Hebrews 4:10–11 (NET)
“For the one who enters God’s rest has also rested from his works, just as God did from his own works. Thus we must make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by following the same pattern of disobedience.”
I believe that many of us are striving for things spiritually that are unnecessary and even detrimental to our faith journey. We spend much time striving after perfection and working into a “good” standing with God, and then we realize that our efforts fall very short, get discouraged, and walk around in a defeated posture. This is not what God had in mind for His children. God wants us to have spirits that are at rest in Him and what He has accomplished for us.
What has God accomplished for us?
God has accomplished absolute forgiveness and salvation from our sins.
There are some of us that have a hard time believing that we are completely forgiven. Think about the idea that if as a worker your boss gives you a paid day off you feel that it really isn’t true so you go into work just in case he doesn’t pay you and you miss out on the rest that he offered for you. Many of us would say that is pretty crazy. Well, in much the same way, we are going to “work” trying to gain penitence for the sins that God has already paid the price to forgive, and it is robbing us of true joy. 1 John 1:9 tells us that when we ask God to forgive us, He Does! His work of forgiveness is already done. It was done when our Savior hung on the Cross of Calvary for each of us. Stop Striving, accept it!
God has granted us access to Him by Grace.
I know that I have struggled to pray, or feel close, to God whenever I messed up. It is a vicious cycle that takes place in us when we sin. We sin, feel rejected by God, feel distant, don’t feel worthy to come to Him, and then hesitate to reconcile. The fact of the matter is that we are already reconciled to God! That happened way before we ever knew it. While we were yet sinning Christ reconciled us to God through His death (Rom 5:8). Because of this the Bible assures us that we can approach God with confidence to find grace in our times of need (Heb 4:16). Not because we earned it, no because Jesus is the High Priest who offered up Himself in order to make so that we do not have to ever worry about not being accepted by God.
Our imperfections are covered up by the perfection of Jesus, our Sacrificial Lamb! We never have to worry about being worthy enough to come to God when we mess up because He doesn’t acknowledge our mess up anymore, instead He acknowledges the work of Jesus as enough to cover over our mess ups. This doesn’t mean that we do not confess our mess ups (sins), but it means that when we mess up we can have confidence in approaching God in order to confess it and walk in unhindered fellowship with Him again. Remember that we only see things in the present or past, but God is outside of time and He knew that mess up was going to happen before the creation of the World because He is all-knowing, and He chose to overlook it when He supplied the One who hid our lives from Him (Col 3:3). Thank you God!
God gave us the blessing to cease from our works.
It is interesting that in the main verses from today (Heb 4:10-11) the very thing that we are to work for (strive after) is to enter into the rest God has provided for His children! How awesome is that? It is almost like God knows (tongue in cheek) that we are naturally inclined to work towards acceptance and achievement, but the reality is that there is nothing we can add or take away from the complete work of Christ on the Cross. We do not like to hear that, well maybe we like to hear that but we live in ways that actually contradict this truth. In this context, the writer of Hebrews is telling them that they have not entered into the rest God has for them because they had evil hearts of unbelief! It is unbelief that stops us from entering into His rest, and we need to understand when we are operating in unbelief.
I grew up in a religious system that believes that you cannot know for sure that you have salvation, all you can do is work hard your whole life to try to keep the laws of the Bible and the laws of the church and at the end of your life hope that you were able to somehow please God enough to be found worthy of His acceptance. This breaks my heart! There are billions of people in this world who are believing either the same thing or something close to this. I have watched the destruction of striving after this unattainable measure of goodness, and what it does to people. It sucks the life out of us, and inevitably it causes sin to spring up in those who are wore out from this striving. There are many works of darkness that plague people who are in religious systems that require works in order to be acceptable God. These systems are a direct refusal to accept the work that Jesus did so that we do not have to believe this, or adhere to any sort of “law” system, but have a child-like faith that accepts Him and believes that we are accepted in Him with God (Eph 2:14).
I can tell almost immediately if a person who is claiming to be a Christ follower is operating in a works based system, because they get very uncomfortable whenever I begin to discuss the freedom, complete forgiveness, rest, grace, etc. elements of our faith. This makes people who feel they have to work to gain proper standing before God very uncomfortable because they are relying so heavily on their own efforts, and when you strip them of their efforts then they are left with nothing to offer. Well, this is exactly the point of the Gospel! For thousands of years before Jesus came to the world the Israelites tried to do things based upon the law, but they failed miserably because the law was unable to make them perfect, or was unable to perfectly please God with an everlasting expiation. But now we have the law of Christ, which makes us all perfect and acceptable to God! We can rest from any and all works based systems, and enter into the peace that is offered through Jesus Christ (Rom 5:1).
God desires for us to enter into rest!
In the creation account God set the example of what it looks like to enter int rest. He wanted it for the Israelites so much that He commanded a day of rest, called the Sabbath, to be observed every 7 days. So important was this command that it is included in the “10 Commandments” listed in Exodus 20:8-11. A Sabbath rest is very important to God, and like I have stated in previous posts, everything God does in the physical is supposed to point us to a Spiritual reality. If He used a day set apart to resting in His provision and worshiping Him in the physical, then I believe that this represents a Spiritual reality that we should be paying attention to also! Trust in His provision for us in His Son Jesus Christ to make us completely perfect and righteous (2 Cor 5:21) before Him, and live our lives full of love, gratitude, worship, and good works as a result of these truths!
As I said before, we want to feel like something depends on us. We feel like we need to achieve something at least. Well, here is your assignment, “Thus we must make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by following the same pattern of disobedience.” (vs.11). There it is, strive to rest. That is not inactivity, that is intentionally seeking out time with God and worshiping Him for being able to be at peace in our spirit. Everything that we “do” now (the good works that we are called to [Eph 2:10, Tit 2:14]) is done out of gratitude – not obligation!
Final Plea
The ark of Noah is also pictured in this word rest, because after many days of being tossed around and worked over by the winds and rains, it “rested” on the mountain of Ararat to signify that God relented and now they were safe in His work of deliverance! When we settle into the Vessel that God has prepared for our deliverance and trust Him through all of life’s storms, then one day the sea of life will subside far enough to allow the land of Heaven to be revealed and our deliverance will be fully realized and the true and final Sabbath will be entered into!
The Vessel that God has provided for our deliverance is Jesus, and if you are struggling to enter into His rest then please examine at what point in your faith there is unbelief. When we do this, it is not for condemnation purposes, but it is for our benefit and growth spiritually. I find it super encouraging that the solution is belief! That seems to me to be an easy fix to our problem of unrest. Believe that it is not about you and it never was. It has always been about Jesus and His finished work on the Cross, and all we must do is trust in that work in order to enter into a perfect rest from our works. Do it now, make the decision to obey God today by following Him with all of your heart, and trust Him to give you peace and rest in your spirit. He loves you and wants you to know His plan for you is to cease from your endless works to try and gain approval. He wants you to know that you are approved in Christ and Him alone! That is good (no great) news!
Happy Labor (or Labor-free) Day. God bless you!