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(upbeat music) - Here we are with day two of Hebrews chapter four. We're going to
look at verses three to six today, talking about God's arrest and how it comes
into our lives. I'd like to begin by reading those verses, three to six.

Now, we who have believed enter that rest. Just as God has said, so I declared
an oath in my anger, they shall never enter my rest. And yet, his work has been
finished since the creation of the world.

For somewhere he has spoken about the seventh day in these words, on the seventh
day, God rested from all his work. And again, in the passage above, he says,
they shall never enter my rest. It still remains that some will enter that rest.

And those who formerly had the gospel preached to them did not go in because of
their disobedience. Now, first, before we get into some of the principles in
these verses, I know they make many of us scratch our heads because we're not in
the same place as those who first read this. So we think, why does God say you
can't enter the rest?

And then he says, you shall never enter my rest. What he's doing is he's showing
that God talks about rest all throughout the Old Testament. He's showing that if
rest was no longer available for God's people, why would he say they can't enter
my rest?

There must have been something still available. Even after God rested on the
seventh day, there was still some kind of rest available that they weren't
entering into in the Old Testament. And the proof that he's given to them here
is it's not over.

There is still a rest to be entered into. Now, if I'm going to enter into that
rest, there's a second truth we have to add to what we learned yesterday.
Yesterday, we learned that it comes by faith.

A second truth is I have to understand that it's God's rest, not my rest. It is
God's rest, not your rest. Notice he says again and again, enter into what?

My rest. It's not their rest back in the Old Testament. It's not your rest.

Now, it's God's rest. And the question behind this is, are you chasing after
your rest or are you living in God's rest? It's one of the most important
questions of every day of life.

Are you chasing after your rest or are you living in God's rest? Now, to answer
that question, it would be helpful, I think, to take a minute to understand
God's rest. On the seventh day, we read here God rested from all his work.

Is this just talking about what happened in creation on the seventh day? What
does it mean when we say that God rested? Why did God rest?

God doesn't need to rest. God's all-powerful. Well, if you look throughout the
scripture, there are three specific reasons that God rested.

And you see all three of them in this one short passage. God rested because he
was finished. God rested to give us an example to follow.

And God rested also to show his plan for the ages, to fulfill his plan for the
ages. Three reasons. One, God rested because he was finished.

Here in verse three, God's work was finished from the time that he made the
world. He finished his work. That means that the universe, this world, is not
some vast unfinished symphony.

The world, the universe, they are not works in progress. God finished his work
and then he rested. So the universe, this world, is a finished work of creation
that's been marred by the presence of sin.

Now, do you see the incredible difference that makes in the way that you think
about the world around us, that you think about your life? As a picture of this,
picture a house with just the frame completed. And it still has to have the wall
board put on.

It still has to have the outside siding put on. You've got this house. And right
beside it is an old Victorian mansion that's been neglected for years.

The house with just the frame needs to be finished. The Victorian mansion needs
to be restored. And this truth tells us that we don't need finishing.

We don't need to finish ourselves to make ourselves better. We need restoring.
Do you want to live in God's rest?

It's not a matter of you doing better, you finishing out the frame of your life.
It's a matter of God's restoring power in your life. God rested, number one,
because he was finished.

He also rested to give us an example to follow. Now we read about this in the
Ten Commandments. We read about this in the commandment for a day of rest.

Exodus 29 to 11, work and get everything done during six days each week, but on
the seventh day, it's a day of rest to honor the Lord your God. The reason is
that in six days, the Lord made everything, the sky, the earth, the sea, and
everything that's in them. On the seventh day, he rested.

Now there's a personal question behind this for us about the Sabbath day. Do you
rest once a week? You were built to rest once a week.

The truth is, you and I, the way God made us, if you don't rest, you're going to
break down. Now how you rest is between you and God, by the way. This is a
favorite camping ground of legalists to tell you not only that you need to rest
on the Sabbath day, but how you need to rest.

You need to rest like I say you need to rest on the Sabbath day. I'm not going to
get too far into that because the truth of the matter is this passage that we're
looking at right now is not about that day of rest. It's not focusing on that
day of the rest.

It's one of the reasons God rested and we see it throughout scripture, but this
particular passage is focusing on the first truth we just looked at. He rested
because he was finished and it's focusing especially on a third reason we see
throughout scripture that God rested. God rested to fulfill his plan for the
ages.

Look at verses seven down to verse 10. Therefore, God again set a certain day,
calling it today, when a long time later he spoke through David as was said
before, today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts. For if Joshua
had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day.

There remains then a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For anyone who enters
God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. There's the
phrase on which most of this chapter hangs.

There remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. Not the weekly Sabbath,
that's not what he's talking about here. He's talking about the creation
Sabbath.

He's talking about the plan that God has that's indicated in that Sabbath and
he's talking about something God wants to do in your life and my life. We rest
from our spiritual work. We rest from our attempts to get closer to God on our
own strength and power and energy and we realize it's a gift, it's grace.

I can rest in him. Just like God rested from creation, you and I rest in God. We
rest from our works so that we can be free to do his work in our lives.

Now when God rested from creation, it doesn't mean he stopped holding the
universe together, he's still holding the universe together. He's still doing
work in this world, but he rested from the work of creation. And it's the same
thing in our lives.

We need a new birth, we need a new creation in our lives. We need to become a
new creation. And out of that new creation, in that place of resting from our
works, my attempt to get closer to God and my energy, then I can do the work
he's given me to do.

Again, we rest from our works so that we can be free to do his work. I hope you
noticed, I'm sure you did as we read through these verses, that we came across
that word again that we've been seeing so often in the first chapters of
Hebrews, the word today. In fact, we heard the same phrase repeated a third
time.

Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts. Anytime you see
something repeated, not once, but twice, but three times in this close
proximity, in the scripture, you know God is saying, don't miss this. God has
something for you today.

You see, they thought that God's messages, God's promises, God's rest was all in
the past. And the writer of Hebrews writes and says, if the promised land that
they went into in the past was God's only promise of rest, God would not have
spoken of another day of rest. Today, there is a spiritual rest that God wants
you and I to enter into.

And anytime I begin to put that in the past, what God used to do, or what God
once did in my life, I am missing, I'm missing what God wants to do. There is a
promise that God wants you to enter into, to live in the place of today. And
notice he says, yet it remains for some to enter into that rest.

Tomorrow, the verses we're going to look at, we're going to focus on how you do that.
How do you enter in? Before we get to what we're going to talk about tomorrow, the
question is, what am I going to believe today?

We've talked about faith. We talked about understanding it's not my rest, it's
God's rest. Where are you going to put your faith today?

That is the question. Let's put our faith in him. Jesus, we take a moment right
now.

To admit how often we try to put life, we try to put everything on our own
shoulders, even following you, even being the person you've made us to be.
Somehow we take what you're wanting to create in us and we try to create it for
ourselves. We're sorry, Lord, we're sorry.

And we know you're patient with us, we know you're growing us, and we pray you
keep growing us in this direction of your rest, trusting in what you can do by
faith. Not seeing it as our rest, not seeing it as something that we build for
ourselves, but seeing it as your rest, a place you want us to enter into and
live in by grace through faith. I pray we'd live in that place today, the place
of your promise, of your presence.

We pray it together in your name, Jesus. Amen.