Matt 11:28 Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
v. 29 Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
v. 30 For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."
I struggle with verses like these. I don't know what it's like to have rest. I'm not complaining, I just don't understand where/when the "rest" part comes in. I look at the suffering in the world (knowing that it has purpose) but I don't see many people who have "rest" - I just see the suffering part. Are these verses speaking of the future?
Hi Jeff, life is a struggle and more so for some it seems than others. I am bringing some excerpts from a Bible study on 'Keeping Sabbath' maybe it will be of some help to you.
http://forums.bible-truths.com/index.php/topic,6310.msg50888.html#msg50888 -----
GOD IS YET CEASING FROM THE WORKS HE COMPLETED
Gen 2:2 And F I N I S H I N G is the Elohim, on the sixth day, His works which He does. And ceasing is He on the seventh day from ALL HIS W O R K which He does.” (Concordant Version)
The works ARE finished and God IS ceasing from all those works of physical creation of the heavens and the earth and the sea and all that in them is. Now all this ties in with keeping the seventh day, a day of rest. If God is still ceasing from all the works that were finished, He does that on the seventh day. This still must be the seventh day of God’s ceasing!
We don’t read of anything where God began creating some other part of the physical universe on the eighth day or the ninth day or any such thing, nowhere. We are now into God’s SPIRITUAL creation… making man in God’s very own spiritual image.
The idea behind the seventh day is it represents rest. Israel was told to rest every seventh day of a weekly cycle. But it represents something. It was a law, they had to rest, it’s the fourth commandment, it’s a law.
Heb 10:1 For the law (part of the... remember the Sabbath and keep it holy) having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things…
The shadow is not the image itself. So in some ways it’s almost worthless, except it points you to something.
Like I’ve (kiddingly) said years ago. What would you sooner have, the shadow cast by a $380,000 Ferrari or the Ferrari? Now if you see the shadow of it and if you know exactly what kind of a shadow it cast, you would say, that shadow looks like and is pointing me to… a Ferrari! But you don’t want the shadow, you can’t drive the shadow, the shadow has no value. But the Ferrari, that’s most valuable, very valuable. Or you could say the shadow of a million dollar mansion or anything else.
So these laws are all a shadow of something better.
Heb 4:10 For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.
There it is. When you enter into God’s rest… now we are talking about the real rest, then you cease from your works, just as God ceased from His. How long has God been ceasing from His works of the physical creation? For thousands of years! Does He cease everyday? YES. There is not a day that goes by that He starts creating another universe or another earth or another human race someplace.
So in the same way we are entering that rest. We enter into that rest! Which rest? The one that God is ceasing from. I does’t mean that God rests because He is tired, okay. We rest because we are tired. It’s just that when it says ‘rest’ it means to cease. It can mean to rest, but it means to cease or to stop.
So he that has entered into His ceasing, he also has ceased from his own works. Ceased or you can say rested, but it means to stop - cease from his own works. “AS God did from His.” Now do we do that and what does it mean?
God is yet ceasing from His physical creation and making physical things. We too are commanded to cease from working our work, and we start by resting every week on the seventh day of 24-hour periods… first the physical then the spiritual. But that is NOT “entering into God’s rest” by keeping the letter.
Rom 7:14 For we know that the law is spiritual…
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Exo 31:15 Six days may work be done, but on the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the Lord. Whosoever does any work in the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death.
That’s not just a warning declaration, but a parable. If you don’t keep the Sabbath today, you shall surely be PUT TO DEATH.
Much of the plan of God revolves around JUDGMENT. Judgment now upon the chosen few Elect and judgment later upon the rest of humanity. If you are still in the physical - the letter - the rituals - the shadows, then you’re not being judged in the spiritual LIGHT.
The weekly cycle of seven days was a microcosm of the physical and spiritual creation of God. It’s seven days, not just six. The six days were the actual physical creation, the seventh day was the stopping and ceasing from the physical.
But we have an inkling as to what the seventh day is all about. If it’s not about the physical creation, what is it about?
Gen 1:27 So God created (creating) man in His own image; in the image of God He created (creates) him; male and female He created (creates) them.
Again it’s the indefinite “creates” and “creating” it’s still going on. But the physical creation is not going on, this is spiritual, God is creating humanity into His own spiritual image. That’s what it is all about, but this is spiritual. This can be done on the seventh day, because it is spiritual. It’s not doing your own work when we enter in, like it says in Hebrews 4.
Heb 4:10 For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.
So when we enter in His rest we cease our own work, just like God ceased His. It doesn’t mean nothing else is going on. Oh there is plenty going on, but now it’s spiritual, at least it should be, that’s what we are hoping.
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So this whole thing of coming out of our life - coming out of carnality - coming out of religiosity is like coming out of darkness into the light and that light will give you peace or rest. You have to rest or cease your works and that is what this verse says, which concludes in Heb. 4:10. Now let’s look at verse 3.
Heb 4:3 For we who have believed do enter into rest…
There it is. So right now we do enter into rest. How do we enter into rest? By stopping doing our own works, by coming out of the shadow. Keeping the seventh day is a shadow and you’ve got to come out of that and come into the light of that… the real thing is Christ.
Christ of course did good on the Sabbath day although He was criticized for it. He didn’t break the Sabbath day as some have taught in the past. He did not break the Sabbath day, but He certainly started expanding it into the spiritual realm of doing good. He did good, He didn’t go out and plow with a yoke of oxen. Of course He didn’t.
When you enter into rest though, you don’t enter into rest by keeping the Sabbath every week. You enter into rest by doing what it says in verse 10.
Heb 4:10 For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.
You cease from doing your work, your religiosity, just like God stopped making the physical universe. We are now entering into the light, into the spiritual realm. That is for those who do not have hardened hearts and God gives us these abilities to do this.
Col 2:10 and ye are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.
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mercy, peace and love
Kat