Devotions From City HarborSample

Come however you are. Come with all your heartbreaks. Come with all the mistakes you’ve made.

We’re all looking for a safe place; for healing, for acceptance. We’re looking for someone to tell us we’re okay. And deep down, we know the only solution is in the arms of Jesus. So, why do we spend so much time running away from Him?

Perhaps, we’re waiting for the right moment. We’re waiting until everything is nice and neat and tidy. The idea of going to Him when we are so clearly messed up is frightening and humiliating. We convince ourselves that to face Jesus in such a state is to be guilted and shamed. We have to fix ourselves first. Then, we can go to Him, show Him how we used to be bad, but now we’re good!

Of course, the problem here is an obvious one. The healing we need, the cure to the cancer of our own sin, is only found in Jesus Christ. And our frantic search for an alternative only succeeds in exhausting us further. We inevitably wind up collapsed in a heap on the ground, utterly spent.

We are like a drowning man who, upon stopping his thrashing, realizes he’s been struggling against the very one attempting to save him. Once we’re finally wearied of fighting, we realize there was never any need.

In Matthew 11:28, Jesus says, “Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” In the Gospel accounts, we see countless examples of Christ going to the weak, the worn out, and the messed up. He lays his own hands on people covered in dirt and riddled with sickness.

See, He is not waiting for us to get our act together. He is beckoning to us now. In fact, He will gladly take us at our worst. We need only get past our own pride, our insistence upon saving ourselves. Then, we can come covered in mud, smelling of manure, and find a father running down the path to embrace us.