REST
[p. 453] REST
Genesis 2: 1 - 3; Hebrews 4: 1 - 11; Matthew 11: 28 - 30
It is interesting to trace out any thought which runs through Scripture — to see how it is expressed, and constantly reappears. One can take up in this way the thought of rest, which runs through Scripture from beginning to end. We get it foreshadowed in the Old Testament, and the fulfilment of it in the New. As a rule you get in the New Testament the answer to what is called for in the Old. For instance, there was in the Old Testament a call for the righteousness of God, but in the New the righteousness of God is revealed.
In tracing the subject of rest I would lay down as a principle that, if there is to be rest for man, there must first be rest for God. The Lord could say, “Come unto me ... I will give you rest”, for the reason that God had found His rest. Again, in Hebrews 4, the Spirit speaks of entering into rest. God has found a point of rest in Christ into which man is to enter.
Now to go back to the beginning (Genesis 2: 1 - 3), “God rested the seventh day”. There are two thoughts apparently essential to rest, one is cessation from toil, and the other complacency in what has been wrought, the sense that it is good. To understand the rest of God you must bear these two thoughts in mind. There had been six days’ labour in creation, and the seventh day was rest. God rested from His work, and at the same time His complacency was complete in what He had created. “God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good”. Rest is more than cessation from toil, there is a moral element in it.
The greatest thing that God had created was man; he was the image and glory — the representative and effulgence of God — in the creation which God had [p. 454] made; and all the lower creation was put under him, and looked up to him. God made man at once and at the best, and man, as then made, has never been improved upon.
God’s rest in creation evidently supposed man holding the place in which God had set him. But the rest of God was interfered with, for man was tempted and fell. By man sin came into the world, and by sin death. Man fell under the judgment of God, and the rest of God was so far disturbed. Now I want you to appreciate the serious consequence of this. It brought about, as regards man, a distinction between God’s nature and His attributes. Nothing could alter the fact of God’s love to man, but man having sinned, necessarily the righteousness of God was against him. God loved man, not for what was in man, but in the sovereignty of His love. Before man fell, the nature and attributes of God were in accord as regards man; but the moment man fell he became obnoxious, by reason of sin, to the righteousness and majesty of God; but this could not alter the fact that man was the object of God’s love. But man’s position and God’s were relatively affected.
To show how all this was to be met, I pass on to Noah’s burnt-offering (Genesis 8: 20, 21), in which God smelled a “savour of rest”. (See note.) If there was to be rest for God, two things must come to pass: God must be glorified, and man must find a place of acceptance outside of himself. God must be glorified in the conciliation of His nature and attributes, His righteousness must be conciliated with His love; and that is what the burnt-offering typically set forth, and what came to pass in the death of Christ. God was glorified, the judgment under which man lay was borne vicariously; and man could find in Christ risen a place of acceptance with God. Man can come to God by the altar of burnt-offering. Thus there is a savour of rest.
If we turn to Leviticus 23, we have the whole series of Jehovah’s feasts, they were occasions on which God surrounded Himself with His people; holy convocations, and the subject is introduced by the sabbath. Christ is the rest of God, God’s sabbath. If you do not begin with Christ as the rest of God, how are you to go on to keep the feast of unleavened bread, or any other feast? All the institutions of God began with the sabbath, which is the type of God’s rest in Christ.
There are two remarkable passages in the Psalms — first, Psalm 95: 10, 11, where Jehovah says, “They have not known my ways: unto whom I sware in my wrath that they should not enter into my rest”. Secondly, in Psalm 132: 1 - 5, where David says, “Until I find out a place for Jehovah, an habitation for the mighty God of Jacob”, and verse 8 appeals to Jehovah to arise into His rest. In verses 13, 14, Jehovah answers, He hath chosen Zion — this is My rest for ever: here will I dwell. Now there is a great distinction between these two psalms: the first gives Israel in the wilderness, and the second, David, as a figure of Christ. It is the difference between Israel looked at on the footing of responsibility, and Christ who has glorified God, and founded mount Zion, the place of God’s rest.
Psalm 95, gives the thought of Israel excluded from entering into God’s rest for their perverseness. But in Psalm 132, we have Christ providing for God the place of His rest. The rest of God is where God dwells, and Christ has provided a place of rest for God. We may dwell for a moment on this point. You will remember that when the ark was taken by the Philistines they were plagued of God until they sent it back. David brought it eventually to mount Zion. Christ has provided a resting-place for God, where God can dwell, and that is in sovereign mercy, the fruit of redemption. The boards of the tabernacle were set in sockets of silver; the tabernacle was founded in redemption. So the true dwelling-place of God is set up in redemption. Mount Zion speaks of what God [p. 456] Himself has provided; mount Sinai of what man was to provide for God. Thus God has found a rest, and that rest is His dwelling-place. No doubt all this will be made good in time to come in regard to Israel; the Psalms contemplate this, and have thus a great deal of application to Christ; and we see that in spite of all the perversity of Israel, as seen in Psalm 95, God will find His rest and dwelling place here, He will abundantly satisfy her poor with bread ... clothe her priests with salvation ... make the horn of David to bud. Psalm 132 gives a beautiful picture of what God will effect here in the One in whom He has found His rest.
There is one other passage, in the prophet Zephaniah, chapter 3: 17, to which we may refer. This seems to be the climax of what is set forth in Psalm 132. There we read, “Jehovah thy God in the midst of thee is mighty ... he will rest in his love”. He dwells in the place which Christ has provided for Him, He can joy over His people with singing and rest in His love. We have thus in the Old Testament a foreshadowing of what will yet be effected in Israel.
Now, in the New Testament we come not to the foreshadowing, but to the reality of things. I would call attention to John 5: 16, where the Jews sought to slay Jesus because He had done these things on the sabbath day; He says, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work”. I have hitherto spoken of what God works for man, but in this chapter we get the idea that, if there is to be rest, God must work in man; and God had been doing this from the outset. I do not believe that a man ever approached God save in virtue of a work of God in him. Abel offered his burnt-offering to God as the result of the work of God in him. The same principle is seen in Enoch or Noah, or any of the men of faith — the Father had been working in man all along. The raising up of the impotent man expressed a work done in him, rather than a work for him. A man hopelessly incapable took up his bed and walked. Thus we see [p. 457] that not only must God work for man, which is set forth in the burnt-offering, but that no man draws near to God except in virtue of a work in him. And this work still goes on. Christ’s voice is not silent now. It is still heard. He works effectively in man, and they that hear His voice live. God’s work in man could not have glorified God, nor removed the judgment that lay on man: this was effected in the cross. The Christian believes in the work of God for him, and at the same time he himself is a subject of the work of God. God had set His love on man, and in order to make that love effective it was necessary for God to work in man if man was to have part in God’s rest.
To pass on to Hebrews 4. Here we see that a promise is left of entering into God’s rest. The argument from Psalm 95 is that if God sware that certain should not enter in, that implied that some would enter in. “There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God”. “Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest”. The strict application of this passage is to the time of the kingdom when God will rest in what will be brought to pass in Christ; but faith does enter into rest, we who believe do enter into rest. Now, rest for us is in entering into God’s mind; you penetrate the secret of His rest; you apprehend what gives rest, and that is Christ, and thus you get the virtue of God’s rest. Rest is in the apprehension of the burnt-offering, in which God was glorified. The cross is the glory of God morally, although not the display of it. We are before God to the perfect satisfaction of His righteousness, according to the value of the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ, and can bear to be measured by the reed, as the angel did the heavenly Jerusalem. The very attributes of God to which sin made us obnoxious we do not now fear; they have been completely vindicated in the work which has been done for us. You enter into rest as you appreciate the burnt-offering, and the effect of this is that you want to get near to Christ; you are set upon learning [p. 458] of Christ. You could not take His yoke upon you without coming near to Him, and then you learn of Him, for He is meek and lowly in heart. There is no difficulty in approaching Him, for with One who is meek and lowly it is easy to approach. He says, as it were, You can come near to Me; I shall not repel you, and you will find rest unto your souls, My yoke is easy, and My burden is light. If you learn of Him you become like Him. The way to find rest to your souls is to be like Him. When we have pride that can be wounded we are liable to suffer much disturbance of heart and mind; we have not rest. When Jesus was here He was the one Person on earth who had rest; no doubt there was much sorrow of heart for Him, but He was ever conscious of divine love, and had rest of heart and spirit in this weary world of turmoil; and so He can say, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me”. You could not enter into rest if the rest were not there, but God has found His rest in Christ in virtue of redemption. I commend to you the subject of rest — the foreshadowing of it in the Old Testament, and the answer to it in the New.