You Who Labor and Are Heavy Laden

March 27, 2020 (Friday)

The Scripture passage, Matthew 11:28-30, has provided a platform for our blogs for several days. Today I want you to focus on the words, “All ye that labor and are heavy laden.” These are the people to whom Jesus’ invitation is directed. Who were they?

The offer of rest for the soul was made to those who had sought help from their religious leaders. Here’s the way it worked. A person had a problem, so he went to his counselor, no doubt a Pharisee, who listened, then offered a solution. The irony was that the counselor only added to the problem. He suggested that the poor sinner redouble his efforts to live by the law, and probably offered ideas about how to do that. The final solution, in many cases, was a new interpretation of a law, which in itself became a new law, now added to the hundreds of human traditions that had been dumped onto the Ten Commandments. And so the man with the problem is encouraged to work hard and allow the burden of guilt to inspire him toward obeying more laws. The Apostle Paul discussed this problem in Romans 7, concluding that the law enslaves us because we do not have the power to keep it.
The sinner felt condemned without hope. Paul acknowledged that awful fact, but then heralded good news: “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ!” (Romans 8:1). Reading those words, we can almost hear Jesus calling, “Come to me for rest, peace, release from spiritual slavery, freedom to live happily, knowing the joys of forgiveness.”

The word, “gospel,” means “good news.” When you are down, troubled, trembling under the load of sin, working hard to please God, but failing in all your efforts to keep the law, and someone tells you that God loves you and wants to save you, believe me, that’s real good news! When you come to the Lord, working hard and burdened down, you are overjoyed at hearing the good news: “By grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourself. It is the gift of God. Not of works lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2).

If we find ourselves seeking peace of mind and joy in life, we will find it in Jesus, who has a special place in his heart for “those who labor and are heavy laden.”