GOD’S WORD FOR APRIL 11 ~ ~ Matthew 11:28 ~ ~ “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
We are reading from Andrew Murray’s famous and beloved classic book from the late 1800’s ~ ~ “Abide in Christ.”
Rest for the soul: such was the first promise with which the Savior sought to win the heavy-laden sinner. Though it appears simple, the promise is indeed as large and comprehensive as can be found. Rest for the soul – does it not imply deliverance from every fear, the supply of every need, the fulfillment of every desire? And now nothing less than this is the prize with which the Savior woos back the wandering one – who is mourning that the rest has not been as abiding or as full as he had hoped – to come back and abide in Him. Nothing but this was the reason that the rest has either not been found or, if found, has been disturbed or lost again: you did not abide with, you did not abide in, Him.
Have you ever noticed how, in the original invitation of the Savior to come to Him, the promise of rest was repeated twice, with such a variation in the conditions as might have suggested that abiding rest could only be found in abiding nearness. First, the Savior said, “COME TO ME….AND I WILL GIVE YOU REST”; the very moment you come and believe, I will give you rest – the rest of pardon and acceptance – the rest in My love.
But we know that all that God bestows needs time to become fully our own; it must be held fast and appropriated and assimilated into our inmost being; without this, not even Christ’s giving can make it our very own in full experience and enjoyment. And so the Savior repeats His promise, in words that clearly speak not so much of the initial rest with which He welcomes the weary one who comes, but of the deeper and personally appropriated rest of the soul that abides with Him. He now not only said, “come to me,” but also, “TAKE MY YOKE UPON YOU, AND LEARN OF ME”: become My scholars, yield yourselves to My training, submit in all things to My will, let your whole life be one with Mine – in other words, “ABIDE IN ME.”
Then He adds, not only, “I WILL GIVE,” but also, “YOU SHALL FIND — REST TO YOUR SOULS.” The rest He gave at coming will become something you have really found and made your very own – the deeper, abiding rest that comes from longer acquaintance and closer fellowship, from entire surrender and deeper sympathy. This is the path to abiding rest.