Rest for Your Souls (Part 1 of 2)

The as we approach the end of another week.

I imagine you are looking forward to spending some time relaxing this weekend but that kind of rest is only temporary because there's another Monday just around the corner today on Truth for Life.

Alastair beg takes us to the book of Hebrews chapter 4 to describe the only source of lasting is titled the message rest for your soul and we begin today with prayer book with Jamil Lord, show me thy self within thy word. Show me myself and show me my Savior and make the book live to me for Jesus sake on interning now to this fourth chapter, and particularly to these first 13 verses that is one question which ought to be immediately apparent to those and one that any honest seeker will be cause to ask in making inquiries of the text which is how we learn from it. We will be forced to ask the question to what does the writer read for our when he mentions God's rest. He has been quoting from the Old Testament in relationship to this as you will see in the 11th R's of chapter 3. He has been making application audit in the remainder of what he's had to say and indeed in the first 13 verses of chapter 4 he addresses this issue of rest, some 13 times.

It is possible to approach our Bibles in the kind of fashion, which simply sets society does and where some of the difficulties and challenging portions and moves immediately to a form of devotional application that is not wrong and certainly not always wrong but it almost always brings a group of people who begin to view their Bibles not so much as that which has been provided for our instruction and for the demanding use of our minds and its consideration, but instead brings a group of people who tend to read their Bibles looking for little nuggets and blessed thoughts and of course the Bible is full of many blessed thoughts, but it is possible for us to take them out as it where totally without the context of what the Bible is saying thereby building a compendium of devotional truth without ever understanding the framework in which these truths are set and so this morning before I get to the points of application I need to address with you the very question that I raise what is then this issue of God's rest and if we were describing it in terms of diagram or mathematically, we might put it up as a kind of Venn diagram those interlocking circles, which at the points of intersection where the all have an overlap to come to the essential element of the truth that is being conveyed and that is exactly what I want to try and show you what then is this rest or how does the writer refer to it for our help will first of all, clearly the rest to which he is referring at one level refers to the expedience of a certain group of people, many, many years before, who, having made their journey through the wilderness, made it into the promised land into the land of Canaan.

There were many who did not, as we've seen in chapter 3, but there were some who accompanied Joshua and Caleb and finally made entry into the promised land. And as they were going through that period of their lives.

One of the things that would be uppermost in their thinking and in their conversation would be the prospect of their entering into the rest the promised rest which God had provided for them. And when you read the opening chapters of the Bible. The first five books in particular you find this emphasis a recurring theme.

For example in Deuteronomy 25 when the Lord your God gives you rest from all the enemies around you in the land he is giving you to possess that generate Deuteronomy 2519 and this notion would have been pervasive in that group. The context would be that they had known what it was for their forefathers to have been liberated from the bondage of Egypt. They had been told very clearly that they were heading towards the promised land that they were looking forward to a day when all of the battles in the ravaging elements of the expedience in the wilderness were behind them and they would enter into the rest that God had promised and some of them entered into that rest, but even in that rest it was only a shadow of the rest to which the writer is referring here.

Even those who experience Canaan experience the promised land did not expedience the totality the fulfillment of that which was foreshadowed in their immediate historical context that we need be no doubt about that, because in the eighth verse you have this stated clearly says the writer. If Joshua had given them rest, God would not of spoken later about another day. In other words, if that's all there was. Then there was no reason for God to speak through the psalmist in the 95th Siam many years after the expedience of settlement in the promised land and for God continually to be speaking about our rest, which still awaited the people of God. So the experience in Canaan was a shadow of that which was still coming and that is part and parcel of the way he reversed without being one of the circles of the four circle in the Venn diagram.

Secondly, we have to say that this notion of rest is directly related to the rest of God. Following his work of creation. Now again, we can say that because the Bible says verse three.

Now we who have believed enter that rest, just as God is said and he quotes the Old Testament again and then he says, and yet God's work has been finished since the creation of the world. And then he quotes from the book of Genesis about resting all from his work on the seventh day is a number of things which are important. The writer makes is aware of. First of all that God's rest has been available from the time that creation was completed in other words, it even predated the Exodus from Egypt.

This rest of God, which is something far bigger than was experienced in Canaan.

This rest was actually the rest, which he himself enjoyed having completed creation is quite afford to get our hands around, but it is helpful in seeking to understand the nature of the rest to which the right to reverse when God ceased from the work of creation he could legitimately rest because there was nothing that needed to be added to what he had done when he looks at the work of creation.

He considered it and he saw that everything was very good. Everything was exactly in its place you can imagine being given the responsibility of tidying your room and your parents come down or someone comes down and says, well, it looks fairly tidy on the outside. Now let me just begin to open one or two drawers or let me open one or two closets.

This is a whole another level of tidiness and you have managed to jam stuff away from view, and you've got the remote control and you're not watching TV you are resting. Following the completion of your work and somebody comes down, opens a few drawers opens a couple closets and says black on your feet.

Your work is not yet completed. You've hardly begun. Now when everything is absolutely in place when they're all hanging in the right way when they're all folded in the way that we prescribed. Then you could legitimately sit until that time. Your work is not done.

There is no rest for the wicked.

There is no rest for the untidy, but in God's work of creation. He can legitimately take time to rest. It was the rest from the completion of a task. It was the rest from the accomplishment of the purpose it was not a gateway to idleness. Indeed those of you whose minds are thinking ahead may well be recalling the words of Jesus in John chapter 5 where in speaking to those around me says my father is always at work and to this very day and I too am working also.

Sunday I was God resting and working well because the rest at the end of creation was an expression of the fact that everything was absolutely taken care of now. The reason this is important is because it gives us an insight into another dimension of what this rest really means in commentating on this part of it. Jeffrey Wilson, an English commentator says God established the pattern upon which man's life was to be built by following the cycle of his creative activity with his day of rest on you to train fingers through with me as an alien thought in American Christianity in the rhythmical succession of six days of work and one ensuing day of rest in each week we see the principle on which the life of humanity has been constructed.

In this way man is reminded that life is not an aimless existence, but that our goal lies beyond. So God constructs the universe and makes it absolutely perfectly.

And then rests purposefully posits, and in that in that creative ordinance is says this commentator and I believe them to be touching reality and helpfulness in that he says is actually the framework of the rhythmic cycle that is intended for all of humanity. Therefore when humanity denies the existence of a creator God and brings the link between a personal God and his creation. Then they will inevitably deny any significance to the days of creation. They will inevitably deny any rhythmic cycle that is part and parcel of the structure of humanity and he will thereby find themselves in the seasickness of a world without purpose clear every day runs into every other day ad nauseam. They will find that Hamlet was right when he looks out on this world and he said how really stale, flat and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this life because it's just another manic Monday is just another lousy Wednesday is just another boring Sunday and that's where our friends and neighbors lived their lives and sadly that's where many Christians live their lives may never have understood that God from the very origin of creation has established a principal and a pattern by which life works.

All work and no rest doesn't simply make Jack a dull boy but make semi-sad and futile creature. So today, our malls are open. Our newspaper presses are flying. Everything is going in the great rampant waste for material prosperity and the notion that the loom would be silenced or that the farmer would cease from his toil, or that the fishing boats would be gathered into the harbor.

That's an anachronism that's a silly old idea. No, no, says the writer. It's the very rhythmic cycle upon which humanity has been ordered and we have deviated from it to great distress and discomfort. No, it's not my purpose to unpack this but I want to give you little flavor for it.

I want to give you one or two roads down, which you may go on run for a while. I yourselves in your own study and follow these things through. Does it matter the way in which I entered into God's rest on the Lord's day doesn't matter that I am fastidious about these things. Has there been a time in the past in the United States of America where life was different in relationship to these things absolutely quiet because of a view of the world where the view of the world come from.

It came from the Scripture that God is in his heaven when there is no God in his heaven when American capitalism has embraced the empty philosophies of Dostoyevsky when God is dead.

All things are permissible and since he is dead is a method of passing important whether we pay attention to his day. His son, his word or his in the new seer becomes a consumer thing. While I think I'm interested in this. I'd like to try a little of this, there's no sense of awkwardness under the God who had rested from his work of creation.

Now advancing that in verse 19 it is actually referred to as a Sabbath rest, and again is not my purpose this morning to camp on this, but I found this very very intriguing.

Indeed, it is taken up most of my days trying to understand this and let me quote to you because if I try and say this and will take much longer than one be as good says this individual the Sabbath was a creation ordinance which placed the day of rest at the end of six days of work.

But when Adam sinned, it became impossible for man to attain the rest of God by his own efforts. Therefore this now required nothing less than a second creation, and by keeping the Sabbath on the first day of the week, which is established in the dying and rising of the Lord Jesus Christ. The people of God gladly acknowledge that their entrance into this rest depends entirely upon the redemptive achievement of Jesus Christ.

Sorry are looking like alright I understand that. So here it is.

How did we get the rest of the Sabbath on the seventh day because of God established in his work of creation. He made possible and establish the pattern for man to rest. Sin enters into the world, man does not rest whatever you might say about humanity is not tranquility that represents is not gracefulness that represents source, the dust of death is sample upon all of humanity and man can now no longer enjoy this day of rest so it demands a very new creation God who let light shine out of darkness in the work of creation, says Paul to the Corinthians is made, the light shine into your heart and the knowledge of the son of God in the face of the Lord Jesus Christ and so he makes it possible for us by his redemption. The rest for our souls by creation, he establishes the principle of physical rest and by redemption, he establishes the possibility of spiritual rest as God sees us from his work. So in believing in the Lord Jesus because that's what it says in verse three. Now we who have believed enter that rest in order to believe what we have to do with the cease from our own work. I cannot work my soul to say men and women are striving to find the answers to the questions and never cease in their lives there. Even in enlisting spirituality, not knowing whatever it might mean as a means to that answers the Bible if we would enter into the rest, which is possible for us by the redemptive work of Jesus Christ. Then we need to cease from our work and we need to trust in Christ alone all the way through my studies. I kept thinking of one particular statement regarding this in your mind may already have gone to it. I said to myself I have a sneaking suspicion that the answer to this rest? You know where you put all the Venn diagrams where they come together so that you've got what I had to do with Canaan and it had to do with God's rest from creation and it has to do with a Sabbath rest for the people of God where it where does it all come together where where where does the book of Hebrews come together in the person of Jesus Christ and in his work.

Therefore will be no surprise to us if we could go to the words of the Lord Jesus and find one encapsulating statement as to the essential nature of this rest and I believe Buchanan is Matthew chapter 11 and in verse 28 where Jesus looks out on the people and he says to them come to me all you are weary and burdened, 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.

What is this rest to which the writer speaks while it is foreshadowed in Canaan. It is related to the rest of God in creation. It has something to do with a Sabbath principle for the people of God, but it ultimately finds its apex in the experience of the rest which comes for our souls. Men and women this morning all across our city long for rest long for peace, the writer says it is those of us who have believe, who have trusted in Christ who entering to this rest. Have you entered into this rest. Have you ever believed in the Lord Jesus Christ. There's actually a final circle in the Venn diagram which goes beyond the immediate experience of discovering that rest and that is where John in the book of Revelation, chapter 14 describes the experience of those who have died in the Lord and he says of the Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Yes, says the spirit, they will rest from their labor, for their deeds will follow is interesting how many people talk about folks going to the rest you go to somewhere and someone has recently passed away, and some will say well there rest now.

I don't usually get into a dialogue theologically of this point, I usually just nod my head just go in because in my heart I'm saying. I sincerely hope so too.

Men and women think that they can live all their lives with a disregard for God's pouring his invitation to discover rest for their soul abuse.

His day disclaim his work die and enter into their last.

The Bible holds out no such whole cautionary reminder from Alastair big series called fix our eyes on Jesus. Alastair will continue to study next week on Truth for Life. In the meantime, if you'd like to catch up with previous messages or dig deeper in this series, you'll find the entire study is easily accessible on the Truth for Life mobile app as you listen on the app you can save your favorite messages or pause wherever you are and then come back to finish listing later. Plus, you can now read full-length devotionals on the today's tab in the app or access the complete ESV Bible on the menu at the bottom of the page. If you're not listening through the app today.

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