Turn to Hebrews chapter 4. Labor to rest. What a paradox. Labor to rest in the Lord Jesus Christ. is something people prize very
highly. Counselors, therapists charge
high dollars to try and give people some kind of rest. But most are like the woman with
the issue of blood who tried all the physicians She spent,
it says, all her living upon them and found them to be physicians
of no value, of no value. True rest, the rest spoken of
here in this chapter, first of all, is real. This is real. And it can only be found where
it is, and that's in Christ. You can only find this rest where
it is, where God put it, and that's in His Son, the Lord Jesus
Christ. I read it to you out of Matthew
11. under the law, the ceremonies,
the types, the pictures, trying to work their way. They missed
it. They missed it. Trying to work their way to heaven,
trying to please God through what they did. And our Lord says to all who
hear, come unto me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and
I will. Oh, when God says, I will, He
means I will. I will give you rest. I can tell you this, if I do
not have rest, it's because I don't believe Him. It's because I don't
believe He'll give it to me. He that cometh to God must believe
that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek
Him. If I come to him for rest, I must believe he'll give it
to me." Because he said so. He said so. Now, remember this. Paul is writing to his Hebrew
brethren who have professed to believe the gospel. And Paul
wants them to know how serious this matter is. This is just
a continuation of the exhortation not to take this for granted
out of chapter 3. He just continues this in chapter
4. And he points them back to the children of Israel when they
left Egypt. They were going to the land of
promise, and they ended up wandering in the wilderness for forty years.
And most of them died, the older ones that left Egypt, that older
group, the original group that came out of Egypt, they died
in the wilderness except for Joshua and Caleb. Why? Because of unbelief. Now listen,
because they did not believe the gospel, when it was preached
to them. Frank, this morning, has a replica
of the tabernacle. As you said this morning, when
Holly was a little girl, it screamed Christ. It screamed someone's
coming. Every time they looked at that,
the gospel was preached. Every day. The sacrifices. Everything
they went through. The ceremonies. The gospel was
preached to them. That's what Paul says here in
verse 2. For unto us was the gospel preached as well as unto
them. The gospel was preached to them,
Paul says. The gospel was preached to them. But they did not believe
God. They refused to trust His word,
to trust His gospel, to trust His providence. They refused
to trust God. How many times do they say, we
ought to go back to Egypt? They refuse. So Paul gives us
this word of warning. He's giving them this word of
warning and it's given to us. Lest we fall after the same example,
he says, of unbelief. And then he says in verse one,
let us, Paul includes himself here. He does not put himself
above the people he's writing to or preaching to. Paul includes
himself in the message. He said, let us. You know, one
place Paul said, I keep my body under subjection, lest when I
preach Christ, I myself be a castaway. In old Philippians, he said,
I've not arrived. I've not apprehended yet. He said, let us. Let us therefore, listen, fear. Fear. Doesn't the scripture say, for
God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and of
love and of a sound mind? Yes, it does say that. It does.
Did not our Lord say in John 14, 1, let not your heart be
troubled? You believe in God, believe also
in me. And here Paul tells us to fear. Here is where we must rightly
divide the word of truth. Here is where we must handle
God's word carefully. There is a right and a wrong
fear. Listen to these scriptures. The
fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. That is a right fear. That's of God. That's of God. Proverbs 14, in the fear of the
Lord is strong confidence. The fear of the Lord is a fountain
of life. Proverbs 23, happy is the man. Now, this sounds like
a paradox. Happy is the man that feareth
always. Now, is that a paradox or what?
Happy is a man who stands in awe and reverent respect of God
always. That man is happy because he
knows God. He knows God. Paul said in Romans
11, 20, Be not high-minded, but fear. Fear. Oh, we are to fear God. We are
to have a reverent awe at all times. of him, not like Judas
who walked up and kissed him on the cheek and betrayed him. Now listen here, Paul says, there
is a right fear, but now here's what Paul's saying. He's saying
here, we should fear, guard against. This is what he's
talking about. He's saying guard against unbelief. They had a difficult time letting,
some of them did, some of them had a difficult time letting
go of the ceremonies, letting go of the Sabbath, letting go
of these things. Think about it. They were steeped
in these things and then one day, one day, Man comes along
preaching and says, do away with all that. This is something that
they did, they looked to, they held to for salvation. And now the message is Christ
alone, grace alone. Actually, that's always been
the message. That's always been the message. But they had a difficult
time letting go of some of these things. I've seen this over the
years. Over the years, I've seen different
people come to faith. There's two or three people in
my mind. And it takes a while for them
to let everything go. It takes a while to just let
it go and hold on, look to the Lord Jesus, rest in, find your
rest and your hope in Jesus Christ When I stand before God, the
only hope I have is the man seated at His right hand. His blood
is the blood of atonement for my sins. His righteousness, His
right doing is mine. And that's it. That's it. And you've got to let everything
else go. Everything else has to go. And that's why Paul, when
he's writing to his Hebrew brothers, he knows what they were steeped
in. He knows what they've got to
let go. You know, they've done these things for years and hundreds
of centuries. They've done them. It was 2,000
years from Moses to Christ. 2,000 years they were doing these
things. And then one day, stop. It's over with. The real has
come. The antitype is here, the Lord
Jesus Christ. So that's what he's saying here.
He's saying here, guard against this. When he says fear, he means
guard against unbelief, guard against missing Christ by trying
to hang on to anything else, anything else. Guard against
it. Lest a promise be left us of
entering into his rest His rest, God's rest, Christ's rest, the
rest that is in the Lord Jesus Christ, any of you should seem
to come short of it. You know what it is to come short
of it? It's to come short of Christ. Our Lord said this to
a young man one time. Thou art not far from the kingdom
of God. Not far from it is not in it. He wasn't far from it, but he
wasn't in it. Thou art not far from it. Don't
come short of Christ. Don't do that. God has promised
rest to the believers, but now, listen, only believers, only
those who look to and rest in the Lord Jesus Christ, that's
who the rest is promised to. It's to the believers. And with so much at stake, Don't
take it for granted. Don't take it lightly. That's
what he's saying. Don't take it lightly. Just be
dead serious about it. Dead serious. For unto us was
the gospel preached as well as unto them. There was only one
gospel. It was preached to them and it's
preached to us now. Same gospel. They heard the gospel
that we are hearing. Now, if they heard it and saw
it in type, in picture and in promises, and for the most part,
they didn't believe it. They didn't believe it. Now,
the gospel is preached now to us. Christ alone, Christ the
Redeemer, His blood, His righteousness. Now, if we do not look to Him
alone and we try to, and I tell you what, it's so subtle what
we do hang on to. It's so subtle what we will actually still reach
back and hold on to Him. That's why he's saying here,
you've got to look to Him and Him alone. We have Christ preached
to us every week in His person, in His work, out of His Word. But unless we believe Him, unless
we look to Him, listen, and continue in Him, the Word of God It always
speaks of continuing in the faith. Continuing in Him. We too shall
not enter His rest. We too shall not enter it. If
the gospel is not received by faith, it will save no one. No one. You see, it didn't profit
them because He said it was not mixed. with faith. They heard it, but they didn't
believe it. They kept the ceremonies, but
they didn't believe what the ceremonies said. The one they
pointed to, they didn't believe it, but they went through the
rituals. They went through the motions. They had the religion,
but they missed the message. They missed the person that the
types in the pictures and shadows all screamed. And Paul was very serious about
this. He said, these are his brethren.
It's like talking to your children. Just think about this. Just think
about talking to your children about this message. How serious
you get about it. That's what Paul was talking
to his Hebrew brethren here. You know, he said over and over,
I could wish myself a curse from Christ if it would save me. Serious stuff. But he says in
verse 3, we which have believed do enter into his rest right
now. Right now. Now, the full glory
of it, the full enjoyment of it is yet to come, but we have
entered into it. We are not trying to work our
way to heaven. We are not trying to do anything
in any way, shape, or form to please God in hopes He will accept
me, accept us in what we do. No, no. We which have believed
do enter into that rest that's in the Lord Jesus Christ. When
a man believes the gospel, he enters the rest that's in Christ.
from the dominion of sin, from the burden of the law, from self-righteousness,
we have a real rest in Christ now and forevermore. Now, the rest that we have in
Christ is a different rest than the one spoken of in verses 3
and 4. Look here in verses 3 and 4. for we which have believed do
enter into rest. As he said, as I have sworn in
my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest. And then all of
a sudden, and I'm going to tell you, you have to look at this.
He jumps. He jumps, although the works
were finished from the foundation of the world, he jumps to creation.
He's talking about this rest in Christ. And then he jumps
to creation. For he spake in a certain place
of the seventh day on this wise, and God did rest the seventh
day from all his works." When you think of the first type, and what he's going to do here,
he's going to show that creation and redemption and this rest,
this perfect rest that we have in Christ in this world to come,
has been the whole purpose of God all along. It's not like
God created the world, then man failed, and now God's trying
to rescue him. He's saying this has been the
purpose of God from the very beginning. What's the first type
you think of in the Scriptures? The seed of the woman. But that's
not it. It's the Sabbath. It's that day
of rest that God rested on the seventh day, that Sabbath day,
before the fall ever happened. And he reaches back and he jumps
right back to creation. He doesn't go to the fall, he
goes to the creation and shows that the whole purpose of God
in creating this world by Jesus Christ is to have a people through His redemption, And they
are going to have a perfect rest, a perfect joy, and a new world
to come. It's just like one long thread
running. You see, when religion looks
at it, if you take religion, just false religion, you take
the way religion looks at it, religion looks at God creating
the world, Adam falling, and then the Lord Jesus Christ trying
to rescue man from what happened in Nepal. But that's not it. It's been the whole purpose of
God from creation all the way through. Even the fall. And we are God's people. There
remains a rest. For who? It says here. For the
people of God. This rest. Alright, let me get
back. Where was I at? I completely
lost my place here. Okay. The rest that we have in
Christ, in verse 3 and 4 here, the rest we have in Christ is
different than spoken of in those two verses. It says God did rest
the seventh day from creating the world. And then he speaks
of the rest of the promised land. Well, here's what Paul's going
to do. He's going to take the Hebrew
brethren from those lesser rests, Lesser types to the real. The Lord Jesus Christ. That's
what He's going to do. He's going to take them back
to the lesser, then He's going to bring them to the greater.
The Lord Jesus Christ, who is our rest. He's our rest. And
He says here in verse 5, And in this place again, if they
shall enter into my rest, speaking here of Canaan, if they would
have believed, They could have entered in, but they didn't,
so they wandered around in the wilderness for forty years because
of their unbelief. Now seeing, therefore it remains
that some, listen, this is good, some must enter in. Christ said,
I have sheep which are not of this foal, them also I must bring
in. God's purpose will not be defeated
through unbelief. Even in that typical rest in
Canaan, they wandered around the wilderness for 40 years.
But now, God did bring a people into the land of Canaan, which
was a typical of the rest, the land of rest. It's not going
to be destroyed through unbelief. God is going to have a people,
and they are going to believe, and they are going to enter in.
He's going to see to it. He's going to see to it. Just
as Joshua took Solomon to Canaan, even so the Lord Jesus Christ
is going to take a multitude into glory, into that true land of rest,
paradise, paradise. And again, He sets a definite
day in verse 7. And I wrote over top of that
word, Lemethus, he set. Again, he set a definite day.
Today. He set today. And it's referring
back to Psalm 95. Today. What is that day? It's this gospel day. It's the
gospel day. And if you would hear his voice
tonight If you would hear his voice,
he says, in the gospel, when you hear it, don't harden your
hearts. He said, believe it. Receive
it. Bow to it. Fall at his feet. Again, he said a certain day,
saying, in David, today, after so long a time, as it is said,
today, if you will hear his voice, harden not your hearts. But believe, believe, rest in Him, look to Him. For
if Jesus, that's Joshua, if Joshua had given them rest,
then he, David, in Psalm 95, would not afterward have spoken
of another day of rest. If Joshua, if that had been the
rest, you've got to remember who he's writing to here now,
he's Hebrew brethren. If that had been the rest that God had
meant and spoken of when Joshua took them over into the land
of Canaan, David, which was 400 years after Joshua, would not
have spoken of another day. But he spoke of another day,
and that other day is this day, the gospel day. Christ is the rest. That's what
he's saying. Christ is the rest. Those were
just typical. They were just types. The Sabbath. The Sabbath day. It was just
a type. The land of Canaan. It was just
a type. The real rest is the person. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. Although
Joshua took them into Canaan, and they enjoyed a temporal rest,
it was not the true rest, for David would have never spoken
of another day, 400 and some years after that. So then, in verse 9, I'm going
to go down to verse 11. There remaineth therefore a rest,
the keeping, look over at your margin, the keeping of a Sabbath,
the keeping of a Sabbath. You know, all the other times
it spoke of a rest before this, it speaks, it's like repose.
It's like resting, you know, sitting down, resting from your
working. But here it's speaking of actual keeping of a Sabbath.
You know, the law said back then to keep the Sabbath. We keep
the Sabbath in Christ. That's fulfilled in Christ. Christ
is our Sabbath. And we keep it in Him. It's fulfilled
in Him. So then, there is still awaiting
a full and complete rest for the people of God. There remains
a rest. We've entered into it now in
Christ by faith. We've enjoyed some of it now.
We have our ups and downs. But we enjoy it. We enjoy a rest. We're not trying to work and
please God to attain salvation. But one day, in a little while,
Vicki and I was talking, coming over here, how fast time is rolling. I mean, it's just rolling by
so fast. And I told her, I said, in a little while, this will
be over. I mean, in a little while. And
then we will enjoy the full glory and benefit, pleasure of that
rest that we have in Christ forever and ever and ever. Eternity. Eternity. For he that is entered into his
rest, he also has ceased from his own works as God did from
his. Paul speaking here of the Lord
Jesus Christ in verse 10. Christ had a work to do in preaching
the gospel, in redeeming His people, and He has what? Finished. He has finished His
work. Never to do it again. Never to do it again. And He
is now seated at God's right hand. He's entered into His rest. For
he that is entered into His rest, Christ also has ceased from His
own works as God did from His, because He cried, It's finished.
And listen, when we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, when any
man, any woman is brought to faith in Christ, He is their
rest. There's your rest right there.
seated at God's right hand. Our rest is seated at God's right
hand. We are accepted in Him, loved in Him, blessed in Him,
glorified in Him, justified in Him, redeemed in Him, sanctified
in Him. We don't bring anything to the
table. We don't bring anything. Let us, therefore. Let us labor,
therefore. Looking at it, he's saying therefore.
Looking back on all that's been said. Let us labor. That sounds odd, doesn't it?
Labor to rest. But I tell you what, we have
to, don't we? We have to. We have to labor. And that's
why Paul's writing to his Hebrew brethren. He knows the struggles
they're going through. He knows what it is to live in
his flesh. He knows what it is to be brought up in religion
like he was. It's a struggle. He said, you've got to labor
to lay down everything continually. You lay it down today, when you
get up tomorrow, you'll have to lay something else down. And
you get up tomorrow, you'll have to lay something else down. You
have to labor to rest in Him. Let us labor, therefore, to enter
into that rest. lest any man fall after the same
example of unbelief." Not believing God. We must strive by faith
each day to rest in the Lord Jesus Christ. Every day. You
get up in the morning, you've got to strive to rest in Him.
Because you've still got that old nature. You've still got
that old nature to contend with. And you've got to strive to rest.
We must strive against ourselves We must strive against self-righteousness.
We must strive to rest in His righteousness. The Christian life is not a life
of ease. It's a struggle. The Lord said,
watch and pray. Watch and pray. The Lord said,
Strive to enter in. Strive to enter in. And here,
he says, labor to rest. Let us labor therefore to enter
into that rest, to experience it, to enjoy it. My, what joy we have in Christ. Oh, he said, labor, strive to
enter into that rest. Don't hold on to anything but
him. Don't look to anything but him.