(tm) The Rest of God
Back to A Summary of Kingdom Concepts
The writer of the Book of Hebrews warns his readers, experienced Jewish Christians, to be careful that they do not come short of the rest of God.
Just what is the rest of God? The writer of the Book of Hebrews proceeds, in the fourth chapter, to present three aspects of the rest of God.
The first aspect has to do with God’s work being finished from the beginning of the world.
The second aspect has to do with the Sabbath day.
The third aspect is associated with the possessing of Canaan.
Whoever would enter the rest of God must cease from his own works.
The rest of God is that state of being where we refrain from our own ambitions and do what God is commanding at the moment. The greatest liberty any believer can achieve is the point at which God’s greatest desire is his greatest desire. Such a state of rest and freedom is not attained to overnight, but it indeed is attainable if we will diligently pursue it.
The rest of God is based on the fact that God in six days created all events, all people, all things, all circumstances, through to the coming down of the new Jerusalem to the earth. Our own life and destiny is a part of the finished work of God.
Then God rested. We are to enter that rest by ceasing from our own plans and looking to God for all we think, say, and do. The Lord Jesus does nothing apart from the Father. We are to do nothing apart from Christ. When we are abiding in Christ, doing His perfect will at all times, we then are in the rest of God, the eternal Sabbath. This is the only kind of life worth living. This is an important part of our Canaan, our land of promise.
But numerous enemies are entrenched in the good things God has for us. They are entrenched even in our own body, soul, and spirit.
So in order to dwell in untroubled rest in God through Christ we have to continually pray and believe God until we are able to conquer every enemy that would keep us from dwelling in untroubled rest in God.
The exhortation of the Book of Hebrews is that having begun as a Christian we must be careful that we do not die in the wilderness of unbelief and disobedience. We must press forward in faith each day until we are living in the perfect center of God’s will through the Lord Jesus Christ.
We can do this, you know, if we are willing to give our whole attention to it. This is the mark set before us, the heavenly calling. For this we have been grasped, and we are to lay aside all else that we may lay hold onto that for which we have been grasped.
We have to forget that which is in the past if we are to reach forward to the goal of participation in the first resurrection, the resurrection out from among the dead, the resurrection that will occur at the return of the Lord.
As the Apostle Paul would say, "Let as many as are perfect be thus minded."
Back to A Summary of Kingdom Concepts