Rest For The Weary

By 

John Orlando

Voice of the Gospel Mission Church, Middletown NY

4 September 05

Text: Matthew 11:28-30

Background/Context:  John the Baptists, Jesus’ rebuke of cities, sovereign grace, the Sabbath.

         One of the greatest stories that comes to us from church history is that of the conversion of the great Reformer, Martin Luther.  Martin Luther, who lived over 500 years ago, was a Roman Catholic monk.  His decision to enter the monastery was due to an encounter he had with a bolt of lightning while he was on horseback.  He had been training to be a lawyer, and while on the way home, the lightning nearly hit him, and knocked him off the horse. Terrified, he vowed that he would leave his studies in law and dedicate himself to the monastery. 

Before beginning their daily work, the monks would go to confession every day.  They would spend a relatively brief amount of time confessing their sins, and then start their day of work.  The monks had a grueling daily schedule, but Martin did well; however, his superiors began to become concerned with Martin.  It is reported that sometimes he would be in confession for hours!  Why?  What was causing so much angst for Luther?    

Well, the issue was that Martin Luther was immersing himself in the Law of God and all of its demands, and when he analyzed himself in light of that, he simply could not bear it.  No matter how many times he confessed his sins, he still had an overwhelming sense of guilt.  

Why?  Well, for one thing, Luther didn’t sugar coat God’s holy and righteous demands in the Law, and he realized just how far short of God’s glory he actually fell.  And the great irony is that this is precisely what the Law of God is supposed to do!  It is designed to show us how desperate our condition is before a holy God, and how desperate our need is of a Savior.  

Instead of turning to the Savior though, Luther turned to himself and the church.  He tried to gain right standing with God by obeying the Law, and the church had devised and added a host of other things that they claimed a person must do before that person would ever gain peace and right standing with God.  All of these things had in essence combined to create such an incredibly heavy burden and unbearable yoke that Luther found himself utterly crushed under the weight of it all, until finally, he discovered and took hold of the truth of what our Lord tells us in our passage this morning; that Jesus gives Rest For the Weary.  As we come to our passage this morning, the first point I’d like us to examine is:   

I.  The Call of Christ:  Jesus says, “…Come to Me…” Here we must note a couple of things.   

A.  The Nature of Christ:   

1.  The first thing to notice about this call that Jesus makes is that Jesus’ statement

here is, at the very least, an implied statement on Jesus’ part that He is in fact divine.  

One would expect a man that was merely a prophet or a great moral teacher to direct us to God as the one that would give a soul rest, but Jesus doesn’t direct us somewhere else; He points us to Himself. As He tell us in other places, “I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father but by Me,” and “I am the resurrection the life, he who believes in Me will live even though he dies,” and “I am the door, and “I am the good shepherd.”  

All of these things that Jesus says teach us that while Jesus was indeed a great prophet and a great teacher, He was much more than those things.  He is the infinite God, the Son of God, being fully God and fully man.  He is the Alpha and the Omega, the second Person of the Trinity, God of God, Light of light, the creator of the heavens and the earth and everything in between.  He is the sovereign and omnipotent Lord God Almighty.  He is the promised Messiah that would come to deliver His people from the bondage of sin and death by living the perfect life of obedience to the Law of God that we never could, and laying His life down on the cross to pay the penalty for the sins of His people. And though Jesus is all of those things, please note that He says that He is: 

                        2.  “…gentle and humble in heart…” – That is, Jesus is not harsh or stern; but is meek; and tender.  And, one that is gentle, or humble, is one who exercises restraint; he is willing to forego any rights one might have in this world in submission obedience to God and His will. 

The Lord God omnipotent, who spoke and the limitless galaxies came into existence, and who has all power in His hand, tell us that He is gentle and humble in heart.  The Sovereign King of heaven and earth was willing to forgo His rights.  He did not come into the world in a royal palace, but was born in a filthy barn.  He did not come to us in dressed in the royal robes of majesty, but after He was born was dressed in simple swaddling clothes.  He who has infinite power and could, as He said when He allowed Himself to be arrested, call down legions of Angels; restrains His power at that point for a greater purpose.  As the Apostle Paul says in Philippians 2:5-9, Jesus made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men, and He humbled Himself and became obedient to death; even the death of the cross!  He is gentle and humble of heart, and He says: 

B. “Take My yoke upon you…” A yoke is a piece of wood that is used in binding two things together (usually two animals together in order to pull a load).  A yoke also is used to denote severe precepts, enslavement, and moral bondage.  

Even though the Law of God is good and holy, and glorious, it is nevertheless described as a yoke of bondage, and a ministry of death.  It is, in essence, a stern taskmaster.  The Law knows nothing of imperfection, and it deals in absolute precision.  What the Law prescribes and commands must be obeyed perfectly to the letter.  And the penalty for non-compliance is not just a slap on the wrist; but death.  Those that do not conform and comply with every jot and tittle of the Law incur the curse of God upon themselves, as Paul says in Gal 3:10-11: “For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse…Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law, to do them."   So rigorous are the holy demands of God’s law, that we are utterly powerless in and of ourselves to obey even the least challenging part of the least command.  

When some in the early church tried to teach that in order to be saved one must have faith in Christ, plus remain in adherence to the Law of Moses, the Apostle Peter raised his voice in protest, and said, “Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved in the same manner as they." 

Whereas God thundered down on Mt. Sinai in the giving of the Law to Moses, Christ comes to us, a bruised reed He will not break.  And this is the whole point.  When God gave the Law, He gave it in order to reveal His absolute Holy character and nature and to reveal how guilty people are before Him.  By His Law, God has stopped every mouth, and the world has become guilty before Him, and by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight.  Instead, we are only storing up wrath for ourselves for the day of judgment.  The Law then was given to show us all of these things, and to serve as a tutor to impress upon our hearts just how devastating sin is that we might be driven to Christ to be delivered from the yoke and bondage of sin.  

And, whereas the Law is a stern taskmaster, Christ is the exact opposite.  It’s not that Christ has lessened the requirements of the Law though.  Christ, as the One that fulfills the Law, shows us the full scope of the holiness of the Law, and He probes into the very heart of man.  For example, when people read the command, “You shall not commit adultery,” they feel that they have not violated that command if they have not actually performed that act.  However, Christ tells us that if we even look upon another lustfully, we have violated this commandment!  As Jesus tells us, “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, and slanders.”   

The Good News is that Jesus Himself has set us free from the ministry of death and condemnation by His perfect obedience to the whole of the Law, and has bore the curse that was due us by His perfect, substitutionary work of atonement on the cross! As Paul says in Gal 3:13-14:  “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree").  We have been delivered from the yoke and bondage of the stern taskmaster, and from the yoke of sin that resulted in our death, and it is for freedom that we have been set free in Christ, and this freedom is realized when we take Christ’s yoke upon us.  

What is Christ’s yoke?  The piece of wood that bind us and unites to Christ is the cross of Christ.  When we take Christ’s yoke upon us then, we are, by God’s sovereign grace, appropriating for ourselves the perfect work of Christ on our behalf.  As Paul says in Gal 2:19-21:  “For I through the law died to the law that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died in vain." 

The problem is that we often live our Christian lives as if Christ were a stern taskmaster.  We place ourselves under the yoke and bondage of self righteousness and we get caught up in all kinds of things, thinking that it will make us more acceptable in God’s sight.  The Apostle Paul argued throughout the book of Galatians against those that would try to base or make their relationship with God a matter of faith in Jesus Christ plus adherence to the Law, at one point encouraging his readers in Gal 5:1-4:  “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage…I testify…to every man who becomes circumcised that he is a debtor to keep the whole law. You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law.” 

But then we turn on so-called Christian TV, and we see “preachers” carrying themselves as if they are some kind of spiritual giants, encouraging their hearers in almost every sermon to “get to the next level.”  A number of things could be said in response to this, not the least of which is that this kind of thinking fosters the false idea that there are a bunch of different levels we must ascend in Christ.  True, we are growing in the grace and knowledge of Christ, and we want to grow as much as we can; however, what we need to realize is that while we are in union with Christ, we are already at the “highest level” in God’s sight.  In other words, we cannot get any more right with God or pleasing to God than what we are this very moment in Christ.  And this has absolutely nothing to do with us, but everything to do with God and His grace, and the righteousness of Christ that has been imputed to us.  It is all about what Christ has done and is doing for us and in us.  It all about Jesus Christ and Him crucified. 

This is ultimately the point that Jesus is trying to get us to see when He says, “learn from Me.  What do we learn when we turn to Christ?   Obviously, many things, and we will touch on some of those things a bit later, but fundamentally the most important thing we learn is that Jesus doesn’t save us just to put us right back on the hamster wheel of trying to earn His favor!  Instead, He tells us that His “yoke is easy and [His] burden is light.”   Why?  Because Jesus carries our burdens, and He, by His grace has yoked us to Himself, and the life that we now live we live by faith in the Son of God, trusting and resting in His perfect works.  

So, we have seen the call of Christ; that this one who is God in the flesh, and is the King of kings and Lord of lords, actually bids us to come to Him, but, He doesn’t tell us to first make sure we have it altogether before we come to Him!  No!  He is telling those who deserve His just judgment to come to Him…just as they are; not that they might remain that way, but that they might be forever transformed by His amazing grace!  We do not come to Him by offering our best works, or bearing elaborate gifts.  We do not come to Him exalting in all of the things that we do.  On the contrary, those that Christ is calling are all those who are: 

“…weary (labor) and heavy-laden…” 

II. The Called of Christ  

A.  Weary:  To be completely worn out or exhausted, usually by some kind of labor that we have engaged in.  We all can relate to what it is to be weary, whether it is because we have worked long hours at work, or been overwhelmed with school work, or we feel overwhelmed by various circumstances that have arisen in our lives that tend to stress us out. 

B.  Heavy-laden:  The idea of heavy-laden is to overload and heavily burden, as one might do with the freight of a ship.  If the ship were weighed down too much, there would be the real possibility that it could sink.  Here, the idea is that the ship is overloaded, and it has sunk.  

C.  What is it that has made us weary and heavy-laden?  It has to do with something far more profound and serious than any kind of physical cause that would make us weary or feel heavy-laden.  Ultimately, Jesus is speaking of our spiritual condition.  As we have discussed, we are all guilty before the bar of God’s justice.  The Apostle Paul tells us that we were dead in our trespasses and sin.  It’s not that our ship is sinking, so to speak, but that our ship has sunk.  It’s not that we are drowning and just need someone to throw us a lifeline; it’s that we have drowned and sunk to the bottom of the ocean floor.  God then dives in after us, pulls us up to dry ground, gives us mouth to mouth resuscitation, and brings us to life!   And this leads us to the: 

III. The Promise of Christ  

“…And I will give you rest…And you will find rest for your souls”  

A.  Something Given To Us:  Notice, this is something that Jesus will give to us, and it is something that Jesus will not fail to give us, for He does not say “Come to me…so that I might possibly be able to give you rest,” but He says “Come to me…and I will (not might!), give you rest.  

B.  The Meaning of Rest:  Rest from what?  Well, in the Bible, the concept of rest goes all the way back to Genesis and creation, when God created the heavens and the earth in six days and rested on the seventh day.  It was not that God was tired or weary; rather, the word “rest” has the idea of completion and that God had ceased from His creative activities.  This would serve as a basis for the establishment of the Sabbath.  The word “Sabbath” simply means to “desist, to cease, to rest.”   The Sabbath in the Old Covenant was that one day in seven that God’s people were to cease from their normal daily activities and works, and were to set themselves completely apart to God.  (Not only was there this weekly Sabbath day, but there was also a monthly, yearly, and every seventh seven-years (i.e. Year of Jubilee) Sabbath).  

But the idea of Sabbath rest is teaching something far greater than merely ceasing from our normal activities, or setting one day in seven aside to worship God.  All of the OT was simply a shadow that pointed to the ultimate fulfillment to be found in Christ.  In that sense, Christ is the actual substance of all of those OT types and shadows.  This is critical to keep in mind when discussing anything related to the OT, the Sabbath included. 

When people ask questions concerning the Sabbath, their answers are all focused on what man does, and whether or not we are supposed to worship on Saturday or Sunday.  Man and his obedience is the thing that is exalted, not Christ and His perfect works and God’s glory. But, beloved, the answer to the question of the Sabbath is not man and what he does or doesn’t do, or whether it is Saturday or Sunday; the answer to the question of the Sabbath, like everything else in our lives, is Jesus Christ and Him crucified.   The OT Sabbath was merely a shadow of a greater reality that was to be revealed and ultimately fulfilled in Christ.  So, just as Christ is the lamb without blemish, and just as Jesus is the Temple, so He is also our Sabbath.  

What is ultimately in view is eternal life, and the rest that comes to God’s people in their daily lives by virtue of being in union with Christ.  True Sabbath rest has to do with us ceasing to try and justify ourselves before God on the basis of our own works...in both justification and sanctification.  We want to rest upon the works of another; the perfect works of Jesus Christ.  When we do this, we have moved from death to life; from bondage to freedom, from times of weariness to times of renewal and refreshing. 

            “But,” someone will say, “How can you say that it is all about Jesus and what He has done and is doing?  What about our part?  Aren’t we supposed to pursue godliness, and walk the walk?”

Yes, we must purse godliness, and “walk the walk.”  But, what I have discovered is that many of us live as is if that is all a matter of us pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps.  We make our long lists of do’s and don’ts and act as though this is what godliness is all about.  Well, beloved, true godliness, or “walking the walk” doesn't mean that everyone knows that we go to church every time the church door is open, or that we have a Bible College degree, or that we have a Jesus fish on our car bumper, or that we wear a LORD’S GYM T-Shirt, or that we do any of those things normally associated with church activities and “spirituality.” 

Walking the walk means that we live as those that have been ceased by God’s grace, and strive, by that same grace, to live as people after God’s own heart.  In other words, it is to love our neighbor as ourselves, to love our enemies, to forgive as we have been forgiven, to pray for those that despitefully use us, to serve others and to esteem others as greater than ourselves. It is to keep no record of wrongs, to be patient and kind even when it hurts!  That is what walking the walk is really all about; this is what we learn from Christ.  To do this we must realize that the Gospel isn’t just for unbelievers, but is for believers as well.  We must live each day looking to and resting upon the perfect works and righteousness of Christ.   

Conclusion 

Coming back to Luther, we mentioned that he finally discovered the rest promised by Christ.  But how?  What was it that set him free?  It was the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Luther exchanged the heavy burdens and yoke of man-centered self-righteous works in favor of Christ and Him crucified.  Once He realized that salvation was entirely the work of the sovereign grace of God, and that a person was declared right before God by grace alone, through faith alone, in, by, and because of Christ alone, Luther stated that it was if the doors of paradise had swung open, and he walked in.  At long last Luther was delivered from the yoke and bondage of self-righteousness as He took the yoke of Christ upon him, and found rest for his soul, and he lived in light this amazing truth for the rest of his life. 

What about you today beloved?  Are you weary?  Come to Christ.  Are you burdened?  Come to Christ.  Hear the words of our Lord:  “Come to Me all you who weary and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”  Rest, beloved, fully and completely upon the perfect and finished work of a perfect God and Savior.  Take His yoke upon you, and you will find rest for your soul.  And beloved, this promise is not just for the unbeliever, but it is for you, the believer.  Rest in Christ today!   

Amen.

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