Working to Find Rest

WORKING TO FIND REST
HEBREWS 4:1-13

Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it. [2] For good news came to us just as to them, but the message they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith with those who listened. [3] For we who have believed enter that rest, as he has said, "As I swore in my wrath, 'They shall not enter my rest,' "although his works were finished from the foundation of the world. [4] For he has somewhere spoken of the seventh day in this way: "And God rested on the seventh day from all his works." [5] And again in this passage he said, "They shall not enter my rest." [6] Since therefore it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly received the good news failed to enter because of disobedience, [7] again he appoints a certain day, "Today," saying through David so long afterward, in the words already quoted,” Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts." [8] For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on. [9] So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, [10] for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his. 11] Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience. [12] For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. [13] And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

In the name of Jesus:
One man challenged another to an all-day wood chopping contest. The challenger worked very hard, stopping only for a brief lunch break. The other man had a leisurely lunch and took several breaks during the day. At the end of the day, the challenger was surprised and annoyed to find that the other fellow had chopped substantially more wood than he had.
"I don't get it," he said. "Every time I checked, you were taking a rest, yet you chopped more wood than I did."
"But you didn't notice," Said the winning woodsman, "that I was sharpening my ax when I sat down to rest."
Today we are society that longs for rest. For wholeness and well being. We think that we can find this rest apart from God. Weekend publications in the paper invite us to find diversion from the mundane of life. We think diversion is rest. So we live for the weekend, and its diversions. A night out on the town. Or the chance to catch up on things at home. Or an opportunity to do what we want to do. Seeing as we work all week for someone else or something else, the weekend becomes “my time” where I can do what I want. And so we seek the diversion, we try to find our rest. Now, mind you, diversions are not evil. They are good, and can be God pleasing, but if we allow these diversions to become our rest, while forgetting the rest that God alone can give and that is what we really need, well, then the diversions become idol worship. And this is what happens, people have replaced God with the diversions of the world. All the while, we are left spinning our wheels, wondering why we never have enough time in a day, still anxious over the trials, temptations, and stresses of life. Some turn to substance abuse to cope, other seek more diversions, toys, things. There is still a gnawing inside. We are still a people who need rest, who want rest, but we are unsettled, we can’t find rest.
God promised to His people of the Old Testament rest. But they would not submit to God’s way for rest. They turned to the riches of the world, trusting in popular opinion, worshipping of other gods, turning their back on God and the rest He had in store for His people.
God said that these people would never find rest. They would never enter His rest. There was a rest for the people of God. Their hopes and dreams were in the Promised Land. But on their journey to that land they lost their way, placed their faith in worldly things rather than God. In the end, they were denied that rest that they longed for and sought.
We are on a journey, a journey toward the Promised Land called heaven. A land flowing with milk and honey, a land of peace and contentment, a land whereby we will truly be at rest, no more problems, no more trials, no more sin, no more temptation by Satan, no more death. Heaven is what every human being craves. But we are separated by God because of our sin. We have loved ourselves, the world and its ‘things” we end up selling what we have to gain the world but in the process, we are in danger of losing our souls and the rest we long to have. God warns us not to love the world and its riches. But isn’t that exactly what we do? Hence, we are a people who want peace but have no peace, a people who want to be free from stress but cannot cope with stress, we are burdened with our sins and we can not find a way to save ourselves.
God’s good news, though, is that there REMAINS a Sabbath rest for the people of God. He says to strive to enter that rest, to work hard at obtaining that rest. But, and here is the irony, that rest doesn’t come from our own efforts, ability, or anything that we might or can do. That rest is a gift of God in Christ. It is not earned nor deserved; it comes from having faith in Jesus as Lord and Savior.
Jesus lived a life of contentment, a life of obtaining, not the things of this world, but rather buying back the world which was lost due to Satan, death, and sin. The world in its present state is wasting away, and yet, God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son to be the payment price to buy back the world from sin, Satan, and death. In His life Jesus lived for sinners and in His death His blood was the purchase price for the souls and lives of sinners, so that by His stripes and shed blood sinners have become children of God, receiving this as a gift of God by faith, simply trusting in Christ as Lord and Savior.
God gives rest in Christ. God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. God forgives the sins of all on account of Jesus. God’s rest is given and extended to all who believe in Jesus; for only in Jesus does a person enter into the rest that God gives. Only in Jesus can a person have the peace which He alone offers. God says in the Third Commandment to “Remember the Sabbath day, by keeping it holy. What does this mean? It means that as God’s people God calls you to pay attention to it, stop and rest on the Sabbath, to keep this day special from all of the other days. How is this done? Simply it is done by resting from all of the activities of life and worshipping God. It means that on Sunday you do not despise the preaching of God’s Word or the study of it, but you hold God’s Word as special and you hear and learn from that Word.
What does that Word reveal? Only that a person is justified freely by God’s grace through faith in Jesus. You are justified in Christ. Yes, it means that you are forgiven and now have a right relationship with God. The fruit of being justified by Christ is the peace you have with God. To be justified by Christ certainly means that you are forgiven. It means that you not only escape the punishment for your sins, but that you also have now a positive relationship with God. This relationship is a wholeness, a unity of well being, it is salvation, consisting of oneness with God and consequently with others. In the modern vernacular, it means that when you have faith in Christ God has put your life back in order. You have your act together. You are whole, at one with God, at peace with Him and others, because of the relationship you have with God in Jesus Christ.
The writer to the Hebrews says that we must work to enter that rest. Strive to enter the rest. So much in life is all about striving to get stuff which will rot and decay and die. Store up, rather, as Jesus says, treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy and where thieves will not break in and steal. Work at seeking and receiving the rest God wants you to have. Strive to enter into God’s rest. Prioritize your life so that the things of God come first. Set goals that place God at the center of your life and set goals which will enable you to find your rest. That very well may mean clearing your schedule and actually scheduling in worship, Bible study, and prayer time. If you find it hard to find rest, schedule in time with God and keep that appointment.
Two very practical ways to find your rest is to daily remember who you are. Daily remember that you are baptized, that God has washed away your sins and given to you a new nature, a new life in Jesus. Instead of just thinking of Baptism on Sunday, begin to incorporate it into your everyday life. Begin each day remembering your Baptism; begin each day in the name of the Triune God whose name you are baptized into: make your beginning in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Daily confess your sins, repent of them, and ask God for forgiveness in Jesus Christ. Pray that God would empower you to turn from sin and every evil in your life. In doing this, you would be striving to enter that rest.
But also begin each day by resting in God. Begin each day in the Word. One Christian has said that he is in the Word before he goes out into the world. Helps abound to get you into the Word: Portals of Prayer, Good News Magazine, are just two resources we have for free at our church. Daily you and I need to hear God’s Word spoken to us in His Word. For as we hear His Word, the Holy Spirit strengthens our faith in Christ, we believe more firmly in Christ, and we grow secure in the knowledge that Christ has prepared an eternal rest for us in heaven. There really is rest for the people of God, and that rest in found through faith in Jesus. Just as God kept His promise by leading His people in the Old Testament to the Promised Land, so too He keeps His promise today to lead us to heaven, and He instructs us to follow in the way that He leads, and that way is Christ.
A low cost airline has made this phrase its trademark: Want to get away? When you are looking for a place to rest, look no further than Jesus; Jesus has said “"Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. [2] In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?” Jesus has prepared that place through His innocent life, suffering, death, and resurrection. Jesus is the only way to God, and the only path upon which we travel to find our rest.
Amen