good to have a powerful drive to succeed in your calling. But when fear of failure hangs in the background with nagging anxiety, it will wear against your soul and deplete your strength. Self-justification is exhausting. And when you fall short even in your greatest strength, the fear of a failed life can be paralyzing.
The world points to self-esteem as the solution. But it’s the very effort to boost your self-esteem that is so exhausting. The solution Jesus offers is soul rest.
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28-30).
The yoke of self-justification is burdensome. Jesus invites you to trade that in for his easy, rest-giving yoke. 
Taking up the yoke of a rabbi meant placing yourself under his teaching. But are Jesus’ teachings easy? Love your enemies? Be perfect as I am perfect? Forgive as you have been forgiven? In what sense is the Christian life easy or rest-giving?
Jesus answers that question in a wonderful way. He doesn’t explain the details of how it works. Instead, he tells us something about his heart. 
“Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am humble and gentle in heart” (Matthew 11:29).
This is the only place in the Bible that speaks of Jesus’ heart. It’s a precious verse. When Jesus calls you to place yourself under his authority, he sees the concern on your face and says, “Don’t be afraid. If you embrace my teaching, you never have to worry about me throwing a burdensome weight on you, because I’m not like that. It’s not in my nature. You don’t have to be afraid of what I’m going to require. Why? Because I have such a soft heart toward you.” 
How many times have you felt like you’re such a screw-up, and what you should be seems so far out of reach, that you start to think of God as hard to please? That image of a hard-to-please god that’s forming in your heart is a false god.
If the god you have in mind isn’t humble, compassionate, and gentle in heart toward you, it’s not Jesus. Could it be that harsh, impossible-to-please master is … you?
God is very easily pleased by his Son—and by anyone who is in his Son. If the Lord Jesus Christ vouches for you, the Father is pleased with you. And what is Jesus’ attitude toward those who trust him?
“Christ accepted you” (Romans 15:7). 
Take a moment and let those words seep into your pours. 
Maybe it’s hard to win the approval of your dad or the popular kids at school or whomever else you’re trying to please, but Jesus invites you to throw that burden off and simply enjoy his full, unearned, undeserved acceptance.  
God’s Rest
Scripture does not merely call us to enter rest. We’re invited to enter God’s rest.
I recently heard a young Christian describing the original sabbath rest. He said, “God created everything in six days, and on the seventh day he was exhausted, so he rested.” 
Those who know the Scriptures would chuckle at that. We know it’s impossible for an omnipotent God to become fatigued. So why did he rest?
There are two reasons a person rests from work. One is fatigue. The other is that the job is completed. When you are so satisfied with the work that nothing more can be added to it, you say, “It is good. My work is done here. It is finished.” God stopped creating after day six because the work was complete. That’s God’s rest.
So what does it mean for us to enter God’s rest? It means we get the first kind of rest because of the second kind of rest. We are wearied and in need of renewal and rejuvenation. But to find that renewal, we must enter into God’s kind of rest. The “It is finished” kind. 
Jesus said it on the cross. It is finished (John 19:30). What is finished? The work of making us acceptable. This endless work you do trying to justify your existence and become good enough for God, or your dad, or your spouse, or yourself. That work is finished. Jesus stepped in, completed the task of making you acceptable and good enough, showed it to the Father, and God said, “Behold, it is very good!” And his words thundered from heaven: “It’s done!” 
When you enter God’s rest, you cease striving to justify your existence because that work is done. In Christ, you are fully justified and no improvements can be made.
Harold Abrahams didn’t violate the Sabbath by running on Sunday. He violated it by looking to that race as his justification. 
Coming To Christ
You might be thinking, This all sounds great on paper, but why doesn’t it seem to work for me? Maybe you’ve taken Jesus’ yoke and you’ve tried living out his teachings, but instead of getting rest for your soul, you feel burdened by some of his requirements.
You’re trying your hardest to obey his commands, but the harder you try, the less peace and rest you feel. Why does that happen?
Look again at Jesus’ promise. When do you get the rest?
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).
The rest comes only when you come to him. It’s possible to obey his commands in ways that don’t involve movement toward Christ. The rest and refreshment doesn’t come until your obeying is a coming to him. 
You move closer to him by embracing his will. By loving and hating what he loves and hates. By interacting with him and offering your obedience to him as a gesture of love and loyalty. By seeking his help and guidance. And by keeping in step with his Spirit.
If you obey Jesus’ commands that way, you will find rest for your soul. No one ever draws near to Christ and comes away burdened.

Godliness Training Exercises

•	Memorize Matthew 11:28-30 and Romans 15:7.
•	Ask God to search your heart and reveal any justifications you have been relying on—the things that would make you feel like a total failure if you did poorly in those areas. Write them down.
•	For each item on your list, imagine yourself failing completely in that area and still enjoying God’s full acceptance and approval. Imagine it as vividly as possible until it affects your emotions.