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THE GOSPEL OF
REST
"There remaineth
therefore a rest to the people of God.
"-HEBREWS iv. 9.
THE keynote of this chapter is Rest. In the second verse
it is spoken of as a gospel, or good news. And is there
any gospel that more needs preaching in these busy, weary
days, through which our age is rushing to its close, than
the Gospel of Rest? On all hands we hear of strong and
useful workers stricken down in early life by the
exhausting effects of mental toil. The tender brain
tissues were never made to sustain the tremendous wear and
tear of our times. There is no machinery in human nature
to repair swiftly enough the waste of nervous energy which
is continually going on. It is not, therefore, to be
wondered at that the symptoms of brain tiredness are
becoming familiar to many workers, acting as warning
signals, which, if not immediately attended to, are
followed by some terrible collapse of mind or body, or
both.
And yet it is not altogether that we
work so much harder than our forefathers; but that there
is so much more fret and chafe and worry in our lives.
Competition is closer. Population is more crowded. Brains
are keener and swifter in their motion. The resources of
ingenuity and inventiveness, of creation and production,
are more severely and constantly taxed. And the age seem's
so merciless and selfish. If the lonely spirit trips and
falls, it is trodden down in the great onward rush, or
left behind to its fate; and the dread of the swoop of the
vultures, with rustling wings, from unknown heights upon
us as their prey, fills us with an anguish which we know
by the familiar name of care. We could better stand the
strain of work if only we had rest from worry, from
anxiety, and from the fret of the troubled sea that cannot
rest, as it moans around us, with its yeasty waves, hungry
to devour. Is such a rest possible?
This chapter states that such a rest is possible.
"Let us
labor therefore to enter into that rest." Rest? What
rest? His rest, says the first verse; my
rest, says the third verse; God's rest, says
the fourth verse. And this last verse is a quotation from
the earliest page of the Bible, which tells how God rested
from all the work that he had made. And as we turn to that
marvelous apocalypse of the past, which in so many
respects answers to the apocalypse of the future given us
by the Apostle John, we find that, whereas we are
expressly told of the evening and morning of each of the
other days of creation, there is no reference to the dawn
or close of God's rest-day; and we are left to infer that
it is impervious to time, independent of duration,
unlimited, and eternal; that the ages of human story are
but hours in the rest-day of Jehovah; and that, in point
of fact, we spend our years in the Sabbath-keeping
of God. But, better than all, it would appear that
we are invited to enter into it and share it; as a child
living by the placid waters of a vast fresh water lake may
dip into them its cup, and drink and drink again, without
making any appreciable diminution of its volume or ripple
on its expanse.
What is meant by God resting? Surely
not the rest of weariness! "He fainteth not,
neither is weary." Though he had spread forth the
heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth, and
weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a
balance, and had invented ten thousand differing forms of
being, yet his inventiveness was as fresh, his energy as
vigorous as ever. Surely not the rest of inactivity.
"My Father worketh hitherto," said our Lord.
"In him we live, and move, and have our being."
True, he is not now sending forth, so far as we know,
suns, or systems, or fresh types of being. But his power
is ever at work, repairing, renewing, and sustaining the
fabric of the vast machinery of the universe. No sparrow
falls to the ground without him. The cry of the young lion
and the lowing of the oxen in the pastures attract his
instant regard. "In him all things consist." It
was the rest of a finished work. He girded himself
to the specific work of creation, and summoned into being
all that is; and when it was finished he said it was very
good: and at once he rested from all his work which he had
created and made. It was the rest of divine complacency,
of infinite satisfaction, of perfect content. It was
equivalent to saying, "This creation of mine is all
that I meant it to be, finished and perfect. I am
perfectly satisfied; there is nothing more to be done; it
is all very good."
This, then, is the rest which we
are invited to share. We are not summoned to the
heavy slumber which follows over-taxing toil, nor to
inaction or indolence; but to the rest which is possible
amid swift activity and strenuous work; to perfect
equilibrium between the outgoings and incomings of the
life; to a contented heart; to peace that passeth all
understanding; to the repose of the will in the will of
God; and to the calm of the depths of the nature which are
undisturbed by the hurricanes which sweep the surface, and
urge forward the mighty waves. This rest is holding out
both its hands to the weary souls of men throughout the
ages, offering its shelter as a harbor from the storms of
life.
But is it certain that this rest
has not already been entered and exhausted by the children
of men? That question is fully examined and
answered in this wonderful paragraph. The Sabbath
did not realize that rest (ver. 3). We cannot
prize its ministry too highly. Its law is written, not
only in Scripture, but in the nature of man. The godless
band of French Revolutionists found that they could not
supersede the week by the decade, the one-day-in-seven by
the one-day in-ten. Like a ministering angel it relieves
the monotony of labor, and hushes the ponderous machinery
of life, and weaves its spell of rest; but it is too
fitful and transient to realize the rest of God. It may
typify it, but it cannot exhaust it. Indeed, it was broken
by man's rebellion as soon as God had sanctified and
hallowed it. Canaan did not realize that rest (ver.
8). The Land of Promise was a great relief to the
marchings and privations of the desert. But it was
constantly interrupted, and at last, in the Captivity,
broken up; as the forms of the mountains in the lake by a
shower of hail. Besides, in the Book of Psalms, written
four hundred years after Joshua had led Israel across the
Jordan, The Holy Spirit, speaking by David, points onward
to a rest still future (Psalm xcv. 7). Surely, then, if
neither of these events has realized the rest of God, it
remains still, waiting for us and all the people of God.
"There remaineth, therefore," unexhausted and
unrealized, "a Sabbath-keeping to the people of
God."
And there is yet a further reason
for this conviction of God's unexhausted rest.
Jesus, our Forerunner and Representative, has entered into
it for us. See what verse 10 affirms: "He that is
entered into his rest; " and who can he be but our
great Joshua, Jehovah-Jesus? He also has ceased from his
own work of redemption, as God did from his of creation.
After the creative act, there came the Sabbath, when God
ceased from his work, and pronounced it very good; so,
after the redemptive act, there came the Sabbath to the
Redeemer. He lay, during the seventh day, in the grave of
Joseph, not because he was exhausted or inactive, but
because redemption was finished, and there was no more for
him to do. He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on
High; and that majestic session is a symptom neither of
fatigue nor of indolence. He ever liveth to make
intercession; he works with his servants, confirming their
words with signs; he walks amid the seven golden
candlesticks. And yet he rests as a man may rest who has
arisen from his ordinary life to effect some great deed of
emancipation and deliverance; but, having accomplished it,
returns again to the ordinary routine of his former life,
glad and satisfied in his heart. Nor is this rest for
Christ alone; but for us also, who are forever identified
with him in his glorious life. We have been raised up
together with him in the mind and purpose of God, and have
been made to sit with him in the heavenlies; so that in
Jesus we have already entered into the rest of God, and
have simply to appropriate it by a living faith.
How, then, may we practically
realize and enjoy the rest of God ?-( 1) We must will the
will of God. So long as the will of God, whether
in the Bible or in providence, is going in one direction
and our will in another, rest is impossible. Can there be
rest in an earthly household when the children are ever
chafing against the regulations and control of their
parents? How much less can we be at rest if we harbor an
incessant spirit of insubordination and questioning,
contradicting and resisting the will of God! That will
must be done on earth as it is in heaven. None can stay
his hand, or say, What dost thou? It will be done with us,
or in spite of us. If we resist it, the yoke against which
we rebel will only rub a sore place on our skin; but we
must still carry it. How much wiser, then, meekly to yield
to it, and submit ourselves under the mighty hand of God,
saying, "Not my will, but thine be done!" The
man who has learned the secret of Christ, in saying a
perpetual "Yes"to the will of God; whose life is
a strain of rich music to the theme, "Even so,
Father"; whose will follows the current of the will
of God, as the smoke from our chimneys permits itself to
be wafted by the winds of autumn, that man will find rest
unto his soul.
We must accept the finished work
of Christ. He has ceased from the work of our
redemption, because there was no more to do. Our sins and
the sins of the world were put away. The power of the
adversary was annulled. The gate of heaven was opened to
all that believe. All was finished, and was very good. Let
us, then, cease from our works. Let us no longer feel as
if we have to do aught, by our tears or prayers or works,
to make ourselves acceptable to God. Why should we try to
add one stitch to a finished garment, or append one stroke
to the signed and sealed warrant of pardon placed within
our hands? We need have no anxiety as to the completeness
or sufficiency of a divinely finished thing. Let us quiet
our fears by considering that what satisfies Christ, our
Saviour and Head, may well satisfy us. Let us dare to
stand without a qualm in God's presence, by virtue of the
glorious and completed sacrifice of Calvary. Let us
silence every tremor of unrest by recalling the dying cry
on the cross, and the witness of the empty grave.
We must trust our Father's care.
"Casting all your care upon him, for he careth for
you." Sometimes like a wild deluge, sweeping all
before it, and sometimes like the continual dropping of
water, so does care mar our peace. That we shall some day
fall by the hand of Saul; that we shall be left to starve
or pine away our days in a respectable workhouse; that we
shall never be able to get through the difficulties of the
coming days or weeks; household cares, family cares,
business cares; cares about servants, children, money;
crushing cares, and cares that buzz around the soul like a
swarm of gnats on a summer's day, what rest can there be
for a soul thus beset? But, when we once learn to live by
faith, believing that our Father loves us, and will not
forget or forsake us, but is pledged to supply all our
needs; when we acquire the holy habit of talking to him
about all, and handing over all to him, at the moment that
the tiniest shadow is cast upon the soul; when we accept
insult and annoyance and interruption, coming to us from
whatever quarter, as being his permission, and, therefore,
as part of his dear will for us, then we have learned the
secret of the Gospel of Rest.
We must follow our Shepherd's
lead. " We which have believed do enter into
rest" (ver. 3). The way is dark; the mountain track
is often hidden from our sight by the heavy mists that
hang over hill and fell; we can hardly discern a step in
front. But our divine Guide knows. He who trod earth's
pathways is going unseen at our side. The shield of his
environing protection is all around; and his voice, in its
clear, sweet accents, is whispering peace. Why should we
fear? He who touches us, touches his bride, his purchased
possession, the apple of his eye. We may, therefore, trust
and not be afraid. Though the mountains should depart, or
the hills be removed, yet will his loving kindness not
depart from us, neither will the covenant of his peace be
removed. And amid the storm, and darkness, and the onsets
of our foes, we shall hear him soothing us with the sweet
refrain of his own lullaby of rest: "My peace I give
unto you; in the world ye shall have tribulation, but in
me ye shall have peace."
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