“Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; and having an high priest over the house of God; let us draw near with a true heart, in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water” (Hebrews 10:19-22). 

Please note: once the Lord saves us, we will certainly desire to walk in His ways and serve Him, out of a motive of love for Him (and not to earn His favor). Those who “take Christ’s free salvation,” but who still love their sin, show themselves to be without a new heart, and are subject to the Lord’s rebuke: “I never knew you!” (Matthew 7:23). Please see also Romans 8:12-13; Matthew 10:38, 11:28-30; John 14:15, 21, 23.

Now we come to the last section of “Look to Jesus,” which is titled “Rest for the Weary.” “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).

First, do you need rest? This world contains many laboring and heavy-laden ones. In fact, there are few who are not such. This is a place of sorrow and sighing, a vale of tears and woe. “Man that is born of a woman is of few days and full of trouble” (Job 14:1). As wave follows wave upon the seashore, and as season succeeds to season, so trouble follows trouble in the life of man. This is the general experience. Sin has entered, and brought guilt upon the world’s children, and the curse upon its soil. Suffering and sorrow, misery and death, have followed in the terrible train of Adam’s sin, and there can be no real rest enjoyed until sin be put away from the guilty, and no everlasting rest until they be finally removed from sin itself. Earth’s children have all along had a general consciousness that there was something wrong with them, and they have made repeated attempts at changing their condition and obtaining rest to their souls; but all these have proved unsuccessful: evil has not ceased and paradise has not been restored. The world does not afford materials for real and uninterrupted blessedness.

Each heart also knows its own bitterness, and each individual feels his particular sorrow. All do not feel burdened with the same kind of evils. To one, the burden may be a personal affliction; to another, a family trouble; and to a third, a depression in worldly circumstances. But all do feel, at one time or another, so much of that which is evil as to make them conclude that this is an evil and unsatisfying world. And when we look around and take an intelligent view of the condition of society, we shall find it such as to force upon us the sad conclusion that this must be a sinful, sorrow- stricken, laboring, and heavy-laden world. Such words as, “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest,” must surely convey to a world such as ours a peculiarly appropriate and welcome invitation.

Second, who gives this invitation? Who gives this invitation? It is the voice of Emmanuel which falls upon the ear. These are the words of the compassionate Redeemer that meet the weary eye. It was the Word made flesh Who spoke these precious words. Let your mind rest on that striking fact. He “spake as never man spake.” But no man could ever be expected to speak like Him; for though He was in the form of a servant, and in the likeness of man, He was, nevertheless, the Son of God, and as such perfectly knew the Father. This is what He said regarding Himself: “No man knoweth the Son but the Father, neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him” (John 7:46; Matthew 11:27).

What a discovery is here made of the work of Jesus! He reveals GodasaFather to poor outcast sinners. This is surpassingly gracious. He not only makes known the mind of God, but He reveals His heart; for He makes Him known as His Father and our Father. He comes to show us that, though we have ceased to feel towards Him as loving and dutiful children, He has not ceased to feel towards us as a Father. It is He, then, Who came from the Father to declare and testify His love, Who here speaks. That very One Who came to unfold the grace and love of our Father in heaven, invites weary sinners to come to Him. Being partaker of the Father’s nature, there can be no mistake on His part in speaking of the Father. “God hath, in these last days, spoken unto us by his Son” (Hebrews 1:2). He hath spoken to us by Him in words and deeds which admit of no parallel—and He still speaks to us by Him in words of infinite tenderness and love.

But there is something more in the person of Jesus which is fitted to arrest our attention. He is not only “the brightness of the Father’s glory, and the express image of His person,” He is also a partaker of our nature. And, moreover, He did not appear on earth as unfallen Adam did: He appeared “in the likeness of sinful flesh.” If you had seen Him, you would have pronounced Him the “brother born for adversity;” for He was “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.” He was weary, hungry, thirsty: He knew the depths of poverty, and felt the burden of daily toil. If, from having the nature of God, He is able to reveal all that the Father is, and has in His heart toward us; from being a partaker of the nature of man, He is able to sympathize with us, suffer for us, and make our case His own. This, then, is He the God-man Who stood by the waters of the mountain lake of Galilee and addressed to the multitude that surrounded Him this gracious invitation (Hebrews 1:3; Romans 8:3; Proverbs 17:17; Isaiah 53:3). 

But we now know, or may know, more of Him than they knew to Whom these words were spoken. We know Him as the First and the Last, and the Living One Who was dead, and is alive forevermore. We hear the invitation from Gethsemane; we hear it from Calvary; we hear it from the celestial throne. He was delivered for our offenses; He was wounded for our transgressions; He was raised for our justification; He is exalted for our sanctification (the process by which God conforms believers to His character); He will come again for our eternal salvation. His words reveal the Father still as does His finished redemption work, and as does His Holy Spirit when He illuminates the darkened soul.

Jesus is the revelation of God. He is unique. Colossians 1:15, “For by Him were all things were created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by Him and for Him.” 2:9, “For in Him [Christ] dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.” These are the strong testimonies of the divine nature of Christ. He is not only equal to God, He is God! 

John 1:16-18, “And of [from] His fulness have all we received, and grace for grace. For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him.”

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