Turn with me, if you would, to
Matthew 11. We are going to veer from our
normal study through Matthew, normally we would be in chapter
24. But something was laid on my
heart and it's something that I want the whole world to know
and hear. And I believe this is why I felt
led to do things this way this morning. I believe if there has
ever been something that I really wanted to get across and convey
and have people understand and know and believe and it's this. I pray this will be a help to
us. I sincerely pray that we will be able to say that that
helps me. That's a help. I pray we will
learn something this morning, but most importantly, I pray
this will be a blessing. I really pray God will make this
a blessing to us. Our text is going to be verse
28, Matthew 11 verse 28. It says, our Lord said, come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy
laden, and I will give you rest. Come unto me. All ye that labor and are heavy
laden and I will give you rest. The message from our Lord right
there is come to Christ. Come unto me. All ye that labor
and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Have you ever
heard someone say, Come to Christ. That's a real question. I'm sincerely
asking the question. Have you ever heard a preacher
or anybody witnessing say, come to Christ? Have you ever heard
that? Come to Christ. Men stand in
pulpits and they tell sinners, come to Christ. Just come to
Christ. Just come to Christ. You're hearing
that right now. You're hearing that right now.
This may be the first time you've heard that. This may be the first
time you've ever really heard that. This may be the hundredth
or thousandth time you've heard that. But that's the declaration that's
being made right now. Come to Christ. Come to Christ. Come to Christ. Who is the declaration being
made to? Who is our Lord saying that to? Verse 28 says, all ye that labor
and are heavy laden. All ye that labor and are heavy
laden. And he's not talking about in
career and responsibilities and life on this earth. Everybody's
labored and heavy laden in that regard. He's talking about labored
and heavy laden over sin. He said, if you come to me in
that way, labored and heavy laden over sin, I will give you rest. I will give you rest. Now, God
has an elect people. I don't know if you've ever heard
that. I mean, I know you have, but somebody maybe hadn't. I don't know if you've ever really
heard that. God has an elect people. And if a soul on this earth is
not one of those elect before the foundation of the world people,
okay, I'm talking about a soul that is not one of the elect. That soul will not come to Christ. That soul will not come to Christ. Look with me at John 6, John
chapter 6. And if you've never seen this,
I pray God will open our eyes. Or if you've never really seen
this, I pray God will really open our eyes. John 6, 44. This is the Lord Jesus Christ
speaking and he said, no man can come to me. No man can come to me. Except the father which hath
sent me draw him. And I will raise him up at the
last day. The father elected a people to
come to Christ. The ones that He draws, they
are the ones He elected. And the Father is only going
to draw the ones He elected. All right? God elected a people
to come to Christ. And the ones that He draws to
Christ are the ones He elected. And He's only going to draw the
ones He elected. That's who's coming to Christ. So if a soul is not one of the
elect, that soul will not come to Christ and that soul cannot
come to Christ. No man can come to me. People will say, you mean to
tell me if I'm not one of the elect and I come to Christ, he'll
turn me away. You won't come in the first place.
No man can come to me. except the Father which hath
sent me draw him, and I will raise him up at the last day."
All right, but if a soul has been included in the Father's
election, if we are one of the elect, we
most definitely will come to Christ. There won't be an option in the
matter. There won't be a fork in the
road. You know, well, I hope you pick the right the right way.
There's no option. We will come to Christ. We will hear the command of God's
word. Come to Christ. We will be sovereignly drawn
by that command. And we will, no ifs, ands, or
buts about it, we will come to Christ. Verse 37, right here
in John 6 says, all that the Father giveth me shall come to
me. And him that cometh to me, I
will in no wise cast out. So if God has given us ears to
hear this and a heart to want to do this, if God has made us
desire this, come to Christ. That's the declaration this morning.
That's the command. Come to Christ now. Okay. There are three types of people
on this earth. Three conditions. Maybe I should
say three, three categories. There are three categories. Every soul on this earth. This
includes every soul on this earth. But let's bring it down to every
person in this room. All right. There are three categories. Every person in this room falls
into one of these three categories, and I'm literally talking about
every person in this room falls into one of three categories.
All right. The declaration is come to Christ. Some people literally have no
idea what that means. Come to Christ. The declaration
goes out, come to Christ. Where is it? Some people literally
have no idea what that means, all right? Some people think
they know what that means. Come to Christ. They envision,
you know, everybody, as I say this, you have something in your
mind, you're envisioning something in your mind, and they envision
coming to Christ. They envision coming to a man. Jesus Christ is a man. He is
the God-man. And they envision, okay, come
to Christ. Come see a man, come to a man,
okay? Some people have no idea what
it means. Some people think they know what it means. And then
category three, there are some people who actually know what
it means. Now let's all ask the Lord, I'm
so passionate about this and I'm so concerned about this.
And I'm not just concerned for the young people, I'm concerned
for the middle-aged people and the old people. Let's all ask
the Lord in our hearts this morning to teach us what it actually
means. Let's all ask the Lord, I mean
right now, Lord, would you open my eyes to this today? Could
today be the day of salvation? I'm gonna do my best if the Lord,
you know, Well, God is sovereignly in control of all these things.
I'm going to pray that the Lord will let me make this as plain
as I can make it, as clear as I can make it, but the only way
that we're going to know this is if God teaches it to us. That's
the only way. I'm going to try to give this
all I have, but the only way we'll learn it is if God teaches
us. What does it mean? What is coming
to Christ? I'm going to give you the answer
right now and then I'm going to explain the answer. Okay,
here it is. Coming to Christ is coming to Christ. Coming to Christ is coming to
Christ. And I want to put all of the
emphasis on the last word. not the first word, the last
word. Coming to Christ is coming to
Christ. I pray God's spirit will work
and move and show us this today. Our Lord said back in Matthew
11 verse 28, he said, come unto me, all ye that labor and are
heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Come unto me, all ye
that labor and are heavy laden, and I'll give you rest. Come
unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I'll give
you rest. The first thing that causes God's
people to be labored and heavy laden is the sin that they have
committed against God. The first thing that causes God's
people to be labored and heavy laden is the sin they've committed
against God. God's people are labored and
heavy laden over what they have done. God's people are labored
and heavy laden over what they've done. I know that you are despicable
in your mind and in your thoughts. I know that you are. And I'm going to leave the body
out of this for a minute. We're just going to set the body
aside, okay? We're just going to focus on
where everything originates. The only reason we do something
in body is because it started inside, in the mind, in the heart. I know that you are despicable
in your mind, in your thoughts, And you know that I'm despicable. I know that you have done things
in your life that you feel such deep guilt over. And you know that I have too. Every soul here has a whole lifetime
of sin. We can't do anything without
sinning against God. We can't do anything without
pride. We can't do anything without everything is just tainted with
sin. It's altogether vanity. It's just sin. But there are
individual moments, individual things, individual happenings
that we have done that will haunt us till the day we die. moments in time, things that
we've done. If you are a child of God, you are labored and heavy laden
over the guilt of what you've done. All right, listen to me. Come to Christ. Come to Christ. And here is what
that means. in the mind, in the heart, the
same mind and heart where all that sin originates, the same
mind, the same heart, you rest in the fact that Jesus Christ
bore your very sins in his body on the tree. You just rest in the fact that
God, the Godhead, Father, Son, and Spirit made Jesus Christ
to be sin for you. Who knew no sin. Who knew no
sin. The only sin in him was my sin. Your sin. the sin of all of His
people, but He took it from us, and He made it to be His very
own. You rest in the fact that in
the blood of Jesus Christ, everything that you feel so guilty for having
done, You rest in the fact that all of it has been put away forever. According to God, it is gone
forever and God is the only one who matters. That's what it is to come to
Christ. It's to take your guilty burden
that you feel because of everything you've done. You take it to Jesus
Christ and leave it there. is to trust in the heart, trust
in the mind and in the heart that He has actually taken care
of that for you. He has actually taken care of
that for you. You can rest. You can rest every
time that guilt pops up. Go to Jesus Christ and rest.
You come to Christ and rest. The first thing that God's people
feel labored and heavy laden over is what they've done. What
they've done. And if you don't feel that, hang
on a minute. Live a little bit longer. You
will. You will. Come to Christ. When it comes
to all that vile, wicked sin that you've done, you trust in
the blood sacrifice of Jesus Christ that put it all away.
Come to Christ. You know, people always think,
oh, if I could just go back and do it over, oh, if I could just
undo that. You've thought that. If I could
just go back and not do that, I got a better one for you. Come
to Christ. If you went back and undid it,
you'd do something right after that. Just come to Christ. The first thing that all of God's
people are labored and heavy laden over is what they've done.
All right. The second thing that all of God's people are labored
and heavy laden over is what they haven't done. Turn with me to Colossians three. Colossians three. Verse 1 says, If you then be
risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where
Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on
things above, not on things on the earth, for you are dead and
your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our
life, shall appear, then shall you also appear with Him in glory. Verse 5 says, Mortify therefore
your members which are upon the earth, fornication, uncleanness,
inordinate affection, inappropriate affection, evil lusts, that's
what concupiscence is, covetousness, which is idolatry. And again,
we're going to leave the body out of this. As soon as I read
a verse like that, everybody thinks about the body. We're
going to leave the body out of this, okay? To do this in the
mind is to do this before God. And don't misunderstand me. You say, well then, okay, I'll
do it in the body because it doesn't matter. You know, it's already
done. To do it in the body, you're going to suffer earthly condemnation
for that. You want to live a life of fornication?
You're going to suffer for that. You will suffer for that. You
want to murder? You want to let anger turn to
wrath to the point that you murder? You're going to have to go to
jail for that. But for those who think, well,
I've never done that. Oh, yes, we all have. And to
do it in the mind and do it in the heart, it's a done deal before
God. And no matter what happens on
this earth, there's an eternal condemnation. that must be dealt
with because of the sin that originated right inside here. So verse 5, he said, Mortify
therefore your members, kill all of this. Kill all of this
fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence,
and covetousness which is idolatry, for which things sake the wrath
of God cometh on the children of disobedience. in the which
you also walked sometime when you lived in them. But now you
also put off all these anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy
communication out of your mouth. Lie not one to another, seeing
you have put off the old man with his deeds. Change your ways."
That's what he's saying. Change your ways. Look at verse
12. Put on, therefore, as the elect
of God, holy. Be holy. Our Lord said, Be ye
holy. Pure. As I am holy. Be ye holy as I
am holy. Let me ask you a question. Has
anybody here done that? Has anybody here achieved holiness? in this flesh, in body, mind,
heart. I haven't. I haven't. I would
love to. I wish I could. But I haven't yet, and it's because
I can't. Not in this sinful flesh that I'm walking around in. I
can't. Look at 1 Thessalonians 4 with me. Verse 1 says, Furthermore then,
we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus,
that as you have received of us how you ought to walk and
to please God, so you would abound more and more. For you know what
commandments we gave you by the Lord Jesus. For this is the will
of God, even your sanctification, your holiness, your purity. that you should abstain from
fornication, that every one of you should know how to possess
his vessel in sanctification and honor, not in the lust of
concupiscence, even as the Gentiles, which know not God, that no man
go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter, because that the
Lord is the avenger of all such. As we also have forewarned you
and testified, for God hath not called us to uncleanness, but
to holiness." What do we have to do to achieve holiness? What
do we have to do to achieve holiness? We have to obey every word, every
law, every commandment in this book. Every one of them. We have to be what this book
tells us we have to be in mind, heart, body, everything. From the crown of our head to
the sole of our foot inside and out, we have to be sinless, sinless. We have to be perfect according
to the words of this book. We have to put off the old sinful
man of the flesh and we have to put on the new holy man created
in Christ Jesus. Now, if you are not one of God's
people, you may have yourself convinced that you've done that.
I was in a service one time and a man asked this very question,
have you, you know, Conquered sin and such on and so forth.
I asked these questions, hoping nobody will answer me. Don't
anybody answer. You may get it right. You may get it wrong unless
you say Christ, which is always right. But anyway, I was in a
service one time. Has anybody conquered sin? A
woman said, I have. If you are not one of God's people,
you may have yourself convinced that you have achieved this.
But if God has opened your eyes to the truth of the matter, you
carry a very heavy labored burden over the fact that you are not
what this Bible says you ought to be. You're not, and I'm not
either. You do not do what this Bible
tells you to do. You do not live like this Bible
tells you you ought to live. And that grieves you. And to
that I say, come to Christ. Come to Christ. Know and believe
in your mind and in your heart that Christ is your holiness. Christ is your perfection. Christ is your obedience. Christ not only achieved holiness,
Christ is holiness. If you have Christ, you have
holiness. Everything he did while he lived
on this earth, everything was in obedience to this book. That's
all he did was obey this book. He obeyed this book. That's glorious. Every word, every law, every
commandment. Christ was for you. What this book said you had to
be. Christ did for you what this book says you have to do. If
you're going to please God, you got to do this. Christ did it
for you. Christ lived for you like this
book says you have to live. That's why he came. He came to
fulfill all of the work that had to be done. All of the work,
not half of the work. Well, he took care of the sin,
but now you got to take care of the righteousness. No. All the work. He came and took
away from you everything you have done. And He put in its place everything
that you haven't done. And that makes me glad. That
makes me so happy. He removed the sin and He established
righteousness. When it comes to every good thing
that you need to be before God, come to Christ. Come to Christ. Every time you read that and
say, that's not me, go to Christ. Come to Christ. Don't come to
the law. It's grace, not law. Don't come to the law. Thank
God the message today is not come to the law. Are you at odds
with God? Come to the law. Do you need
to satisfy God? Come to the law. Do you have
sins that need to be paid for? Come to the law. No. Come to Christ. Come to Christ. Go with me to Romans 10. Romans 10. Verse one says, brethren, my
heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might
be saved. For I bear them record that they
have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they, being
ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish
their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto
the righteousness of God." My favorite illustration of submission
is holding a door open for somebody. That's what submission is. It's
humbling yourself and lifting up another and saying, after
you, you first. They have not submitted to the
righteousness of Jesus Christ that says, no, you go in before
me. You be the forerunner. Please,
I'd rather your righteousness represent us. Verse four says,
for Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone
that believeth. We don't go to the law to satisfy
God. Our efforts in the law, that's
not what makes God happy. Jesus Christ makes God happy. He obeyed the law for us. And
to come to Christ is to trust and rest in the fact that that's
so. He did it for us. Come to Christ.
For forgiveness of sin. Come to Christ. For the fulfillment
of the law, come to Christ. And then even though our Lord
was not talking about the burdens and the trials of this life when
he said, all ye that are labored and heavy laden, they still apply. They still apply. Every trial,
every trouble, every difficult circumstance, every worry, every... Is anybody here worried about
anything? You worried about anything? Come to Christ. Come to the sovereign
God. Come to Christ. In order to truly
come to Christ, we're going to have to believe that He is and
He's able to do everything He promised to do for us. So we acknowledge Him and we
honor Him every time we come to Him. Every time. No man can
come except the Father. Draw. So Heavenly Father, draw us. Lord, draw us. Give us the ear
to hear. Give us the mind to believe.
Give us the heart to come. Give us the heart to come. Come
to Jesus Christ. Amen.