chapter of the book of Hebrews,
Hebrews chapter 4. We talked a little bit about
this this past Wednesday night, but time would not permit us to enter into other aspects of it
which I am determined to do this morning by the grace of God. Chapter 4 of the book of Hebrews
and verse 3, it says, For we which have believed do enter into rest. For we which
have believed do enter into rest." There's no rest for unbelievers. There are two classes of people
on the face of the earth. They are believers and they're
unbelievers. There's no argument about that,
are there? We're all agreed. Any reasonable
thinking person would agree with me in regard to that statement. Two classes of people, not three,
two, believers and unbelievers. What is it that the believers
believe? They believe in the report. Let
me read something to you in connection with that over here in the book
of 1 John. It says, and this is the record,
1 John chapter 5. You do not have
to turn if you do not want to. But what is it that believers
believe? There are two classes of people,
believers and unbelievers. And this is the record, verse
11 says, of chapter 5. And this is the record. This
is that which has been said, authorized, recorded, and this
is the way it is. This is it right here. This is
the report. Remember Isaiah said, Who hath
believed our report? This is it right here. This is
what believers believe. And this is the record that God
hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life,
and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. Believers
and unbelievers, these things the apostles It says, These things
have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son
of God, that ye may know that ye have eternal life,
and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God. and unbelievers. Now, go back to Hebrews chapter
4 verse 3, For we which have believed on the name of the Son
of God do enter into rest. Now, according to this verse
of Scripture here, the statement that I have read to you, there
are some people in this world of over six billion people. That is, at any given time. There
are some people that have lived and died, and some that do live,
and some that will yet live, out of Adam's race of people
that have entered into rest. It is a present enjoyment that
he's talking about, not a future attainment. It is a present enjoyment. Some out of the six billion that's
living today upon God's planet Earth have entered into God's rest. It's a rest in their heart and
in their soul and in their conscience. They've entered into this rest.
Our Lord said one time, he said, Come unto me, all ye that labor
and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Rest
for your soul. Those that believe on the name
of the Lord Jesus Christ have come unto Him. They have seized
from their labor. They quit trying to save themselves. Come unto me, all ye that labor
and are heavy laden, that are burdened down, that are heavy
laden with trying to save themselves. Seize your labor and come to
me and I'll give you rest. They are believers. When a man
believes, the moment that a man believes on the Only Begotten
Son of God Himself, the Lord Jesus Christ, he seizes his labor
in trying to save himself, and he rests in what God has done
in Christ on his behalf. Well, for we which have believed,
already believed, not future, now, that's important. Now, I
know that there is a perfect rest. for every believer, for
every child of Adam that has been a recipient of the grace
of God in Jesus Christ. There's a perfect rest. We call
it heaven. We call it heaven. Die and go
to heaven. We've heard about it ever since
we've been children, about heaven. We've always heard, though, that
if you're good, you go to heaven. I've always heard that. Or at
least that's the impression that I always was left with, that
if I was good enough, I'd go to heaven. So I remember they
told me one time, said, if you don't drink now until you're
21 years old, well then, you know, some good things might
happen to you. In other words, if you're good
enough and refrain from this and that and so forth, you go
to heaven when you die. But I found that that's altogether
wrong. Heaven's not for good people,
it's for bad people. Bad people who were made good
by the grace of God in the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, those that
have believed, they've entered into rest right now. Right now.
You're at rest now. Rest in your soul. That is, you
rest from the fear of the wrath of God falling on you. Now, all the time I was growing
up, I lived under Fear, fear of wrath. And they called it
back then, fear of hell. And I was reminded from time
to time that if I continued doing what I was doing, I'd wind up
in hell. Well, when a believer has come
to the Lord Jesus Christ, he enters into rest. in the fear
of the wrath of God falling on him on the account of his sin,
because the wrath of God has fallen upon his substitute. So
I am made to rest that the wrath of God won't fall on me on the
account of my sin, because God provided me a substitute. in the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ, and Jesus Christ is none other than God incarnate in human
flesh. And he become a man, God become
a man, and as a man was tempted the same way that I'm tempted,
yet he did not yield to temptation, he honored and magnified. the inflexible, unswerving law
of God and made it honorable. He did that on my behalf. And
he bore the penalty that was due me, the wrath of God fell
on him, my substitute, and he bore it. So the moment I believe,
I see that God punished me in his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ,
And so I rest then. There's rest for my soul. And
so at night, when I lay down, I can close my eyes and I can
say, Father, I thank you. I thank you that I'm not what
I ought to be. I'm not what I used to be. But by the grace of God, you've
made me a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. And I have no fear
now of dying. I have no fear of judgment. I
have no fear that my sins will face me one day. Why? Well, I see in the Lord Jesus
Christ that you sent your only begotten Son to save poor sinners
like myself who couldn't save themselves. So I rest. You see
what I'm saying? You understand? I rest. I'm resting. I'm resting. I don't have a perfect
rest, I will one day, but I rest now. I rest now. That's what he's saying here,
do enter into rest. Now, let me go through this one
more time. It does not say here that we
who have belief shall enter into rest. It doesn't say that. does
not say that we who have believed shall enter into rest. Now, that's
true, we shall enter into rest. But it is not the truth that's
being taught in the fourth chapter of the book of Hebrews. As I've
already said, we do enter into rest even in this present life. There's a whole lot of people
multiplied thousands and thousands. Maybe they're Christians, maybe
they're not, I don't know. But there's many who profess
to be Christians that have not entered into this rest. They've
not entered into this rest because they don't know anything about
this rest. They're striving to find rest
and peace for their soul by things that they think and things that
they do. Well, anyhow, that's not the truth that's being taught
here. We do enter into this rest right now, even in this present
life. All who are believers in the
Lord Jesus Christ are already enjoying a rest of heart, and
in that proportion they enjoy perfect rest. It's not a future
privilege that he's talking about, it's a matter of present enjoyment. And that's what I want people
to have. I want people to have what God's given them. I don't
want the devil to rob them of the enjoyment of rest. God's
given me rest and my soul's at rest, and I want everyone else
to have it. All right? We which have believed, Does that include me and you?
We which have believed. I believe! By God, I believed
yesterday, and I believe today, and by the grace of God, I'll
believe tomorrow. It's a continuing thing. I've
been believing this for over 40 years, and I'll continue to
believe it by the grace of God, until I give up my last breath
upon this earth. I believe, we which have believed
do. Not maybe, not I hope so, not
if everything is in the right relationship. No, we which have
believed do. enter into rest. Now, the type
and pattern of all true rest was the rest of God at the end
of the six days of creation that I read to you in Genesis chapter
1. The type and the pattern of true
rest. is the rest of God at the end
of the six days of creation. God saw that it was very good
and he rested, and he rested. Now, we read, and I've already
read this to you, but we read one more time that the Lord rested
on the seventh day from all of his work which he had made. He rested. He rested. Now, God's
ideal of man's happiness was that man should not only work,
but that he should also rest. What a restfulness there seems
to be in every part of creation into which Man has not come. There is a restfulness in that
part of God's creation, in that environment that man has not
entered into. For instance, this might be a
poor illustration, but it's the best that I can come up with.
You go to any part of the United States of America where man is,
go to any place in the fifth estate, or I could say any place
in the world, but we'll confine it to the United States. Go to
any part of the United States of America where man is, and
you'll find the hustling and the bustling of industry. You'll find skyscrapers and buildings,
and you'll find factories and smokestacks and all of that,
wherever you go. You'll find in the rural part
of the United States of America the tractors a-buzzin'. You'll
find the ox and the ass and the horses toiling in labor. You'll find them piling ground
and turning up the soil. And when you meet with men and
women along the way, you'll see sickness and you'll see poverty.
But if you get away, out into the woods and into the mountains.
And if you get out into the mountains of West Virginia, up in the land
of Canaan, up here on top of the mountain where Fred goes
to his camp, Fred has a camp up here on the mountains that
he goes to, and it's not far from Canaan Valley, which is
the land of Canaan. That's the reason they named
it Canaan Valley. It's called in the Bible the
land of Canaan. If you go up there, where there's
no hustle and bustle, where men have not invaded the stillness
and the quietness and the restfulness of the mountains and the woods
in the wilds of nature, and you'll see how restful Everything is
there. That's the reason people go up
there, isn't it, Fred? That's the reason Fred goes up
there to get away from all that work he does at home, so he can
rest a little bit. See how restful everything is
there? It seems like once you get out
there in the woods on top of the mountain in the laurel thickets
by yourself, it seems to me like that the birds seem to have little
else to do but to sing the praises of God. Had there been no fall
of man, the whole world would have been restful and peaceful
like it is in places now where man is not. There would have been no thorns,
there would have been no thistles to add to man's labor and toil,
there would be no sweat from man's weary brow, there would
be no tired brains in offices and in hospitals and in factories. But you see, sin, S-I-N, has
come into the world and from that state and that condition,
Man has fallen. Now, since I said that, let me
attempt to describe the rest which comes from the type which
is given unto us of the rest of God when, after he had created
everything, after everything was made that he made, He rested
from his labor. The rest of God at the end of
six days of creation was like the rest which the believer enjoys,
for it speaks. This rest that God rested in
is like this rest that we're called to enter into. Why? Because it speaks of a work that
was finished. It speaks of a work that was
finished. God created everything, everything
that is, everything that was. He created it in six days. He finished the work, and when
He finished the work, He rested. Oh, you remember there in the
story of creation that I read part of it to you? How the darkness
had been divided from the light and He called one day and He
called the other night. You remember how the waters above
the firmament had been separated from the waters below the firmament?
You remember how I read to you that the creatures began to swarm
on the earth and the fowls of the air filled the heavens, when
the herbs began to yield forth their seed, and the trees yielded
forth their fruit. I read to you about the creation
of the cattle and the whales of the sea and the beasts of
the earth, and I've also told you many times of man, the creation
of man, the masterpiece of God. You know that when the sun set,
On the sixth day, God had finished all His work and there remained
nothing to be completed. There wasn't any loose ends to
tie up, Bob. There was nothing that was laying
around that needed to be swept up. All the work had been done. creation was finished and complete. Nothing could be added to it,
nothing could be taken from it. It was finished and God rested. He rested from His labor. He
had placed in the world, on this planet, all the creatures that
was necessary to make up the complete circle of existence. There was no deficiency in anything
that he made. The whole work of creation was
finished and therefore God did rest. Now, let me ask you this
question. Now, can a believer ever come
to that condition of rest like God rested Yes, yes, yes. There is, right now, a true condition of settled rest in the heart,
or at least available to every believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, when the believer, go back
to that fellow again, the believer, Now when the believer sees the
work of his own salvation completely finished, Jesus himself, at the
end of his life, he'd come upon a divine mission, he'd come to
seek and to save that which was lost, to restore them, to bring
them back into fellowship with God. to die in their stead and
pay their due, to cover them, wrap them up in a righteousness
which he wrought out himself. Now, when a believer sees and
hears that cry that rings from Calvary's cross, when our Lord
Jesus Christ shouted with a loud voice, it is finished! What was he talking about? The
work that the Father has given him to do, it's finished! The redemption of sinners is
finished! Nothing more for you to do. So
I say, when the believer sees the work of his own salvation
completely finished, he can rest. and rest in Christ and Christ
alone." When he sees that, can he say that he's done it himself? He's done it himself or he's
helped to do it in any manner? No! The moment, the very moment
that the sinner believes in Jesus Christ, if he has been rightly
taught and rightly instructed He hears ringing from the cross
of Calvary that good news, that the work of salvation is finished. And He knows beyond a shadow
of a doubt that the atonement that He who on that cross made,
that atonement is perfect. And He knows that the justifying
righteousness that is needful for his own soul is completed,
one hundred percent, absolutely. And he knows that every covenant
blessing is secured, and he knows that it's not only secured, but
it's guaranteed for him by and through the finished work of
the Lord Jesus Christ. And he rests in it! He seizes! trying to save himself, and he
rests in him and him alone, who only can save his never-dying
soul. And he rests in him. And when
he rests in him, he finds after salvation is all by the grace
of God. It's not by what he does or not
by what he doesn't do. He knows that all that was needed,
all that was needed in order to lift the sinner from the very
gates of hell to the very throne of God, He knows that this work
has been wrought by none other than the Lord Jesus Christ, the
great Redeemer, the incarnate Word of the living God. Oh brethren, remember this. Try to lay hold of this if you
can. Remember that if you're a believer,
you're not partly saved, but you're all saved. You're wholly
saved, not partly saved. God didn't do something and then
you've got to add to what He done in order that the job might
be done. No, God did it all Himself in
Jesus Christ, just as God did it all in creation. And when
He did it all, He rested. May God enable you and enable
me to see that I too can enter into that rest and have rest
for my soul. Rest in my heart. Oh, you remember
that you're not partly saved, but wholly saved. Remember this, that the robe
that you wear does not reach a part of the way to cover you,
but it covers you from the top of your head to the bottom of
your feet. The washing and the cleansing
given to you has not washed away a part of your spots, but has
washed away all your spots. Our Lord said Himself, He said,
If I wash you, you're clean. Ever been. Ever been. Ever been. Ever spot. Ever flaw. Oh, listen. And you may rest,
then, if you see these things as a sinner, and trust in Him
who alone can save you. You may rest, too, as God has
rested. Why? Because the work of your
salvation is finished in the Lord Jesus Christ. The work. And that's the good news. And
that's the good news that men will not listen to. Why? is not this universally accepted
because there is a tendency in man to save himself. He's got to have a part of it
or he won't take it. And so there's just a few, and
the few is the chosen of God. And God makes them willing to
comply with his truth in the day of his power. He calls them. with an irresistible call. It's
a call that cannot be refused. And they bow to his loving feet
and receive him. Now, another reason, another
reason why God rested on the seventh day is this. Not only did he rest because
his work was finished and his work was complete, he rested
on the seventh day Because all the work that he had finished,
he said, was good. That's another reason he rested.
He said it was good. God saw everything that he made. There was not anything made,
Glenn, that he didn't make. And he saw everything that he
made, and behold, he said, it was very good. And therefore
he rested. Oh, what a rest the believer
gets when he looks on the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And after intense scrutinizing,
investigation, examination of every part of that which Christ
did, he's able to say of it all, it's very good. And I can rest
here. No part of His work is flawed. No part of the work of creation
was flawed. When He made Adam, He made him
perfect. He gave him such a high intelligence
that Adam named everything that was named. There's nothing named
that was not named. That is, in the animal kingdom
by Adam himself, high intelligence, perfect, perfect, perfect man. God says, now all that I'm going
to pass before you, He said, you name them. And when the mouse
came hopping through, He called it a mouse. And when a bird come
winging through, He said, that's a bird. And when a dog began
to bark, he said, that's a dog. And when a cat began to meow,
he said, that's a cat. Adam, Adam, my soul, no part
of the work of God in creation is flawed. No part of the work
of redemption is flawed in Jesus Christ. It's a perfect work, suitable, listen to me, suitable
to the needs of a sinner. If you don't need it, you'll
never get it. You've got to need it. To see Him, the Lord Jesus Christ,
as prophet and priest and king, Him as related to His offices.
Oh, may the God of all grace enable us here this morning Enter
in to His rest. Enter in to the rest concerning
the fear of God. Rest from our sins. Oh, that's
a rest for me, to know that my sins will not be brought up. They'll not be paraded out for
everyone to see and everyone will say, well, I didn't know
that he thought that or I didn't know that he'd done that. I didn't
know that he was like that. Oh, no. Listen, my sins were
paid for. They were bad in the sea of God's
forgetfulness. They were cast behind the back
of God. And where is that? God's everywhere.
But he says he cast our sins behind his back. And he said,
I'll remember them against you in a way. My sins are so completely
gone by the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ that God
himself cannot see my sins. That's a big statement. Isn't
that a big statement? My sins are so completely gone
in the doing and the dying, the finished work of the Lord Jesus
Christ, the atonement that he made, the covering that he covered
me with, the acceptance that he made me accepted in. God Himself,
the triune, all-seeing, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent God. He cannot see my sins. Oh, that's
rest, isn't it? I rest, isn't it? Oh, if I didn't
have that, I'd as well go up to the Empire State Building
and jump off. I'd make it that much worse. Oh, to see His work. of covering our sins by a substitutionary
sacrifice so complete. Oh, I'm made to say, brethren,
it's a very good work. That's a very good work. There
can't be no better work than that, Pat. That's a very good
work. Won't you believe it? Won't you believe it? Won't you trust it? God enabled you to trust Him.
You can enter into that rest. One more thing now. Go over something
that I said here Wednesday night. I want to be sure that you see
what we're talking about. Over there in this same chapter,
down at the 11th verse, He said, Let us, let us labor. Let us labor, therefore, to enter
into that rest. What's that mean? You just got
through saying this work situation ain't no such thing as works
and salvation. That is, we cannot save ourselves
by our works. But here he said, let us labor,
therefore, to enter into that rest. What does he mean? He means
let us labor not to labor. Let us labor not delay. Our natural
tendency is what? Our natural tendency is to try
to do something in order to save ourselves. Well, I'll tell you
what, you know, I've been thinking about God for some time now,
two months, two years, five years, six weeks. I've been thinking
about God, and you know what? I just know that some things
I've done are wrong, and you know what I'm going to do? I'm
going to quit doing them things. I'm going to quit doing them things,
and I'm going to change my attitude, and I'm going to be different,
and I'm going to pick up and start again. But that ain't salvation. See, you have this natural tendency
to reform yourself. You think that God will look
over your past and excuse it. No, He won't. I will, and you
will me. But God won't do it. See, because
God's pure and holy. See, if He did not, punish wickedness
and evilness and sin, he wouldn't be God. Sin must be punished. Now, the believer's sin is punished
in the Lord Jesus Christ. So he receives the Lord Jesus.
He bows to it. And he said, I see that. That's
good news to me. So I quit trying to save myself.
I'm going to quit this trying to reform. It's good to reform,
but don't reform in order to believe that your reformation
will stand you in good stead with God. It won't. Oh, no. Ah, you see, it's our
natural tendency to try to do something in order to save ourselves. That tendency must be beat down
by labor. So that's what he's talking about
when he said, let us labor, therefore not to labor. Let us labor to
beat this tendency down and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ alone.
And if we'll do that, we'll enter into this rest. But as long as
you think you can do something, if it's just raising your hand,
if it's just moving your eye lid, as long as you think you
can do something, that's not salvation. It's all a hymn. He's got to have all the glory.
God's got to have all the glory, and that's the only way he can
get it. If anything, any part of salvation was left up to you,
then God would have to share his honor with you, and that
he won't do. He'll have all the glory. It's
all by his grace. See what I'm talking about? Labor
to be clean rid of your self-reliance and your self-righteousness.
Labor! You labor in your prayers never
to depend upon your prayers as the means of your salvation and
your justification. Don't depend upon prayer or repentance. Don't even depend on your faith.
Labor in your faith never to trust your faith. But trust Him,
the Lord Jesus Christ alone. I'm telling you the honest to
God's truth, the best that I know it, the best way that I can tell
it, I'm telling you here this morning, flat out, that this
is how God saves sinners, by and through this substitute.
And it is a completed work. It's a finished work, and it's
very good. And there's no other name given
under heaven whereby we must be saved except the name of the
Lord Jesus Christ. So you're wasting your time to
look elsewhere. If you look at yourself, the
only thing you're going to find is sorrow and regret. The only
thing you're going to find, looking to yourself, is vileness and
blackness, darkness and despair, and regret, wishing that you
hadn't done what you did. if you look at yourself. Look
unto him, all ye ends of the earth, and be ye saved. Labor to be less and less in
your own estimation. Quit blowing your own horn. Quit always talking about what
you've done. Why don't you just listen to someone tell you what
he's done? And then you'll come to the agreement
with yourself and with God that what you've done don't outdo
you. See? Labor! Labor! To think less and
less of yourself! There ain't nothing wonderful
about you. Nothing wonderful. You're just
a sinner. Black, vile, dirty sinner. Fit for hell. That's all. Labor! Don't! Grow in your self-esteem, but
grow downward in self-humiliation. He does not say who have believed
shall enter in, but we which have believed do enter into rest. Oh, the rest of a man's soul
falls down to this. in his believing in the gospel
of our Lord Jesus Christ. We who have believed. Salvation of your soul, the rest
of your soul, heaven, it all rests upon you believing. We who have believed. Well, the Lord bless what I've
said Do you understand that? Made God by His Spirit in life.