Jesus: A Home To Rest In

Key Text: Hebrews 4:1-13

Following my message last Sunday on Hebrews 4:1-13, Jesus: A Home To Rest In, I've had a number of conversations, and a few questions, on the topic of Christian rest. I've written a short overview of the subject to help guide your thinking on it, I hope it helps a little.

Christian Rest

Rest, for the Christian isn’t as simple as a single idea. Like much within the Christian life and faith, the Bible gives us a few ways to think of it.

I would categorise the idea of rest as being part of the now-but-not-yet tension of Christian living. What I mean by this is, in a similar way as we are experiencing many of the benefits of salvation now, in other ways, we haven’t yet seen the final fulfilment of our sanctification. The Bible says we are glorified (Rom 8:30), but it also says we will be glorified (Rom 8:17, 5:2; 1 Pet 5:1). For more on this, a great article by Daniel Dunlap can be found here: https://www.ligonier.org/le…/articles/living-in-the-tension/

The most common way Christians think of rest is usually connected with our final rest—a state that exists beyond the shroud of death when we meet Jesus face-to-face, the work of sanctification will be complete, Jesus will have kept us to the end, and we will enter into his rest.

But there is also a way of entering his rest now—not speaking of death. This is a rest where we cease from our labours of self-justification, self-righteousness, and even self-sanctification. It is resting in the sufficiency of the gospel that allows us to enjoy the presences of God, to boldly enter the throne of grace, and boldly cry out, ”Abba Father”. In the following short quote, Gavin Ortlund speaks about this rest in the context of taking a regular rhythm of rest that many Christians would call a Sabbath principle—I think it’s helpful (the whole article can be found here: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/…/7-ways-to-work-hard-a…/

"If you struggle to take Sabbath rest, it may be a gospel issue—finding your identity in your work, or being a people-pleaser, or using busyness to distract you from unhappiness. So much overwork is driven by self-justification efforts: we need to accomplish more and more because we’re failing to apply to our hearts what Christ has already accomplished for us. So the most important thing to do during Sabbath rest is to refresh your heart with fellowship with God, and to enjoy your status as his beloved child because of what Jesus has done.

A great irony is that if my day off is going poorly and is not fun or restful, I can start to get a little agitated or stressed at how poorly I am “doing” Sabbath. In those moments I need to remember that Jesus himself is my truest Sabbath rest. Ultimately, my rest is not in a Sabbath day but in the One who has promised: “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matt. 11:28)." — Gavin Ortlund

I hope these few thoughts help.

Chris Thomas