May 30, 2004

THE REST-GIVER

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest" (Matthew 11:28, NIV).

One of my favorite pastimes is helping my wife, Carla, with her never-ending garden chores. At the end of a typical summer day in Florida with its depressing heat and high humidity, the body demands rest and will accept no substitute for it. So it is with our tired souls and troubled minds.

Christ's gracious invitation, "Come... and I will give you rest" (Matthew 11:28, NIV), is precisely what is needed for a world weary and burdened by sin. Christ's invitation to rest is both an invitation and also a precious promise. Are you burdened by the weight of sin and guilt? Come. Come with your anxieties and fears, come with your perplexities and problems, come with your cares and troubles, come with your frustrations and unfulfilled dreams, come with all your spiritual, social, and mundane burdens because you have Christ's guaranteed promise, "I will give you rest" (Matthew 11:28, NIV). He will give us the rest of grace when we cease from our own efforts to earn salvation.

This marvelous promise of rest spans the present and the future. The ultimate realization of this rest is that eternal and uninterrupted rest that remains for the people of God (see Hebrews 4:8, 9). What a glorious prospect--an eternity of joyous, productive, rejuvenating rest in the company of the ever-present Rest-Giver! In the meantime, always remember that, "the Saviour alone can give us the rest and peace we so much need. And, in every invitation He gives us to seek the Lord that He may be found of us. He is calling us to abide in Him. This is an invitation, not merely to come to Him, but to remain in Him."--This Day With God, p. 140.

My Prayer Today: Lord, in my soul weariness, I respond to Your invitation and come to You for rest. Amen.