Come Unto Me

The Primitive Monitor--June 1911

Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden and, I will give you rest;” --Matt. xi, 28.

This text has been quoted to prove that Christ is seeking to save all the race, but the words do not include all the race. Who are the laboring and heavy laden? I think it should include those who feel the weight and guilt of sin—those laboring to get rid of it, and burdened with the intolerable burden, who have seriously sought relief by the law, but found no relief. Jesus says, “Come unto me,” as if he were skilled in removing burdens from sin-burdened souls, and he is.
Maybe someone will see this who is truly “laboring, and heavy laden,” and if so, I assure you this text is for your good. The first impression of one who is enabled to see his real state is that he must do some good thing. “What good thing must I do that I might have eternal life?” I believe everyone who is blessed with a true conversion in his first conviction for sin looks to the law for relief. He says, I am a sinner both by nature and practice and am unfit to come to Christ as I am. So I must reform and improve my base before I venture on the mercy of God. Men, by nature, believe that we must in some degree deserve it, and so when they wake to see their state as it is, they try the system they had ever looked to, but I understand the words, “Come to me” to mean, “Look to me” or depend on me. The people looked to the brazen serpent, not to heal those slightly wounded by the serpent, or to heal those who had been improved by their own effort, but to heal the worst, those who were the worst. So the Son of man was lifted up, not to save good and reformed people, but to save sinners. One difficulty with men is, they forget that their sins that bear them down as a mountain weight, stand as the reason why they are to “look” to him or go to him. If their sins are few and small, then they might find relief in some other way, but if they are “five hundred pence” sinners they need a Savior skilled in taking off such burdens.

“Come to me.” Some fly to the church and its ordinances. They may do this and not “Come to me.” They try reformation, and think when they get to be fit to go to him then they will go, and so try in every way to improve, but all to no avail—they are sinners still. “He smote on his breast and said, God, be merciful to me a sinner.” The thief said, “‘When thou comest into thy kingdom remember me.” This was coming to Jesus, or it was looking to him. The thief had just said, “We suffer justly.” He not only felt unfit for heaven, but he felt unfit to live on earth. Surely, he was one of those who “labor and are heavy laden.” He had no good works to recommend him, no obedience to law, human or divine. It was a coming to him. “Nothing but sin have I to give.” Jesus replied, “Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.” It often ‘takes’ time to learn that we must come to him without one plea it our favor. The prodigal said, “I have sinned against heaven and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.” He came with no fitness to come, no worthiness, nothing but sin, and yet be was welcomed.

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