Calvary Road Baptist Church
“COME UNTO ME” Part 2
Matthew 11.28
Turn in your Bible to Matthew 11, and read six verses with me. We will read Matthew 11.25-30, but I will only preach on Matthew 11.28:
25 At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes.
26 Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in thy sight.
27 All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and 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.
28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.
30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
From verses 25-26, the Lord Jesus Christ’s brief prayer to His heavenly Father shows us that some things are revealed to babes that are concealed from the wise and prudent of this world. Thus, you have no reason to think you are deprived of spiritual secrets those with more experience, more money, or more education may have. Quite the contrary. Such are seen here to be disadvantages to receiving spiritual insight. Then, from the comment He makes in verse 27, we see that no one knows God the Father except the Lord Jesus Christ, and those He reveals the Father to. Therefore, there is no possible way to know God except by knowing His Son, Jesus Christ.
If you knew nothing else from the Bible, you would know from those three verses that your dealings must be with Jesus Christ or you will never know God. He is it. He is the exclusive and unique avenue of approach to God the Father.
After these verses, John 14.6 is no surprise. In that verse Jesus said to Thomas, “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.”
To restate the truth from last week’s look at this same text, though the outworking of a sinner’s salvation by Jesus Christ’s suffering, and bleeding, and dying on the cross, was a profoundly difficult thing to do, so difficult that only Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of the living God could do it, what the sinner must do to receive the benefit of Christ’s saving work is astonishingly simple.
If you will come to Jesus, He will save you. The challenge is not to come to Him physically, of course, since the crowd He was speaking to in our text had already come to Him after a fashion physically. They had already journeyed from city or village to get to where He was teaching and preaching. Therefore, it is clear from the context that Jesus was not speaking of anyone physically coming to Him.
Keeping in mind that one portion of God’s Word must always be in harmony with truths taught elsewhere, what can we say about this matter of coming to Jesus? Salvation from sins is by grace through faith. Numerous passages in the Bible clearly show that to be true.[1] Therefore, coming to Jesus is just another way of referring to being saved from your sins through faith in Jesus Christ. The difference, of course, is that coming to Jesus is something you can picture in your mind. Coming to Jesus is a concept that children can grasp. Coming to Jesus is even something the most hard-bitten reprobate can conceive of, since even the lost refer to times of great regret and sorrow over mistakes made or sins committed as “come to Jesus time.”
Thus, we see that God in Christ has greatly condescended to not only suffer and bleed and die for the sins of sinners, but He has also greatly condescended to make the single, necessary step resulting in salvation so amazingly simple, that many times sinners are shocked that the wonders of God’s grace are promised through so simple a step as coming to Christ. Yet as simple as coming to Jesus Christ is, so simple that no explanation of how to come to Christ is ever given in the Bible, so simple that even little children are invited to come to Christ in the same way as everyone else, there are so many who do not come to Christ. Most, in fact, do not come to Christ.
In Matthew 7.13, the Lord Jesus Christ warned, “. . . wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat.”
If you are here this morning in a lost condition, whether you are non-religious and lost or very religious and lost, you are still lost. You are still undone. You are yet in your sins. You still need the salvation from sins that only Jesus Christ provides. You still need to come to Jesus, though most sinners will not come to Him.
Two points in my sermon this morning:
First, WHY YOU SHOULD COME TO CHRIST
Let me give you four reasons, each of them sufficient in themselves, why you should come to Jesus Christ.
First, you are commanded to come to Christ by the Lord Jesus Christ, Himself. Jesus Christ is the eternal Son of the living God. He is the Second Person of the triune godhead, sent from heaven’s glory to bear the sins of many and save them from their sins, thus sparing them the wrath of God. However, keep in mind that the Lord Jesus Christ is not issuing an onerous command when He says, “Come unto me.” To be sure, it is a directive. However, it is a directive to lost sheep, who are wandering far away. In another passage, He said, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish.”[2] Keep in mind that in Christianity there is no ritual that insinuates itself between you and God. Neither is there a mortal man who would pretend to mediate between you and God. The faith once delivered to the saints is a faith in which God’s Son interposes Himself between the sinner and the holy God, and reconciles the sinner to God. Keep in mind that when Jesus Christ directs you to “Come unto me,” you are being notified that a meeting between God and man is about to take place, and will take place when you respond. Only Jesus Christ can arrange such a meeting, which is why you should come to Him.
Next, you are so needy of the salvation that only He provides that you should come to Christ. You are in no position to dictate terms. You are in no position to negotiate. You are entirely at a disadvantage when it comes to your standing before the thrice-holy God. You are dead in trespasses and sins and He is the God of all the living, Creator and Sustainer of all things. If you were standing in a dark alley, with just enough light from a far away streetlight to see the very large pistol your attacker is pointing at you, would you be so foolish as to question his demands for your money and your credit cards? Would you barter with his demand for your ring? With him holding the gun, what do you have to bargain with? Now, God is holy and not a criminal and you are a wretched sinner and not by any means a victim. However, the point that I seek to make is the same in both illustrations. You are in no position to barter, to negotiate, or to stall. You are dying of thirst in the hot desert. You are profoundly needy of that which only the Lord Jesus Christ supplies. You are spiritually dead and He is the author of life. You so desperately need what He supplies in abundance that should you not come to Christ you will finally, utterly, eternally, perish. So, come to Him because you need Him.
Third, you are so helpless to save yourself from your sins that you should come to Christ. You have no doubt heard the cruel and heartless jokes that are told at the expense of those with profound ailments. “What do you call a man on your doorstep with no arms or legs? Matt.” “What do you call a man in the water with no arms or legs? Bob.” That type of humor reflects the slide of our culture into the degenerate pit that first century
Finally, you should come to Jesus Christ because of His loveliness and attractiveness. What good does it do to describe the Lord Jesus Christ in terms that are difficult to comprehend? When I speak of majesty and glory, or when I make reference to omnipotence or transcendence, do most people grasp what I am talking about? I do not think so. However, what happens when I describe the reactions of those who saw Him, who heard Him, who touched Him, who watched Him, and who ministered to Him? Would that help you appreciate His loveliness and attractiveness? At a wedding that ran low on wine, He turned the water into wine, thereby guaranteeing the success of the wedding feast. He spoke as one that had authority, yet people by the thousands surrounded Him to hear what He had to say. Why? “Never man spake like this man.”[3] Little children were eager to come into His presence, and He had to warn His disciples to leave them alone so they would not bar their access to Him. Without the slightest effeminacy, He was a man women felt entirely comfortable around. Yet at the same time, His inner circle was manly fishermen.
Let me read what one woman did for the Lord Jesus Christ:
36 And one of the Pharisees desired him that he would eat with him. And he went into the Pharisee’s house, and sat down to meat.
37 And, behold, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster box of ointment,
38 And stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment.[4]
Why did she do that? Maybe she did it for the same reason another woman did almost the same thing on another occasion:
6 Now when Jesus was in
7 There came unto him a woman having an alabaster box of very precious ointment, and poured it on his head, as he sat at meat.
8 But when his disciples saw it, they had indignation, saying, To what purpose is this waste?
9 For this ointment might have been sold for much, and given to the poor.
10 When Jesus understood it, he said unto them, Why trouble ye the woman? for she hath wrought a good work upon me.
11 For ye have the poor always with you; but me ye have not always.
12 For in that she hath poured this ointment on my body, she did it for my burial.[5]
God apparently illuminated those women in a way He illuminated the understand of few others. They knew the Lord Jesus Christ was going to die for sins and be buried. But what I want you to pay attention to is the fact that He was approachable. They did not fear coming to Him. So, whether it be Simon Peter and John, or Lazarus and his two sisters Mary and Martha, or the woman caught in the act of adultery, or the thief on the cross . . . there was an essence, a quality, an attraction, that showed sinners who wanted forgiveness that they had nothing to fear from Him, that they could come to Him. How can the Lord Jesus Christ be unapproachable if children felt the liberty to flock to Him, if sinful women felt they could come to Him, if sincere Pharisees could approach Him, if Romans, lepers, blind men, and cripples could come to Him? If all those different types of sinners wanted to come to Him, and did come to Him, and never regretted coming to Him, why do you not come to Him?
Last, WHY MOST DO NOT COME TO CHRIST
Two lines of thought:
First, consider that sinners will not come to Jesus Christ. Why will sinners not come to Christ? If you finally die in your sins, what explanation will there be for your refusal to simply come to Christ?
It may be that you are too proud to come to Christ. When you keep in mind that God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble,[6] you must own up to the fact that coming to Christ, though a very simple step of faith and obedience to Christ’s command, is also a humble step of faith and obedience. Is that the root of you refusal, that you are proud? If that is the case, let me ask you what good your pride ever did you, what benefit you have ever derived from your pride? Simply set your pride aside as you would a filthy garment before taking a bath and come to Christ.
It may be that you do not recognize the gospel’s simplicity. You would not be the first person who thought that salvation was just too wonderful and glorious to be gained by so simple a step as coming to Christ. However, keep in mind that the cost of salvation is so high, the price that has been paid in the doing and dying of Jesus Christ is so exorbitant, that there is simply nothing left to be done but to come to Jesus. Jesus paid it all, as the gospel song says. All to Him I owe. So, for God to demand anything more of sinners than to come to His Son would diminish the significance of what Jesus Christ did on
Third, it may be that you still love your sins. It is the ministry of the Holy Spirit to persuade sinners that as pleasurable and desirable as sins first seem to be, they yield up a bitter fruit in the end. Thus, it may very well be that John 3.19 speaks to your case: “. . . men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.” What I would suggest you do is reconsider your sins in light of what Jesus Christ offers. Which will bear bitter fruit in the end? Which will lead to destruction? Which will doom your soul to hellfire? Admit that you love your sins, but then decide to turn from them and come to Christ! That is what you need to do.
Finally, consider that sinners cannot come to Jesus Christ. I would like you to turn to John 6, and read verses 44 and 65 with me:
44 No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.
65 And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.
You cannot come to Jesus Christ unless the Father draws you, verse 44, unless it is given to you of the Father, verse 65.
This whole matter of salvation is a great puzzlement to men, all the while being a great work of God. On the one hand, we are told to do something. Yet, on the other hand, we are informed that we can do nothing.
So, what are you to do? You are to try to come to Christ, and continue trying to come to Christ until you do. When you come to Christ, you will look back on your experience and see that God drew you by various means, and that He gave it to you to come to Jesus.
You can see that you should come to Christ, but that most will not. Be different. Keep on coming until you get to Him. You will find that He is well worth the struggle and effort.
[1] Genesis 15.6; Romans 4.5, 5.1; Galatians 3.22; Ephesians 2.8-9
[2] John 10.27-28
[3] John 7.46
[4] Luke 7.36-38
[5] Matthew 26.6-12
[6] James 4.6
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