Hebrews chapter four, a title
of the message this morning, Christ, our Sabbath rest. Let's review for a few moments
what we looked at last week, beginning in verse four, where
he spake in a certain place on the seventh day on this wise,
and God did rest the seventh day from all his works. After
creating the world in six days, God rested on the seventh day.
That was the very first Sabbath day, Christ or God rested. And he rested because his work
of creation was finished. There's nothing left for him
to create. And that creation was perfect. God said it was
very good. On each individual day, God looked
and saw what he'd done and said it was good. But after the last
day, he looked at the totality of creation and he said, behold,
it's very good. It's perfect. And God gave us
this story as a picture of the rest that a believer has in Christ. Look at verse 9. This is what
the writer tells us. There remaineth therefore a rest to the people
of God. There is a rest that God's people
must enter into. They all will. God's going to
bring every one of them to it. Now the word rest that he uses
here in verse 9 means a Sabbath keeping. There is a Sabbath keeping
for God's people. And every believer everywhere
keeps the Sabbath. Now somebody's thinking, what?
You know, I thought the law was all done away with in Christ.
You know, you're not putting me back under the law and the
ceremonies and for us to keep Christ away with all that. Well,
you're absolutely right. But this Sabbath keeping is not
a work that we do. It's not a ceremony that we observe.
This Sabbath keeping is rest in Christ by faith. beginning of verse three. But
we which have believed do enter into rest. How is it that we
enter into this rest in Christ? By faith. Now, all of our faith
is in Christ. We read this before the service.
He's the Lord of the Sabbath. Christ is our Sabbath rest. Our
rest is not a day. It's not a day that we observe.
It's not a ceremony. It's not a work that we do. Our
rest is a person. The Lord Jesus Christ Christ
the Savior is our Sabbath rest in every way. Now the law gave
more than just a Sabbath day. We think of the Sabbath, what
comes to, at least comes to my mind, I don't know, maybe you're
smarter than me, what comes to your mind might be different,
but I just think when I hear the Sabbath, the law of the Sabbath
day, but God's law also gave us a Sabbath year and gave us
the year of Jubilee. And Christ is all three of those
Sabbaths for the believer. And I want to look at that this
morning. So we see how Christ filled all of the law of the
Sabbath and he is our rest. Now, number one, the day of rest.
Christ is our Sabbath day rest. Now on the very first Sabbath
day, the very first seventh day, God rested from all his work
because there was nothing left to do. Well, God gave the Sabbath
day to his people as a picture of the believer's rest in Christ
our Sabbath. God didn't give that as a day.
He gave it as a picture of a person. Verse 10 tells us that. For he
that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his
own works as God did from his. Now, the believer's entered into
his rest. Whose rest is he talking about
there? He's talking about Christ's rest. Christ is seated in glory
right now, isn't he? Resting. Why is he resting? Because he fully accomplished
all the work that the Father gave him to do. He has saved
all of his people from their sin. And we rest in Christ. We enter into his rest. We rest
from all of our works of the law. We rest from trying to earn
a righteousness that will make God happy with us. We rest from
that. There's no need for us to do
it. That's why we rest, because the work's already done. Christ
already finished it. And we rest in him. We don't
have to establish our own righteousness because Christ is our righteousness.
And we rest from all of our religious works. We rest, you know, when
people do all these religious works, you know what they're
doing? They're trying to complete their salvation. Well, the believer
rests from that because we're completing Christ. We rest from
fear of condemnation. You know, a lot of times people
keep working and trying to keep the law and observing all these
religious ceremonies and things. because they're afraid of condemnation.
They're afraid God's going to strike him down. Will the believer
rest from the fear of condemnation? We have no fear of condemnation
for sin because Christ, our substitute was already condemned for us
and we rest in him. Now look back at Exodus chapter
31. Here's where the law of the Sabbath
was given. Exodus chapter 31, the law of
the Sabbath day. Exodus 31 verse 12. And Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily my
Sabbaths ye shall keep, for it's a sign between me and you throughout
your generations, that you may know that I am the Lord that
does sanctify you. The Sabbath day is given as a
picture or sign to us that it was the Lord who sanctified Israel.
He set them apart for his holy use. He made them holy. And all
this is given to us just like all the Old Testament scriptures
is given to us as a picture of Christ, our Savior. He has fulfilled
this law of the Sabbath by sanctifying his people with his obedience
and with his blood that washed them and made them holy. Christ
is the one that set his people apart and he made them holy.
He made them without sin by taking their sin away from them and
then giving them a new holy nature. Now, that being the case, We
can rest from trying to make ourselves holy because Christ
already did it. He already did that for us. So
this rest, it's only in Christ our Sabbath. Now, isn't that
a joy? I mean, we need to start stopping
once in a while and think about that. What a joy to be set free
from the great burden of the law, from the burden of having
to observe all these religious ceremonies. This is good news.
It's rest. Rest in Christ, he's already
accomplished all that for you. And this has got serious consequences.
Look at verse 14, Exodus 31. You should keep the Sabbath,
therefore, for it is holy unto you. Everyone that defiles it
shall surely be put to death. For whosoever doeth any work
therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people. Six
days may work be done, but the seventh is a Sabbath of rest,
holy to the Lord. Whosoever doeth any work in the
Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. Anyone who did
too much work on the Sabbath day, picked up too many sticks,
took too many steps, that person would be put to death. And that
happened. That's recorded in scripture.
They put people to death for working on the Sabbath day. And
they were put to death because their work defiled the picture
of rest in Christ. Their work was being added to
the finished work of Christ. and this is so serious, they
were put to death for it. Now I read that this week and
I thought, this is another example of how happy I am to be living
in this day. If I'd been living in that day,
I'd have been one of y'all were stoned. I know I would have just
been so ignorant, I would have done work without even realizing
on a Saturday, and y'all would have put me to death. I never
could have rested on Saturday. I never could have rested. It
might've looked like on the outside I was resting, but on the inside
I'd have been full of fear and trembling. I was going to break
the Sabbath without even realizing it. See that seventh day Sabbath
never gave anybody rest, did it? Now they might've forced
themselves to rest on the outside, but inwardly they weren't resting.
Inwardly, they had no peace of heart. Inwardly, they were wishing
they could do something else. They were full of fear of doing
too much work and being put to death. They didn't want to worship
God. I mean, yeah, I don't like the
day off from working out in the fields, but I don't want to spend
the day worshiping God. There's no rest in the heart in that
seventh day, Sabbath. And this law of the Sabbath is
still in full force today, verse 16. Wherefore, the children of
Israel shall keep the Sabbath to observe the Sabbath throughout
all their generation for a perpetual covenant. Now this is still true. Anybody who violates the Sabbath
is going to be put to death. The second death. You and I violate
the Sabbath rest by not trusting in Christ our Sabbath. And we
defile salvation in Christ by trying to add our works to Christ's
finished work to somehow make it better and think we're going
to be more saved than somebody else. And we need to remember,
we're going to try to add our works to something. What are
our works? What does scripture say our works
are? They say our works are nothing but sin. And what's the wages
of sin? Death. You've got to pay that wage every
time. You'll not miss one payroll,
not one. The wages of sin is death. So that's what happened to you
and me. We try to add our work to Christ's finished work. But
what a joy, isn't it a joy to be free from the fear of being
put to death because Christ has already made his people perfect.
He's given them eternal life that they can never lose. They
can never be put to death because he was put to death for them
as their substitute. So the rest we have in Christ
is true rest, isn't it? It's rest in the heart. peace
in the heart and the conscience. You know, the theme of Hebrews
is Christ is better. Christ is a whole lot better
rest than the law's seventh day rest, the seventh day Sabbath.
Christ is better. We have true rest for the soul
in him. All right, next look at Leviticus
chapter 23. Leviticus 23, verse 23. You might want to mark this because
we're going to come back in a few moments to Leviticus 25. You
might want to mark this. Verse 23, Leviticus 23. And the
Lord spake unto Moses saying, speak unto the children of Israel
saying in the seventh month on the first day of the month. So
you have a Sabbath, a memorial blowing of trumpets and holy
convocation. You shall do no servile work
therein, but you shall offer the offering made by fire unto
the Lord. Now in the Sabbath, no one could
do any servile work. We saw earlier you can't do any
work, but here he specifies you should do no servile work. But
what's servile work? It's the work of a slave. It's
the work of bondage of a servant. There was to be no work done
by servants, no bondage, no work done by bondage in that day.
But everyone was to offer the burnt offering for sin unto the
Lord and do nothing else. Now, here's the picture. Christ
fulfilled this picture for us. You rest from all your works
of the law. All our works of the law are
servile works, aren't they? There are works that we do because
we have to do them or we'll die. Or we think we've got to do them
or we'll die. Now just quit that. Just quit that servile work and
rest in Christ. Quit all your servile works and
rest in the sacrifice of Christ. Look to Him as all of your salvation. All right, one more scripture
on this Sabbath day, Deuteronomy chapter five. Deuteronomy chapter 5. Verse
12. Keep the Sabbath day to sanctify
it as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee. Six days shalt thou labor
and do all thy work. But the seventh day is the Sabbath
of the Lord thy God. In it thou shalt not do any work.
Thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant,
nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy
stranger that is within thy gates, that thy manservant, thy maidservant,
may rest as well as thou. And remember that thou wast a
servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought
thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm.
Therefore, the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day. This is the law of the Sabbath.
You rest. You rest. And you have your servants
rest too. You have your children rest too.
You have your animals rest. You have strangers that are busy.
You have them rest. You rest and everybody under
your roof rest. This is the picture. Christ has
fulfilled this law for us. You rest in Christ. You rest
in Christ. Every one of us here this morning,
right now, right now, rest in Christ. Rest in Christ. And you fathers, you mothers,
you make sure you tell your children, rest in Christ too. You tell
them, rest in Christ. You support the gospel so the
gospel can be preached. Telling other people, you rest
in Christ. Come to Christ and rest in Him.
You who believe, don't ever forget where God found you. Don't forget
what it was like to be under that awful bondage to the law. Don't forget what it was like
to live in that constant fear of the law, being constantly
afraid God is going to strike you down. Don't forget that.
If you don't forget that, you won't go out putting other burdens
on people. Don't put the burden of the law
on people. Don't make up rules and regulations and just put
that on people. Simply tell them about freedom
in Christ. Just preach Christ. Tell people
about Him and about His sacrifice. And if God will give them faith
to believe it, they'll find rest for their souls. You rest in
Christ and you tell others to rest in Christ. They'll have
rest that they could never find for their souls through the law.
Just tell them about Christ. He is our Sabbath day. He's the one that we rest in.
All right, now back to Leviticus chapter 25. Here's the second
thing. Christ is our Sabbath year. They had set aside a year that
was a Sabbath year. Leviticus 25, verse one. And the Lord spake unto Moses
in Mount Sinai saying, speak unto the children of Israel and
say unto them, when you come into the land which I give you,
Then shall the land keep a Sabbath under the Lord. Six years shalt
thou sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune thy vineyard
and gather in the fruit thereof. But in the seventh year shall
be a Sabbath of rest under the land, a Sabbath for the Lord. Thou shalt neither sow thy field
nor prune thy vineyard. That which groweth of its own
accord of thy harvest thou shalt not reap, neither gather the
grapes of thy vine undressed, for it's a year of rest under
the land. And the Sabbath of the land shall be meat for you,
for thee and for thy servant, for thy maid, for thy hired servant,
and for thy stranger that sojourneth with thee, and for thy cattle
and for thy beasts that are in thy land shall all the increase
thereof be meat. Now for a whole year, this is
the Sabbath year, every seven years, nobody was to till the
ground. They weren't to plant any crops.
I guess they would prune those grape vines to make them grow
more or something. I don't understand how all that
works. But they weren't to do any of that. No farming at all.
Just let the land rest for a whole year. Now, the ground's still
going to bring forth. Stuff's still going to grow.
Jen and I got a tomato plant growing in our yard. We didn't
plant. It had to come from last year, a rotten tomato or something
we threw out there. It's just growing of its own
accord. Interestingly enough, it's the best tomato plant we
got. Just growing of its own accord. Stuff's gonna grow of
its own accord. Now you can eat that. You can pick it and eat
it. What he's saying here is, don't you pick it and harvest
it and store it up. This is hand to mouth. Whatever it is, if
you're hungry, go out there and pick something and eat it. And
leave the rest alone. Don't store anything up. You're
not storing something up. Because this whole year, you're
trusting the Lord to provide. That's the law of this Sabbath
year. And the Lord gave this Sabbath year to teach his people
just that. Trust the Lord to provide. And
he promised he would. Look at verse 20. And if you, if you should say,
what should we eat the seventh year? Behold, we shall not sow
nor gather in our increase. Then I will command my blessing
upon you in the sixth year. And that sixth year it should
bring forth fruit for three years. And you should sow the eighth
year and eat of the old fruit until the ninth year, until her
fruits come in. you shall eat of the old store.
You know what? God just promised them, I'll
provide. I'm going to just bless the land
richly in that sixth year. It's going to bring enough for
you until you wait till the harvest of that ninth year. And in that
time, everybody's going to have the same provision. It doesn't
matter if you're rich or poor. It doesn't matter if you own
a huge farm or you're homeless. It doesn't matter. Everybody's
going to have the same provision, just what land grows naturally.
and you're going to eat hand to mouth only what the Lord provided. Now, there are so many pictures
of Christ in this seventh year rest, the Sabbath rest. First,
the land rested. He stressed that in this day,
the land is going to rest. Hold your finger there. Look
over at Romans chapter eight. And the land needs to rest because
the ground is under the curse of Adam's sin. That's why the
ground brings forth thorns and thistles to us. And when Christ
returns, when Christ our Sabbath returns, the ground, creation
is going to rejoice in rest because creation is finally going to
have freedom from the curse of sin. Look at that Romans 8 verse
19. For the earnest expectation of
the creature, that word is creation, the earnest expectation of the
creation is waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God. For the creation
was made subject to vanity, not willingly, not by something they
did, but by reason of him, of Adam, who has subjected the same
in hope. Because the creation itself also should be delivered
from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of
the children of God. For we know that the whole creation
groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only
they, but ourselves also. which have the first fruits of
the spirit, even we ourselves grown within ourselves, waiting
for the adoption to wit, namely the redemption of our body. Creation
is waiting for the exact same thing all the redeemed are waiting
for. They're waiting for Christ to return. And when he returns,
we're finally going to have complete rest from the curse of sin because
he's going to remove it from his creation. And the ground
won't bring forth thorns and thistles anymore. because he's
removed the curse of sin. The ground is even gonna have
rest. Even that ground resting is a picture of rest in Christ. The whole creation will have
when he returns. Then that Sabbath year required
the people to trust the Lord's gonna provide. They had to trust
him. If you're a farmer and you're
not planting crops this year, you've got to trust that the
Lord's gonna provide, give you food to eat, don't you? Well,
this is the gospel requirement. The gospel requires you and me
to rest from all of our works. Just quit your works trying to
make God happy with you and trust the Lord to provide. Trust that
the righteousness that Christ provides is enough to make you
accept it. Trust that the sacrifice of Christ,
the sacrifice he provided, the precious blood he provided is
enough to pay all your sin debt, to wash you clean from all of
your sins. See, if we would be saved, we've
got to trust Christ. There's no salvation without
faith. There's no salvation if we keep working. Salvation is
had in trust. Trust that everything he is,
is all we need. He's our righteousness. He's
our sanctification. He's our wisdom. He's our redemption. He's our substitute. He's our
sacrifice. He's our sin offering. He's our
peace offering. He's our bread. He's our water.
He's our way, our truth, and our life. Christ is all. And you trust Him to provide.
That He's all you need. The end of Sabbath year, in that
year, everybody's equal. The rich and the poor, they're
all equal. They all had the same amount.
They all ate as much as the Lord provided. Whatever it is that
he caused to grow without their help, that's what they ate. Oh,
I wish we'd learned that. I wish we'd learned what that
picture. In Christ, every believer is
equal. One's not better than the other.
One doesn't have more than another. Now, we might have grown in grace.
We might have grown in knowledge, but we're all equal in Christ. Every believer is equally righteous. Christ is our righteousness.
How can you get more than that? Every believer is holy in Christ. I mean, holiness is not a thing
of degrees. You either are or you're not. Every believer is
holy in Christ. Every believer is redeemed. Everyone
has faith in Christ is forgiven in Christ. We all have life. We have the same life. Christ
is our life. We all have the same hope. We all have the expectation
that He's going to come back and take us from this awful place
and take us to be with Him. That's our expectation. We expect
that to happen because that's what He promised. And we trust
Him to provide all this stuff, whatever it is we're hoping in,
without our help. We're just going to eat. We're
just going to have. We're just going to be filled
with whatever it is the Lord provides without my help. That is a beautiful rest, isn't
it? Just trust Him to provide. Now here's something about the
Sabbath year I found that's very, very, very interesting. Scripture
never one time records that Israel observed the Sabbath year. I
always thought they did, but when I looked at this, Scripture
never one time says they observed the Sabbath year, not once. I
thought, huh. And I went on the internet, you
can find all kinds of stuff on the internet, I went and found
a bunch of Jewish historians to read. And they said, well,
Israel should have observed the Sabbath year. But they said as
far as we can find in our records and handed down from generation
to generation, Israel never one time observed the Sabbath year.
Never. I reckon that ought not be surprising
to us. Those Jews never could trust
God enough to observe the Sabbath here. They never could do it.
From their history, that doesn't surprise you, does it? And you
know what else? Look at their history. Israel
never had an extended period of rest. They never had extended
period of peace in all their history because they couldn't
trust God enough. I think there's a connection
there. But that's a very different story for spiritual Israel. Remember,
national Israel is always given as a picture of spiritual history,
of God's true people. And this is a very different
story for spiritual history. Every believer observes the Sabbath.
They observe the Sabbath day and they observe the Sabbath
year by resting in Christ and trusting whatever the Lord provides
in him is enough. Christ is all I need. That's what your heart truly
believes. You're observing the Sabbath
year of rest. that Christ, whatever God provides in him, is all I
need. Now isn't that a joy? To know
we have rest in Christ. Christ is better than the law
of the Sabbath. We don't have rest just for a day. We don't
even have rest just for a year. We have rest for eternity in
Christ because Christ fulfilled that law. He's better than the
Sabbath year. All right, thirdly, Leviticus 25. Here's the year
of Jubilee. Leviticus 25 verse 8. And thou shalt number seven sabbaths
of years unto thee, seven times seven years. And the space of
seven sabbaths of years shall be unto thee 49 years. And thou
shalt cause the trumpet of jubilee to sound on the 10th day of the
seventh month in the day of atonement. So you make the trumpet sound
throughout all your land and you shall hollow the 50th year
and proclaim liberty throughout all the land and all the inhabitants
thereof. It should be a jubilee unto you
and you shall return every man his possession and you shall
return every man and his family and jubilee. So that 50th year
be unto you and you shall not sow neither reap that which has
grown of itself in it, nor gather the grapes in it of divine undressed. Boy, it is the jubilee. It should
be holy unto you. You should eat the increase thereof
out of the field in the year of this jubilee. You shall return
every man unto his possession. And if thou sell aught unto thy
neighbor, or buyest aught of thy neighbor's hand, ye shall
not oppress one another. After seven Sabbath years, seven
sevens, the year of perfection, then comes in the 50th year,
the year of jubilee. Scripture also calls the year
of jubilee, the year of liberty. You know why the American slaves
always were looking for jubilee now, don't you? This is the year
of freedom. It's the year of liberty. And
all this has given to us is a picture of liberty, freedom in Christ,
free from the law. Oh, happy condition. In Christ,
I am free, free from all the demands of the law, free from
condemnation, free from every debt, free from this life of
slavery, this work of servile bondage. The year of Jubilee
was just like the Sabbath year, only it was better. In the year
of Jubilee, all debts were canceled. Suddenly a debtor. Can you imagine
just being in debt, just under a crushing weight of debt, just
crushing you. And the year of Jubilee, trumpet
sounds and you're debt free. Oh, what a relief. How happy
you'd be. Whenever we pay off our mortgages
at our home, we all take videos of burning the mortgage, telling
me how happy we are. But you know, we're not debt
free. We've still got other debts. When that trumpet of jubilee sounded,
you're free of every debt. What a glorious picture of Christ
our Savior coming for His people. And they sold themselves in bondage.
Oh, they've got a debt they cannot pay. And Christ came. paid the debt in full. He told
his people, you're debt free. Now, this debt that being paid
in Christ is much, much better than the law of jubilee. You
know, if I owed you a debt and that trumpet sounded, now I'm
debt free, you know what I'm really going to know in the back
of my head? I'm going to know. Really, I owed you. Really, I
didn't pay it. And you just had to write it
off to bad debt. Danny, this is what we were talking about.
I used to have to do this. We were talking about just foreign services. Somebody,
when I worked at the wholesale, man, they'd rack up a big old
debt. We'd sell them all this stuff on credit, and they'd run
off to Florida. I had somebody do that to me.
They'd run off to Florida. You can't chase them for debts down in Florida.
And you just wait, wait, wait, and they don't pay. Eventually,
you've got to write it off to bad debt. I mean, you've got
to get off the book. It's just bad debt. Now, the
debts cancel, but never was paid. See the difference? I knew a
man one time. He filed bankruptcy. He had to
get immediate relief from his business. He was just under bankruptcy.
It was just crushing him. And he filed bankruptcy to get
out from all that debt. And he spent years working, paying
back every single person he had to file bankruptcy on. Because
he couldn't stand to face it. He couldn't stand knowing, I
caused you this loss. And he paid back every last one
of them. Because he just felt like it
was an honorable thing to do. That's a great story. But what
if you can't pay that debt off? What if you couldn't get a job
that paid you enough to pay those debts off? It would just be bad
debt, wouldn't it? And you'd always feel shame.
Feeling that when you saw him on the street, I'd just, ugh,
I'd be ashamed. Jim and I got our first, well,
it was our only mortgage, wasn't it, from a bank president named
Mr. Slybeck. The bank, they weren't,
this is the kind of banks, boy, they don't sell their mortgages
off. Mr. Slybag was holding that mortgage. I paid that bank every month,
and I thought, I'm not ever going to miss a payment if I can help
it, because I saw Mr. Slybag out on the streets. His
wife was a teacher. I'd see him, you know, and it's
just like, I just, oh, the horror. I was just horrified of ever
missing a payment or doing something. Mr. Slybeck gave us that loan.
Just the shame. If I had caused him loss and
his business would have been so shameful. In Christ, the believer thinks
no shame. No shame. Because Christ came
and paid the debt in full. He didn't reach in his wallet
and pull out money. He saved up to do it. He offered
himself before the father and his precious blood, his life's
blood. He died to pay the sin debt of
his people. So you who believe don't have
to be ashamed. You don't have to be ashamed to look at the
law. That law is your old creditor. You don't have to be ashamed.
You're on good terms with him. The debt's been paid in full.
Jesus paid it all. All the debt I owe. Sin, my sin,
left a crimson stain. His blood washed it white as
snow. So there's no shame. Then in the year of Jubilee,
all property that had been lost was restored back to its original
owner. Now this is a picture of Christ. He restored back everything
to his people that they lost in Adam. But what did Adam lose
when he sinned? Brother, he lost everything.
He lost it all. He lost everything for himself
and he lost everything for everybody he represented. Adam lost life. He lost innocence. He lost fellowship
with God. Adam's understanding was darkened.
Adam was a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant man. And after he sinned,
he thought he could hide from God in bushes. Thought he could
blame his sin on God for giving him that woman. His understanding
was darkened. He lost everything, didn't he?
Within Christ the second Adam came. And the year of Jubilee,
that trumpet sounded when Christ came. He restored his people. Everything out of lost, only
better. You think about this year of
Jubilee. Say a fella, he lost his farm because he just, he
couldn't manage land. He couldn't manage money. He
lost his farm. Well, the year of Jubilee came and he got it
back. Well, Doug, he didn't get no
new skills. He still can't manage money. He still can't manage
land. He's going to lose it again sooner or later, isn't he? What
Christ restored his people can never be lost because the management
of it's not up to you and me, it's up to him. He manages it
perfectly. Christ restored righteousness
to his people that can never be lost. He restores unto them
life that can never be lost because it's eternal. He gives them light. He gives them wisdom. He gives
them understanding that cannot be lost. If Christ has saved
you, you can't forget this. I don't know a lot and I forget
a lot, but I'm not going to forget this. Salvation is in Christ.
He saved me. I know that. He gave that to
His people. He restores unto them fellowship
with God that cannot be lost. It can't be lost in this life.
In this life, He's promised you. I'll not lose you. You can't
lose that fellowship. We're going to have it perfectly.
He restored everything that Adam lost, only better, didn't he?
Then in the year of Jubilee, all the slaves went free. Oh,
how happy they were to be delivered from bondage to that cruel taskmaster. They're free. Look over Isaiah
chapter 61. This is good news to you and
me because in Adam, we've sold ourselves into slavery. Slavery
to sin, we've sold ourselves in bondage to sin so that we
can't quit sinning. We've sold ourselves in bondage
to the law that we cannot keep. And the law and sin are cruel
test masters. In Isaiah 61, Christ came. He
said, the spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord
hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto me, unto the meek.
He sent me to bind up the brokenhearted. He sent me to proclaim liberty.
He sent me to proclaim the year of jubilee to the captives, and
the opening of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim
the acceptable year of the Lord, that's the year of jubilee, and
the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all that mourn. Christ
came and he set his people free from the law, and he did it legally. The law didn't let his people
go because the law was forced to against its will. Christ kept
the law perfectly. He satisfied every demand of
the law, including the law's last demand that there be death
for sin. Christ died in the place of his people and the law satisfied. The law is not sending justice
out to look for anyone for whom Christ died. You're free from
that law, free from worry about it forever. And that freedom
can never be lost. Christ set his people free from
bondage to the law and bondage to sin. by giving them a new
nature. Our sin nature has put us in
such bondage, but Christ comes and gives his people a new nature,
a nature that can't sin. You might be thinking, I don't
think he's talking about me because I still feel like I'm a bondage
to sin. I mean, I don't want to sin. I can't stop. I can't stop sinning. I feel
like I'm under the control of sin. Well, that's true. We can't
stop sinning. But the believer is free from
sin. Free from bondage to sin. We're free from the controlling
power of sin in this way. Sin can't make you stop believing
on Christ. It can't make you stop loving
Him. It can't make you stop trusting Him. So you're free from the
controlling power of that sinful nature. Free. Free from slavery. At the end
of the year of Jubilee, Somebody's going to have to do business.
They're going to buy and sell, do some sort of business. But
the law of the year of Jubilee said you can't oppress anymore.
Y'all deal honestly with each other. Don't overcharge somebody.
Don't oppress each other. Well, that's a picture of freedom
in Christ. We're free from the law, free from sin, free from
death. And none of that can oppress
you anymore. It can't stress you out anymore.
You're free from those things in Christ. Now, in the year of
Jubilee, those old Jews, just like the Sabbath year, they never observed it. Never
one time did they observe the year of Jubilee. Now, I read
this law of the Sabbath. I have to tell you, I love being
a Sabbath keeper, don't you? I love rest in Christ, our Sabbath,
but the Jews, They never observed this year of Jubilee. This was
not good news to them because they were too selfish. They could
not let go of the profit that they had in this world. The stuff,
the things of this world was too important to them. They couldn't
write that debt off to bad debt. They gained land, they gained
property, they gained slaves through doing good business. And they could not let those
gains go. couldn't rest in Christ. Back to our text, Hebrews 4.
Brethren, let's not be like those old Jews. The call of the gospel
is rest in Christ. The call of the gospel is to
keep this Sabbath rest through faith in Christ. Hebrews 4, verse
11. Let us labor, therefore, to enter
into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of
unbelief. Here's what the writer's telling
us. Work hard to quit working. Work hard to quit your works
and rest in Christ. Work hard at this. Don't trust
your religious doings. Don't trust all these religious
ceremonies or works that you do. Work hard to quit that. And
just rest in Christ. Rest in Him as your salvation.
Rest in Him as your righteousness. Rest in Him as your holiness.
Don't try to make yourself holy. Just rest in Christ. That's what
He's saying. Not do what this flesh wants
you to do and rest in Christ. Work hard at taking off those
grave clothes of false religion. And you're going to have to work
hard at doing it. Because the moment you take them off, the
old man's going to put them back on. And you've got to work hard
at just taking them off all the time. Work hard at constantly
laying aside the sin that does so easily beset us. I'm sure
that sin applies to a lot of things, but I'll tell you the
one I know it does. The sin of unbelief. If we can lay aside
this sin of unbelief, we'll rest in Christ. Work hard at seeking
Christ. What did our Lord say? What does
the Almighty God say? Seek me with all your heart.
Sounds to me like that's working hard, isn't it? Seeking with
all your heart, seek him with everything you've got. You know
what else God said? The day you do that, you'll find
me. You find him, you'll find Sabbath. If you find Christ,
I promise you this, you'll become a Sabbath keeper by resting in
him. Let's bow together. Our father, how we thank you
for these precious scriptures that we've read. showing us rest
in Christ our Savior. Father, I beg of you that you'd
apply this word, your word, to our hearts here this morning.
Cause each soul here this morning to leave, leave this place resting
in Christ our Savior. Resting in Him as our all and
in all. If we have Him, oh what we have,
we have everything. Cause us to look away from the
works of the flesh, and all the things this flesh is so easily
fascinated with, enable us to set our affection on Christ our
Savior. Rest in peace. It's in His precious
name we pray. Get back.