Opening illustration: All of us enjoy receiving invitations—to a meal, a wedding, or a concert. Usually, when the invitation is printed on a little card, there are cryptic letters written at the bottom: RSVP. We know what those letters mean. They are an abbreviation of a French request to reply to the invitation. Unfortunately, not everyone knows that.
A couple found political asylum in the USA during the Second World War. They came from Central Europe, and they were not well versed in the American culture. One day they received an invitation to a wedding, and at the bottom of the invitation were those cryptic letters: RSVP. In his thick, Eastern European accent, the husband said, "Vife, vat does it mean: RSVP?” So they thought for a while, until inspiration dawned, and the husband said, "Vife, I know vat it means: Remember Send Vedding Presents."
They made a mistake by imaging that the message was a demand when, in reality, it was an invitation. Unfortunately, there are many people who make the same mistake about Jesus Christ and the gospel. They think it is a demand when in reality it is an offer—a free invitation.
Today’s passage is found in Matthew 11 and Jesus is not demanding anything … just making an offer. How we respond to it matters the most.
Introduction: No amount of philosophy or theology or speculation can give us the intellectual rest that comes through faith in Jesus. The Christian claim is that the relationship of the believer to Jesus is all important. We are saved by faith, not by our understanding or intellect. Many who have great intelligence are still lacking the wisdom that comes from believing in the Lord. Many of limited learning and understanding have the personal joy of knowing and loving the Savior and knowing that they are valued and loved by God. When we come to Jesus, we find rest for our souls––the Greek word is psyche––for our minds. We can rest from having to figure everything out, from having to understand the meaning of the universe. We can be free to give our doubts also to God. You can have peace of mind, rest in your quest, by receiving God's revelation in Jesus.
What is Christ asking us to lay down?
1. Vain Things (vs. 25-27) - Empty, fruitless, nothing of lasting value
Jesus is talking about the Father concealing things from those who are worldly wise and think they are too smart for the world and even for God. But all things have been revealed to Christ through the Father. Therefore all the vain things of the world must be put away so that God’s wisdom can be revealed to us in great measure. It is better to be a fool for Christ than be worldly wise in the sight of man. What are the vain things of the world that we must lay down at the feet of Jesus? The scriptures warn us of a number of these vain things (1 Corinthians 10:12).
• MAKING THIS WORLD & ITS ACTIVITIES THE GOAL OF YOUR LIFE – Ecclesiastes 1:2 (Neither pleasure, wealth, materialism, wisdom, death, labor, social standing, etc. give lasting satisfaction)
• VAIN WORSHIP – Matthew 15:7-9 (By following the doctrines of men; By hearts that are far from God)
• VAIN LABOR – 1 Corinthians 15:58 (Works of faith are not vain in the Lord; By holding forth the word of life)
• VAIN PREACHING – 1 Thessalonians 2:1-2.
• VAIN REPETITIONS - Matthew 6:7.
• WORLDLY WISDOM – 1 Corinthians 2:4-7, 13; James 3:15.
• FIGHTING AGAINST THE PURPOSES OF GOD – Acts 4:24-28 (With immoral living, unauthorized church work, worship, false doctrine … Because God is wiser than us … Who has ever fought against God and won it?)
• IF YOU REVERT TO SIN, GOD’S GRACE & YOUR FAITH ARE VAIN - 2 Corinthians 6:1.
2. Worldly Burdens (v.28)
Now we move on from the two statements Jesus makes to the two invitations he issues. The first invitation is, "Come unto me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Notice to whom that invitation is addressed: he's speaking to us, to human beings. He's far from being complimentary. He likens us to oxen laden with a load that threatens to crush them. Jesus assumed that humankind is burdened. I, for one, do not doubt his diagnosis.
There is, for example, the burden of our anxieties and our fears, of our temptations and responsibilities, and of our loneliness. There is the sense that life has no meaning or purpose. Above all, there is the burden of our failures that are properly called our "sins." Does our conscience never feel its guilt? Does our heart never bow down at the sense of shame? If these things are not part of our experience, I fear we shall never accept the invitation of Christ. It is the burdened he invites to come to him. Jesus said in another passage, "Those who are healthy don't need a doctor, but only those who are sick." We come to him when we sense our spiritual sickness, when we sense our burdens. The very first step to take toward Jesus Christ is a frank and humble admission that we need him. Nothing keeps people away from Jesus Christ more than our arrogance and unwillingness to acknowledge that we need him desperately.
What does Jesus offer with this invitation to the burdened? He offers to ease their yoke, lift their burden, give them rest and set them free. Marvelous! Nobody else can do that but Christ, for he is portrayed in the New Testament as the supreme burden-bearer. He bore our burden when he died on the cross. Listen again to some of these verses from the New Testament: "The Lord has laid on [Jesus] the iniquity of us all." "Behold the Lamb of God who lifts up and bears away the sin of the world." "He was once offered to bear the sins of many." "He bore our sins in his own body on the tree."
Jesus is the sin bearer, the burden bearer. If we come to him, he will lift our burden from us. This is the very essence of the Christian good news: Almighty God loves us. In spite of our sin and guilt and rebellion, he loves us and came after us in Jesus Christ. He took our nature upon him, becoming a human being. He lived the perfect life of love; he had no sin of his own for which atonement was necessary. Then on the cross, he identified himself with our sin and guilt. In fact, he was made sin with our sins, and he was made a curse instead of us. In that Godforsaken darkness of the cross, Jesus endured the condemnation we deserve. Now—on the grounds of his sin-bearing death—if we come to him, he will lift the burden and give us rest: full and free forgiveness together with a new birth and a new beginning.
John Bunyan eloquently expresses this truth in his allegory Pilgrim's Progress:
He ran thus until he came to a place somewhat ascending, and upon that place stood a cross, and a little below, in the bottom, a sepulcher. So I saw in my dream that just as Christian came up with the cross, his burden loosed from off his back, and began to tumble, and so continued to do, till it came to the mouth of the sepulcher, where it fell in, and I saw it no more.
Then was Christian glad and lightsome, and said, with a merry heart, "He has given me rest by his sorrow and life by his death." Then he stood still awhile to look and to wonder, for it was very surprising to him that the sight of the cross should thus ease his burden. So he looked and looked again, even until the springs that were in his head sent the waters down his cheeks.
Jesus invites us to come to him if we're burdened; but what do we have to do? Nothing, except come to him. Salvation is a gift—absolutely free and utterly undeserved—and there is no substitute for a personal commitment to Jesus Christ.
Some people try to make it complicated, becoming engrossed in the externals of religion. They come to church to be baptized; they come to the bishop to be confirmed; they come to a pastor to seek his counsel. They come to everything and everybody except the One who invites them to come—Jesus Christ. It's possible to come to all those other things and never come to Christ himself. Don't stumble over the simplicity of his invitation.
Illustration: Some years ago there was a famous professor of Hebrew in Edinburgh University. His name was Dr. John Duncan; he was known affectionately by his students as Rabbi Duncan, because of his excellence in Hebrew. Such were his attainments in the Semitic languages that his students were persuaded he said his prayers in Hebrew. One night two of his students crept quietly along the corridor outside his bedroom and put their ear to the keyhole, where they expected to hear great flights of Hebrew rhetoric and mysticism. This is what they heard instead: "Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, look upon a little child. Pity my simplicity. Suffer me to come to thee." If a Hebrew professor can do it, I see no reason why you and I shouldn't do it. "Come to me," he says simply, "and I will give you rest."
Illustration: There is a plaque at the base of the Statue of Liberty, inscribed with a poem that reads in part: “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
Hope and promise for those weary travelers, that’s what the Statue of Liberty offered. But today I want to tell you about a greater hope and a greater promise, for all those loaded down with even greater burdens. That hope and that promise are found in the person of Jesus Christ, who says to us today, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” Yes, “Rest for the Heavy Laden,” that is Jesus’ promise to you today.
“The heavy laden”? What sort of heavy load is Jesus talking about? What sort of burden might we be laboring under, from which Jesus will give us rest? Here Jesus is speaking of the burden of the law, which loads us down with heavy demands.
3. Earthly Yoke (vs. 29-30)
Jesus' second invitation is this: "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me." I marvel at the balance of the Bible. The Christian life is not just taking it easy and enjoying rest. When we come to Christ, he first eases our yoke and then fits his yoke upon us in its place. He not only lifts our burden, but he places his burden upon us instead. There are too many of us who want the rest without the yoke; we want to lose our burden, but we don't want to gain Christ's. Nevertheless, the two invitations of Jesus belong together, and we have no liberty to pick and choose between them.
What is the yoke of Jesus? A yoke is a horizontal wooden bar laid on the necks of oxen. The Jews spoke of the yoke of Torah, the yoke of the Law, because in the Old Testament a yoke is a symbol of submission to authority. What Jesus meant when he said, "Take my yoke upon you," he explains by adding, "and learn from me." To take upon us the yoke of Christ is to enter his school, to become his disciple, to regard him not only as our Savior but as our Lord and Teacher, which includes submitting our minds and wills to his lordship, bringing every part of our life under his sovereign control. Does that sound hard? It really isn't. It's the way of liberation, because the burden we lose when we come to Christ is heavy, but the burden we gain when we come to Christ is light.
What Jesus is inviting us to do in coming to him and learning from him is to find the way of freedom. Jesus describes himself as humble and gentle in heart; you have nothing to fear. He is a patient, gentle master, and he lays upon us an easy yoke and a light burden if we will but come to him.
Application: Did you notice that, although there are two invitations, the promise attached to the two invitations is exactly the same? Jesus says, "Come unto me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me and you will find rest unto your souls." The way to find rest is to lose our burden at the cross and allow Christ to put his burden and yoke upon us instead. Freedom is not found in discarding the yoke of Christ; it's found in losing our own burden. It's not found in discarding his authority; it's an amazing truth that freedom is found under the yoke of Christ. This is one of the great paradoxes of the Christian life: under his yoke we find rest; through service we find freedom; when we lose ourselves in loving, we find ourselves; when we die to our self-centeredness, we begin to live.
