WHAT’S SO IMPORTANT ABOUT REST?
“There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God” (Heb. 4:9). We have rest when we learn to discern between what is God’s job and what is ours. Sometimes we look at the godly things we’re praying for, and we think God is working too slowly in getting them done. We get tricked into trying to help God out, taking on burdens and tasks that are not ours. When we do that, we discard any rest we might have had. Our actions bring frustration, stress, sore muscles, and various pains. In the case of the Hebrews who escaped Egypt, their weariness with God’s timing ended in death. God planned a great future for them in a beautiful land, but their impatience and arrogance kept them out. Arrogance hardened their hearts and they could no longer rest in God.
Moses was in direct communication with God and went up the mountain to receive God’s will for the people. But the people got annoyed.
“And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves together to Aaron and said to him, ‘Up, make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him’” (Ex. 32:1)
Aaron and the people were quick to come up with their own solution.
“So Aaron said to them, ‘Take off the rings of gold that are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.” So all the people took off the rings of gold that were in their ears and brought them to Aaron. And he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool and made a golden calf.
“And they said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!’ (Ex. 32:2-4).
That was a big lie. The one true God brought them out of Egypt, a God who they couldn’t see with their eyes. Instead of trusting Him, they took matters into their own hands, thinking they had a better way to get themselves through the wilderness and to a better place. They wanted something they could see with their physical eyes, so they sacrificed their precious possessions and made a golden calf.
When we try to do God’s job, we sacrifice our precious possessions as well. We sacrifice our peace and replace it with anxiety. We sacrifice our rest and replace it with strained and worried muscles. We sacrifice a healthy mind for a pained body. These things are not good.
“And the Lord said to Moses, “Go down, for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves” (Ex. 32:7). The people became corrupted because they lacked patience. We’ve all been there when we forge ahead with our ideas and try to force God’s hand. We don’t do this on purpose, but we need to beware if we start.
When a thing gets corrupted, it gets perverted and doesn’t do what it’s supposed to do. The corruption can be either be a diminishing or an addition. Rust is an example of addition. Rust perverts a good clean pipe by growing on it, distorting it and it eventually takes over. Once I had a plumber take out a rusted u-joint. It had so much rust on it that the pipe’s interior was barely an eighth of an inch opening. Arthritis is a corruption of bone cells where it grows extensions that shouldn’t be there.
We need to keep corruption out of our prayer life and our thought life. A good way to do that is to come into the rest of God. Let God do His work. Be patient and trust Him to do His work.
Genesis 2:2 tells us: “And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.” God rested from His work, and that’s a good lesson for us.
Hebrews 4:9-10 tells us: “There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God. For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his.”
The Bible is telling us we need to cease from pushing our ways and trust His ways instead. Don’t get impatient with God; it will corrupt us. “Wherefore as the Holy Ghost saith, ‘Today if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness’” (Heb. 3:7-9). The Hebrews brought calamity and catastrophe to themselves by trying to do what they thought God wanted instead of doing what He actually wanted.
The Lord already knows that impatience comes easily, while rest does not. When we get started on a thing, it’s hard to stop, especially if we think it’s a righteous, God-ordained thing.
We need to know when to pray and when to stop and let God do what He does. Impatient, pushy prayer doesn’t move God any faster. It just backfires on us, and God doesn’t want that. Like His plan for the Hebrews, to go to a good place, God has a good plan for our health and welfare too. It’s vital for us to be open to when God says for us to rest. Trust Him, don’t push Him.
FREE THRU TUESDAY: WINGS SAMPLE G – SPIRITUAL EYES
In this sample book, I’ve chosen five chapters specifically about seeing life’s incidents from a spiritual point of view.
Chapters include: OUR SPIRITUAL FIVE SENSES
GOD'S SPIRIT TOUCHES OUR SPIRIT
NO GLASS CEILINGS
GENERATIONAL CURSES
A DIFFERENT TAKE ON ANGER AND FORGIVENESS
PAYMENT FOR SIN and
TELLINGS THE DEVIL WHERE TO GO
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