May 23 – Come to Me

Hope for Today: A Daily Devotion from Reasons for Hope*Jesus

 | Hope for Today Archive | Sign Up for Our Resources | 

“Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Matthew 11:28-29

Here Christ is commending His own meekness, both as a pattern for imitation and as an encouragement for heavy-laden sinners to draw near to Him with confidence. Rest is promised, not for the merit of our labor and humility — but merely for our coming to Him and believing in Him.

He says, “Take My yoke upon you.”  
“But how shall I take it?” says the sinner.

“Learn of Me,” says the Savior. “Let Me be your Teacher. And though you are blind and foolish, fretful and forgetful, yes, wholly polluted with sin, I can yet bear with you, because I am meek and lowly in heart — not rough and haughty to offenders, as Pharisees usually are — but full of compassion toward them, willing to receive them, and ready to forgive and comfort them.”

Come therefore to Him, O sinner, with all your loads of sin and misery. He will in no wise cast you out — but receive you gladly.

Devotion by Karl Heinrich von Bogatzky (1690—1774)