Matthew chapter 11, verse 28,
and the title of the message is simply, Come unto Jesus. Come unto Jesus. Let's read our text in Matthew
chapter 11, verse 28. all you that labor and are heavy
laden, and I will give you rest." Preparing this message, I went
over the chapter to see the context in which this great thing, this
great word of Christ had been given. And if you go back to
the beginning of the chapter, you'll see that this began with
John the Baptist. John the Baptist was now in prison
and facing death. Remember that he had told Herod
he shouldn't have his brother Philip's wife and it was fixing
to come down on him. He knew that his death was near.
And so his faith began to wane somewhat. And he told his disciples,
he said, go and ask if this is the one, if Jesus, if you are
really the Messiah. And so his disciples went and
Jesus, Jesus told him, He said, look around you boys, what do
you see? Listen to what I'm saying. Everything I do fulfilled all
of the Old Testament prophets. The dead are raised, the blind
see, the deaf hear, the dumb speak. What do you think? Yes,
I'm the one. Yes. And this goes to show us,
if we are believers in Christ, that it is not above any one
of us for our faith to wane. Many times in this life we as
believers in Christ have our faith to wane and we wonder,
are we really saved or not? Is Christ's blood really sufficient
for me? We often ask these questions.
And let me say this, it doesn't matter if your faith is small
or your faith is great. Small faith or great faith does
not determine true faith. Now say it again. Small faith
or great faith does not determine true faith. The only thing that
determines true faith is its object. If the object of your
faith is Jesus Christ, you're alright. You're okay. If the
object of your faith is Christ and Him crucified and Christ
alone, you're alright. And so the Lord, he answers the
apostles, the apostles or the John the Baptist's question.
And he says, I'm the one. Look around you and see I'm the
one. I raised the dead. I give sight to the blind. I am the way, the truth and the
life. And no man comes to the father
but by me. We that have experienced this,
we know that there's none other name given among men whereby
we must be saved. You know what? Even the we, I
know it's I. I like putting that there. I
like saying I. There's none other name given among the heaven whereby
I must be saved. I must be saved by Christ and
Christ alone. So in verses 7-19, the Lord then
vindicates His prophet. His prophet has had weak faith,
and now then He begins to vindicate. He says, don't you, you that
are against John the Baptist, you that didn't like his message,
don't go gloating because his faith waned. Don't go gloating. There was not, Jesus said, there
is not a man born of woman greater than John the Baptist. That's
a high statement, my friends. That's a high statement. He vindicates
His prophet. You see, these men, when they
went and heard John the Baptist, they wanted to go out and see
him, and they thought that he would be altogether different
than he was. They went out there expecting
a man in robes of silk and satin. They expected a man to be smooth
in his words, and John was everything but smooth. John was a rough
old man. He was in camel skin. I've never worn camel skin. Don't
intend to, really, if I can help it. But John, he was a rough
man, and he preached eugeneration of vipers. He was a rough man,
and he preached the truth without compromise. And they didn't like
it much. You see, John didn't fit their
mold. John didn't fit their mold. And Jesus said, you generation,
you're like a bunch of children. You're like a bunch of children.
You said we've piped and you've not danced to us. You've not
danced to our tune. In other words, he didn't fit
in with the norm of what they thought a preacher should be.
When the forerunner should come, they didn't think a forerunner
would be like this. And so when they piped their
tune and he didn't dance to it, They were offended and pouted
like little children. And that's, you know, that's
just like a lot of people that think a man that is called of
God, a servant of God, should be one way. But when he's another,
they use this as an excuse not to be faithful to the service.
Well, I just don't like that preacher's demeanor. I don't
like the way he sounds. He's too rough or he's too smooth. These people are people that
think that they know everything and need to be taught nothing.
They're like a bunch of spoiled children. They're like a spoiled
brat. Nobody likes a spoiled brat.
Nobody. Nobody likes one to sit there
and pout and put their hands on and pout their lips. Well,
I don't like this because of this and I don't like this. God
doesn't care. God sends His men and God's people
will accept His men. God's people will accept His
men. Jesus vindicated His prophet and He vindicates all His pastors,
all those He sends. And people should not be very
careful what they say about God's men. People should be very careful
what they say about God's men. Because it's God that sent them,
it wasn't the person. It wasn't the person. So he vindicates
his his profit here, and he he warns those that have that are
like pouting children. And in the last verses here before
we get to our text, the Lord Jesus begins to warn these cities. He gives a word of warning. These cities were blessed above
all other cities in that Jesus Christ Himself came to preach
to them. And I notice something very peculiar about this. He
said, if this works, if these miracles were done in Tyre and
Sidon, in Sodom and Gomorrah, they would have repented. You know the Lord knew that even
during the time He was destroying those people? And yet He still
withheld those miracles that would have caused their repentance.
And yet these people have heard the Word of Christ and they have
rejected Him. And God says it will be better
for that homosexual sodomite in judgment than for a person
to hear the Gospel and reject it. You, today, I promise you,
if you walk out and God takes you into eternity and you have
heard the Word and rejected Christ, my friend, it will be better
for the worst man on the face of the earth than for you. in
judgment. I promise that. I know that from
the Word of Christ. I guarantee you hell will be
hotter for those who have heard the Word and rejected it as those
that have not. My friend, today you have a clearer
message delivered to you than the message of Sodom which Lot
gave. Lot, I'll tell you what, Lot was a just man, but Lot was
not a man you'd want to be your pastor. Lot was not a man that
was very stern, that was always following the truth. He was a
man that waned on the truth and compromised. Friends, I am telling
you the gospel this morning without compromise. And if you walk out
of here, my friend, your judgment is that much greater. Your judgment
is that much greater. And so we come down to our text. Let's look at our text. Jesus
said, in light of this, in light of these things, Jesus says this,
even though these warnings come out, come unto me, all you that
labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. There are three things I want
us to see from this message this morning. First of all, a gracious
invitation. A gracious invitation. Second
of all, I want us to see a grievous qualification. A grievous qualification. And third, a glorious result. A glorious result. First of all,
a gracious invitation. A gracious invitation. Jesus says, come unto me. This, my friends, is the general
call of the gospel to each and every one of you under the sound
of my voice. I say, come unto Christ. Come unto Jesus this morning. The smallest child can understand
that, can't they? I tell my children, come here.
Well, they do. They look at me with a question.
Do they not understand that? Well, sometimes they do. And
that's all because they don't want to come. But it's simple,
it's plain, it's not something complex. Jesus said, come unto
Me. Come unto Me. This is the general
call to you. This is a general call to everyone
under the sound of My voice. I'm not calling to the people
that can't hear Me. Jesus is calling to those who are under
the sound. Come unto Me. This hits your
ears, this general call is to you. To you. Come unto Me. And I'll tell you this, some
of you will hear this this morning and you will walk away in your
rebellion not having come to Jesus. Jesus says come. And you will walk away not coming. You will walk away from Him this
morning and you will not come. Because of your rebellion, because
of your natural love for sin, you won't come. You won't come. Because of your hatred for God,
you will not come. But if there's anyone that has
a desire this morning, if you are curious, if you have a sense
of desire to come to Jesus Christ this morning, if you have an
inkling to these words, if you entertain these words at all
in your heart, listen to them. Listen to them. If you have an inkling in this,
I want to do this. I want to show this gracious
invitation. Asking a question. Jesus said,
Come unto Me. To whom do we come? If Jesus
said, Come unto Me, to whom will you come? To whom will you come? These words are spoken by Jesus
Christ, the Son of God. And for any to come to Him, they
must know whom they're coming to. Don't you think that's fair?
If Jesus says, come unto Me, don't you think you ought to
know who you're coming to? Yeah, you should. Paul said this in Romans chapter
10, he says, Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord
shall be saved. Isn't that a gracious thing?
Isn't that a wonderful passage of Scripture? But he doesn't
stop there. How in the world will you call on Him who you
don't know? If you don't know Him, how is
it that you'll ever call on Him? You won't. You won't. And how shall they hear without
a preacher? That's what I'm doing. I'm doing
this. I'm preaching Christ to you this morning. I want to show
you Christ. I want to show you this One into
whom you are to come. First of all, this One to whom
you've got to come to, that has called you to come in His general
call, this Man, Jesus, has all things delivered into His hands. Look at that in verse 27. Look at this. All things are
delivered unto Me of My Father. This One who calls you has all
things delivered into His hands. What does all things mean? Does
it not mean all things? Is there anything outside of
His control this morning? Is there anything that has not
been delivered into the hands of Jesus Christ? No. All things
have been given to the Son of God. Now, I'll tell you something
about this man Jesus. He is Himself God. He is Himself God. So before
the world was created, Jesus had all things in His power. John chapter 1 tells us that
Jesus created everything by the Word of His power. He spoke it
and there it was. Jesus had all things. But what
does that mean then? That He was delivered all things.
Well, Jesus, if you had all things, then what do you mean by all
things are delivered to you? What is that? Well, that means
that He as the Mediator was delivered all things. He as the Mediator. What is a Mediator? A mediator is somebody that stands
between someone, intercedes for someone. And he is the only one
that can stand between you and God. My friends, if you go out
of this place not having come to this Jesus, then you will
stand before God by yourself. You'll stand before God by yourself.
My friends, I don't want to stand before God by myself. This man,
Jesus, He came for this purpose to be a mediator. And He did that with all of His
heart and with all of His soul. And He was successful. And because of His obedience
to God, because of His righteousness, because He did everything you
should have, everything I should have done, He did. And God says,
I am well pleased with this one. Can you say that God is well
pleased with your actions, your thoughts, your heart this morning? Is there anything about you that
is pleasing to God? My friend, there is nothing about
me that is pleasing to God. The only thing God has ever been
pleased in is His Son. He's pleased in Jesus Christ. And because He is pleased with
Him, Jesus earned all things as a man. In other words, men want this. Men want God to give them everything.
They think they deserve everything. But there's only One that deserved
it, and His name is Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ, who has all
things, says, come unto Him. Come unto Him who has all things
in His power. Listen to me. Both good and evil
are in His hands. Both good and evil. Most men
like to think all good is in Jesus' hands and all bad is in
Satan's hands. He can't control that devil.
He can't control our flesh. My friend, you are delivered
into His hand. And my friend, whether you come
to Christ or not, I guarantee this, He is your King. He has earned it. He has earned
the right to be your Lord and your Master. Your Judge and your
Executioner. He has earned the right. He has
earned it. And God gave it to him. God gave
him all things. Friend, you woke up this morning
and you are still breathing because He allows you to. And no other
reason. You breathe in and you breathe
out until He says, stop. And then you'll stop. Whenever
that is. Boast not thyself of tomorrow,
thou knowest not what a day may bring forth. The Lord may reckon
in your time to be at hand. I went to visit a cemetery a
few years back and as I noticed, there was no pattern to the ages
of the people laying in those graves. There's no pattern. My
friend, God, the Lord Jesus Christ, has set your time. The time you
were born and the time you shall die is set and it is in His hands,
and He does with it whatsoever He wills. And you have nothing
to say about it. I have nothing to say about this. He is Lord of all. Come unto Him. Come unto Him
who is Lord of all. Come unto Christ and recognize
that He is God manifest in the flesh. You remember that rich
young ruler? He came to God and he said, good master, good master. And he came running too. I mean,
I thought that was something. He came running. And he came
running and he kneeled down and he said, good master, what must
I do to inherit eternal life? And the first thing Jesus said
is, why are you calling me good? There's only one good, it's God.
In other words, that rich young ruler, he saw Jesus as a good
teacher, a good man, but he never came to Jesus as God. And if you are to come to Christ
this morning, you must come recognizing Him as God. My friend, God is
on His throne and His name is Jesus Christ the Lord. That's
His name. Second of all, if you come to
Christ, you must come to this Christ who is sovereign in salvation. Look at that back in verse 27
again. No man knoweth the Son, but the Father. Neither knoweth
any man the Father, save the Son. And to he to whomsoever
the Son will reveal Him. No man knows the Son, but the
Father. You that believe, before you
came to Christ, did you know Christ? Oh, I know you knew a
lot about Him. I know you knew a lot about Jesus
before you came to Christ. I know you knew He was... In
your mind you knew, oh yeah, that's the Son of God, sure,
yeah, I understand that. Yeah, sure, He died on the cross, I
understand that. And you were one of those people that knew
everything and didn't want to be taught anything. I know because I was
one too. I was too. I didn't need to be
taught. I knew everything about that
Jesus thing. But I didn't know Him. I didn't
know Him. Why? Jesus said, No man knoweth
the Son but the Father. No man by nature knows Jesus
Christ. No man. No man knows Jesus Christ
but the Father. In other words, I didn't know
anything about Jesus that was beautiful. Like I said, I had all my ducks
in a row, and I knew everything about doctrine, and I knew everything
about total depravity, limited atonement, unconditional election,
perseverance, preservation. I knew all that before I came
to Christ. But I didn't know Christ. You
see, I didn't see any beauty in Him. I didn't see any beauty
in Him. Isn't that what Isaiah said?
We saw no beauty in Him that we should desire Him. And some,
if you're lost today, if you've not come to Christ, you don't
see any interest in Him. There's no beauty in Him. Lost
people have no interest in Christ. They have no interest in the
things of God. Why? Because they can't know
Him. They don't know Him. They don't want to have anything
to do with Him. I tell you that God from all
eternity chose Jesus Christ to be His Savior. He chose Him to be
the only source of knowledge of God. You see, friends, you
can never know God unless you know Christ. And you can never
know Christ unless you know God the Father. And how in the world
can we know God unless it's revealed to us? Salvation is not a decision,
it is a revelation. I don't know how many decisions
I made for Jesus before He actually came and saved me. I don't know
how many times I came down. That's why you have to have rededication
of lives when they come to a Jesus that doesn't save. Because they
don't know Him. He hasn't been revealed to them.
Oh, but my friends, come to Him. Come to Christ. He is the only
one who can reveal God to you. My friends, I can tell you until
I'm blue in the face, but until God comes, you'll never know
Him. Bow down before Christ. Come to Christ as the only hope
of ever knowing God. He says, to Whomsoever the Son
will reveal Him. My friends, when Christ reveals
the Father, He reveals Himself, and He reveals that He is the
righteousness of God that you need. He reveals that the blood
of Christ is the only peace with God. We can't make peace by ourselves. If you've said you've made your
peace with God, then you have no peace with God. Only Christ
can make your peace with God. And if He has, He's already done
it. He's already done it. My friends,
He is sovereign in salvation. He is sovereign in salvation.
No man can know the Father, cannot know His eternal justice. You
see, before I came to Christ, I didn't know of my need. I didn't
know my need. When I came to Christ, He revealed
to me my need, my need of salvation. And this is why we see men groping
in the dark. Why do you think there are so
many religions? Because men want to come to the Jesus of their
own making. They want to come to the Jesus
of their own imagination. They don't want to come to the
one who is sovereign, the one who is God, the one who has everything
in His hands. They don't want anything to do
with that, Jesus. They want to have a little something to do
with it. They want to have a little say-so in this matter. But all
who come to Christ must see and know He is God and the source
of all knowledge of salvation comes from Him alone. You won't
ever get it from anyone else. You won't ever get it from anyone
else. And my friend, this Christ that I've just described to you
is a foreign Jesus to the religion of our day. The Jesus of freewill
works religion, sits in heaven, doing not whatsoever He pleases,
but whatsoever man pleases. You see, I don't know anything
about a Jesus like that. I didn't come to that one. I'm
not coming to that one. Don't go to that one. He cannot save you. The Jesus
that does whatsoever man pleases is not the Jesus that says, come
unto me. The Jesus of men reveals God
to whomsoever man wills and not to whomsoever he wills. If this
is your Jesus, then you've not come to Jesus. You've come to
another. You've come to another. If any
man will come to Christ, he must come and see that He is Lord
and Sovereign, that He is a Prince and a Savior. That Jesus came
not making salvation possible, but recognizing He accomplished
salvation. He accomplished it. He finished
it. He pleased God. That's the Jesus
you're to come to, my friends. Come to Him. Come to Him by faith
and bow down before Him. Bow down before Him. This is
a gracious invitation. My friends, I do not deserve
this invitation. Do you? When I came to Christ,
I did not deserve this invitation. And even as I come by faith to
Christ now, I still don't deserve it. I still don't deserve it. But I still come. I still come. And you that believe, I know
this, when He says, Come unto Me, you still are coming to Christ,
aren't you? You haven't stopped. And if you
believe until the end, you'll keep coming if He saved you.
Number two, I want us to see a grievous qualification. We see who we are to come to,
but how are we to come to Jesus? How are we to come to Jesus?
Jesus said, come unto me, you that are labored and heavy laden. This is a grievous qualification.
It narrows it down now. Jesus said, come unto me, you
that are heavy laden. You that are labored and heavy
laden. That's the qualification. Sure,
pastor, nobody wants to go to hell. And so I'll come to Jesus
so I won't go to hell. No, my friend, that's not the
qualification. The qualification to come to
Jesus is that you are labored and heavy laden with sin. Are you labored and heavy laden
with your sin? My friend, all men by nature
are sinners by birth and sinners by choice against God. And right
now, some of you are under the condemnation of God. There are
some who do not know Christ, and they are under the condemnation
of God. Yet how do they act? Do they
act like they are under the condemnation of God? Do lost men run around
with a grievous burden on their back concerning the things of
Christ? Concerning the things of God?
No. Oh, no. No. Sure, when the preacher gets
done, people feel a little twinge of guilt. They may say, oh, I'm
so guilty. And then they go out the door,
and sure enough, they'll find something to entertain them enough
to get that out of their mind. I knew a man once, and he came
to me, and he was really grievous for sin. He seemed like he had
a burden for sin. And he did this for quite a while.
It was several months that he came like this. And he came interested
in Christ. He said, oh, I have a grievous
burden and I'm a sinner and I know I'm going to hell. I was excited. I thought that was good. But
again, time will tell about the people like that. Because sure
enough, little by little, the guilt went away and the burden
was gone. And then he's back right where
he started. Right where he started. Back in his sin. This is not
a person with a grievous burden. Someone who has a burden for
sin, someone who has a grievous burden of sin and guilt before
God, that will never go away until they come to Christ. It
will never go away until they come to Christ. I remember when
I had the grievous burden of my guilt, I tried everything
to get rid of it. I tried everything. I said, well,
I'll just stop going to church and I'll get rid of it. You know,
I don't want to hear the preacher anymore. I don't want to hear
that. I'll try to make excuses and get out of there as fast
as I can. And I'll live in my sin and I'll satisfy myself. And the more I did, the bigger
the burden got. The more grievous the weight
on my shoulders began to be. And then they said, well, I'll
look at religion again. And so I went back to religion
and I started learning things about religion. But the more
I entangle myself in religion and law, the greater the burden,
God. It didn't get done. It wouldn't
go away. I was like that woman with the
issue of blood. You know how she went to all
those doctors? And the Scripture says she grew none the better,
but grew worse. A man with a burden like that!
Jesus says, you're qualified. Come unto Me. Come unto Me, you
that are burdened with sin. You that are burdened with the
law, you that are burdened with religion and trying to please
God. To someone who's trying to please
God by what they do, let me ask you this, when is enough enough? When will you please God? Scripture says, "...cursed is
everyone that continueth not forever in all things that are
written in the law to do them." God says, "...cursed is everyone
that continueth eternally." And my friend, if you were to be
saved, if it were possible for you to be saved by your works,
do you realize that when you got to heaven, you would still
have to work? It would never end. Oh, but my
friends, Jesus says, Come unto Me. I have finished everything
that is necessary for you. Come unto Me and the burden will
go away. Come unto Me, you that are grievous
and need a Savior. Is there anyone that needs mercy?
Is there anyone that needs grace? Jesus said, Come unto Me, you
that are labored and heavy laden with your sin. Come unto Me. Friend, Jesus didn't call good
people. If you're a good person, He's
not calling you. If you're a righteous person,
He's not calling you. He is calling evil, wicked, vile,
worthless sinners. And those are the people He calls.
Do you qualify? Oh, yes. Praise God, I qualify. I am the chief of sinners. Remember that publican that said,
God be merciful to me, the sinner. When a man's burdened for his
sins, he won't know about everybody else's sins, but he'll know about
his own. You see, I see how God could be gracious to you. I can't see how God could be
gracious to me. That's a mystery. Was that a mystery wrapped in
an enigma? I don't know. It's just a great
mystery how God can say to me, come unto me. But He does. There's
pardon. There's forgiveness. There's
mercy to be found. Don't wait till the burden's
lighter. It'll never get lighter, my friends. It'll only get worse. Come now,
Christ said. Don't wait. Come now. Come now
unto Me, you that are burdened and heavy laden with your sins.
Don't try to wait. What's that song say? It says,
don't wait till you're better. You'll never come at all. If
you wait till you're good enough for Jesus, my friends, you'll
never come. You'll never come. And to those of us who have come,
don't we still come in the same way? Are we not still burned
with our sin? Are we not still grievous about
this flesh and this body we have to drag around? Yes. Are we tempted
and tried? Do we need a great Savior? Jesus
says to us again and again and again, come unto Me. Come unto
Me. Come unto Me. Friends, don't
come to a creed. Don't come to a religion. Don't
come to a set of doctrines. Come to the person of Jesus Christ,
you that are heavy laden and labored with your sin. Come to
Christ. And my friends, all who come
to Christ, there is a glorious result. A glorious result. Jesus said, I will give you rest. I will. Do you not see the willingness
of Christ to give those who come labored rest? Do you not see
the willingness of Christ to save all who come to God by Him? My friends, there will not be
one cast out that come in this condition to Him. If you come
this way, my friends, there's rest. There's rest. Well, pastor, I don't need rest.
You won't come, will you? You won't come. I got everything
I need. I'm alright. You know, I'm doing
good. Me and God, we got this thing
squared away. It's alright. My friend, you'll never come.
You'll never come. But to those who do come, this
is His gracious promise to you. I will give you rest." What is
rest? You know, we think of rest as
something like a nap. I know a lot of you go home today,
it's raining outside, you'll be ready to take that nap. Sunday
afternoon naps. I know you can't do without them.
But that's not the kind of rest that he's talking about. It's
more like a refreshment. I was working in the yard the
other day and man, I was thirsty. It was hot and I was hot and
sweating. And I asked Cheryl, give me a
glass of water. And when I got that water to
my lips, it was refreshing. Gave me strength. gave me freedom
and liberty to do what I needed to get done. And that's what
it is. Christ gives us life. He gives us life and peace with
God. Is there anything greater? Do
you need anything else? What do you need? What do you
need? Whatever it is you need, that's
what you're going to go after, right? I promise you, you'll
do everything you can to get it. Do you need rest? And my friends, you'll not stop
until you come to Christ. If you've figured out you need
rest, you won't go anywhere else because there's only one place
for rest and it's in Christ. And my friends, my believer friends,
we know this to be true. Every time we come to Christ,
what do we find? Refreshment. How many times during the week
do we sigh? Do we moan? Do we complain? Are
we not content? Come to Christ! There's refreshment. There's refreshment. There's
peace. For He has by His obedience obtained
the righteousness of God that each and every one of us need.
So come to Him. He obtained God's pardon by His
blood. Is there anything more precious
than the blood of Christ? My friends, Christ's blood is
precious. It's precious. And my friends, it affords all
that come rest. It affords all that come rest.
He satisfied God by His offering. And I know this for a fact. People
say, well, you know, you believe in election and that, you know,
that stops me from coming to Christ. My friend, election never
stopped anyone from coming to Christ. Matter of fact, without
it, no one would come to Christ. But because he has it, some do
come to Christ. And all that do come to Christ
in this way find rest. Find rest. I pray that God would bless this
to our hearts. That God would refresh us that
know Him, that have come to Him, keep coming. And if you don't
know Christ this morning, come even now. My friend, it's not
an act of the body, it's an act of faith to believe on Christ
alone for all your hope and all that believe on Him. Find rest.
because He has accomplished our salvation. He's already done
it. He said, it is finished. Now come. Now come. I pray that God would bless this
to our hearts, that the men would come to prepare the Lord's table
for us.