After the sermon, we'll sing Psalter 421 verse six. Beloved congregation, I think you'll all agree with me. If I were to say to you that one of the marks of life in this world is unrest. Restlessness. Much of the news that we hear is filled with unrest. Violence, so much that much of it doesn't even make the news. Wars, rumors of wars. Globally and nationally, there are strife and divisions in families, in nations. There are natural disasters which uproot and upset the lives of people. Volcanoes, earthquakes, one so recently in the Philippines, floods and fires. They pour unrest into the lives of millions of people every year. Life is filled with agitations and strifes between people. There's trouble in many homes. There are tensions in the church. We're all witness to great controversies that rage in politics. This world is burdened down by untold loads of care and trouble and unrest. Sometimes we try to escape. We maybe go away on vacation somewhere to seek rest. Or we try to get away from it all using different means, or maybe we just try to tune it all out. We stop listening to the news anymore or watching it. We can cloister ourselves in, but other troubles find their way into our now smaller existence. Unrest marks the life of a fallen human being. Even the people of God, there is, of course, a restlessness, a restfulness. which they have, and yet there is so much trouble. What's the cause of all this unrest? Well, the world has many answers, many theories, but the Bible gives the only one true answer. All of it is a symptom of great spiritual restlessness, a symptom of sin, the effects of sin in our world, in our lives, in our hearts. And Jesus understood this so well, perfectly. He who left the realms of glory and who became poor, as we saw this morning, he entered this sinful world. He saw the grief and the unrest and the trouble, and he knew it already before he was here. The trouble here, and he, in the words of our text, verse 28, Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. He gives you and me a place to go where true rest from sin can be found. These words have proven to be of great comfort to many people. Millions have found spiritual rest by coming to Jesus Christ, the only place to get rest. So we look this afternoon at our theme, Come to Jesus Christ and Rest. And the first thing I would like us to notice as we look at this is who is the one speaking, the speaker? Who's saying these words? Well, it's Jesus Christ, isn't it, boys and girls? And that's significant because he is not just anybody. He's not just another person in this world, is he? There are many people in this world, many voices in this world that call out to you and to me to come to them and to follow them. Join us. Do what we do. Enter into this place with us, this activity. Young people, the call of this world seems so promising. It seems harmless. It seems legitimate. It seems attractive, plausible even. But all the voices that call in this world, they're actually deceitful. You can't find satisfaction and rest in this world of restlessness. Ultimately, the world is not seeking your good. There's much good in this world by God's grace, also in common grace. But terminating our affections on things below does not lead to rest. It's not good. But the voice speaking in this text, he's not like them at all. He's the voice of none other than your creator. It's the voice of the God who made you. The one who speaks these words is God that cannot lie. Every word he speaks is pure and true and trustworthy. As God, all the attributes of God are his. As God, he's eternal. His word is eternal. He sees the end from the beginning. As God, he's holy. His motives are pure and harmless. He's trustworthy. And as God, he's all powerful. That which he promises you, he's also able to perform. All power is given unto me in heaven and on earth, he says. And as God, he's all knowing. He knows what he says when he offers this promise to you. You know, this is a wonderful thing that he is fully God. Because if a mere man were to call us to himself and to call us to follow him, we would be foolish to do so. But here's God speaking to us. But that's not all. Because if he had only been God, then what would his call do us? The wonder is that this one, while he is God, is also man. Luther said this, I will have nothing to do with an absolute God. Well, this was Luther's way of speaking. What he meant to say was, if Christ was only God, then I'm lost. Luther understood the value of the incarnation. You see, Christ is not only God. He is here speaking as God, but he's also speaking as man. Come unto me. He was like you and me. He is like you and me. Made like unto his brethren in all things, sin accepted. He's the son of man. We hear this every year at this time of year, and yet what a wonder it is that he is the one who came into this world as God and yet equally as man. this union of the two natures, divine nature and human nature in one person. He, the everlasting word, became flesh and dwelt among us. He's the one who's speaking. There's two great benefits to the fact that he's also man. The first is that as man, He can take your place as your substitute. And the justice of God can be satisfied so that this promise can be worked out. But second, as man, he's able to be touched with the feeling of your infirmities, all the unrest and the turmoil and the strife that can hit you in life sometimes. He understands it. He was there. He was tempted in all points like as we are, the scriptures tell us. Someone might say, well, he wasn't in my position. He wasn't in my situation. He was tempted in all points like as we are. He knows every aspect of human suffering and temptation, struggle. He knows what it's like to suffer grief and hardship, to be tempted like you. And so when we hear him saying in this text, come unto me, that me is a very special person, altogether different from any other, infinitely greater than any other person who could ever call you. And as he calls you, the voice of the Lord Jesus Christ and his heart are filled with joy." Here's a profound thought, that Jesus Christ here calls out to you with great joy. You see, the gospel message is not proclaimed with a long, somber face. He delights to save the sons of men. There's quite a contrast in this chapter, isn't there? He'd been denouncing the cities of Chorazin and Bethsaida. We read it together. Some of the darkest words our Lord spoke. These woes, speaking of coming judgment, in which the sin and the judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah would appear. so much smaller and manageable and tolerable than the sin of these cities who were exalted to heaven, but he says, will be cast down to hell for their unbelief. But then the great contrast in this chapter is seen in verse 25, where it seems the Lord's face is changed. And we read, at that time, Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth. He's experiencing great joy in his heart. He's acknowledging the Father's revelation of truth, truth that frees, truth that is in himself, truth that saves. He uses a very strong word when he says, I thank thee. A word that's only ever used in the New Testament to acknowledge God with thanksgiving. As Christ thinks of what his father has done for fallen man, his face lights up and joy grips him. And then he moves from judgment to mercy and to this open invitation for sinners. And he does so with great joy and great delight. Thomas Boston, the Puritan, he writes these words. Christ invites sinners with an enlarged heart. We get an echo from the words of Christ through his prophet. Turn ye, turn ye unto me, for why will ye die, O house of Israel? There's this earnestness, an enlarged heart, a desire, a joy in the anticipation of receiving sinners to himself. The prospect of it is wonderful to him. He is the father of the parable who gladly receives the prodigal home. You see him in this text, beloved. He's yearning for you with love. and with joy at the possibility and at the invitation of salvation. Boston again, behold him smiling and inviting you now to himself, sending love looks to lost sinners from a joyful heart with him. Oh, his joy is not complete until his people have come to him. You hear this day, hearing his words, let that sink in. Christ has finished his work of salvation, but he has not finished his work of saving. He has his eye on you today. All Boston says, nothing can make Christ forget poor sinners or be unconcerned for them. Sorrow could not do it. Joy could not do it. In all the peaks and valleys of his human experience, he never forgot poor sinners. How true it is that when we are in the depths of sorrow, we will forget others. When we are experiencing the heights of joy, we also forget others as we turn inwards and relish our joy. But in either extreme, Christ turns outward to sinners. On the cross, he's entering an ocean of wrath, which we can begin to fathom. And he remembers sinners. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. He says to the thief, today shalt thou be with me in paradise. He says to his mother, behold thy son. And when he went up into an ocean of joy, where he is today, he remembers lost sinners. He carries them as Aaron the high priest on his breast, on his lips, as he makes intercession. The Lord has joy. The one who speaks these words is a joyful one. as he offers his gospel. And Boston says, if a sinner that repents brings joy into the very courts of heaven, then do Christ a delight and come to him today. Give him joy and come to him. Here's the one who's speaking. He is God, he is man, he's filled with desire, with joy. And next I want to draw your attention to the ones he's speaking to. He says, come unto me, and then he adds who it is he's addressing. All ye that labor and are heavy laden. He's addressing the inhabitants, the sinful inhabitants of this world of unrest. The word translated labor is a word picture of one who has worked so hard that he's thoroughly exhausted. One who's drained all his strength and all his energy to absolute exhaustion. And the word heavy laden is the graphic picture of one who's being pressed down by a great unbearable burden, too much to bear, he's bending over, his back is breaking. We need to see that that's not a physical exhaustion or a physical burden. Jesus is speaking to the spiritually exhausted, to the spiritually burdened. That's why he says in verse 29, I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. He's addressing the spiritually weary and burdened. Here he is, he comes into this world, this sinful world, and he sees all around him men and women burdened in every possible way by sin. Think of what it must have been for him, the holy one of God, who himself, even in his human nature, was sinless, to live in the cesspool of sin that is this world. What a contrast. It's like a pinprick of light in darkness. The greatest contrast imaginable is the pure Son of God dwelling among us, in our flesh, and all the sin around Him. He sees it all. He sees that communion with God was lost in paradise. He sees the poison of sin staining every heart. He sees the plight of every sinner by nature as weary and heavy laden. He sees the wreck and the damage that sin has made of the image of God and all these people around him. He sees the burdens that are multiplied in our lives because of sin. He sees all the unrest, all the spiritual burdens on people, and it's to such people that he calls out. Now notice something. He doesn't say, come unto me, all you that feel you're laboring and heavy laden. The gospel call goes out to all men indiscriminately. You may be here this afternoon and feel no need of him. And yet the call is going out to you. It confronts you. It actually exposes you to your need. It comes to us whether we feel that we're laboring and heavy laden or not. Well, what did Christ see when he saw people burdened down by sin? He saw at least three things, and to help you remember them, I'd like to put them in mathematical terms. First, he sees the subtraction of sin. It's loss. What has sin subtracted from us? What have we lost by sin congregation? We've lost God when we sinned. When Adam and Eve and we in them fell in paradise, we lost communion with God. By nature we are, as Paul tells the Ephesians that they once were, without God. We're without hope in the world. We don't know God anymore. The connection, the relationship to God is lost. Verse 27 tells us this. Neither knoweth any man the Father except the Son. Reveal Him. Sin has alienated us from God. It cuts us off from Him, the only source of life and satisfaction and true rest. Here's a great part of the heavy burden weighing down on all men, the subtraction of God from their lives without God. The second thing he sees is the addition of sin. What does sin add to you? What do you and I gain by sin? Well, we think we gain many things, don't we? We think we'll gain pleasure and we think we'll move forward in this world and we'll be happier. Not true, that's a lie. But we do gain something by sin. We gain guilt. When you sin, when I sin, we gain guilt. Added to your account when you sin is guilt. Sin makes you guilty before the God of heaven. First, we've lost God. And then we've got God against us due to the guilt of sin beforehand. Guilt, one man wrote, follows sin as the shadow follows the body. The third thing about this burden of sin is its sum, or you could say its product. When you subtract God and you add guilt, what the sin spit out as the sum of it all is death. The Bible is full of the strong connection between sin and death. Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death, James 1, 15. The wages of sin is death, Romans 6, 23. The soul that sinneth, it shall die, Ezekiel 18, verse 4. In the day thou eatest thereof, God has said to Adam, thou shalt surely die. And so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned, Romans 5, 12. Death is a great burden. It's the great enemy that weighs on all men, the great burden on all mankind. You can't get around it. You can't avoid it. But the sad reality is that physical death isn't the only death. The worst death is the second death, spiritual death. What a burden that is that the Lord Jesus, as he's speaking to these people and to all men by nature, he sees that they're heading for that great eternal ruin. That's a burden, don't you think? In the second death, you're without God. without any hope of ever having God or any good again. The terrible thing. This is the burden of every sinner apart from the Savior. Christ is looking out on these multitudes. He says, come unto me. You who are under the loss of God due to sin, under the guilt of it, and under the wages of sin and death, oh, come unto me. Notice here then, thirdly, the action in this text. There are two actions. The first is the action that he calls you to, come unto me. The gospel isn't only for listening, we must hear the gospel, but it's not for passive listening. The gospel calls us to action. It calls you to rise up and to come to Jesus Christ. Not physically, you can't travel somewhere to be with him, but spiritually to seek relief from your burden with him. You can't find relief from your burdens of sin and guilt and all the burdens that come with that in this life except in Him. But to find it, you must go to Him. You must tell Him. You must unburden yourself to Him and submit yourself to Him. That's what the Gospel calls you to do. Maybe someone's here this afternoon and you say, well, I don't feel the burden of sin in my life. I'm kind of indifferent to all of this. My friend, then you need to go to God and tell him that. I say, Lord, I've been sitting under the preaching maybe for 10, 20, 30, 40 years, maybe longer. I've just been going about my life, just going about my business. Nothing's ever changed. Lord, show me. Ask Him to show you your burden. It's a prayer He delights to hear. So that you will also come unto the Savior as a Savior for your sin, for your need. You know, it's only in Him that we will find rest. We do try to find rest for the different problems in our life and the different, someone said that, The heart has a hole in it in a certain shape, let's say a circle. We try to put all kinds of triangles or other shapes into it, it never fits. We try to find satisfaction in so many different things. It's God you need, it's Christ you need. Augustine, the church father, he said, our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee. Maybe you're here and you have been laboring to get rest, trying. Also, religiously, you still feel so restless. You know, Jesus was speaking to people like that. There are many people in Jesus' day who had A legalistic religion? The Pharisees, we read, bound heavy burdens and grievous to be born and laid them on men's shoulders. The people were veritable spiritual slaves trying to work themselves free under that form of religion. Jesus saw it. He grieved at all the unrest it produced. and all the weariness it produced in the heart of these people. You see the next chapter opens with a clear example of this. I think it's not for nothing that Matthew puts that example after this call. Come unto me. You have there the Pharisees who are so concerned that the law not be broken, that the disciples should not pluck corn on the Sabbath day. put it in their hands and work the chaff off the kernels and eat them. Jesus sees the brokenness of that twisted form of religion. He has to tell them that the Sabbath, this is not the purpose of the Sabbath. The Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath. It's just one example of so many ways in which they were burdened by religion. by a misconception of religion. It was all geared to make them bring something to God. Salvation by works. And how easily you and I can be like that too. We can fall into that trap. Still believing that somehow I can please God, apart from faith in His Son, by doing things for Him. Or by denying myself certain things. or by cleaning up your life all on your own. All vain attempts to try to find rest. It's vain. No amount of spiritual labor and working can yield this rest. Christ says, here's the way. Come unto me. This is the action you need to take. Go to Jesus Christ. Go on your knees. Talk to him. Tell him your burdens. Tell him your exhaustion. Tell him your weariness, your hopelessness, your despair maybe, your emptiness, your indifference, your coldness, your sadness, your sickness, your heaviness. Tell him, ask him for help. That's coming to Jesus. That's faith, letting go of everything in yourself and surrendering yourself to him. That's what come unto me is saying. Believe that in me, is everything your poor soul needs for time and for eternity. Cling to me. Focus on me. Come unto me. That's the way to get true rest. It's the great promise that this text gives. And and It's the second great action. And I will give you rest. Christ will also do something. He will give you rest. Ask the people of God. They will tell you it's true. Child of God, you know this. There's rest in the Son of God like you found nowhere else. You don't always feel it in the same way. You dare not deny it, even at your lowest points. He gives true rest from all the burdens that sin is pressing down on you. Sin took away, it subtracted God from you. that the Lord Jesus restores God. He brings the people to God. How did he do it? Well, he lost the favor and presence of his father for your sake when he cried out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? And God has his people added back to him. I can say that reverently. He'd lost his own image bearers. They're brought back by God, by the Lord Jesus to God. Sin, remember, added guilt to you, but Christ subtracts all your guilt again from your account. He balances the books, as it were, spiritually. He lays it all onto his account, and he bears your guilt away, nailing it to his cross. He was smitten of God and afflicted with the guilt of sinners. Paul tells us that it was the handwriting of your sins that he nailed to his cross, the signature of your sins. Your, it's very personal, your sin signature. Child of God, he nailed to that cross. You know, guilt removed spells rest. What a wonder that that most restless emblem, that most restless cross, a place of violence, a place of unrest, suffering, anguish, pain should yield such rest for you. It's a paradox. It's the wisdom of God. You see, the cross is the great solution to every human problem, every trouble, every burden finds its resolution in the cross of Christ. How thankful we're to be for that cross. It's the place where he removes your guilt and restores you to God, child of God, and gives you rest for your soul. Death? Sin produced death, but he has conquered that too. Death is not gone. It's still real. You'll have to die, child of God, yes. And you may say, where is the rest in that? Well, there is rest in the fact that he went into death before you and the fact that he came out of death for you. He conquered death. So you need not fear death, child of God. It is a passageway into glory. He releases from the fear of death because even in death's fail, he faileth never. He's the one who Hebrews 2 says, delivered them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject unto bondage. Those who've come to him by faith, they have the restful prospect. of having him commission death as their chariot to bring them home. Never to die again. Never to taste a second death. But only life forevermore. They will enter into his rest. Perfect rest. The word for rest here means to cause one to cease from any labor or movement. One Puritan, I think it was John Flavel, he compared it to an infant that is hungry. You can put all kinds of things into its mouth, but it will not rest. It'll be agitated, it'll be stressed, it'll be restless until you give it its mother's milk. And then amazingly, that child's at rest, content. There is a rest for your soul, beloved. Come to Jesus Christ and rest. He gives genuine rest. One more word. For those who are yet outside of Christ. Don't reject the Savior. Who calls you with joy and with desire. They'll make him have to say of you. You will not come to me that you might have life. How long will you go on in sin? and suffering under the burdens of it. Turn to him this day. Come unto him. If you don't, then one day his come unto me will turn into its fearful opposite. Depart from me. Now is the day of salvation. He says, today, While it is called today, hard and not your heart, but come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Amen.