nd to recommend yourselves unto Christ. For to what
purpose is that anxious and scrupulous exaction of such previous
qualifications, if it be not to give some more boldness and confidence to
thy mind, to adventure to believe the promises and come to Christ, because
thou thinkest thou canst not come when thou art so unclean and so
unworthy? And therefore thou apprehendest that thou canst so purge thyself
from sin and adorn thyself with graces, as may procure some liking, and
procure some favour at Christ's hand, which is indeed very opposite to the
tenor of the proposal of free grace in the gospel in which there is
nothing upon the creature's part required as a condition or qualification
to make them the more welcome in coming to Christ.

Let this word then abide with you: "Come unto me, and take my yoke upon
you, and learn of me," which in substance is this, Come and cast your
burdens on me first, and then take my burden upon you. O it is a blessed
exchange! Cast your heavy burden upon my back, and take my light burden on
yours. For what is it to invite them that labour and are ladened to come,
but to come and repose themselves for rest upon him? And that is directly
to lay over that which burdens and ladeneth them upon him. There is an
unsupportable burden of sin, the guilt of sin, and there is an intolerable
weight of wrath. "Mine iniquities are gone over mine head (Ps. xxxviii.
4.) and as an heavy burden they are too heavy for me." And when the wrath
of God is joined to this burden, the name of the Lord burning with anger,
how may you conceive a soul will be pressed under that burden, which is so
heavy, that it will press the mountains into valleys, make the sea flee
out of its place, and the earth tremble? Now here is the invitation. Is
there any penitent soul that feels the burden of the weight of sin and
wrath? Let them come and disburden their souls of care, fear, and anxiety,
in this blessed port of rest and refuge for poor sinners. Is there a yoke
of transgressions wreathed about thy neck, and bound by the hand of God,
(Lam. i. 14) a yoke that neither men nor angels are able to bear? Then, I
beseech you, come hither, and put over your yoke upon Jesus Christ. Tie it
about him for God hath laid upon him the iniquities of us all, and he bore
our sins. He did bear the yoke of divine displeasure, and it was bound
about his neck with God's own hand, with his own consent. Now, here is the
actual liberty and the releasem