Isn't there any way to get a real, honest to goodness rest?

November 17, 2013 Evening:

Title: There Remains a Sabbath Rest

Old Testament Passage: Psalm 55:6 – And I say, “Oh, that I had wings like a dove! I would fly away and be at rest;

Gospel Passage: Mark 14:26-31 – If I must die with you, I will not deny you.

Sermon Text: Hebrews 4:8-9 – More thoughts on Psalm 95 and the conquest of Canaan

Sermon Point: There is a future Sabbath-like rest for the people of God that we are to eagerly anticipate

[8] For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on.

There is a sense in which the whole Bible is about rest.

First, the Lord entered into His ruling rest of the seventh day of the week of creation. Then with the fall of mankind, our rest was destroyed by Adam's sin. Our way to God's rest was cut off. God would have to provide the way for us to enter His rest.

Many centuries later the Lord set up Israel as a land of rest. Yet Moses and the wilderness generation were not permitted to enter that picture of rest because of unbelief and disobedience.

Joshua brought the people of God into the land of rest, but that conquest must have been only a picture of the good things to come. This we know because centuries further into the future David wrote Psalm 95 to a new generation long after Joshua had already led the Israelites into Canaan. He encouraged that new generation with God's offer of rest.

[9] So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God,

Therefore, there remains something beyond Canaan for the people of God. There is another land of rest that would signal the complete repair of sin's devastating damage of this present creation and of human beings created in God's image.

The answer for us comes in the Man of Rest who has worked for us the great work of salvation. We need to come to Him in order to find true rest.

This is His Word to His children: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of Me, for I am gentle and lowly of heart and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

There are many false counterfeits, false saviors, that claim to have rest for us. The rest that we want is the rest of the seventh day, God's rest. Only God can certify the true way into that rest. The resurrection of Christ is God's certification that an honest way of rest for mankind has been provided.

Let us strive to enter the only God-approved land of rest through the true Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth. Having precious promises of rest, let us eagerly anticipate all that God has promised us. The Lord has brought us perfect rest—the ruling rest of the seventh day of creation, now secured for all the children of God in the blood of Jesus Christ.