[0:00] Now let us turn together in God's word to our passage in Matthew chapter 11. And we read our Lord's words at the end of the chapter at verse 28.
[0:19] Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you shall find rest unto your souls.
[0:39] For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. And I will give you rest. Any preacher can be absolutely sure that these words are relevant to any people, in any congregation, in any part of the world.
[1:04] True, they might be more relevant at certain times to certain people, who are feeling more than at other times, or other people, what's referred to here.
[1:19] The being heavy laden. The being burdened. But we can be absolutely sure that there are always those who are in just this position.
[1:32] And indeed, when this text is taken and preached on, the preacher can be sure that if today, someone who hears it, feels that it is somehow not quite so relevant tomorrow, or the next day, they'll know full well that it surely is.
[1:51] Life is full of burdens. Full of physical and emotional and material and mental and spiritual burdens.
[2:02] And at some time or other, what Jesus is speaking about here hits everyone. Everyone, at some time, feels the weight of the burden.
[2:17] Is conscious of the problem. Sometimes so grievous, so heavy, that it can hardly be borne. Some years ago, in my previous congregation, I was asked by the rector of the local academy to help out in an emergency.
[2:39] One teacher was obviously going to be off for several months with a nervous condition. And it was very difficult in that area to find somebody suitably qualified to step in for a short time.
[2:51] And it so happened that I had the necessary qualification. So I agreed that I would help out. And I made the condition that my work as minister would have to have priority if there were emergencies, if there was ever any clash in responsibilities.
[3:12] While he was coming to me almost on bended knee, pleading that I would come so I could make my own conditions very easily. And so I went and taught for several months, half time, in the local academy.
[3:27] And obviously the kind of thing that could happen would be a funeral, a wedding, some important church meeting, pastoral thing. And one week, particularly, I remember, on the Monday, I had to go and visit a family, actually in a neighbouring congregation, which I was covering while the minister was away.
[3:51] A family whose 16-year-old son had committed suicide. So I had to visit the family and then take the funeral a couple of days later.
[4:03] And no sooner was that over than I received word, we were sitting there in the staff room, that there was a family that needed me. Their son in his early 20s had fallen off the deck of his fishing boat in the harbour, a west coast harbour, and been drowned.
[4:23] And it was even more poignant in that, though not officially, everyone knew that he had been drinking heavily, and that that's why he'd fallen overboard and been drowned.
[4:36] And I remember when that message came through, and it was interval time, and one of the teachers sitting beside me, who had no church connection, no Christian interest whatsoever, he said, well, I don't know how you can cope.
[4:56] All these things. And he said, wasn't until you came on to the staff here that I realised how these are happening all the time. Families with burdens and problems.
[5:08] I see it through you. I don't know how you can cope with that emotional stress. Well, I tried to tell him of the way that, through God's grace, we do cope.
[5:22] And it was a reminder to me too, as to all of us, isn't it, that burdens are an everyday thing. There's not a family. There's not a person who doesn't, one way or another, sometime or other, find the truth of what Jesus says here, that there are those who labour and are heavy laden.
[5:46] Well, it may be this evening that you're sitting in the congregation, and you're young, and you're tempted to say, well, I know what these ministers say, and my parents say, and the other folks say, oh, yes, you're going to have these problems, and you're going to have difficulties, and, well, when you're young, you feel that hasn't happened to me, it's not going to come.
[6:09] But, my dear young friends, it does. The two cases I mentioned, they were young, 16 and 22. And what tragic occurrences, what burdens upon the families of these young men.
[6:23] The Bible says, man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards. And that is profoundly true. Because of sin, and the bitter fruit of sin, and you, however young you may be, whoever you may be, this affects you.
[6:41] And in one way or another, will affect you more and more. Just reflecting over my own family circle, just slightly bigger than our own children, into the close family circle, in recent years, with my wife, we were reflecting on the fact that we have known cancer, taking away the life of one of our family members in his 30s.
[7:10] We've known another, suddenly thrown out of his job, month after month after month, trying to find a job, unable to find it, becoming more and more depressed through unemployment.
[7:24] And in another case, a marriage that seemed so full of hope, and in our family circle, as I say, not our children, but ending in separation and divorce.
[7:35] Just one family. But isn't it true? Isn't that the world we live in? Isn't that the sinful situation in which we find ourselves? One that leads us to burdens, to trials, to tribulations, to problems.
[7:53] And the Lord Jesus Christ comes to you in your situation. You have your burden, and your problem, and your trial. How can I know what these are?
[8:04] But you know it. And the Lord Jesus Christ comes and says, I want to meet you there, where the burden is heaviest, where the problem seems most insoluble, where you are bowed down and heavy laden.
[8:20] I want to come and meet you there, and lighten the load. Come to me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
[8:32] So how? How can you know this lightening of the burden? How can you know this rest in the midst of the trials and tribulations that are very real?
[8:45] And if they're not today, they will be, as I say, tomorrow or in the days to come. How? Well, let's listen to the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. And let's notice some very, very simple truths.
[8:58] In order to know the truth of these great words of the Lord Jesus Christ, you must first of all know who he is. Know who he is.
[9:12] Notice carefully the words that he uses. Come unto me. And all that is said here about being freed of burdens, about finding life made easier, it all hinges on the one who says it, on who he is.
[9:29] Just someone who is sympathetic. Someone who makes us feel better. Some therapist. Some counselor. Well, the Lord Jesus Christ himself lets us know.
[9:42] In the words immediately before the words that we read, we have the indication who this me is who is inviting us to come to him. All things, he says, are delivered to me of my Father.
[9:55] No man knoweth the Father, knoweth the Son, but the Father. Neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him. He is saying, I who call you, I'm not merely someone who knows skillfully how to handle situations, who can apply some kind of therapy.
[10:14] Not at all. It is the eternal God, co-equal with the Father, the one who knows the Father intimately, and has done from all eternity, the one who is truly God.
[10:25] The one who himself, in his great prayer, reveals to us that communication, that relationship with God, and tells us who he is.
[10:37] Thou hast given him, speaking of himself, thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and the one who is speaking here, Jesus Christ, whom he has sent.
[10:54] I finish the work thou gavest me to do, glorify thou me. We could go on through this prayer, but the thrust is this, that the one who is speaking is the one who is God, the one who has all power, the one who is able to say, come to me.
[11:12] Oh, we do try and help, don't we? As neighbors, as friends. Sometimes, our poor efforts yield some success, but how limited it is. But this one, who is God, God from all eternity, the source of all power, the one who speaks with the resources of the eternal God, and does so because he was and is that eternal God, he speaks with authority and with power.
[11:40] And it means this, that your problem may be whatever it is, and your burden may be the heaviest, that you imagine anyone has ever had to bear. So complicated in your case, so difficult, nobody has ever had it quite the way you've had it.
[11:56] And the one who comes and says, come unto me, is the eternal God, whose power is infinite, and who would never say what is not within his gracious power to accomplish.
[12:10] and this one says, come to me. But it's not only when we consider who he is, it is not only that he is the eternal son of God, but he speaks to the accents of God's love and of God's power with a human voice.
[12:35] For he is the God man. And as he speaks these words, come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, he knows precisely what he's talking about.
[12:49] For he has known heavy burdens. He has known what it is to be heavy laden. You think back over the incarnate life of the son of God.
[13:02] You think of him as a refugee driven from his homeland to take refuge elsewhere under an alien power. You think of him brought up in one of the poorest of families of Israel.
[13:15] It's supposed, I would say rightly, that Joseph, Mary's husband, probably died when Jesus was a young man, an adolescent, and it's highly likely that the Lord Jesus Christ to take responsibility as breadwinner for mother, for brothers, and for sisters, no benefits, no rich uncles, our Lord Jesus Christ knowing the reality of poverty, knowing the reality of suffering, living in a country under alien occupation, the enemy troops marching proudly, crushing opposition under their feet, and when he begins his ministry, didn't he know envy and jealousy, perhaps that's sometime been your problem, there at work, you're the victim of envy, you're the victim of those who have vested interests, and the Lord Jesus Christ knew that, he knew it full well, he knew weariness, he knew rejection, he knew what it was to reach the point where humanly speaking he would say,
[14:28] I can't go on, does that sound inappropriate with regard to the eternal son of God, my dear friends in Gethsemane, as we see him agonizing, as we see him bow down with the thought of what lay ahead, the weariness of body, and especially the weariness and the heaviness of soul, why else was an angel sent to strengthen him?
[14:55] Our Lord Jesus Christ, in all points tempted like as we are yet without sin, as God he says to you, come to me, for the power and the resources are his, and as man who knows your condition, who has plumbed all the depths, the one who is gentle and lowly, he comes to and says, come to me.
[15:22] He's been through it all, and therefore he understands that the bruised reed he will not break, that the smoking flax he will not quench.
[15:35] So you have to know who he is. Oh, there's no one better to meet your need, there's no one better to bear your burden, but you have to know something else.
[15:49] You have to know to whom he's speaking in order to experience the wonder of which this verse speaks. You have to know secondly to whom he's speaking.
[16:02] Well, we've said it several times, haven't we? He's speaking to the heavy laden. Now, it's interesting that that same phrase is used by our Lord when speaking to the Pharisees about their attitude to the people.
[16:20] Matthew 23, it says, they bind the religious leaders of the day, they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be born and lay them on men's shoulders, but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.
[16:36] You remember how Peter in the great council of Jerusalem when he's pleading with his brethren not to impose the old Jewish rituals and ceremonies on Gentile believers, he says, why do you tempt God to put a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither they, our fathers, nor we were able to bear.
[16:57] Burdens laid down by religious leaders who were interested only in that the people would do what they wanted, would submit to their authority. And all the time, our Lord says, not willing with their little finger to help to bear these burdens.
[17:15] So there they were, the Pharisees breathing down their necks, pressing them down with heavy burdens. In my ministry in London, one of the things that is different from most other free church congregations is that I spend hours and hours, many hours, every week, sitting in trains, especially the underground train.
[17:44] One visit can take an hour and a half to get there and an hour and a half to get back. And I've overcome the frustration of it by copying a lot of London commuters and learning to read, read anywhere and at any time.
[17:58] Among things I've read, a set of Walter Scott's novels that I'd had in the house for 20 years and never looked at them, except one or two. And one of them, I don't remember which one it was, maybe the antiquary, but one of them presents to us a character.
[18:16] His name was Lord Glenallen. And as the writer, the novelist, Walter Scott portrays him, he's a character who rather repels us.
[18:29] He was always dressed in the deepest black. He was gaunt. He never laughed, never smiled, never sang. If he sat down at table, he would only take the rudest of fare, nothing other than the merest smallest amount that would keep him alive.
[18:51] It seems an enemy of life. And the story goes on, and we discover that this man had married in his younger life, and was very happy, and then discovered that the woman he had married was his own sister.
[19:11] They had been separated in infancy, and had come together. Well, he was appalled at what he had done, and his father confessor, thought he was part of the Church of Rome.
[19:23] His father confessor impressed on him how dreadful was this sin he had committed, and that the only way to receive deliverance and forgiveness for this terrible thing he had done was not merely separating from his wife as he had known her, but atoning for his great sin by more and more penances.
[19:47] And as the poor man was doing more and more self-inflicting torture on himself in the privacy of his room, eating not only the humblest affair, but the most revolting affair, living in that kind of way, his conscience never found freedom, and so more penances, more hardships, well, the Pharisee laying heavy burdens on the shoulders of that man, never ever finding rest, never finding peace for his soul.
[20:21] We don't need to go to novelists, do we, to find that this is so. We think of Martin Luther, we think of Luther those many years, being told that this way and that way, if he kept the laws of the church, if he faithfully recited all the prayers, if he carried out the penances, if he did his pilgrimages, you remember him going to Rome, whether he actually went up the famous stairs, supposedly Pilate's staircase, on his hands and knees and back down again, well, who knows, said that he did, but he tried out all the penances, all the offerings, everything, heavy burdens, heavy laden, and that way, finding no peace.
[21:07] And the Lord Jesus Christ insists that none of these things can ease the guilty conscience. But my friends, don't just brush this off by saying that's the church of Rome.
[21:21] How easy it is, and how sad it is to find that there are those, and it may be they feel a burden, maybe they do desire to be at peace with God, and the way that they adopt is to be more religious, come more often to the church, do the right things, practice the right activities, and yet never coming with the burden, the burden of sin and guilt to Calvary's cross.
[21:47] Not by labors of our hands can we fulfill thy law's demands. Could my tears forever flow? Could my zeal nor respite know?
[21:58] All for sin could not atone. Thou must save, and thou alone. And so to those who are heavy laden with a guilt of their own sin, their conscience telling them that they're not right with God, Jesus says, come unto me.
[22:18] But it's not just that. It's wider. It's not just the burden that's been talked about in that dialogue with the Pharisees, the burden of religious practices that don't work because they're humanly devised.
[22:31] there is the wider area of burdens and troubles of every kind. I sketched out a few at the beginning of the sermon. And this is where the Bible comes to us as a book that is absolutely up to date.
[22:50] The society in which we live is a fractured society. It is full of the most terrible problems, broken lives, broken homes, addictions.
[23:03] Well, obviously, where we are in the city of London, there by the Thames embankment, we have some of our members who actually work with the homeless in London, and they tell us and bring sometimes these wrecks of humanity, and we hear the most heart-rending stories.
[23:20] But we don't need to go to London, do we? These kind of things are with us here. And so the Bible, which so many would dismiss us out of date, as not understanding the realities of the situation as it is today, comes to us and says, look, it's all here.
[23:38] Is there marriage breakdown, betrayal, abandonment, of one spouse by the other, tension within the home? Why, of course there is.
[23:50] Sadly, we know it. Well, you turn to the word of God, and you see God setting before us a Hosea, a man of God, who with great hope and buoyancy, marries.
[24:03] God gives the gift of children, and then tragedy of tragedies. That wife would promise to be faithful, away she goes. The old man is too boring, and so away she goes.
[24:15] She dresses up to the nines, and she goes off down to the marketplace. There'll be somebody more interesting, somebody who can give her what her husband couldn't give. And we see Gomer in the marketplace, selling herself to prostitution, and going down the slippery slope of degradation, and of auto destruction.
[24:38] It's there, in the word of God, that kind of burden that anybody perhaps bears, the burden that you perhaps know, in your relationship with husband or wife, perhaps it's with the children, perhaps there's tension there.
[24:51] Well, the word of God brings it to us. Or think of other cases. You read in the prophecy of Habakkuk, and there's a man who cannot understand, as you read his first chapter, why the world is in such a mess.
[25:05] Why is it, God? Why is it that there's such injustice and violence? And he says, Lord, you're not listening, it seems. And you remember how God says to him, Habakkuk, I'll attend to that.
[25:18] And God sends the Chaldeans, the Babylonians, more wicked still, and Hosea, Habakkuk cannot understand. We live in a world of violence. We live in a world of injustice.
[25:31] So many things that are not fair, is that your problem? Are there those who are not dealing with you as they ought? Well, the Bible has it. It sets out such problems.
[25:42] The Bible knows all about it. God understands. Or is it the kind of problem we were singing about in Psalm 38? the problem of guilt because of what you've done.
[25:55] You can never free yourself of it. And that leading, it's all there in Psalm 38, to ostracism. The psalmist says how his friends and his family, they turn away from them, they stand from them, they stand aloof because of what he's done, he says, the guilt that he feels.
[26:13] Well, God says, is that your problem? It's there. Is your problem a material thing? Destitution? Business is cracking up?
[26:24] Everything you do, it doesn't seem to work out? Well, you turn to the book of Job and you see a man utterly destitute. You see a man ridden with disease. Is that maybe the problem?
[26:36] Well, it's there in the word of God. So what is your situation? The burden, the heavy ladenness, what's yours?
[26:48] Has it got to the state, perhaps, that you've even wondered, shall I end it all? A few couple of years ago, a man came into our church in London.
[27:01] We're right in the heart of the city and he'd been wandering along the Thames embankment. He had a drink problem and many other problems. It was the first time he saw the door of the church open and he came in, sat through the service.
[27:16] As I spoke to him afterwards, he said, I was walking along the Thames embankment and the situation was so terrible that I just thought I'll end it all. Just throw myself in.
[27:28] But he did have some knowledge. He said, I couldn't bear to think what would happen afterwards. And I saw your church door open. I can't give you a happy ending as yet.
[27:41] we pray for the context with that man. But is it maybe a burden that is so heavy that you feel there is no way in which I'll ever be free of it?
[27:53] Not in this life anyway. Or is it as I've suggested, the marriage that is breaking up that began with such hope, with such anticipation that it seems to have cracked up, gone sour?
[28:06] And you wonder, well can this ever, ever be solved? Is there anyone who can help me here? Is there anyone who can help us put this together again?
[28:18] Or is it maybe that you're still waiting for those results? That niggling pain. And you wonder, is it going to be more serious?
[28:31] Is it going to be perhaps terminal? Well I could multiply, couldn't I? All the problems. But they're all there in the word of God. They're all set before us. I've given examples, but there are many, many more.
[28:44] And the Lord Jesus Christ comes and says, you who are burdened and heavy laden, it's you to whom I speak. Now it may be that in a gathering like this someone may be listening to me and tempted to say, well you're talking about all these things but what do you know about them?
[29:05] I'm going through this problem, this problem in my home with my marriage, with my children. What do you know about them? Have you known that kind of tension? No, thank God I haven't.
[29:17] I've only known nearly 40 years of a happy marriage. I confess that. But I don't know your particular experience. Or have you known that terminal illness?
[29:29] No, I haven't. with my brother minister who preached this morning. We were commenting with great gratitude last night that both of us have enjoyed remarkably good health right through our ministry.
[29:42] Not like many of our brethren. And we've never hardly ever missed a day of our ministry. No, I haven't known personally that particular thing.
[29:54] Or your burden may be that you can't get a decent job. And you look at me and say, well, you've got job security anyway, haven't you? You haven't known that? No, I haven't. My dear friends, I'm merely the spokesman of the living God.
[30:13] It is not I who say, come unto me. It is Jesus Christ. He knows. He knows in the depths. He knows it all.
[30:24] And he, the eternal God, he says to you, where you are burdened and heavy laden, come unto me. Know who he is.
[30:38] Know to whom he's speaking. Know, finally, what he offers. Know what he offers. He uses the figure in verse 29 of a yoke.
[30:51] Take my yoke upon you. I think that probably thinking back to Bible times, most of us feel that perhaps the picture here is of the older and bigger and stronger ox, yoked with the younger, more inexperienced ox, and the older one is taking the strain.
[31:15] The younger one's going along with him, the older one is taking the strain. Perhaps. But maybe we can think, it's not a modern picture, but perhaps the oldest of you can remember, perhaps your, I don't know, your parents or grandparents, talking about it.
[31:30] It's the picture of the dairy maid. When in olden time, well not so olden perhaps, there would be a yoke for one person. And if we haven't seen it, we've seen the pictures.
[31:43] And hanging down each side, there would be two pails of milk. And she has it, she's able to carry it, because she's got the yoke taking the strain. And if you read up about these or know about them, you'll know that there are two things that are absolutely essential with regard to that kind of yoke.
[32:03] It must fit perfectly, no rough edges, nothing that would chafe the neck or the shoulders or before long, the burden can't be carried.
[32:16] And the burden must not be excessive. excessive. The yoke is intended to help, but the burden must not be too much. Now, thinking of the yoke, whichever picture you like, there's one thing that's obvious, and it is that the burden is not taken away.
[32:33] It's not excessive, but it's not taken away. And the Lord Jesus Christ, though, he may take away the burden. God can, in his sovereignty, free us from this or that burden that we bear.
[32:45] But very often, that is not his way. He makes it bearable. The yoke that fits perfectly enables us to carry that burden that previously was leaving us crushed.
[33:01] Cast your burden on the Lord, and he will sustain you. So, thinking of what he offers, this yoke that enables us to carry, and to carry even easily, what can be a heavy, weighty burden, you might ask, I hope you do ask, what should I do?
[33:25] You may feel that one way or another, you've been described tonight. You haven't found that rest of which our Lord speaks. You don't know there's rest to your souls, the easiness of the yoke, or the lightness of the burden.
[33:43] So, what should you do? Well, obviously, I want to say two things. The first one is what you find here in this text, and just add a sentence about another one.
[33:54] The first is this, come with your burden to Christ. Now, he says it. It's his word. Come unto me, all ye that labor, and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
[34:11] Some of you know very well. Perhaps a few don't know quite so well the famous Pilgrim's Progress. But in the Pilgrim's Progress, perhaps the best known of all the pictures that set before us, is of this man, Christian.
[34:28] He's leaving his home city. It's a city of destruction. If he stays there, he's doomed. And he's making his way to the celestial city.
[34:40] And Bunyan shows us this man, and he's got a burden on his back. And all the time, he's groaning. It is, of course, the burden of his sin before a holy God.
[34:53] The burden of his own inability to be right with God. And the further he goes, the heavier it gets. And after various adventures, Bunyan tells us how he comes to a hill, and he's to climb up the hill, and it's more difficult than ever.
[35:08] And he's groaning with the weight of his burden. And then, then Bunyan tells us that in his dream he saw this, that just as Christian came up to the cross, his burden loosed from off his shoulders, and fell from off his back, and began to tumble, and so continued to do, till it came to the mouth of the sepulcher, where it fell in.
[35:33] And Bunyan adds these wonderful words, and I saw it no more. God in his mercy, taking away that burden of guilt and sin, casting it into the depths of the sea, that we might know it no more.
[35:49] Now, of course, we've been talking of other burdens that God leaves us with, and enables us to bear them. But, oh, first, my dear friend, come to Jesus Christ. Come to the cross of Calvary with that burden of yours, whatever it might be, and there, at Calvary's cross, coming as a sinner, coming with your need.
[36:10] The burden will, I promise you, will be loosed, because it is Jesus, the crucified one, who says, come to me, all ye who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
[36:26] Now he doesn't promise that having taken away that burden of sin and guilt, forgiven through the precious blood of the Lamb, that every other problem is immediately solved, or every other burden is immediately loosed.
[36:42] He can, but many a time, the Lord Jesus Christ grants the rest and the relief of which he speaks, even as we continue to bear the burden.
[36:55] Here's someone, and the problem is one I've sketched out already. this person hasn't been feeling well, and is sure there's something serious wrong, and goes, is sent for tests and x-rays, and feels it's going to be malignant, it's going to be a problem, I've got my family, what will happen to them?
[37:19] Now the Bible does not say that by coming to Jesus Christ and trusting in him, that that burden will be taken away, that the results will be positive and not negative, that they will be favourable and not unfavourable, oh the Bible doesn't say that, but the Bible does say, and Jesus Christ does say, whatever the result that comes to you, it may be an absolutely shattering result for you and your family, but I tell you this my dear friend, with your burden I am here, take my yoke on you, and even with the heaviest of burdens, with Jesus Christ bearing that burden for us and with us, there is a lightness in our step and an assurance that under all these things we can and will rejoice in Jesus Christ, our blessed Lord.
[38:10] Lord. I came across a little incident, reading a book once, about the turn of the century, the early years of this century, an English gentleman was visiting the Scottish borders for a walking holiday, and one day he was out, and as he was walking along there he saw two boys, small boys, coming towards him, and one of them would be about ten, and the other maybe four or five, and the ten year old had the four year old, or whatever he was, on his shoulders, he was carrying him, while he only needed to look to see that the little fellow was disabled, that he could never have walked on his own, so his brother was carrying him, and the gentleman who was walking along, he stopped and looked at them and said, oh, young fellow, that's a heavy burden that you're carrying today, at which the boy looked at him and said, no sir, that's not a burden, that's my wee brother, and Jesus
[39:20] Christ comes and says that he is able to bear every burden, and when you are indwelt by the love of Jesus Christ, then the burden is not a burden, when he bears it with us, and so tonight, come to Jesus Christ, with all your sin and guilt and burden and problem and difficulty, and he says, come to me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
[39:57] I just want to add one thing, it's not in the text, but I think it's related. Come with your burden to Christ, and then secondly, in response to this invitation, join with Christ's people.
[40:13] Now, where do I get that from? Well, I think of that verse, where we're told, bear one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.
[40:25] The Lord Jesus Christ promises to bear these burdens for us, and with us. But his way of doing it is very often through his people.
[40:38] And as you come to the Lord Jesus Christ with your sin and confess it, and by God's grace receive deliverance, and you go out and tomorrow the other burden, it's still there.
[40:50] Well, it may well be that the Lord Jesus Christ's way of helping you to bear it is through his messengers, his servants, with the people of God.
[41:03] Here today in this church, we've gathered round the Lord's table, and that is meeting with the Lord, feeding upon Christ by faith, enjoying and benefiting from this means of grace.
[41:16] But you do it with the Lord's people. You do it together. And if they are faithful, if we profess to be the Lord's, are what we ought to be, then we will be bearing other people's burdens, yours as Christ's messengers.
[41:36] So then, come with your burden to Christ, and join with the people of God, and you will know how true this glorious truth is.
[41:48] Come to me, all ye who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest to your souls.
[42:04] Let us pray. O Lord, our God, we recognize this evening as we come before thee, that we are utterly helpless to help one another, to save ourselves, to take away our own burdens.
[42:29] We are the victims of our own sin. But we praise thee for one who bore sin in his own body in the tree, for one who rose again in the power of an endless life, and the one who, being God, became man, who comes to us and says, come to me, for I will bear your burden.
[42:55] Help us then, even tonight, to come just as we are, with all our sin and all our need, to Calvary, where Jesus welcomes sinners.
[43:09] In his name, amen. Amen.