Come to Me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. (Matthew 11:28 NLT)
What did He mean? The burden of the law was
upon the people, indeed, it was a heavy burden for them. The Pharisees gave more
than two thousand interpretations to the law of Moses, and said: 'The law of
Moses does not mean that you have only to keep ten commandments; it means that
you have to keep two thousand.' There was not a point in all their human life
where this law was not applied and made their lives difficult. And all this was
gathered up into the Sabbath: 'You must not make your bed on the Sabbath! You
must not carry your bed on the Sabbath! You must not poke your fire on the
Sabbath! You must do nothing on the Sabbath - you may not even walk more than
three miles.' Two thousand regulations for their lives! The one thing that they
were meeting every day, and especially on the Sabbath, was 'You may not'.
"Come unto me, all ye that labour and are
heavy laden, and I will give you rest" (Matthew 11:28).
What has happened? Jesus has appropriated the Sabbath to
Himself. It is no longer a day of the week - it is a divine Person. (If the
Seventh Day Adventists saw that, the whole of their system would go in five
minutes!) No, Jesus is God's Sabbath. He is the end of God's works, and in Him
God has entered into His rest. This is the 'rest which remaineth for the
children of God' - not a day of the week or on the calendar, but a divine
Person, the Son of God. In Him we come to rest, and that which was our bondage
is now our servant. In Him that against which we were always struggling is now
our victory. Oh yes, Jesus is the Sabbath, and if we live in Him we shall not
spoil the Sabbath. Every day should be a day of rest to our souls. Oh, this is
a mighty thing that the Lord Jesus has done!