I hate to give the devil his due, but I think it was the Rolling Stones who said, “You can’t always get what you want, but you get what you need.” That statement is true here this morning in regards to our subject before us. It’s perhaps not what we would want to hear, or would want to consider on this Sunday morning, but it’s what we need to hear. It's like when we feed our children, we don't always give them what they like to eat, we sometimes need to give them what they need. What is good for them.
In the next chapter of Hebrews, the author accuses the Christians there of having a nutritional deficit. As it says in chapter 5:12-14 “For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.”
Now I think that sentiment is behind a lot of what the author of Hebrews is writing in the passage before us today. He’s writing to Christians, I believe, but Christians who are lagging in their spiritual development.
Some commentators distinguish between the intended recipients as either Christians, or in some passages, non Christian Jews. But I think that it actually is written to all Christians, but perhaps particularly to immature Christians, who might stop short of entering into all that their salvation was intended to produce. And in that respect, I think it is very contemporary. Because I think there are a lot of Christians today who are at risk of falling short in terms of spiritual maturity.
And so far the epistle has given three warnings to Christians. The first was a warning against drifting away in chapter 2. The second was a warning against hardening your hearts in chapter 3. And now we see a third, which is the possibility of not entering God’s rest in chapter 4. All of which are speaking primarily to believers. I think the author is exhorting Christians to continue to be strong in their faith and not come short of all that God has designed our salvation to produce in us.
Now one of the great benefits of our salvation is peace, contentment, and rest. That is one of the promised blessings of salvation. Jesus said in Matthew 11:28 "Come unto Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.” And again in John 14:27 "Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.”
That sounds like something that we could all use, doesn’t it? Peace and rest. I suppose that’s why many of you came to the beach, to seek rest, to try to find some peace out of all the hustle and bustle and stress of the world that you may have been caught up in all year. Peace and rest are great blessings that God has promised to His children, and yet if we are honest, most of us would probably admit that is not our daily experience. And so this passage we are looking at today is dealing with rest. How we can enter that rest that God has promised us.
The passage starts on that premise in vs1, “Therefore, let us fear if, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you may seem to have come short of it.” That is something to be feared- that we should come short of this rest that God has promised. That would be a tragedy, that we might have rest available, but yet fail to appropriate it and experience it for ourselves. The good news is that it is obviously intended for us to have it now. It’s not something that was only available to the early church, or as the preceding chapter indicates, it was not a rest exclusive to the ancient Israelites who had been wandering in the wilderness for 40 years, waiting to enter the promised land, the land of rest. But God’s rest is available to us today. It is a blessing of salvation, and furthermore, it is an essential element of salvation.
Let me explain it in regards to salvation this way. Salvation is composed of three elements, all of which are necessary. First is justification, second is sanctification, and the third is glorification. Justification is the defeat of the penalty of sin. Sanctification is the defeat of the power of sin. Glorification is the defeat of the presence of sin, and that happens when we are resurrected to new life with a glorified, sinless body.
But it is in fully realizing and appropriating all the victory that is available in Christ that we are truly set free. It is only when we appropriate all that salvation offers, that we truly can have peace and be truly at rest.
I think this idea of rest is best illustrated by the idea of a flock of sheep that are under the care of the shepherd. Jesus likened Himself to a shepherd, even the door of the sheepfold, and he who enters in by Him will go in and out and find pasture. Rest is not sleeping, nor some sort of eternal bliss, but it is a life under the care and comfort of the Good Shepherd, a life that has peace knowing that He is guiding and providing all that is good in life. That life in Him is abundant life, fruitful life. Fully trusting and following and living under the authority and direction of the Shepherd produces the rest that the sheep must have if they are to grow and mature and have the abundant life that God wants for them to have. Sheep must have that rest if they are to be healthy and flourish. They can’t survive on their own outside of the care of the flock. So this rest which is provided by the Shepherd is essential to their life. All the comfort and security and peace that the sheep need in order to thrive is found in complete submission to the Shepherd’s care and direction.
What Hebrews is warning against, and exhorting us to, is for Christians to fully enter in to all that their salvation promises. So many Christians come short in that they are happy to receive justification, but they come short of sanctification. And without sanctification, they will fail to receive the rest and blessings and spiritual development that their salvation is designed to produce.. They want justification, but then they want to live in the flesh. But sanctification is learning to live in the Spirit’s control.
Now the author goes back to the former illustration which he used in chapter 3, which is that of the Israelites who wandered in the wilderness for 40 years, and were not able to enter God’s rest because of unbelief. He says, in vs2, “For indeed we have had good news preached to us, just as they also; but the word they heard did not profit them, because it was not united by faith in those who heard.” The disobedient Israelites then are to be a warning for us, in that they had the good news preached to them, they had the promises of God, and yet they failed to enter all that God had promised them. In the same way, he is saying we have had the good news preached to us, we know the promises of God for rest and peace, but if we are not careful we will forfeit them by failing to continue in our faith.
I want to make sure that you know what he is talking about here though. He uses some words or phrases almost interchangeably. For instance, in vs2 he says their hearing the gospel wasn’t profitable because it was not united by faith. In chapter 3:19 it says they were not able to enter His rest because of unbelief. In vs18 it says they were unable to enter because of disobedience. In chap.4 vs 6 it says they failed to enter because of disobedience. In vs11 we’re warned “let us be diligent to enter that rest, so that no one will fall, through following the same example of disobedience.” So it’s clear that unbelief and a lack of faith and disobedience are all ways of speaking of the same thing. A lack of faith is a lack of believing in what God has promised, and because you don’t really believe the promises that results in disobedience to the truth of God, which prohibits you from experiencing the rest of God.
When the Israelites refused to enter the land, it was an act of disobedience, as well as fundamentally a lack of faith. So we see that disobedience is a lack of faith, and a lack of faith results in disobedience. Faith is not just an intellectual thing, or an emotive quality. Faith is action. Faith is doing what God says. Disobedience is acting on your own wisdom, according to your instincts. Faith is never inactive, but active. Thus James says, faith without works is dead.
We sometimes camp out so strongly on salvation is by grace and not works, which is true, but in so doing often neglect to emphasize that faith produces works. James says in chapter 2:20-22, 24 “But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless? Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up Isaac his son on the altar? You see that faith was working with his works, and as a result of the works, faith was perfected; ... 24 You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone.”
Now if James can say that man is justified by faith and works, then it certainly is true that man also is sanctified by faith and works. It’s not just the hearing of the gospel but by the appropriation of it, the doing of it, by which we receive the profit of our salvation.
So, he says in vs3, we who appropriate the promises enter that rest. We who act on the promises in faith, enter into the rest of God. But what exactly is this rest of God? Some people have traditionally thought of the rest as referring to the hereafter, the rest of heaven. But I believe that what is really meant here is the rest that God promises to His people is the rest that He himself enjoys. And that’s illustrated by the author’s reference to Genesis 2:2. , where God is said to have rested on the seventh day from His work of creation.
I noticed something about creation in studying this that I have never seen before. In each day of creation, the Bible is careful to say about every day that it is an actual 24 hour period. And in each case it says, and it was evening and morning, the first day, or the second day, etc. Evening and morning is given for each day, until you come to the seventh day. And no mention is made of evening and morning. And the reason for that is because it symbolizes that God’s rest is continuing. It is a rest that is meant to be shared with His people who respond to Him in faith and obedience.
That’s why in the previous chapter the author quoted from Psalm 95, in which God warns that they shall not enter His rest. He says today do not harden your hearts in disobedience, and thus forfeit the rest that God has promised. That was a promise and a warning to the Israelites under Joshua, and it was a promise and a warning to the Israelites under David who were by then living in the land of promise, but still had not come to that rest, and it’s a promise to us, who are Christians under the Lord Christ, who are being warned not to come short of that rest. God’s rest has been open to His children since the time of creation, but it can be forfeited by disobedience.
Therefore, it says in vs6, it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly had the gospel preached to them failed to enter because of disobedience. But the rest of God remains open for us to enter. The promises of God are still in effect. And in fact, the Holy Spirit urges you to enter it today. Today, He says, do not harden your hearts. To put it off is to harden your heart. Today is the acceptable day. Do not harden your hearts by the deceitfulness of sin. That’s from vs 13 of the previous chapter. That’s what it means to harden your hearts. To follow your own wisdom, to reject the word of God, to think that you know better than the Lord. That’s the deceitfulness or the lie of sin, and it ends up hardening your heart to even further disobedience against God. Today repent of your rebellion, repent of your unbelief, and God will give you His rest as you follow Him in faith and obedience.
Vs.8 says, “For if Joshua had given them rest, He would not have spoken of another day after that. So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.” Now what day is that? It’s not Saturday, it’s not Sunday, it’s not sometime in the future, it’s Today. It’s not sometime in the past, or in the future, in the sweet by and by, but it remains available, and it is today. Today do not harden your hearts, but enter into His rest. God’s rest is available today.
So what is the rest, that God promises to us? I believe it is the rest from our works, and allowing Christ to work in us. It is the rest from our purposes, and allowing God’s purposes to work in us. It is the rest from the insistent desires of our flesh, and Christ living in us through the Spirit. It’s not relying on our strength, but relying on God’s strength. It’s not confidence in our wisdom, but confidence in God’s wisdom. Here it is in a nutshell; vs10 “For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His.”
It says in Psalms 46:10, “cease striving and know that I am God.” The peace of God is found in peace with God. Cease striving against Him. And allow Him to be Lord of your body, soul and spirit. Matt. 11:28-30 "Come unto Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. "Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. "For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”
In our flesh we say, “Oh, the way of God is too hard. It’s not much fun to be a Christian. I have too many things I want to do. I want to live life to the fullest.” But God says the way of the sinner is hard, but the way of the Lord is easy.
So now we know what God’s rest is, the next question is how do we appropriate it? How do we enter it? Well, we’ve established it’s through obedience, but obedience to what? The answer is obedience to the word of God. Vs.12. “For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”
The word of God, the word that I am preaching, is not the word of man, but it is a living, effective, diagnostic, cleansing agent of God, which probes into the inner parts of man, to his very soul and spirt, to discern the thoughts and intentions of the heart. The word of God reveals our motives. The word of God is like a cleansing agent which scrubs away the sin which darkens our understanding and veils the light of God. It is the living agency of the Holy Spirit which brings us to repentance, which reveals the secrets of the heart. In Isaiah 55 God says that HIs word will not return void, without accomplishing His purpose. It is the path of sanctification. It is the way of life, it is the source of truth. In it we find rest.
And the word of God, likened to a two edged sword cuts and pierces the hardness of our heart. It is the tool that God uses to circumcise our hearts. And when this agent of God is employed from hearing the word preached, from reading and studying the word, then we can start to experience the rest that God has promised, as it informs our faith, and encourages our faith, and washes our hearts and minds in the word. This is where we get God’s perspective. The world hammers it’s perspective at us relentlessly, through media, entertainment, advertisements and all sorts of daily activities. But the word of God is powerful. Romans 1:16 “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” The word of God is the power of salvation to everyone who believes. You want the power of God to work out your salvation in your life? Then spend time in he word of God and follow it’s instructions and live according to it’s direction.
And just as the word of God distinguishes the thoughts and intentions of the heart, so God knows our hearts. There is nothing hidden from Him. He knows our motives. He knows how we really feel. He knows when we have sin in our heart that we are holding onto. Vs.13, “And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.”
Since God knows our hearts, then why don’t we then open our hearts to Him, and ask Him to come in, and take all the rooms of our heart as His own. To occupy all of our heart. That’s the secret to sanctification. Our loves, our life, our devotion, our feelings, our minds, all of our being we surrender to the Lord. And when we do that, we will enter into His rest. He will cleanse us from all unrighteousness. He will change our hearts, and renew in us a right spirit, that we might do the things which are pleasing to Him.
There remains available a time for us, a day for you, to enter that rest. And today is the appointed day that God wants you to come to Him. Come to Jesus today, and enter that rest. Jesus says, “Come unto Me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
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