Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.
Matthew 11:28, NRSVue
Charlotte Elliott lived with long illness in Brighton, England. Years earlier, a visiting minister named Cesar Malan had told her to come to Christ just as she was.
The story most often told places her at home in 1834, about 45 years old. Her family was busy preparing a bazaar to raise money for a school her brother had founded for the daughters of clergy. Everyone else had a job to do. Charlotte was too sick to help, and she stayed behind, feeling useless.
Alone in that house, she remembered what Malan had told her, and she wrote the words down for her own comfort. They became one of the best-loved hymns in the Christian church: “Just as I am, without one plea.”
The woman who could not help at the bazaar ended up writing words that have helped people come to Christ ever since.
Maybe your week left you feeling like Charlotte. Maybe you could not do enough, or give enough, or be enough. Jesus does not ask you to clean yourself up first. His invitation is for the burdened. He says come.
So come today, tired as you are, questions and all. Set something down. The week does not have to end in a perfect score for you to receive his rest.
Prayer
Jesus, I come to you just as I am. Take what I can’t carry anymore, and give me your rest. Thank you for loving me here. Amen.
Today’s step
Take ten quiet minutes with no phone, and breathe.
The story: History of Hymns: Just As I Am, UMC Discipleship
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.