1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:26,500 Proclaim the goodness of the gospel. We're going to be in Matthew here in just a moment. We've been walking through a series talking about following Jesus, how Jesus is a Savior for those who maybe have questions, who are skeptical, for maybe those who are overlooked or who feel like they have been unseen. 2 00:00:26,500 --> 00:00:41,500 He's the Savior for those who maybe feel unwanted. And this morning we're going to take a look at how Jesus is a Savior for the weary. And so I'm going to begin by praying, and then we will spend some time together in God's Word. 3 00:00:41,500 --> 00:00:56,500 Father in heaven, we thank you for taking care of us. We thank you for your word. And we just ask that as we come to these moments, you would encourage us in a world where it seems like we're often tired and overwhelmed that you would direct us. 4 00:00:56,500 --> 00:01:03,500 to the strength of the gospel. Thank you for Jesus and for grace. It's in your Son's name we pray. Amen. 5 00:01:03,500 --> 00:01:13,500 So I made a lot of rookie mistakes yesterday. It was yesterday afternoon, and the kids and I had to run to the grocery store to pick up a couple things. 6 00:01:13,500 --> 00:01:23,500 And so we started by running to Martin's, and we were laser-focused. It was like we were on a mission. We got out. Teamwork was happening. 7 00:01:23,500 --> 00:01:30,500 We got in, and we got out, and it was perfect. And then came the rookie mistakes, and they just sort of piled on to each other. 8 00:01:30,500 --> 00:01:38,500 Because in addition to running to Martin's just for a couple things, we had to go to Costco. And so rookie mistake number one was Costco on a Saturday. 9 00:01:38,500 --> 00:01:51,500 Rookie mistake number two was Costco when every single one of us were hungry. And so as we walked through Costco, or in some cases bludgeoned our way through Costco with the shopping cart, 10 00:01:51,500 --> 00:02:01,500 And we get to the food, and we start looking at all the different options for dinner. And one of the things that happens is when you're hungry, everything looks good. 11 00:02:01,500 --> 00:02:08,500 And so the kids and I are sitting there, and they go, "I'd try that. I'd try that." And I was like, "Right on. I'm really hungry. Let's try it all." 12 00:02:08,500 --> 00:02:19,500 And then what happens? We get home, and we begin to make the food, and we regret every single one of our choices. I don't know if I'm going to like that. I don't like how that looks. 13 00:02:19,500 --> 00:02:37,500 Right? And it was just rookie mistake after rookie mistake for me. And what was at the heart of it was that in that moment in Costco, we thought we knew what our heart wanted and what our heart needed, and it turned out we were wrong. 14 00:02:37,500 --> 00:02:51,500 And it's not just true for Costco at 5 p.m. on a Saturday. I would say that it's true for all of our hearts all of the time that what we think our heart truly needs were frequently very wrong. 15 00:02:51,500 --> 00:03:01,500 And the good news about Jesus that we're going to see here in the book of Matthew is that Jesus knows exactly what our hearts need. 16 00:03:01,500 --> 00:03:10,500 So before we get to our text this morning, we need to understand what's happening around our text. 17 00:03:10,500 --> 00:03:16,500 We need to know what's going on before these verses. We're going to read in just a moment what happens before. 18 00:03:16,500 --> 00:03:26,500 And it's not just sort of an interesting intellectual exercise, but in this chapter what Jesus is doing is he is addressing the needs of our heart. 19 00:03:26,500 --> 00:03:40,500 And sometimes he's very, very gentle and very, very careful, but there are other times where we tend to not listen and Jesus gets a little louder and a little more firm. 20 00:03:40,500 --> 00:03:50,500 And so what we see in this chapter as we walk through it, first of all, is that Jesus knows how to deal with our doubts. 21 00:03:50,500 --> 00:04:03,500 Matthew chapter 11 begins with John the Baptist, and he is in prison. He's been speaking the truth of God to the king of the area, King Herod, and it has not gone well for him. 22 00:04:03,500 --> 00:04:18,500 And because he has offended the king, he is in prison. And John, he knows his Bible, and he knows that one of the identifying marks of the Messiah is that the Messiah would come and he would get people out of jail. 23 00:04:18,500 --> 00:04:30,500 And so John is beginning to do the math, thinking, "Well, if Jesus is the Messiah," he said, "I've seen him, I've baptized him, I've proclaimed that he's the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world." 24 00:04:30,500 --> 00:04:43,500 If he's the Messiah, and the Messiah brings people out of jail, and here I am in jail, is Jesus really the Messiah? And he begins to struggle with his doubts. 25 00:04:43,500 --> 00:04:58,500 And so what he does is he doesn't speculate and he doesn't guess about things. He goes to Jesus, which is the place where we need to go with our questions and our doubts, and he takes them to Jesus by sending two messengers. 26 00:04:58,500 --> 00:05:08,500 Luke's account gives us a few more details. And the reason he sends two messengers to Jesus, because in the first century, that was enough for a legal witness. 27 00:05:08,500 --> 00:05:22,500 One person's testimony wasn't enough, but two people's testimony was. And so John sends a legal witness with the question to Jesus, "Are you the one who is to come, or should we wait for another?" 28 00:05:22,500 --> 00:05:35,500 And what's interesting in Luke's account is Jesus doesn't even answer the question. Not right away. They come and they ask this question, and in Luke's account, Jesus spends the next hour 29 00:05:35,500 --> 00:05:50,500 healing everybody in sight, physically, spiritually, dealing with all of the brokenness. And then he turns and addresses John's messengers. 30 00:05:50,500 --> 00:06:04,500 And what Jesus is doing, not just with how he speaks to John in the beginning of this chapter, but with what he does before he speaks, is he is answering the questions of a discouraged heart. 31 00:06:04,500 --> 00:06:19,500 And maybe this morning, if you're in a place where nothing seems to be going according to plan, Jesus, talking to John through those messengers, is seeking both through word and example to deal with the doubts and the struggles of the heart. 32 00:06:19,500 --> 00:06:33,500 The very next thing that happens is controversy. Specifically, the crowds that have been surrounding Jesus and have watched him heal, and they've heard what he said about John the Baptist as he answers the question 33 00:06:33,500 --> 00:07:02,500 that John has. They begin to sort of insert themselves into the middle of the situation. And from Jesus' reaction, they are doing so in sort of a negative, critical way in regards to John. And so Jesus begins to speak, and he does so by dealing with the self-centeredness of the crowd. And we might say, "Well, 34 00:07:02,500 --> 00:07:31,500 I'm not self-centered." Let me tell you how unselfish I really am. And it's in those moments we begin to realize that we might need some quiet reflection as well. Because what happens with our hearts? If our hearts become self-centered, we become the standard by which everything else is measured. And you can see this in a lot of small ways in our world. If you think about it, when we're driving, right, we become the standard by which everything else is measured, right? 35 00:07:31,500 --> 00:07:58,500 If you're going faster than I am, you're reckless. If you're going slower than I am, you just don't know how to drive, and you're driving too slow, and you need to get out of the way. Because my speed and my decisions are the perfect ones, and they are the ones by which I will measure the standard of everybody else's driving. And when your heart becomes focused so much on yourself, you begin to do this. 36 00:07:58,500 --> 00:08:16,500 If somebody does more, they've done too much. If they do less, they haven't done enough. And self-centered, being self-centered, our heart makes us the standard by which we measure everyone else. 37 00:08:16,500 --> 00:08:31,500 And so in this text, in verse 18, that's what has happened. People have come and they've asked, John's disciples have come, he's talked to Jesus, he sent them away, and now the crowds are mad at both John and Jesus. 38 00:08:31,500 --> 00:08:46,500 And in verse 18, Jesus addresses the self-centeredness of the crowd. Because they said, "John, he doesn't eat, he doesn't drink, he's no fun at all," and they accuse him of having a demon. 39 00:08:46,500 --> 00:09:03,500 And then Jesus shows up and he eats and he drinks. And these people who have just criticized John for not eating and not drinking, now criticize Jesus for doing too much eating and too much drinking. 40 00:09:03,500 --> 00:09:13,500 And they say he's a glutton and a friend of sinners, right? That guy, John, is no fun. That guy, Jesus, has too much fun. And Jesus looks at them. 41 00:09:13,500 --> 00:09:23,500 And he doesn't ignore them and he doesn't bite back bitterly. But he engages them and seeks to show them that there's something bigger. 42 00:09:23,500 --> 00:09:30,500 And so he points out the fact that the standard is really the center of the heart. He said, "Nothing makes you happy." 43 00:09:30,500 --> 00:09:38,500 Right? We can play a happy song and you'd be mad and say it needs to be sad. We can play a sad song and you'd be mad and it wasn't happy. 44 00:09:38,500 --> 00:09:43,500 He says, "You're mad about John not doing enough. You're mad about me doing too much." 45 00:09:43,500 --> 00:09:50,500 The issue in the center of your heart is that it's focused so much on yourself you can't see anybody else. 46 00:09:50,500 --> 00:10:01,500 And so Jesus in Matthew chapter 11 begins by dealing with doubt, then with self-centeredness, and then in the last section before our text, he deals with hard hearts. 47 00:10:01,500 --> 00:10:08,500 And Jesus pronounces judgment on these three cities in Matthew chapter 11. 48 00:10:08,500 --> 00:10:21,500 And he's done some amazing things and spent some extended period of time in this area, and these people, instead of listening to Jesus' call, simply are there to see a show. 49 00:10:21,500 --> 00:10:29,500 And here's the reality, that if we live with sin and brokenness long enough, it becomes our reality. 50 00:10:29,500 --> 00:10:38,500 And I was thinking back to one of the very first times I was in the hospital here. It was a Sunday morning. Greg probably remembers it well, because I was not doing well. 51 00:10:38,500 --> 00:10:44,500 His brother-in-law shows up, happens to be a pastor, and we tagged him in, and I went to the emergency room. 52 00:10:44,500 --> 00:10:49,500 And I remember laying there in the emergency room, and I was hurting really bad, but I'm a pessimist about pain. 53 00:10:49,500 --> 00:10:56,500 So when they come in and they go, "What's your pain number?" I always say something kind of low, because I'm like, "It can always get way worse," right? 54 00:10:56,500 --> 00:11:02,500 And it usually does. And so I tend to understate it. And after about an hour in there, as they're doing tests back and forth, 55 00:11:02,500 --> 00:11:08,500 and I don't know if this was a nurse or a doctor, they walked in, and they said, "We can't handle you just like writhing around on this bed." 56 00:11:08,500 --> 00:11:15,500 I said, "I'm not writhing. I'm taking this pain like a man." And they said, "No, you're not." And then they put something into the IV, 57 00:11:15,500 --> 00:11:23,500 and it was only when the absence of pain was present that I realized how much pain I had actually been in. 58 00:11:23,500 --> 00:11:31,500 By removing that, all of a sudden I realized how badly I was hurting. 59 00:11:31,500 --> 00:11:40,500 And the same is true for our hard hearts in the darkness of rebellion against God, right? 60 00:11:40,500 --> 00:11:47,500 We have had so much time to get used to it. It's become normal, the brokenness that surrounds us. 61 00:11:47,500 --> 00:12:03,500 And that is what happens in this last section before our text. These three cities and all of the people who are there have become so used to darkness and brokenness that when Jesus shows up, they go, "I don't need any of that." 62 00:12:03,500 --> 00:12:16,500 And so Jesus speaks to them very strongly, not out of anger, but to sternly tell them that there is something they desperately, desperately need. 63 00:12:16,500 --> 00:12:28,500 And it's in this context of doubt and of self-centeredness and of hard hearts to the brokenness in the world that Jesus begins to pray. 64 00:12:28,500 --> 00:12:35,500 And it's in this prayer that we begin to meet a new group in this chapter. 65 00:12:35,500 --> 00:12:42,500 So we're going to take a minute and just read through Matthew 11:25-30. 66 00:12:42,500 --> 00:12:46,500 This begins with Jesus praying, and he says, "Come to me." 67 00:12:46,500 --> 00:12:47,500 Well, that's not the right verse. 68 00:12:47,500 --> 00:12:54,500 At that time, Jesus declared, "I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, 69 00:12:54,500 --> 00:13:00,500 that you have hidden these things from the wise and the understanding, 70 00:13:00,500 --> 00:13:03,500 and revealed them to the little children. 71 00:13:03,500 --> 00:13:07,500 Yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. 72 00:13:07,500 --> 00:13:10,500 All things have been handed over to me by my Father, 73 00:13:10,500 --> 00:13:13,500 and no one knows the Son except the Father, 74 00:13:13,500 --> 00:13:16,500 and no one knows the Father except the Son, 75 00:13:16,500 --> 00:13:20,500 and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. 76 00:13:20,500 --> 00:13:23,500 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, 77 00:13:23,500 --> 00:13:25,500 and I will give you rest. 78 00:13:25,500 --> 00:13:28,500 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, 79 00:13:28,500 --> 00:13:31,500 for I am gentle and lowly in heart, 80 00:13:31,500 --> 00:13:34,500 and you will find rest for your souls, 81 00:13:34,500 --> 00:13:39,500 for my yoke is easy and my burden is light." 82 00:13:39,500 --> 00:13:44,500 And as Jesus prays in the first few verses, 83 00:13:44,500 --> 00:13:50,500 we begin to see both his identity and his heart. 84 00:13:50,500 --> 00:13:55,500 You see, Jesus has been, in this chapter we learn from Luke's Gospel, 85 00:13:55,500 --> 00:13:56,500 he has been healing. 86 00:13:56,500 --> 00:13:58,500 In fact, Luke 21 says this, 87 00:13:58,500 --> 00:14:03,500 "In that hour he healed many people of diseases and plagues and evil spirits, 88 00:14:03,500 --> 00:14:06,500 and on many who were blind he bestowed sight." 89 00:14:06,500 --> 00:14:11,500 And one of the questions that the crowd has is, first of all, 90 00:14:11,500 --> 00:14:13,500 "How does Jesus have this power?" 91 00:14:13,500 --> 00:14:16,500 But as they hear his prayer, they're also going to say, 92 00:14:16,500 --> 00:14:19,500 "Who does he think he is?" 93 00:14:19,500 --> 00:14:23,500 Because in these words that may seem sort of confusing to us, 94 00:14:23,500 --> 00:14:26,500 "I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, 95 00:14:26,500 --> 00:14:29,500 that you have hidden these things from the wise and the understanding 96 00:14:29,500 --> 00:14:31,500 and revealed them to the little children. 97 00:14:31,500 --> 00:14:35,500 Father, such was your gracious will, and all things have been handed over to me 98 00:14:35,500 --> 00:14:39,500 by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, 99 00:14:39,500 --> 00:14:41,500 and no one knows the Father except the Son, 100 00:14:41,500 --> 00:14:44,500 and to anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him." 101 00:14:44,500 --> 00:14:48,500 What Jesus is doing, very simply, and there's a lot here, 102 00:14:48,500 --> 00:14:52,500 he's simply declaring that he is the Son of God. 103 00:14:52,500 --> 00:14:58,500 In John's Gospel, it happens like this as they talk about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 104 00:14:58,500 --> 00:15:04,500 He says, "Before Abraham was, I am." 105 00:15:04,500 --> 00:15:13,500 And the first part of this prayer, we see both Jesus' heart, and we see his identity in all of these words to the Father, 106 00:15:13,500 --> 00:15:17,500 and about the Father, and what the Father has given him and entrusted him. 107 00:15:17,500 --> 00:15:22,500 Jesus is saying, "I am the Son of God." 108 00:15:22,500 --> 00:15:30,500 And what we find is that the identity of Jesus helps our weary hearts, 109 00:15:30,500 --> 00:15:33,500 because Jesus has the power to help. 110 00:15:33,500 --> 00:15:37,500 And what's wonderful is just because we have the power to help, we don't always help. 111 00:15:37,500 --> 00:15:44,500 And so sometimes, in our house, somebody, she'll remain unnamed, will say, "Can you help me?" 112 00:15:44,500 --> 00:15:47,500 And I'll go, "Well, I could help you," right? 113 00:15:47,500 --> 00:15:51,500 Because "can" doesn't always mean "will," right? 114 00:15:51,500 --> 00:15:58,500 And so here we have Jesus in this declaration that he is the Son of God as he prays, 115 00:15:58,500 --> 00:16:04,500 and the implication is he can help. The question is, "Will he help?" 116 00:16:04,500 --> 00:16:12,500 And what I love in this text, in Matthew chapter 11 and verse 25, he says, 117 00:16:12,500 --> 00:16:17,500 "I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, you have hidden these things from the wise and the understanding, 118 00:16:17,500 --> 00:16:23,500 and revealed them to the little children." 119 00:16:23,500 --> 00:16:28,500 I want you to see what Jesus is saying here, and I want you to see the love of Jesus. 120 00:16:28,500 --> 00:16:36,500 In Luke chapter 18, Jesus is surrounded by a great crowd, and everybody starts to bring their kids to him. 121 00:16:36,500 --> 00:16:41,500 And the disciples say, "No, we don't want any kids. They're noisy. They're rambunctious. 122 00:16:41,500 --> 00:16:46,500 They sometimes get in the way." And Jesus says this, "Truly I say to you, 123 00:16:46,500 --> 00:16:53,500 whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it." 124 00:16:53,500 --> 00:16:58,500 And Jesus is not just saying children are important, but rather the children have something to teach them. 125 00:16:58,500 --> 00:17:03,500 And one of those things, I think, is about enthusiasm. 126 00:17:03,500 --> 00:17:10,500 In our world, it's so easy to be cynical, and it's so easy to be negative. 127 00:17:10,500 --> 00:17:16,500 And especially with young children, right, they have joy in such simple things. 128 00:17:16,500 --> 00:17:22,500 And I love it. For most of my life as an adult, I didn't think much about cows, right? 129 00:17:22,500 --> 00:17:28,500 But now, as a dad, every time we pass a field of cows, it's like, "Hey, there's cows!" 130 00:17:28,500 --> 00:17:34,500 And everybody looks at cows now, and it's to the point now where even if I don't have kids in the car, 131 00:17:34,500 --> 00:17:38,500 and in one case where I was by myself, I'm like, "Look, there's cows!" 132 00:17:38,500 --> 00:17:41,500 And then you realize there's nobody else in the car with you. 133 00:17:41,500 --> 00:17:48,500 And one of the things I think Jesus loves about children is their enthusiasm and their joy for these things. 134 00:17:48,500 --> 00:17:56,500 And so he tells us as adults, he says, "There's an enthusiasm that is found in seeing these things." 135 00:17:56,500 --> 00:18:04,500 It brings us joy. And Jesus says to us, "Grumpy adults, maybe you have something to learn from these children." 136 00:18:04,500 --> 00:18:18,500 But it's not just the joy of children. In this text, I think Jesus is saying the children do something a lot of us as adults struggle to do, and that's simply to ask for help. 137 00:18:18,500 --> 00:18:29,500 And he says, "You've hidden these things from the wise, the people who are self-centered and think they have it all together, but the children, you have shown it to them." 138 00:18:29,500 --> 00:18:36,500 I don't like to ask for help. Most of us don't like to ask for help. We struggle with that. 139 00:18:36,500 --> 00:18:41,500 Spend some time with some little kids, and you'll find that they love to ask for help, right? 140 00:18:41,500 --> 00:18:49,500 I could be in the middle of fighting a forest fire, and there would be a child come up and go, "Hey, can you help me open my fruit snacks?" Right? 141 00:18:49,500 --> 00:18:56,500 And you turn around, you help open their fruit snacks, you go back to the fire, right? It happens regularly. 142 00:18:56,500 --> 00:19:06,500 And I think one of the things that Jesus loves about children, and he wants to encourage us as adults in regard to our attitude, 143 00:19:06,500 --> 00:19:10,500 is that a child doesn't care what you're doing. If they need help, they're going to come and ask you. 144 00:19:10,500 --> 00:19:17,500 But we as adults, we think that we can handle it, and we can figure out, and we can put it together ourselves. 145 00:19:17,500 --> 00:19:23,500 And so Jesus here is saying, when he talks about revealing this to the little children, 146 00:19:23,500 --> 00:19:27,500 I'm not speaking to those who think they have it all together. 147 00:19:27,500 --> 00:19:33,500 I'm speaking to those who realize they can't do it by themselves. 148 00:19:33,500 --> 00:19:38,500 I want you to hear what Jesus says to our weary hearts this morning. 149 00:19:38,500 --> 00:19:42,500 We begin in verse 28. He just simply says this, "Come to me. 150 00:19:42,500 --> 00:19:48,500 All who labor and are heavy laden, I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me. 151 00:19:48,500 --> 00:19:53,500 For I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 152 00:19:53,500 --> 00:20:03,500 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light." The first thing you see Jesus saying is there is hope and help for the weariness that you face. 153 00:20:03,500 --> 00:20:10,500 We like to have an answer for all of our troubles, right? If we're tired, it's like maybe I just need to get stronger, right? 154 00:20:10,500 --> 00:20:17,500 That day really wore me. If I got stronger, I'd be able to work harder and not feel it as much. 155 00:20:17,500 --> 00:20:23,500 Or if I had planned things out better, and if I had done more in advance to prepare, it would have been easier. 156 00:20:23,500 --> 00:20:29,500 If I had gotten a good night's sleep, I would be much less tired right now. 157 00:20:29,500 --> 00:20:37,500 Or this is my go-to. If I had just had like a few more pots of coffee, I would have been able to accomplish everything that I needed to. 158 00:20:37,500 --> 00:20:46,500 And that's not what Jesus says. Jesus doesn't say, "You need to be stronger. You need to get a better plan. You need to get a better night's sleep. 159 00:20:46,500 --> 00:20:56,500 Or caffeine." He just simply says this, "Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." 160 00:20:56,500 --> 00:21:05,500 There is hope and help for the weariness that you face. Jesus then deals with our fear. 161 00:21:05,500 --> 00:21:15,500 Have you ever heard somebody say, like, "It never hurts to ask?" Like, sometimes it does, right? Sometimes the response you get is harsh, and it's unexpected, 162 00:21:15,500 --> 00:21:22,500 and it's disturbing, and it breaks your heart because you had this hope, and now it's dashed and taken away. 163 00:21:22,500 --> 00:21:29,500 We come in with hope, and we ask, and the answer is no, and we leave even more hopeless. 164 00:21:29,500 --> 00:21:39,500 Jesus deals with that fear in this text. We glimpse this as He talked about the children. 165 00:21:39,500 --> 00:21:46,500 And you find Him saying this, "For I am gentle and lowly in heart." 166 00:21:46,500 --> 00:21:50,500 And so Jesus, first of all, says there's rest. 167 00:21:50,500 --> 00:21:55,500 Secondly, I'm gentle and lowly, and then third, He calls us to walk with Him. 168 00:21:55,500 --> 00:21:59,500 I want to talk about this rest just for a moment that Jesus gives us. 169 00:21:59,500 --> 00:22:07,500 This rest is not simply bringing you a nice chair and saying, "Here, why don't you sit down for a while?" 170 00:22:07,500 --> 00:22:17,500 The rest that Jesus brings us is not to send us on vacation to recharge. 171 00:22:17,500 --> 00:22:23,500 Look what Jesus says, "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, I will give you rest." 172 00:22:23,500 --> 00:22:35,500 Now look what He says, "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light." 173 00:22:35,500 --> 00:22:41,500 He says, "Come rest," and the way you do that is by following me. 174 00:22:41,500 --> 00:22:53,500 We're probably not super familiar with the idea of a yoke, but it's that piece of wood either on the back of horses or cattle to allow them to pull heavier loads. 175 00:22:53,500 --> 00:23:00,500 But it can also be used individually if you've watched somebody carrying a whole bunch of water rather than straining your arms with the pails, right? 176 00:23:00,500 --> 00:23:07,500 It's a piece of wood, and you set it on your neck, and you hook it in, and it allows you to carry much more weight than you normally would. 177 00:23:07,500 --> 00:23:15,500 And here's Jesus going, "Hey, you're super tired. You're exhausted. You feel like you can't go on. Here, come on, put on this yoke." 178 00:23:15,500 --> 00:23:22,500 And we go, "I don't know that that sounds very much to me like rest." 179 00:23:22,500 --> 00:23:29,500 In the first century, this idea of a yoke wasn't just for animals or trying to carry heavy things. 180 00:23:29,500 --> 00:23:38,500 But it also referred to the teaching of a religious leader, and so the Pharisees' teaching would have been their yoke. 181 00:23:38,500 --> 00:23:45,500 The Sadducees, as they taught it, would have been their yoke. The scribes, it was all pictured as teaching. 182 00:23:45,500 --> 00:23:53,500 And in some cases, that teaching was heavy and heartbreaking, and people crumbled under the expectation. 183 00:23:53,500 --> 00:23:59,500 Jesus once said to the Pharisees that you bind up heavy burdens on the backs of people. 184 00:23:59,500 --> 00:24:05,500 And Jesus doesn't just say, "Hey, this is easier." But what does he say? It is easy and light. 185 00:24:05,500 --> 00:24:12,500 And the reason for that is that Jesus equips, strengthens, and carries you. 186 00:24:12,500 --> 00:24:17,500 Our kids like to bring a lot of stuff with them where they go, and I love that. 187 00:24:17,500 --> 00:24:21,500 It's always hard when you're trying to go somewhere simple, and you have like several backpacks. 188 00:24:21,500 --> 00:24:26,500 I remember when they were very little, really little, and you'd go to get them out of the car, 189 00:24:26,500 --> 00:24:29,500 and somehow the shoes always come off in the car. 190 00:24:29,500 --> 00:24:36,500 And so maybe it's cold and it's wintry, and there's no shoes, and you don't want to stand in the snow and put their shoes on. 191 00:24:36,500 --> 00:24:40,500 They also have all this stuff, and they go, "Hey, can you carry? Here's my stuff. 192 00:24:40,500 --> 00:24:46,500 Here's my backpack and all of my things, and now what I want you to do is carry that and carry me." 193 00:24:46,500 --> 00:24:50,500 So what we did is we'd put everything in the backpack and say, "Put on the backpack." 194 00:24:50,500 --> 00:24:53,500 So they would put on all this stuff, and then what do you do? 195 00:24:53,500 --> 00:24:57,500 You pick up your child and the backpack and carry them into the house. 196 00:24:57,500 --> 00:25:02,500 The picture here of Jesus is not saying, "Hey, you need rest, and your exhausted show up. 197 00:25:02,500 --> 00:25:09,500 I've got some more burdens for you, but rather come and hear my teaching, 198 00:25:09,500 --> 00:25:17,500 and listen to my teaching, and follow the teaching that I have for you." 199 00:25:17,500 --> 00:25:25,500 And you find that Jesus equips us, strengthens us, and then carries us to where we need to go. 200 00:25:25,500 --> 00:25:31,500 And Jesus takes all of our weariness, and he gives us strength. 201 00:25:31,500 --> 00:25:34,500 And the call here is to follow him. 202 00:25:34,500 --> 00:25:39,500 That's what Jesus is saying, that if you are tired, and you are worn out, and you are at the end of your rope, 203 00:25:39,500 --> 00:25:43,500 and you're struggling, and you're exhausted, he says, "Come to me." 204 00:25:43,500 --> 00:25:47,500 I will give you rest. I will give you strength. I will give you direction. 205 00:25:47,500 --> 00:25:53,500 I will equip you. I will strengthen you. And I will carry you through this. 206 00:25:53,500 --> 00:25:59,500 One of my favorite pastors outside of Scripture is a guy by the name of Charles Spurgeon. 207 00:25:59,500 --> 00:26:02,500 If you've been here, I've mentioned him a lot. 208 00:26:02,500 --> 00:26:06,500 This was one of his favorite texts. In fact, he starts one of his sermons like this. 209 00:26:06,500 --> 00:26:09,500 "I have often preached from this text." 210 00:26:09,500 --> 00:26:13,500 And then he begins to list the titles of his sermon, "The Meek and Lowly One." 211 00:26:13,500 --> 00:26:15,500 And then another sermon called "Rest, Rest." 212 00:26:15,500 --> 00:26:18,500 And then another sermon, "Rest for the Laboring." 213 00:26:18,500 --> 00:26:22,500 And in another sermon, "Christ Word with You." 214 00:26:22,500 --> 00:26:26,500 Another sermon, "Christ Given Rest." 215 00:26:26,500 --> 00:26:31,500 And another sermon at the end of the 1800s, "The Old Gospel for a New Century." 216 00:26:31,500 --> 00:26:35,500 So Spurgeon says, "I've preached like eight sermons from this passage of Scripture." 217 00:26:35,500 --> 00:26:41,500 And he was specifically speaking about, "Come to me all you who labor, and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." 218 00:26:41,500 --> 00:26:45,500 And Spurgeon then goes on to say, "Not only have I preached from this verse a whole ton." 219 00:26:45,500 --> 00:26:53,500 He says this, "I hope, if I continue to live, to often preach from it in the future." 220 00:26:53,500 --> 00:27:00,500 Here's why Spurgeon loved these verses so much. He says this, "It is one of those great constellation texts." 221 00:27:00,500 --> 00:27:06,500 "Which, like certain stars, shine so brightly in the sky." 222 00:27:06,500 --> 00:27:16,500 "Having served as a guide to mariners and have helped direct many a poor tempest-tossed seaman into the harbor that he wanted to reach." 223 00:27:16,500 --> 00:27:22,500 "These texts have guided many into the haven of everlasting peace." 224 00:27:22,500 --> 00:27:29,500 And Spurgeon says this is one of those texts that will navigate us and guide us and show us a way to a harbor 225 00:27:29,500 --> 00:27:33,500 of safety and peace. 226 00:27:33,500 --> 00:27:39,500 It's a text for the followers of Jesus who are struggling and discouraged and who are tired 227 00:27:39,500 --> 00:27:44,500 and there's not enough left in their tank and they're filled with grief and uncertainty. 228 00:27:44,500 --> 00:27:49,500 Right? The gas light is on in your car and you've been driving for a while. 229 00:27:49,500 --> 00:27:53,500 This is a text for you. 230 00:27:53,500 --> 00:27:58,500 But also this invitation, "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, 231 00:27:58,500 --> 00:28:05,500 and I will give you rest." Right? It's a text for the doubters, for the self-centered. 232 00:28:05,500 --> 00:28:12,500 For those who hearts are hardened by the sin and suffering. 233 00:28:12,500 --> 00:28:19,500 It's my prayer that the light of Jesus would melt and transform you and you would hear these words 234 00:28:19,500 --> 00:28:24,500 in the midst of your exhaustion. "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, 235 00:28:24,500 --> 00:28:27,500 and I will give you rest." Let's pray. 236 00:28:27,500 --> 00:28:35,500 Father in heaven, thank you that you provide and that your grace is sufficient for us and that you bring us to rest. 237 00:28:35,500 --> 00:28:41,500 And so we ask that you would help our hearts in the doubts and struggles of life, 238 00:28:41,500 --> 00:28:49,500 in those moments where it is so easy to center ourself on ourself and to make ourself the standard. 239 00:28:49,500 --> 00:28:56,500 Would you lift our eyes to you? Help us with the danger of hard hearts, 240 00:28:56,500 --> 00:29:01,500 the brokenness in our life and the brokenness that surrounds us. Make us like little children. 241 00:29:01,500 --> 00:29:09,500 In our joy, in your presence, in our courage to boldly ask for whatever it is we need. 242 00:29:09,500 --> 00:29:15,500 And may you give rest to our weary souls. It is in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.