“So, there is a special rest still waiting for the people of God. For all who have entered into God’s rest have rested from their labors, just as God did after creating the world.” – HEBREWS 4:9-10 (NLT)
Give it a rest!! What does that mean? What’s it mean to “enter into God’s rest”? Hebrews 4:9 tells us there’s a special rest waiting for the people of God. That means it’s already been created.
Think about what God promised the people of Israel while they were still in slavery to the Egyptians. He told Moses that He would “bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt…to a land flowing with milk and honey” (see Exodus 3:16-17). Wasn’t that promised land already created and prepared for them?
God didn’t say, “I’ll give you the promised land and when you get there, then I’ll make it.”
At the start of mankind, God created the Garden of Eden completely and perfectly…then He placed Adam and Eve in it. Everything was prepared for humanity ahead of time.
Jesus told His disciples, “Your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him.” What are your questions? Ask God, because the answers are already there.
There’s a tendency (in the midst of challenges or circumstances) to seek answers elsewhere, but we need to keep focusing in on God. We need to get ourselves so engrained in the truth of God’s promises that we actually listen when our spirit tells our souls – our emotions – “Give it a rest…I’m not following you. I’m following God and His promises.”
The devil will try to point out contradictions to your life vs. God’s promises, and if you get in agreement with the devil, that’s where doubt and unbelief comes in…and God’s not friendly towards unbelief.
The Evilness of Unbelief
The Bible doesn’t just say, “Well, gee…unbelief is okay. It calls it evil. If we are unbelieving in one of God’s promises, the Bible says it’s an evil heart. An example of this is found in Hebrews 3:7-12 (NLT). The Holy Spirit reminded, “Don’t harden your hearts as Israel did when they rebelled…” Their heart-hardening unbelief angered God and He took an oath that they would never enter His place of rest!
So let’s get ourselves prepared to believe the promises of God so our heart is always soft, always turned toward God.
One of the traps that Christians fall into is that we trust God for salvation, but then after that we start looking at day-to-day life and we tell God (by how we think and act), “That’s okay, God…I’ve got life handled.”
When we give our lives to Jesus Christ and accept His lordship in our lives, it’s all about Him…when we get caught up about us and our ability to impress God with us, that’s not entering into God’s rest. It’s unbelief and it’s simply wrong.
It’s not about us; it’s not about our ability. It’s always going to come down to His righteousness and His ability to make us righteous whiling giving us the ability to believe that that’s what took place.
Entering into God’s rest means acting on our belief in God and His promises, not out of what we’ve done. Such a belief affects everything, how we see things, how we respond, how we view the world.
Each day, we need to make sure our life doesn’t direct our beliefs, but that our belief in the Giver of Life directs our beliefs!
The view the June 13, 2021 service on which this post is based, CLICK HERE.
