Jesus exhorts us with a famous saying in Matthew 11:28, “Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”

God is omnipresent. He is everywhere. Yet we often do not feel Him or are unconscious of His abiding presence. We are instead caught in the rut of our feelings and our struggles. So, where is God? Is He anywhere near to be found?

As from the days of creation, God calls out to mankind, “Where are you?” Even though Adam and Eve sinned against God, God demonstrated His heart to initiate His loving pursuit. This is God’s heart: He yearns for men to return to the TRUE SOURCE of life; to restore the relationship between God and man.

Despite our sin, God knows our confusion; our loss in direction. He knows our inability to sustain TRUE life apart from His presence. To this end, God devised His plan from the early beginnings of the world to send Jesus as His extension of love to humanity. Through Jesus, God becomes EMMANUEL - God with us - in person, in actual reality.

This Jesus - the Son of Man who walked the earth, tasted every human sorrows, empathized the constraints living in a fallen world - is GOD WITH US. Jesus calls us who are weary and burdened with responsibilities, fear and anxieties to find rest in Him. Yet we are often too focused on our emotional loads and pressures. We come to God in prayer but our focus remains unchanged; still fixated on the burdens. To that, God calls us to COME. The remedy is learning to COME.

“COME to JESUS” carries an inward posture first before a physical outward expression of religious activity.

• To come means we acknowledge His sovereignty, His ability to transcend our struggles.
• To come means we become more conscious of His presence rather than the preoccupation of our pain, confusion and frustration.
• To come means we drop our inadequacy.
• To come means we stop hiding behind our facades.
• To come means a willingness to bare our soul, trusting God knows and He understands deeply.
• To come is to yield to Jesus.
• It is a surrendering of our control, our fears and expectations.
• It is a surrendering to His DIVINE PERSONALITY and allowing His PRESENCE to captivate our focus.

When this happens, JESUS imparts HIS PEACE. Though the situation itself may remain unchanged, it doesn’t matter… because we are now found at rest in the EMBRACE of our Saviour. This is when we find true rest from the turmoil within and without.

So, come to JESUS today, as just you are. JUST COME and YIELD to His love and goodness.

Till Heaven fills every home,

Rev Bryan Tan