After these rather severe words of warning we get a seemingly sudden change in tone. Now Jesus is praising God that He has revealed the kingdom to children, and calling on the weary to come to Him. Jesus was strict when He needed to be strict, He was encouraging when He needed to be encouraging, and He came into the world to save the lost, to bring life to people. We need to be wary if we find we are always focusing on the judgemental side of the gospel. Equally, we need to be wary if we totally ignore the judgement side. Throughout the Bible, throughout the life of Jesus, God is very serious about sin, He is equally (in fact more so) strong on salvation.
God has hidden the truth from the "wise and learned". Now this does not mean it is wrong to be wise or learned, the book of Proverbs is a book in praise of wisdom. But we do need to be wary of becoming proud in our wisdom. As it says in Proverbs, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Men so often make anything else other than God the "beginning of wisdom". When we do that we do not become wise, we become fools.
We then learn how one can truly know the Father. It is only through the Son. Now immediately many people will object that this unfair, why cannot someone come to God by some other way, Islam or Hinduism or some other route? Verse 27 answers this, the Father has committed all things to the Son. Neither you nor I have any right to decide how God should reveal Himself to us. God has chosen to reveal Himself through Christ, and that is the end of the matter. You can argue as much as you like, but it will get you nowhere. Jesus is the only way to know the Father, to know God. And Jesus chooses to whom He will reveal the Father. Now this does not mean we have no part to play. What it does mean is that we must repent and turn to Christ, trust in Him. Then He will reveal the Father to us.
Indeed, this is what Christ calls us to do in the next verse (28). Now look at this. Jesus chooses to whom He will reveal the Father. So man in his stupidity and arrogance argues that this is unfair and gets all uptight about it. But Jesus calls the weary and burdened, He calls us to come to Him, and then we will find rest. Man accuses God of being unfair and harsh, but it is the heart of man that is unfair and harsh.
When we ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil we took upon ourselves a heavy yoke. We tried to make out that we were gods, but cannot bear the burden. If we turn to Christ and take His yoke upon us far from finding it burdensome, we will find great rest and relief for our souls.
When we make Christ Lord of our life we make things an awful lot easier!
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