The Wooing Saviour (Part 2) — J. Glyn Owen

Matthew 11:25–30 and the Invitation to Rest

New Testament Scriptures in St. Matthew's Gospel in chapter 11. And we shall read a passage that begins with verse 25 concluding with verse 30. At that time Jesus said I praise you Father, Lord of heaven and earth because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned and revealed them to little children.

Yes father for this was your good pleasure. All things have been committed to me by my father. No one knows the son except the father. And no one knows the father except the son. And those to whom the son chooses to reveal him.

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.

The Setting Behind Christ’s Invitation

Now we began with this passage last Lord's Day morning. I indicated that I really wanted to come to the closing invitation this wonderful invitation of our Lord's. But I found it impossible to come to it directly because it is set in such a beautiful setting.

And we need to see the setting. We need to see the setting in order to appreciate the wonder of the invitation itself. And what we saw last Lord's Day morning can be put very briefly in this way. Jesus here invites all and sundry who are wearied and heavily laden.

He invites them to come to him and find rest in him. What right is he to make such a claim that he can bring rest of soul, peace of heart and mind to all kinds of people. Is it really not too much to open your arms so wide and to say to the whole universe come to me and I will give you rest.

Isn't this really the most remarkable illustration of megalomania that we have in the whole of literature. And now we looked at the early verses the early part of this passage because it indicates something of the credentials of the Christ so to do, so to offer rest for the weary peace for the troubled a place of refuge and a place where the trials and the troubles of life have ceased to harass us to a point of driving us to despair at any rate our Lord Jesus Christ.

You see he was there having faced some of the most seriously difficult situations in his life experience. But in the midst of it all when it seemed that everything was crumbling everything was going wrong.

He himself had rest. John the Baptist was questioning now whether Jesus was really the Messiah or not. All these cities in which his most mighty works were done. They were not taking any notice of him.

They were going on just as if he hadn't come. John the Baptist had announced the judgments of God upon them. They took no notice of the word of judgment or of wrath. Jesus came with all compassion and mercy.

He healed their sick, he even raised their dead. They couldn't care less. They would neither respond to John nor to Jesus. They were determined to refuse the message. And it was in that hour Jesus turns to his father and he begins to praise him.

And it's a very strong word for praising God. I thank you Lord God. He says Father Lord of heaven and earth. Because you've hidden these things from the wise and the people who are very well to do in this realm or that realm.

And you've hidden them having hidden them from those you have revealed them to the little beds the few humble disciples that I have gathered around me. You have revealed these things to them. And he finds rest.

He's not in trouble he's not distraught. He's not in anguish. He isn't at the end of his tether. He has peace, he has balance he has equipoise even when everything is going against him. And he has it.

For this reason he has an exclusive knowledge of God. He has told us that it is only the father that knows the son. I'm passing that by I'm coming to this. He also says that no one knows the father except the son and I am the son of the father he says and I know God and I know him to be the father and I know God my father to be the lord of heaven and the lord of earth so that nothing can go wrong.

And in the knowledge of him peace like a river attends my way. I have rest of soul on all counts you see on all counts. Therefore he is qualified. He is competent to turn to men and women like you and myself in the 20th century or in any other who are distraught worried with our hearts and our spirits hacked and torn and we know not where to turn.

He is competent. I say to turn to you and to me and say come unto me all you who are weary or burdened and heavy laden and I will give you rest. I can do it. I have it myself and I can lead you into the knowledge of the God and the father the lord of heaven and earth whence my rest comes so that you may know him as I know him and find rest from the same divine source through the one mediator of his joy.

The Burdened Hear Christ’s Call

So we come to the great invitation. It's wonderful to have a text like this. Those of you who are visiting us this morning let me tell you I'm very excited. It's exciting to be able to face members of our own congregation and our own family here.

Some of whom may not yet be trusting the saviour. They've sat in their pews for a long time but they've never come to the lord Jesus and to be able to say he is here. And he's surely addressing them this morning as if he had mentioned them by name and given their social insurance number.

And he's surely addressing you. And his message is this you troubled ones you who are really tired with fighting against this and fighting against that and battling with yourself and battling with circumstances with sin and with satan.

And you're overwhelmed with the burden of it. All he the son of god the saviour of mankind says to you now look, give it up and come to me and I will give you take my yoke upon you and learn of me. And you'll really find rest for your soul.

Now there are three things that I would like us to focus on this morning. First of all the human condition or conditions that are envisaged by our lord in these words. Come to me he says all you who are weary and burdened.

This is the NIV. You who are weary and burdened. It's a good thing not to gloss over these words. When we read a passage like this we can be so enamored with a picture of the whole that we miss the meaning of the parts.

Let's just take the picture clearly now and see what's here. Come to me all you who are weary what does the word mean. The word instinctively calls to mind a condition of extreme tiredness actually a fatigue.

Behind such wearisome fatigue however there lies a life of positive and persistent battling with something. Actually it's a verb we have here. Come to me all you who are being wearied. It's not an adjective describing a condition.

All of you who are being made weary you're battling. You're doing something you're involved in something. And what you're doing is making you weary. It's making you tired. It's sapping your energies. It's taking the life out of you.

It's taking hope out of you. It's taking everything out of you. We can help expand the implication of the word perhaps by quoting the sheer contrast that appears in another saying of Jesus. This is by sheer contrast.

In Matthew chapter 6 verses 28 and 29 he says. Why do you worry about clothes now. This is not only for ladies it's for gentlemen too. Why do you worry about clothes. See how the lilies of the field grow.

They do not labour or spin. Now that word labour is exactly the one we have in our text. They do not labour. They don't go at it. Hammer and tongs to weave their own garments you know. And get all excited.

In case they haven't got the right garment for the next day they do nothing. They rest yet. I tell you says Jesus that not even Solomon in all his splendour was dressed like one of these. You see the weary are those who are fatigued in the midst of actual unremitting exertion of energies.

They've come to the end of their tether. Now the burdened or the heavy laden are the same people but they are here described from a different point of view. We move now with this word from an active exertion of energy to a passive bearing of an altogether oppressive and exhausting burden.

In the first word we were fighting against something and we fought so hard and so long all the zippers gone out of us. Now as far as the second word is concerned we're under the burden. And the burden is so heavy it's so crushing.

It's like a Himalayan range coming down upon our minds upon our spirits upon our bodies. We are really buried. We're sunk under it. Whether I should say this or not but I was visiting a certain country not all that long ago and I saw a picture which came back to me very forcibly this week as I was meditating upon what I should say this morning.

It was the picture of a donkey laden with what seemed to be a burden that was far too much for five donkeys let alone one and there was this donkey with an amazing baggage on its back tied with ropes and the donkey was trying to negotiate a hill, not going up a hill but going down and the poor little thing was too afraid to go down and I don't blame it it seemed to me that either its little legs were going to snap unless its heart gave out first.

It seemed that all the world was tied on its back. You ever feel like that? All the world's on your back and if your heart doesn't stop you're just going to break. You're going to crack. That's what we have here or let it be clearly understood however that Jesus is here describing human situations that were facing him there before his very eyes and which he could foresee as facing men and women down through the centuries right up to our technological age in this 20th century.

Guilt, Rejected Truth, and the Example of Herod

Now the question comes quite naturally, did Jesus have any specific people in mind who were in this two-fold condition? I suggest that he probably did and I would be surprised if he wasn't thinking of people that are here in the background, in the context because so many of them fit into this category.

I think particularly of the ungodly the guilty those who rebel against the light that God has given them either in the law or in the prophets or in the gospel or in nature generally and they refuse the light that God gives and they fight against it and they fight against it so hard until a burden of guilt begins to grow and it gets bigger and bigger and it weighs heavier and heavier until they're swamped.

Many of you know something about this, about rejecting the light of the word of God the gospel of God, the law of God, the word of the prophets the influence of the Christian church and you hear about it and you read about it but you shrug your shoulders and you take no notice of it but something happens to you you get worn out rejecting truth that challenges you refusing testimony that you see to the truth and then the burden the burden of guilt begins to grow and you carry it with you wherever you go it's with you in the morning, it's with you in the day time it's with you as you pause at that traffic light in your car and you don't know what to do whether to go through the red or not and you're all hot and bothered and it's with you when you get to the office it's with you when you lose your temper for the first time, it's with you when you eat your food, it's with you when you come home to your wife and children, it's with you all the time and you go to sleep with it.

It's a burden that's crushing you and it's making a beast of you and you loathe yourself. Who are they? Who could they be? Are there any such people? Well I look back here into the context and I think first of all of King Herod.

King Herod you remember had imprisoned John the Baptist and in no time he was going to have his head chopped off, presented on a platter all in order to please someone in whom he was with whom he was sensually involved.

Now you see Herod was not was not quite an ordinary person. I say that for this reason we read in the Gospel of Mark that when Herod the King heard about John the Baptist he admired him and he veritably believed that God's prophet, God's mouthpiece had arrived on the scene even though Herod was, I'm sorry John was about the only man that ever faced Herod with his own sins and said to him that he was living in adultery and he should leave the woman that he was living with in sin and repent and put himself right with God.

John was the only man that ever dared to do such a thing. We read in the Gospel of Mark that Herod went to hear John in the desert. Herod, Herod King Herod he was discomforted by John he was accused by John, he was put in the dock as it were by the spirit of God through the words of John and found guilty and yet nevertheless when John was preaching in the wilderness Herod was listening but what did he do about it?

Just nothing, what some of you were doing. You got enough doctrine in your heads to feed a thousand souls for a thousand years. But have you come to Jesus yet? Herod had heard the truth and he knew enough truth to recognize the man of God before him but he did nothing and I suggest to you that our Lord saw in his heart a man who was getting weary and tired and his nerves were frayed and he was itchy and edgy and didn't know where to do or what to do and the burden was coming heavier and heavier and he was virtually out of his mind when the vital test came, I believe Jesus would have taken Herod had he come in penitence.

Come unto me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest take my yoke upon you put your own scepter one side Herod come and take my yoke as the son of the living God and I'll teach you to have rest of soul.

Not only King Herod there was that whole generation, this is generality of course but the whole generation depicted by Jesus in the verses of the previous verses of this very chapter he said how shall I liken this generation.

Well he says it's a queer generation all together. They are like children sitting in the market places playing games. That's what we have here, children playing games and as they go and play games they call one to another, you see there's one little group over here and one little group over here and the one says we've played the flute for you but you haven't come to dance and the other says we sang a dirge for you and you did not mourn.

What does the picture mean. What Jesus is saying is this and he goes on to explain it, this is not my explanation. He says this generation is like children not in the right sense but in the wrong sense.

The word of God came to you in the flaming declarations of John the Baptist warning you to flee from the wrath which is to come and you say oh this ascetic man we can have nothing to do with him, he's not our type living in the desert he's dressed in a manner we don't like he talks so uncouth we can have nothing to do with this man.

Let's get rid of him as soon as we can. Then the son of man came, Jesus came dressed like anybody else he didn't come from the desert, he came from amongst the people, he was born in Nazareth, he lived in Capernaum for most of his time, but wherever he came from he lived among men, he sat where they sat, he touched them he had dealings with a common man and a common woman he was there where harlots had their parties to the great consternation of some people, he sat with sinners, they said oh we can't listen to him he drinks, he's a winebibber, which of course was not true but you see the point they would not have the one or the other, they wouldn't have the wooing compassionate Jesus, neither would they have John the Baptist declaring the wrath of God as being imminent, they determined against it, I wonder whether Jesus could see in the hearts of those people nevertheless this awful sense of fighting against God fighting against truth, fighting against the light, battling against something that they cannot win over and in consequence becoming bowed down and burdened and I believe the words of the Lord Jesus would apply to them as to anybody else, oh the heart of Jesus, oh the compassion of the Son of God if it is written in John 3 .16 that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever here we have its equivalent concerning the Son of God come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden every jack one of you, men and women boys and girls scribes and pharisees and common people, you who have said awkward, nasty, terrifying things about me and you've struggled against me, I'm still saying to you my arms are open, can't you see them come to me and I will give you what you can't get anywhere else because I have exclusive knowledge of the Father and I can introduce you to him and you can come to him through me come to me.

I could refer to other illustrations but I don't need, the point is you see, this message was relevant in Jesus' day and I don't need to prove the point, it is relevant here this morning, now you may not be a Herod, no, no, no I certainly don't charge anyone with being a Herod here, not with anything.

Have you been fighting against truth, against light against God's word until at long last you're under a burden of guilt that you simply cannot remove and you're turning to one and another in the hope that you'll get a little bit of help to get a little bit of peace, and you don't get it, my friend this is where to get it.

Jesus says come unto me the divine remedy he offers we must stay with this for a moment. Jesus repeats it I love this you see, repetitions are meaningful. If I tell my wife once that I love her, I hope she believes me but if I tell her twice I really hope she's taking it in.

In the New Testament especially repetitions are very meaningful. It's the equivalent of Jesus verily, verily verily, verily I mean it I mean it listen, listen you notice how he repeats this come to me, he says and I will give you rest that's verse 28, and then he tells them to be yoked to him, etc etc, and then he says and you will find rest for your soul.

There's a rest, he says which I will give you as a gift in which you will discover and experience this rest is not something that you can tuck up in a parcel and go out into the street and say I've got God's rest, I've got God's peace in a parcel and here it is under my arm.

Somebody may snatch it from you. God's rest is something to be found in each new moment in each new day, in each new circumstance in each new month and new year. It's something to be discovered and says Jesus, I'll give it to you in its totality.

And then when you get yoked to me, you'll find it. You'll discover it for yourself. This is a wonderful text isn't it hallelujah my word, if any of you preachers want a text try it, I've been frightened by this text because of the amount of stuff that's in it.

Sabbath Rest and the Peace Christ Secures

The provision actually reminds us of the meaning of the institution of the Sabbath at the creation. See God always wanted man to have rest. He always wanted you to have rest. And he wanted me to be restful.

That was the idea. And so when he had worked for six days, he himself rested and he himself resting. He says now I'm setting aside the seventh day for man to have rest. I want you to be a rested people, I want you to know rest, peace.

I want you to have balance and equipoise, I want you to be people like that. It has been seriously suggested that much of our weariness in the 20th century is nothing other than sabbaths in arrears, sabbaths that we've never kept.

And much of our dispeace is due to the fact that we simply flout the purposes of God and we use a day of rest for anything but for what God meant it to be. Is that true of you? And don't grumble if you've got ulcers.

Don't grumble if you break down. Don't grumble if you were flouting the commandments of God, you will not have rest. Keep to the commandments of God, do what he says. And you will know a rest that you've never known before.

There is no peace saith my God to the wicked. But of course this sabbath rest was not just purely physical it was symbolic of the ultimate rest that man will have when all his trials and troubles are o 'er and we are safe on that beautiful shore whether the imagery is right or not in the city of God which hath foundations when we are there it will be an eternal sabbath.

And sabbath means rest not absence of motion but absence of commotion into it. Nothing shall enter that causes an offence in the city four square where the gates are open. The twelve gates day and night not that defileth shall ever enter.

Now did you hear such a thing. Twelve gates open day and night. But nothing shall come in that will cause an offence. Nothing to disturb the peace. He's gone to his rest says the word and his work follows him or her.

But in between what is referred to in Genesis chapter 2 and this ultimate rest Jesus says I will give you rest here and now you come to me and I will give you a foretaste of that ultimate. And I will fulfill the purpose of God for mankind at the creation.

And rest is his gift. He says I will give it. He who personally possessed such rest and never allowed it to be disturbed by apparent failure as we saw last time and have referred to already this morning or by success.

He also procured it for us who languish and die in need of it. He made it possible by his death for us sinners upon the cross. He died to procure our peace. To make peace says Paul. What a pregnant statement to make peace.

He made peace by the blood of his cross. And he the peacemaker now becomes the peace bringer and the peace giver. And he says I will give you rest. And the heart of peace is rest. It matters not whether our restlessness has been due to our open warfare with God and rebellion against him or to our vainly trying to make ourselves acceptable to him by our own good deeds.

It doesn't really matter why you are weary and heavy laden wherever it's come from. However it has come it doesn't matter. Jesus says you come to me and I will give you rest. And of course beyond the peace that accompanies divine pardon there comes with Christ's rest a reestablishment of a proper relationship with God the father that we may know him who was the father of our Lord Jesus Christ the Lord of the heavens and the Lord of the earth we may know him and know him as our father.

Knowing God as Father

And you see if you know that your father is God and that your father who is God is Lord of the heavens and Lord of the earth. Now frankly honestly rationally what have you got to be afraid of. I'm sure this little story has been heard a thousand times.

I was a very young Christian many years ago when I first heard of it about some little kiddie travelling through the Rockies in a train and he was sitting in the corner on his own. There were two elderly ladies there and they were rather agitated going through the tunnel.

And this little kiddie was bright as a button. It seemed that they were never going to get through. As far as the ladies were concerned they turned to this Larry and they said Larry what are you. Why are you so happy about.

Do you like tunnels. He says I don't mind them. Well you're very happy about going through the tunnels. Aren't you afraid. Oh no no he says my dad is at the engine. My dad is in the engine. My dad is in the engine.

My friend if you know God and if you know God as your father and if you know that God your father is Lord of the heavens and Lord of the earth then you can have peace. Then you can have rest. And that rest which is Jesus gift is to be discovered and experienced by each one who receives it.

You will find rest for your soul. Now that brings me to the third thing and I will enlarge upon that as I mentioned the third point I have the universal invitation announced. Let me repeat it again. I don't want anyone to miss this out this morning.

The Universal Invitation to Come to Christ

You good people who sit right at the back around the gallery. You're not out of this. I can't see your faces. I can't see your faces. Clearly some of you old age they say. But anyway I can't see your faces.

But I tell you the Lord can and He's got you in mind this morning and He's got me in mind and He's got us all in mind. I don't want you to miss this. Not a solitary soul. Is there anybody sleeping here.

I can't see anyone. I hope there isn't. But I don't want you to miss this. Jesus said not me. Jesus said 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 soul. I notice the three steps there. First of all come to me. Come unto me to possess and then increasingly experience this foretaste of heaven. You must come to Christ come to Him not simply read about Him.

That's good in and of itself. But that's not enough. Not simply respect Him. That's good in and of itself. But it's not enough. I remember talking to a dear gentleman in a Roman Catholic area in Belfast where we were ministering and we were looking at a television scene television in a shop window and somebody was having an operation.

And he turned to me and he showed me a big bottle of medicine. And he said I'm not very well myself. He said I guess I'll be going that way before very long. Well I said there is someone that can come with you.

I have a friend who comes with me everywhere. And I said I know he can come into an operating theatre. Do you know him. Who is he. I said the blessed Lord Jesus Christ the Son of God. He took his hat off.

I knew he was a Roman Catholic. You see they have respect for the Trinity. You may not believe everything that the Roman Church believes. But they have a respect for the Godhead. And in days when we Protestants have had all kinds of things and notions about God and about His Son and even about the Holy Spirit.

They've been loyal to the truth about the Godhead and I salute them for that if for nothing else. And he took his hat off and he said sir. He said no no no. I had my collar on. He said your reverence.

He says I think very highly of him. I said that's great. But do you really trust him. There's a long pause it seemed to me. And he said your reverence. He says I think more of him than I can tell you.

I said that's very very wonderful. You're you're very generous. But that's not enough. You know can you put yourself into his hands and trust him and him only to be your saviour and your friend. And I didn't get an answer for a long time.

I haven't had it yet. You see it's one thing to admire the Lord Jesus of Calvary. It's one thing to take your hat off to him. It's one thing to speak well of him. It's another thing to come to him and put your arms around him and let his arms be placed around you so that you're entwined in a bond that not can sever with faith and love united as one.

You come to him. Have you come to him. If you haven't do so now by faith tell him that you're coming. He's here to come to you. And he will not refuse to receive you. The invitation includes. Notice notice please notice this come unto me he says all you who are weary and heavy laden all of you.

And if you think I'm making too much of that little word all let me remind you of my Lord's words in John chapter 6. All that the father hath given me will come to me and him that comes to me. Whoever comes to me I will in no wise on any condition cast out not on your life.

He says you come to me and you won't find a closed door. You come to me to trust me to walk with me to receive me. And I'll receive you. And that's the history of the church. You may take the first step where you are.

The second is this take my yoke upon you. In Jewish literature a yoke was the sum total of obligations which according to the rabbis a person must take upon himself. If you become a disciple of the law then you take the yoke of the law upon you.

And it had this metaphorical sense. The yoke of the law was the responsibility you assumed in taking a certain position. Of course this figurative meaning arises naturally from the literal meaning of the word yoke which according to the new American Webster dictionary is a contrivance for fastening together the necks of two draft animals as oxen.

I think we know that well enough. Now there are other explanations of this but I believe without spelling this out this morning that what our lord Jesus had in mind was this. He was inviting the person who comes to him not only to come to him and walk alongside of him but to be yoked along with him.

You see that wooden yoke going from the neck of one oxen on to the neck of the other and they're bound together by the one yoke. I believe that what Jesus was saying was this come alongside of me come to me.

But not only that. Bend the neck now and let you and I together be bound together by a common yoke a common responsibility a common purpose. You and I together fellow yoke fellows. That would not only imply our associating ourselves with him but our subjecting ourselves to him.

We do not come under his yoke as equals. This context will make that very clear. He is the son of God. He knows God. He knows God as his father in a unique sense and has the ability and the capacity to reveal him to others.

Now he is above us. He is infinitely greater than we are. He's the incarnate lord and Jesus. Imagine somebody saying what me. Join in with you come under the yoke with you. In the book of Deuteronomy one thing is forbidden.

You mustn't put an ass and an ox under the same yoke now. Can you imagine why. Well the reason is simple. The ox is much taller than the ass. And if you have a yoke going from the neck of an ox to the neck of an ass.

You imagine them trying to walk together. The poor little ass is going to get all the weight and the neck of the ox is going to chafe. It's going to cut through. It's going to bleed. And Jesus says now I'm infinitely more.

I'm infinitely greater than you. But listen he says I'm going to bend down to your size. Come to me. He says take my yoke upon you. I am gentle and humble in heart. It's true he says no one else can reveal the father to you.

And I know the father and I am the son of God. But I am gentle and I am humble in heart. I'll come down to your level so that we can bear the yoke together. And he adds this my yoke is actually easy and my burden is light though I'm the lord of all the cosmos.

I'll walk alongside of you in fellowship with you. And we'll go together. Don't be afraid of it. Come and join me. And what. Then. And as you do you will find rest. You'll discover it. I've given it to you.

It's yours in promise. It's yours in the package. It's yours in the promise. It's yours in the covenant. I'm giving it to you. But as we walk together under the same yoke you and I going out into each new day together we've got the same objectives.

We're going to do the same things. We're working together in harmony. You and I now look in so doing you'll find many people who have been given rest have never found it. They are heirs to the rest of everlasting life.

But they not seem to be finding it. They're missing it. In everyday experience it is found under the yoke to Jesus Christ and with Jesus Christ. And lastly and learn of me. Learn of me. And this is the place to learn from Jesus Christ.

He don't come to sit over him. Look down at him as the superior 20th century character who knows everything has no questions. You know how you learn from the Lord Jesus Christ. Come to him. Get under the yoke with him yoked to him.

Go out into the day with him. This is where he teaches you the greatest lessons about all things but supremely about God the Father the Lord of the heavens and the Lord of the earth. And in the knowledge of that you too will have men and women.

Learning Christ in Daily Obedience

Is there someone here this morning who's missing this. Where are you losing it out. Where are you losing. Have you come. Some of you have walked down the front and you've made a profession. I know but you still haven't got it.

Is it that your neck is still not under the yoke with Jesus. I don't know. You're going your own way still bend the neck to that. And then when your neck is bent and when you're bound to him begin to learn from him.

In the process of doing see we don't learn our greatest our most important lessons in easy chairs. We learn our most important lessons about God. When we are obeying God. When we're on the field when we're in the business when we're going with Jesus.