When I Am Overwhelmed Series

Jesus Is Still Sovereign

Matthew 11:28-30

When I Am Overwhelmed

I am not going to presume that your feelings through this time of COVID-19 are the same as mine. But I think it would be true to say that most of us

… perhaps even all of us.

… have had moments when we have felt overwhelmed.

Where we feel we are emotionally drowning.

Where there is a sense of defeat.

Where we feel … burdened.

Now, maybe, when I said that word … “burdened” … maybe your mind started to recall a verse from Scripture.

Matthew 11:28-30

28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

You who overwhelmed … Come to Me.

Come to Me and let my power reassure you.

Come to Me an let my peace carry you.

Come to me and let the journey we have had up to now be the journey that gives you stability.

When you are awake at 2:00am … come to me.

When you feel house bound and shut-in … come to me.

When there is tension in your home because we are driving each other crazy … come to me.

Pick-up the weary … pick-up the burden … and come to me.

The weary described here is the weariness related to work and labour. Reaping in the field. Fishing for the market. Walking on a long journey between cities. It is also a weariness which comes from being worn out by the work of life, and the tiredness that comes through physical exertion. There is also a weariness that might come when we are in the Lord spiritually, and it also has the potential to wear us out.

1 Corinthians 15:9-10

For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.

If we do the Lord’s work in our own strength … without the grace of God … we will become weary.

The burden spoken of here is that which occurs when we are placed under unrealistic expectations and when we have to carry ongoing pressure.

Like constantly having to hold something above our head.

Slowly, eventually, the pressure of this will get us down and we can’t do it anymore. Such burden can happen in a spiritual sense as well – where religion causes a burden.

Luke 11:46

Jesus replied, “And you experts in the law, woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them.”

You who are weary … you who are burdened … you who are overwhelmed.

Physically. Emotionally. Spiritually.

You who are weary … burdened … and overwhelmed … are you coming to Jesus? Or are you going somewhere else?

Are you going to a place of distraction?

Are you going to a place of enjoyment?

Are you going to a place of luxury?

Are you going to a place of guilt?

Are you going to a place of avoidance?

Are you going to a place of diversion?

Are you going to a place of hatred?

Are these the places you go when you who are weary … burdened … overwhelmed?

You might go there.

You can go there.

You may have gone there.

But I can guarantee that when you go to these places you don’t find rest.

Ohh … you will find something.

Maybe for a moment you feel good.

Or maybe for a moment you give yourself a break.

Or maybe for a moment you occupy your life.

A momentary distraction. A fleeting sense of satisfaction. A laugh. A memory. An instant where you find yourself.

It is all possible to achieve when you don’t go to Jesus.

But you will never find soul-reviving rest.

Only when the weary and burden go to Jesus do they find rest.

Revelation 2:2-3 (to church in Ephesus)

2 I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked people, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. 3 You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary.

Did you hear that? In the face of hardship you have not grown weary.