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 solutions.
“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.
Love, Carolyn
I hope you’ll take a look
at my book. You can see some of the writing when you “Look Inside” on the
Amazon page. 😊
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