Introduction:
What Is God's Rest? (Hebrews 4:1-10)
- You will have no rest without Faith . (Heb 4:1-2)
- Rest is not about a day, rest is about Relationship . (Heb 4:3-10)
Colossians 2:6 - Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him.
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:47-00:49
Hebrews chapter four, are you there?
00:51-00:59
Many years ago, I would get frequent calls from some collection agency.
01:00-01:06
And they said, "You are default on your student loans." And I said, "No, actually my student loans are paid off.
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They've been paid off for years." And they kept calling back, they kept calling back and they would get nastier and nastier and nastier every time.
01:16-01:23
And I remember the last time they called me, the lady said, you know, you're defaulting your student loans.
01:23-01:25
I said, that can't be true, mine are paid off.
01:26-01:34
And she said, you understand this is gonna go against your credit record, and this is gonna be damaging to you financially.
01:34-01:36
And I said, well, I don't know what to tell you.
01:36-01:38
I said, but my student loans are paid off.
01:39-01:43
And then she said something that I thought was quite strange.
01:44-02:02
She said, "Sir, do you realize that there are 163 Jeffrey S. Millers in the state of Pennsylvania?" And I said, "No, but do you think there's a chance you got the wrong one?" Silence, silence.
02:04-02:12
But you know, when you're so emotionally invested in an argument and you can't back out, she was still in sort of that mode.
02:12-02:17
And she was like, "Well, if you don't mind "having your credit damaged, then you just don't pay it.
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"Okay, that's up to you." And then she hung up and I didn't hear from them after that.
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And you're like, "Why are you telling us this story?" Here's why.
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We're gonna look at a passage today.
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And you're going to be tempted to be like that person that called me.
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Because maybe you have a strong belief about something and you've had a strong belief about something and even though you've been shown something different, it's kind of hard to back out of what we've strongly believed about something.
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And that's why we wanna stop and pray, because look, my opinion doesn't mean anything.
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And quite honestly, neither does yours.
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The only opinion that really matters is God's opinion.
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So we wanna stop and just bow our heads and pray.
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And I want to ask that the Lord would open our hearts up to receive His word.
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for what it is, and I would ask that you would please pray for me to be faithful to communicate it.
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Alright? So let's pray.
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Father, we believe that Your Word changes lives.
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And this particular passage won't just change one corner or aspect of our lives.
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This particular passage can change our mode of living.
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if we will open our hearts and minds to receive it.
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So speak to us today through your word, Father.
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And thereby be greatly glorified, we pray in Jesus' name.
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And all of God's people said, Amen.
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Hebrews chapter 4.
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We started this theme last week.
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This message actually starts in chapter 3.
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We kind of have a little inception thing going here.
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I'm giving you a message that God gives us in Hebrews, quoting David in Psalms.
04:18-04:36
And he was talking about something that happened back in Moses day during the Exodus. And this is the message. Do not harden your heart. Israel constantly They protested God.
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Constantly complained.
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Never thankful for anything.
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And they never repented.
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And his point here is Israel demonstrated a complete lack of faith in God.
04:50-04:58
God therefore said, "They are not going to enter My rest." Meaning, they are not going to enter the promised land.
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This is a message for you, church.
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The rest in the promised land, you see, it's a picture of salvation.
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And the message is simply this, don't miss what God has for His people.
05:20-05:21
That's the message.
05:21-05:24
God has something glorious for you.
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Don't miss it.
05:29-05:38
Because the mark of someone with real faith, a genuine Christian can be defined a lot of different ways according to God.
05:38-05:40
We're using a lot of different pictures.
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You know, as Ashley talked earlier about being a child of God.
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You know, the Bible talks about us as the church being God's household.
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And there's so many images in God's Word that describes that relationship.
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But this one in particular is the picture of entering God's rest.
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That's what we're gonna talk about today.
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And you're like, okay, what is it?
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What is God's rest?
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What is that?
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It is so misunderstood from Jesus' day until today.
06:25-06:26
So misunderstood.
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And somebody's like, "I got this, Pastor Jeff. I know what the Sabbath is.
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The Sabbath is Sunday." And then there's somebody that thinks they're a little more enlightened on it.
06:41-06:45
And they're like, "No, no, no. Let me explain it to you.
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The Sabbath is actually the seventh day of the week, so technically the Sabbath is Saturday." Well, like what's the answer?
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It's neither.
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And it's both.
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It's actually it's every day.
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Like, what are you talking about?
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Well, let's see what the Bible says.
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On your outline, if you're taking notes, which we always encourage, what is God's rest?
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That's what we're gonna be looking at today.
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What is God's rest?
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And then I guess a more important question is, am I living in it?
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So what is God's rest?
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You have to start here because this is where the text takes us.
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Number one, you will have no rest without faith.
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Okay, so as we're talking about rest, don't get too excited unless you're willing to receive it by faith because there is no rest without faith.
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All right, look at Hebrews 4.1.
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It says, "Therefore," again, this is flowing right from what we talked about last week.
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"Therefore, while the promise of entering His rest still stands, let us fear, lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it." Stop there.
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He's talking about fear.
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Obviously here, he's addressing unbelievers.
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Look, believers have no fear.
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We have nothing to fear.
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If you're a true child of God, born again, you have nothing to fear.
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So obviously he's addressing unbelievers.
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He's saying if you're hardening your heart, as he talked about in the previous passage, he says you should fear.
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This isn't something you want to take lightly.
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This isn't something you want to roll the dice on.
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This isn't something you want to say, yeah, I hear what you're saying and I'll repent later.
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We talked about that last week.
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It's the worst thing you can say.
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I'll repent later.
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No, you won't.
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You'll harden your heart.
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Look at v. 2.
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It says, "For good news came to us just as to them.
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But the message they heard did not benefit them because they were not united by faith with those who listened." Do you see his point?
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Hearing and knowing the message is not enough.
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Church, hearing and knowing the message is not enough.
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And his point here is like, look, it wasn't for the Israelites, right?
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They heard the message.
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And you could say they even believed.
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In the sense that they saw the promised land, and I think they even wanted to enter it.
09:38-09:40
But they didn't have the faith to do it.
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You see, that's his point here in verse 2.
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Faith is more than knowing and agreeing, it's acting upon what you know and agree with.
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That's the difference.
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Put it this way, I used to live in Ohio.
09:58-10:03
And during my years in Ohio, I got a lot of speeding tickets.
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I'm not proud of that.
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just telling you how it is.
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I got a lot of tickets.
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Like how many tickets did you get?
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Well, let's put it this way.
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When I moved back to Pittsburgh, I got a like a Hallmark card from the Ohio Department of Transportation that says we're going to miss you and we wanna thank you for your years of faithful support.
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Not really that part, but I got a lot of tickets.
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And again, I'm not proud of that, but it was a season of my life where I was just in a hurry and I had places to be.
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And just imagine I get pulled over for speeding, the police officer comes up to the window and I roll it down and I say, I'm just gonna cut you off right here, officer.
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Because look, I know all of the motor vehicle laws in this state.
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I've studied the laws and I know them.
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And I'll tell you what else, officer, I even agree that they're reasonable.
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And officer, I know that people should not be doing 90 through here.
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So listen, officer, you can't punish me.
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You can't write me a ticket because I have all the information.
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So are we good, officer?
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What do you think he's going to say?
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He's going to say, no, we are not good.
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He might actually make me get out of the car and walk on a line or touch my nose or say the alphabet backwards, if you know what I mean.
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You see the point. Knowing the information actually makes you more accountable.
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Knowing the information makes you more responsible.
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Knowing and doing are two different things.
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And listen, believing in God and having faith in God are two different things.
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That's what we saw with Israel.
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"Israel, do you believe that God is going to give you the promised land?" "Yes, let's go!" Okay, now go in there and drive out those inhabitants.
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and they're like, "Um, let's go back to Egypt." That's not what faith looks like.
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You know what faith looks like?
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Faith looks like this.
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If this is what God said, I'm trusting him and I'm moving forward based on this.
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That's what faith looks like.
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So do you really have faith?
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I would just say, we'll find out when God's word tells you to do something that you don't wanna do.
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That's when you find out if you have faith.
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So what is rest?
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Oh, he gets this out of the way, reminds us there's no rest without faith, right?
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But here's, that was all introduction.
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We're not counting that.
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Towards sermon time, here's the sermon right here.
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Rest is not about a day.
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Rest is about relationship.
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Look at verse three.
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Okay, like I said, I know a lot of people have different ideas, beliefs, understand it.
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I just want you to see what God's word says.
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Verse three says, for we who have believed, enter that rest.
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As he has said, as I swore in my wrath, they shall not enter my rest.
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Although his works were finished from the foundation of the world.
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Stop there.
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It says in verse three where he says, "We who have believed enter that rest." That tense is right now.
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In other words, he's saying believers are in the rest of God right now.
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That's what he's saying.
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If you believe in Jesus, by faith, receiving God's promises, right now you live in God's rest.
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And I want you to take note over and over as we go through this passage, God calls it his rest.
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It's God's rest.
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God says, it's my rest.
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It's not a rest.
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It's not their rest.
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God calls it God's rest.
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It's the rest of God's finished work.
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That's what it is.
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You're like, well, what is that?
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I'm so glad you asked because that's where he goes next.
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Look at verse four.
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He says, "For he has somewhere spoken of the seventh day in this way." And God rested on the seventh day from all his works.
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And again, in this passage, he said, "They shall not enter my rest." What's he talking about?
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Stop there for a second.
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He's taking us back to creation.
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Do you remember the creation account?
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God created the world according to God's word.
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He created the world in six 24-hour days.
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And on the seventh day, what did he do?
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Say it.
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He rested, right?
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Why did he rest?
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He was exhausted.
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I've been working six days, some of them were doubles and I got it.
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No, God didn't rest because he was tired.
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He rested first of all, because he was done.
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But there's another reason.
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And that is this, God rested to show us the picture of the rest of faith.
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What do you mean?
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Well, fast forward some years after creation, through the Exodus out of Egypt, remember God gave Moses the law, the commandments, and he instituted the Sabbath day, the seventh day, Saturday, for Old Testament Israel.
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God told Old Testament Israel, "Take a day to rest." And with the Sabbath, He gave one command.
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He says, "Don't work that day." That's the command, "Do not work that day." Because it was to be a picture of something greater.
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But as man often does, what did we do?
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What did we do?
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We turned it into legalism.
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That's what we do.
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And in Jesus' day, if you read your Gospels, The religious Jews were obsessed with the Sabbath.
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And did you know that those religious Jews, they made hundreds of laws, man-made laws, that they said you had to keep in order to keep God's command to obey the Sabbath.
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And it was crazy stuff.
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It was things like, you're not allowed to look in the mirror on the Sabbath.
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Why?
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Because you might see a gray hair and you'll be tempted to pluck it.
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And that's work, and you just broke the Sabbath.
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That was one of their rules.
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There were hundreds of them.
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My favorite was you weren't allowed to spit on the Sabbath.
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Do you know why you weren't allowed to spit?
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Because if you're loogie, hit the ground and move the piece of dirt, that's considered plowing.
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And you just worked on the Sabbath and you violated God's law.
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There were so many of these goofy rules that they instituted.
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And you're like, "But we don't do those things today." Really?
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Because we were the same church.
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There are whole denominations and churches built around like the Seventh-day Adventists.
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That's kind of their thing.
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But even some quote, "Ultra conservative churches." They're out there.
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"You don't wash the car on Sunday." You know anybody like that?
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Are you that guy?
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"You don't wash the car on Sunday." Or, "You don't mow the grass on Sunday." And there are some even today that insist that you have to keep the Sabbath because that makes God happy.
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Now listen to me very closely.
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Taking a day to rest is a great principle.
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And I encourage everybody to do that.
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You should take a day to rest.
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To unwind, to be with your friends and family and do things you enjoy, and certainly worship and fellowship with the Lord.
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You should take a day of rest.
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And really the only thing the New Testament says about the Sabbath day, is that we're not supposed to judge those who believe differently about that than we do, right?
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So look, if you're like, "Hey, on Sunday I don't ever cut the grass," hey, I respect that.
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And I don't judge that.
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But when it's about legalism, it's about rules when it's about I do this because this is what makes God happy what you're doing is focusing on the shadow and not the substance and we so often mistake the two I read an account this week from a preacher that I follow He told the story of this teenage girl who was in this church service and they were having communion that particular day and she ducked out and she went and committed some sin. He didn't specify what sin it was but she left to specifically commit some sin and he found out about it later somehow and he talked to the girl about it. He goes, "Did you leave church to go do this sin?" and And he said, "How could you do that?" Do you know what her response was?
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"Hey, hey, it's okay.
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I didn't take communion.
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So it's okay." You see the problem with that?
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See, what is communion?
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Communion is to be this, we're sharing the life of Jesus together.
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and to deny that by going out and willfully sinning, but to be diligent in the way that you observe the sacrament, that's an insult to God.
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It's like you found some kind of loophole.
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Like, really?
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Did you get one over on God?
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No, you did not.
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You see, what he's saying here in Hebrews 4, Rest was pictured in the Sabbath.
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Rest was pictured in Israel's entrance into the promised land.
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But to live in that rest every day is to keep the Sabbath as God originally intended.
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Look at verse six.
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It says, "Since therefore it remains for some to enter it." and those who formerly received the good news failed to enter because of disobedience again he appoints a certain day today saying through David so long afterward in the words already quoted today if you hear his voice do not harden your hearts look at verse 8 look look look he says for if Joshua had giving them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on.
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You see that?
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He's saying if rest was fulfilled by Joshua and that next generation of Israelites that went with him into the promised land, he said if Joshua fulfilled that, then David wouldn't have repeated this command so much later.
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to not harden your hearts and forfeit God's rest.
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You see that?
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If Joshua fulfilled it, why is David still talking about?
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In other words, like the Sabbath day, the promised land was a picture.
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And if that was enough, God wouldn't have said what he says in verse nine.
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So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.
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A rest remains for God's people.
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So what is it?
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All right.
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I see you're talking a lot about rest, but what is the rest?
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Here it is.
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Verse 10 is the rest.
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That was all intro.
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Here it is.
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Look, for whoever has entered God's rest, has also rested from his works, as God did from his.
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There it is.
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This was God's intention from the beginning.
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It's from this, that man fell.
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And it is to this, that man has been restored in Jesus Christ.
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And unless you get this, you're not going to have assurance that you belong to Jesus.
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So what is it?
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It's simply this.
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From the moment you're born, growing up, developing, relating to people, you have been brainwashed into thinking that in order to have somebody's approval, you must perform for them.
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Right?
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I mean, we learn that in school, don't we?
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If I want the teacher to be happy with me, I have to perform well.
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And we graduate and we get a job, What do we learn at this job?
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If I want my boss to be happy with me, I have to perform well.
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Unfortunately, some people grow up in a home where kids grow up thinking that.
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If I want mom and dad to be happy with me, I have to perform well.
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And it goes on and on in every single arena of life.
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And what we do is we take that mindset to God.
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And we say, if I want God to be happy with me, I have to, what church?
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I have to perform.
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I have to do things.
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And then God's going to look down and say, I'm happy with him.
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And if I mess up, God's up in heaven, just like, I can't believe you, I'm so disappointed in you.
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And we have that mindset of approval from performance.
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We take that to God.
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I have to perform to make God happy.
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God's happy with me when I behave.
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He's mad at me when I don't behave.
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I have to do good.
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I have to be good in order to go to heaven.
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And these are the works that we are called to rest from.
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It's stopping your own religious efforts that you think is making God happy with you.
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You see, when you came to Jesus Christ, and I love hearing testimonies.
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I love hearing testimonies because they're all so different, but they're also all the same.
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Because every testimony has this element.
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You stop trying to save yourself.
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You stop trying to be good enough to go to heaven.
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you rested from the work to earn your salvation, and you instead rested on His.
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That's how you came to Christ.
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I'm done trying.
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I can't try.
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It'll never work.
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I can't do enough.
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I'll always fail on my own.
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I'm a miserable sinner that deserves God's worst, but instead God gave me His Son, which I do not deserve.
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but that demonstrates God's love.
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He provided for me what I can't do for myself.
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I'm throwing myself at the mercy and grace of God.
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That's how a Christian comes to be.
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That's how a sinner comes to receive Christ.
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And that is exactly why Paul says in, what is it, Colossians 2.6.
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Look at this, look at this.
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Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus, the Lord, So walk in Him." You see that?
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As you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.
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Just as you were totally dependent on Jesus to save you, that same dependency and that same mindset is how you live in His rest.
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And at this point I was like, "Man, I wish there was a way I could illustrate this." I'm like, "Is there a way that I could just sort of paint a picture to show you exactly what this looks like?" And then I was like, "God already gave us the perfect picture." The best illustration is the one that God gave, and it's marriage.
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Follow with me on this for a minute here.
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Marriage, biblically, you know what the purpose of marriage is?
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To have children. Now that's not the main purpose.
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That happens, but that's not the main purpose.
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Well, it's to find love. That's a purpose, but that's not the main...
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God. That's the purpose of marriage, is to glorify God. And how does that happen?
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Well, the Bible tells us the husband in the marriage relationship is supposed to represent Jesus, the servant leader pouring himself out for his bride. The husband represents Jesus. The wife is to represent the church, the submissive helper that comes and has this love relationship with the one who guides and protects.
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And the world is supposed to see the relationship that Jesus has with his church in a healthy marriage.
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So a healthy biblical marriage is this, two people enter a covenant of a love relationship.
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And see, that's what rest is.
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Let me put it this way, make it real personal.
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You know, my wife Erin, we've been married for 20 years.
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I don't know how she did it, but she's put up with me for two decades.
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But here's the thing with the marriage.
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I don't have to earn her wife-ship.
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Is that a word?
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Wife-ship?
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Somebody Google that real quick.
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Wife-ship?
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We'll go with that.
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I don't have to earn her wife-ship.
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Could you imagine the stress of that every day?
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Waking up and going, "I've got to try to make Erin my wife today.
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I hope that I'm good enough.
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I hope that I'm charming enough.
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I hope that I'm funny enough.
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I hope that I look good enough." That never happens.
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But something, "I hope that I can do something to earn her acceptance so I can be her husband today." That would be a terrible way to live.
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day not knowing the status of our relationship? She's like, "You can be my husband today and maybe tomorrow. I'm not sure about this weekend though. That'd be a horrible way to live, wouldn't it? Just this constant like, "What are we gonna do to make her happy?" But let me tell you what actually happened.
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See, a little more than 20 years ago, Aaron and I entered a covenant before God.
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You see, and because we're in covenant, she is my wife.
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And we have this love relationship based on that.
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Now, yes, I strive to show her that I love her, but I do that from the position of the foundation of the covenant.
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And you see now it's resting in that.
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And it's loving her on that basis.
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And the truth is that makes me love her more because there's no condition.
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It's not we're married one day and not the next.
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She loves me one day and not the next.
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It's resting in a love that's not based on feelings, or circumstances, or performance.
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It's resting in a love that's based on covenant.
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So it is with those who have real faith in Jesus Christ.
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You see, you are in a covenant.
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And your love relationship with Jesus Christ functions totally in that context.
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Just as my relationship with Aaron functions totally in the context of marriage, your relationship with Jesus functions in the context of His covenant with you.
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Do you see?
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It's not your performance.
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It's not your conduct.
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And it's not your feelings.
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It's a loving relationship and a covenant relationship that Jesus Christ established.
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Therefore, you are free to live the life that He called you to and empowers you to, knowing that you are forever His.
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Your sin has been taken away.
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His Spirit lives within you.
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You are His child, and nothing will ever change that.
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So you are free and you have rest.
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And Jesus wants you to live in that rest.
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So to try to reduce the Sabbath rest of God to one day a week of not cutting the grass, It's missing the reality.
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Because for born-again followers of Christ, every single day is the Sabbath.
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Because every day is living in His rest.
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I'd like you to bow your heads with me, please.
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As the worship team comes forward, you know, a lot of times when we preach up here, we want to leave you with something to do, right?
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think about this, or pray about this, or start doing this.
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I want to call you to action.
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This is a little different though, because I want to call you to...
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not to do something, I want to call you to stop doing something.
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With your heads bowed, I just want to ask you, are you somehow still striving?
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thinking that you have to earn God's approval.
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And with all the urgency I can muster, I just want to encourage you to let today be the day that you embrace the rest that He gives to those who have true faith in Him.
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God is not calling you to work or earn or go through red tape or jump through hoops.
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God is calling you to do one thing, and that is to trust Him.
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To believe that He made the provision for you.
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When His Son was nailed to that cross, and when His Son resurrected from that grave, He did that to make the provision for you, so that you could enter the rest of a loving covenant relationship.
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Father in heaven, there is nothing new under the sun.
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And we're so much like the people even in Jesus' day.
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We just get all backwards about this stuff.
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And we start worshiping the pictures instead of worshiping the substance.
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The things that the picture should be pointing us to, the reality of Jesus Christ, Father, bring us there.
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And certainly, Father, as Your Word tells us, we don't judge those who believe differently about the Sabbath, but we are concerned with people that think that the Sabbath is something that we do to make You happy, because that's an insult.
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You made that provision for our sin to be taken away, for us to stand guiltless before You, for us to be adopted children of God.
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You made that provision through the death of Your Son.
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You've given us the promise of eternal life through the resurrection of Your Son.
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And I pray, Father, today, You would grant repentance and grant true faith for the person that's sitting here or watching this or listening to this later that has been striving, wondering, "Am I acceptable to God?" You have done that work, and You've called us to Your rest.
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May we enter that rest today, Father, we pray in Jesus' name.
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Amen.
Small Group Discussion
Read Hebrews 4:1-10
What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
What are different ways people understand, and try to follow, “the Sabbath”? What does this passage say about the Sabbath rest Jesus gives (Heb 4:3, 9-10)?
Based on this passage, what does the Sabbath mean to followers of Jesus?
How should we regard others who believe differently than we do regarding the Sabbath, according to Colossians 2:16-17?
Breakout
Pray for one another.