Revealing the Heart of Jesus

Matthew 11:27-30 and 12:15-21

We’re studying through the Gospel of Matthew. There are two scriptures close to each other – in chapter 11 and 12 – that speak about the heart of Jesus – OR perhaps more directly, the heart of God.

They are wonderful scriptures to help us think about why God sent his Son to earth to die of our sins – and what all that really means. We have entered into the Lenten season. In 4 weeks we will celebrate Easter. Before that we need to spend some time reflecting upon the crucifixion – the terrible way Jesus died on the cross – and why.

So lets’ get started.

Illustration - Back in 1990 Malcolm Forbes died of a sudden heart attack. He was one of the richest men in America. A magazine mogul and real estate magnet. He is the father of Steve Forbes. Steve is still the owner of Forbes Magazine like his father. He is often a news expert on the TV networks and has run for political office – a popular individual. Anyway, Malcolm was quite the flamboyant personality throwing his money around to impress people. For his 70 birthday he threw a 2.5 million dollar party for himself and 800 friends.

Well, he did something quite generous for his employees and others when he died. It made headline news back in 1990. Upon his death, his will provided for all of his employees to receive an extra weeks pay - sort of his way to thank them. Then, he also forgave everybody who owed him anything. He forgave them their debt.

 I don’t know much about Malcolm Forbes but many people know more about him than they know about Jesus. AND YET Jesus forgave the greatest debt for all humankind – Jesus forgives us of our sins. He forgives the rebellion of our hearts.

I want to talk about the love of God that is so big that he willingly forgives us of our misdeeds to him, our hurts to each other, and our past rebellion towards his Son. Why does God do that? When we find that answer we discover the reason for the Lenten Season.

 Alexandre Rodolphe Vinet once wrote “The Christian faith does not consist in the belief that we are saved, but in the belief that we are loved."  Jesus says it this way in today’s scripture: “Come to me all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens and I will give you rest. I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

The prophecy in Matthew 12 also reveals something of God’s heart towards us. God says, “Look at my servant, he is my Beloved. And I will pour out my Spirit upon him and he will proclaim peace and justice to the nations. His name will be the hope of all the world.”

The Apostle John in his Gospel writes: “God so loved the world that he gave us his Son.” The whole reason Jesus came to earth was to demonstrate God’s love for us. I love what someone once wrote. “God does a whole lot more in trying to get us into heaven than he would ever try doing to keep us out.” In reality – God never tries to keep us out. That’s his heart for us. For some strange reason however, we tend to forget that quite easily.

The reason Jesus journeyed to the cross was not because

            a.) he had no choice.

            b.) he was doing God’s will.

            c.) It was the only way to save us.

He journeyed to the cross because he loved us. And before he ever did that – God loved us. God is not just the Great Almighty; he is the Loving Father doing everything he can to rescue us for all eternity.

Illustration – The story is told of the Great Potato Famine 1845 – 52) in Ireland - that a family considered selling one of their 4 sons into slavery so that the rest could survive.

            Not the eldest though – he was their future livelihood.

            Not the second born – he was too much like his father.

            Not the third born – he was too much like his mother.

            Not the fourth born – he was the baby of the family.

They chose to suffer together rather than sacrifice any one of their sons. I would hope we would feel the same way and do the same thing as parents.

Now imagine God’s dilemma when he chose to give away his only begotten Son to die on the cross, that whosoever believed in Him should not perish but have eternal life.

God offered his Son because he loved us that much. And he still does!

Illustration – Of a woman dying in the nursing home of heart disease. She was so afraid of dying. She spoke of it often. I asked her about this once and she told me a bit about her life – AND how she felt like she had NOT been good enough to really be saved by God.

Here’s an important lesson – Salvation is not based on our deeds but on God’s love.

Salvation is not even based on our faith as much as it’s based on God’s love for us.

 In one Gospel story a rich man comes to Jesus and asks him, “What must I do to receive eternal life?”

I have been asked that question in a dozen different ways a hundred times in my career as a pastor.

The answer is this – Believe in the love of God. I don’t know why that kind of belief (or faith) is such a difficult thing to accomplish for many people but it is.

Most everybody knows the Bible verse – John 3:16 “For God so loved the world..” But not everybody knows the next verse. “God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him.” Why – because he loves us that much.

Love is the only thing that can forgive our rebellion, our sinful nature, and the guilt that follows that. The cross, and Jesus’ journey to that cross was God’s act of forgiveness towards us. The reason for LENT is God’s love.

We’ve lost sight of that in recent years. Love of self has become a dominant theme in much of our popular psychology and how we live out our lives. The assortment of self-help books on the shelves in the bookstores witness to that fact. I’ve even found many popular preachers telling us that we should be pursuing that. Life’s happiness can be found as you seek to love yourself, they say. One popular mega-church preacher once preached a series of sermons on Lent. LENT = Let’s Eliminate Negative Thinking.

Some of this may be all well and good but self love won’t come to the forefront until we know that someone greater than ourselves loves us even more. “For God so loved us…”

So, what is faith? Faith is the belief that God loves you. Belief is simply the process of building trust. You build trust over time. You build belief over time too.

The problem with most of us when we struggle with the things of life and don’t know where to turn is that we haven’t taken the time to build faith – a belief that we are so very loved by God. Do you want that?

I hope so. If so then try this during the next month as we move closer and closer to Easter:

1.) Read the Word of God until you accept it as wonderful. Find the logic and wisdom in it. Discover that within the words of the Bible you will find a God who loves you so much that he was willing to sacrifice his Son’s life to forgive yours. Let the Bible speak to you.

2.) Then pray – really pray, including some quiet time to listen for God’s voice. Pray like you are building a relationship with the Father.

Pray to the Son who invites you to come to him so that he can remove your heavy burdens and find rest in him. Lent is called the journey of faith. Let me invite you to take that journey and discover the Christ of the cross.