What about the rest?

Hebrews is one of my favourite books of the bible.  It speaks of the better promises of the new covenant. In Hebrews 4:10-11 (TPT) we read:

"As we enter into God’s faith-rest life we cease from our own works, just as God celebrates his finished works and rests in them. So then we must give our all and be eager to experience this faith-rest life, so that no one falls short by following the same pattern of doubt and unbelief."

The bible speaks of a variety of different kinds of work , but one of the most important concepts we can grasp as believers is that it's not through our own works or efforts that we can please God.  

                                    What pleases God is Faith. 

What pleases God is faith, and without faith, it's impossible  (not difficult but impossible) to please God no matter how we behave or act. Hebrews 11:6 (GNT) "No one can please God without faith, for whoever comes to God must have faith that God exists and rewards those who seek him."

Faith is activated by love.   Seeing, remembering and focussing God's immense love for us causes faith to rise and see the good things of God with blessings and miracles all through our lives. It allows us to stay in peace while all around us maybe chaotic.  

We can chose to enter this rest by putting aside wrong thinking about how God relates to us and us with him. Understanding this and not striving or stressing to get God's approval or his love, and not believing that our own works make us righteous in God's eyes, is a much more restful position to be in.

Earlier in Chapter 4 of Hebrews (v6) we see that people missed out on the rest that comes from realizing these truths, because of one thing; their unbelief, and it goes on to say that we have the opportunity to do the same, or not:

"Those who first heard the good news of deliverance failed to enter into that realm of faith’s-rest because of their unbelieving hearts. Yet the fact remains that we still have the opportunity to enter into the faith-rest life and experience the fulfillment of the promise!"

All through the bible we see how people struggled with simply trusting God.   Adam and Eve started the ball of unbelief rolling through the generations, when they didn't trust God and believed a snake's assertion that God was holding something back from them.  Various heroes of faith had their own moments of looking to their own resources and ability, where they failed to trust and believe God.  Now we have the opportunity to either enter the rest which comes from trusting God or to stay focussing our efforts, weaknesses, flaws or achievements, trying to please God by will-power, or religious behaviour.  

Hebrews 4:11 tells us that we must LABOUR TO ENTER INTO THE REST.  It's hard for us to simply rest in someone else's work.  As a result of what happened in the Garden of Eden, we are now somehow wired to try to be independent and self-sufficient, but we are not capable of being enough on our own.  We can put in effort and struggle and yet never be satisfied or successful in our relationship with God, if it is based on self-effort, however well intended.

Our Christian 'walk' should really be called a Christian 'Rest'.  We need to stop trying to be 'good' people by self effort, or joining self help groups to make us better people so that God will find us more acceptable, and instead look at the truth that we are right with God and beloved and wanted.  As we mediate on what God actually thinks of us, any 'good works' will flow out of our new nature in Christ, rather than from an obligation to try to be better or do the right thing for scoring points with God.

Today I want to help you not to miss out on Gods' perfect plan of rest! Stop striving and wrestling with behaviours and patterns, and the belief that you are not accepted as you are by God.   You will never be good enough on your own.  That't the truth!  Every work we do from our own effort is like dung!  But when we truly rest on God's word, when we take by faith what he has to say, we can rest in his promises, which keep fear and discouragement far away.   Don't be like some of the people who didn't enter into God's rest because of their unbelief, but keep yourself in the love of God (Jude 1:20) and allow faith to work by that love to find God's rest!