Jesus here pictures humanity as struggling hard beneath a heavy load as it makes its way along the road of life. As He watches the long caravan and takes note of the growing fatigue, He is filled with compassion and calls out, "Come to Me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." With the infinite power that is His as God, He offers to relieve people of their burden and give them the rest they need so much.
As we read this vivid metaphor, we are soon led to wonder what is the nature of the load that mankind is carrying. And what will Jesus do to lift that burden from human shoulders? What type of rest will then follow? It is natural to think of the load of responsibility we face in meeting the demands of daily living. As we progress in age, this burden gradually gets more monotonous and tiresome, and many people give way beneath it. Although the Lord promises elsewhere in Scripture to help us bear even this burden, no where does He say He will take it away from us and totally relieve us of it. Concerning this burden we are rather told that "each will have to bear his own load," (Gal. 6:5).
Without examining and eliminating all the other alternatives, the limitations of space here force us to come to the point. There can be no doubt that the load under which Jesus sees mankind stoop and groan is the burden of sin. The context of the verse indicates it, for Jesus had just spoken of the sins of the people of Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum, towns of Galilee. He had favored their residents with His personal presence and the miraculous demonstrations of His power more than others, and yet they had failed to repent. In their blindness they struggled on under their load of sin and refused to accept the relief offer by Jesus.
It is said that "the way of the treacherous is their ruin," (Pro. 13:15). In other words, the road of life is very difficult for those who choose to transgress the law of God. They stumble along under the burden of their sins. We are also urged to consider this: "Do you not know that if you present yourself to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?" (Rom. 6:16). Sin is here presented as a tyrannical master who subjects people to his oppressive burden that will eventually crush them to death. This is the burden that Jesus will lift from those who accept His invitation and come to Him.
How does He relieve this burden? This question is answered by an apostle, "He (Jesus) Himself bore our sins in His body upon the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness," (I Pet. 2:24). When Jesus went to His death on the cross, He took with Him the burden of sin of every person in every generation. When anyone responds to His call to "come to Me" in faith and obedience, He removes the sin from that person's soul and gives him rest. This "rest" is freedom from the tyranny of sin and the death to which it inevitably leads. Returning to Romans 6 we read further, "But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set from sin, have become slaves of righteousness," (vs. 17-18).
Only Jesus offers rest from the cruel burden of sin, because only Jesus died as the perfect sacrifice for all man's transgressions. The world contains many in religion who call upon us to come and follow them in their doctrine, but only Jesus offers to take our sins upon Himself, pay their price, and give us rest.
