Rest I

Rest I - What is Rest?

I. Introduction

a. How many of you have had a crisis or a “really, really rough day” in the past couple of weeks? Most of us, I am sure.

i. If you are like me, you found yourself trying to give it to God.

ii. I had a couple of crisis on this past Monday…including a car that was damaged by a rock. As my mind was churning before I went to sleep, I actively sought out God and tried to set my mind “on things above.” It seemed I would be successful for a moment or two and then my mind would replay thoughts or recite my plans on how to “fix” the problem.

iii. It was almost funny at one point, because I am struggling to “give it to God” and Jennifer rolls over and says, “by the way…”

iv. Husbands, don’t you just hate it when your wife says that just before you fall asleep?

v. Fortunately, it wasn’t serious, but it was another thing to “worry” about.

vi. And you probably guessed it, I woke up several times during the night with a mind full of activity, finding it very hard to bring myself to a place of rest.

b. Have you ever had a night like that? It is very disturbing.

i. However, it was even more disturbing for me, because I have been working on this sermon series for over a month that deals with entering God’s rest.

ii. I personally know how hard it is to get what we say we believe to match up with our actions.

iii. It is easy to talk about what we should do, but it is much harder to do it.

iv. I hope that you will find encouragement from my struggle today as we learn together how to enter into the rest that always satisfies.

c. Let’s pray – Lord God, I pray that you would make your word real to us this morning, and that the distance between belief and practice would be shortened, so that we together can experience what it means to enter your rest. O God, we need Your Rest! We are sooo, sooo tired. Some of us are carrying burdens that seem impossible to take another step with. Others of us are dealing with life’s issues that never seem to get any better. We pray this morning that you would show us your rest. That we would get such a picture of your rest that we would endeavor to enter it. That our struggle would not be against the circumstances of life, but our struggle would be simply to enter into your rest. To know you and the power of your life in us. In Jesus Name, Amen.

II. Explanation of REST:

a. “Mt 11:29 - "Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. "For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."

i. Biblical Rest is a huge subject, and it has incredible implications for our lives.

ii. Biblical Rest deals with how we establish a relationship with God.

iii. Biblical Rest deals with how we maintain a relationship with God.

iv. Biblical Rest explains how we can live the Abundant Life God intends for us.

III. Our Need for Rest

a. Do you remember when you came to Christ?

i. You simply believed what the Scripture said, that on the cross of Calvary he took your place, he died for you; he bore the punishment for your sin; he was wounded for your transgressions, he was bruised for your iniquity; and you believed that.

ii. Immediately there was a sense of peace flooding your heart, a quietness.

iii. You felt no more guilt, no more fear of death, no more need for painful efforts to win Brownie points with God.

iv. When you became a Christian, You were resting on the work of Another.

v. Christ paid it all; you were freely forgiven.

vi. What a sense of rest that was! He gave it to you.

b. But as you went on as a Christian you found that problems began to return and failures came and failures sometimes haunt you.

i. Your Christian life might have become boring and dull, barren and uninteresting.

ii. You knew something was wrong and you resolved to try harder, to give yourself more fully to Christian activity, to throw yourself into it with more zeal and effort.

iii. This you did, and for awhile things went better, then it seemed to ebb out again into the same old thing.

iv. You ended up bored and disillusioned, disenchanted, discouraged.

v. What is the answer? Well, it is what our Lord said, "Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, and you will find rest," {Matt 11:29-30a RSV}

vi. The source of our struggle is that we carry our own yoke instead of Christ’s yoke.

vii. Yoke means-

1. Back in the days of the old West the oxen teams that came across the prairies were yoked together with a great, wooden yoke, made to fit over the necks of two oxen.

a. A yoke is always made for two, never for one.

b. Jesus was a carpenter, and in the carpenter shop in Nazareth he often made yokes.

c. From this he draws his figure of speech: "Enter into the yoke with me," he says, "you on one side; I on the other."

viii. A yoke is also a symbol of servitude, of controlled labor and activity. It means the end of self-service.

a. When an ox is yoked, he is no longer free to do what he wants to do.

b. He is under the direction of the owner, the driver.

c. To be yoked means the end of running his own life and seeking his own way.

d. the writer of Hebrews tells us {cf, Heb 5:8}. "He learned obedience by the things which he suffered,"

i. When you enter into the yoke with Jesus you expect the Father to take over the program of your life.

a. You may be surprised what he does with it.

b. You no longer have the right to decide what you are going to do with your life.

c. It does not make any difference what time of your life you enter into this yoke, whether you are a youth at the beginning of your adult life, or whether you are a man sixty years old, with a great business depending upon you as the executive head.

d. When you enter into the yoke with Jesus Christ you give up the right to determine what your life may be.

e. You expect him to direct you.

ii. It is his job to give the orders, it is his job to make you know what he wants you to do.

a. He may make some dramatic changes, or he may not.

b. He may leave you right where you are, doing what you are doing now, or he may tell you to stop it all, at great cost perhaps, outwardly, and leave it and go some place else to do something else.

c. But one thing is certain, one thing he surely will do, no matter if he sends you some place else or leaves you right where you are -- one thing he will certainly do:

i. He will remove you from the spotlight, out of the center of things, and he will enroll you in school.

ii. And do you know what the curriculum will be?

iii. "Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart," {Matt 11:29b KJV}.

iv. He will begin to teach you humility -- how not to be the center of attention, how to be content with letting someone else get all the credit.

v. God will destroy the very thing that destroys you; that is the desire to be a god, your own god; to run your life to suit yourself.

iii. One reason why you may have not entered into the rest which God has provided, is because, in some way or another, you are protecting some area of the ego, the self-life, saying, "This is mine; keep your hands off."

a. As long as you do that you cannot have rest.

2. "Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abides alone; but if it die, it brings forth much fruit." {cf, John 12:24 KJV}

iv. As you consent/surrender to the yoking of yourself to Christ, a wonderful thing will begin to happen.

i. You will find rest.

ii. Jesus said you would. "Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest." {Matt 11:29 KJV}.

iii. This is why Jesus said, "If any man will save his life, he shall lose it. But if he shall lose his life for my sake, he shall find it," {cf, Matt 16:25, Mark 8:35, Luke 9:24}.

v. Let me see if I can make that clearer.

1. When difficult things happen to us, what are we complaining to God about? “Why?” or “This hurts’ or “Why can’t I have something go ‘my’ way for a change?”

2. As I struggled with the events of this past week, I tried to stop seeking my comfort and my interests in the middle of the trial. (That’s not easy).

3. I had to ask God…

a. Lord, bring something to glorify You out of this experience.

b. Lord, show me what are you doing in the middle of this?

4. And, as a result, by letting go of the results, I was also able to see some good in what happened as well.

a. Everything that happened could have been significantly more serious.

b. Yet, we were spared that kind of tragedy.

c. We had so much to be thankful for.

d. Part of what we can do in entering rest is to “look” to God instead of our circumstances.

e. It is in this looking to God that we find the storms of our lives calmed. The storms are not the circumstances, they are not outside us…the storms are inside us. We confuse the two. Look at the Greek:

c. Rest: Greek - Katapausen

i. Calming of the winds

1. to still, restrain, to cause (one striving to do something) to desist

ii. When we look at our English language, we find words like “restoration” or “restored.”

1. They are built upon the root of the word “rest”

2. But unlike what we would think about “rest” meaning “repair” or “sleep”, these other words go to something a bit deeper.

3. They speak of going back to what once was, through the activity of rest.

IV. Rest: Definition –

i. Ceasing from our own efforts to…

1. Win or maintain God’s approval.

2. To meet our own needs.

b. God’s rest is not like the physical rest we seek.

i. God’s rest is not a time where all thought and activity is set aside and replaced with amusement and leisure.

ii. God’s rest is not a place where good people will enjoy their hobbies and float on clouds.

1. Sometimes we imagine that God’s rest will be sitting under a willow tree in heaven with nothing to do but sigh with satisfaction for all eternity.

iii. No, Rest is more like “taking a seat.”

iv. In fact, the book of Ephesians (which we have been studying in our Wednesday night bible study) talks about “being seated in heavenly places in Christ.”

1. Entering God’s rest has to do with ceasing from our own efforts.

2. We must learn this definition.

3. Ceasing from our efforts to win God’s approval.

a. Are you trying to win God’s approval?

4. Ceasing from our efforts to meet our needs.

5. Rest has to do with laying down our burden. Picking up the yoke.

a. I want you to think about the fact that most everyone here is seated on a pew or a chair this morning.

b. Would you be correct in saying that the chair is supporting your weight?

c. That is how it is in Christ. He is carrying us.

d. But I would also be correct in saying that most of us here are not totally being carried in Christ. That he doesn’t bear all of our weight.

e. I can say that because an equally true illustration exists. Your chair is not bearing all of your weight. Even though you think it is.

i. Most of you have at least one foot on the floor.

ii. And if just a portion of you is not being supported, then you are not totally at rest in Christ.

V. Won’ you enter His rest today? Lay your burden down.Christ’s Offer of Rest

a. In the Philippines I heard a local pastor use the following parable to illustrate Christ’s offer of rest (Matt. ll:28) and the response of people who won’t trust Him completely: The driver of a caribou wagon was on his way to market when he overtook an old man carrying a heavy load. Taking compassion on him, the driver invited the old man to ride in the wagon.

b. Gratefully the old man accepted. After a few minutes, the driver turned to see how the man was doing. To his surprise, he found him still straining under the heavy weight, for he had not taken the burden off his shoulders. Larry Chell