Closer To Heaven
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This video is produced by the South Pacific Division Discipleship team.
Week 11_ Longing for More_ study this lesson for Sept 11 from SPD Discipleship on Vimeo.
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You can view an in-depth discussion of Longing for More in the Hope Sabbath School class led by Pastor Derek Morris. Click on the image to view:
With thanks to Hope Channel – Television that will change your life.
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The logical development of the key ideas in Hebrews 4 becomes particularly evident when reading Hebrews 4:8-11. Joshua did not give Israel rest. Consequently, since God is no liar, there must be another “rest” that remains for the people of God. This group is not made up exclusively of Jewish believers. It includes all those who have accepted Jesus as their personal Savior.
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At times, Hebrews 4 has been used to emphasize the observance of the seventh-day Sabbath, while others have used it to challenge the validity of this Sabbath rest, in light of the fact that there is another (end-time) rest. Neither position reflects the biblical text well. Instead, the text suggests that the end-time focus on God’s special rest has been present since Creation and that the celebration of Sabbath rest offers a small, weekly taste of that end-time rest. Indeed, for the Jews the Sabbath has been understood to be a small precursor of the “olam haba” (“the world to come”).
The Sabbath-like rest that remains for the people of God, echoing God’s rest on the first Sabbath in earth’s history, means that we can cease from our own works and trust Him to fulfill His promise of salvation for us.
Contrary to arguments of some interpreters, the context does not support the suggestion that the Sabbath commandment had been fulfilled in the rest of salvation that Christ brought, making it unnecessary for Christians to obey it. The ultimate rest we are promised through what Christ had done for us does not replace the biblical seventh-day Sabbath; on the contrary, it enhances it.
In a world that highly values self-made people, hard work, and go-getters, resting in Jesus and trusting that His grace is sufficient to save and transform us is truly countercultural.
| How can you help others find rest in Jesus when they think that their sins have been too grievous, that their hearts cannot be changed, and that their cases are truly hopeless? What biblical reference would you share with them? |
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So the creation of the heavens and the earth and everything in them was completed. On the seventh day God had finished his work of creation, so he rested from all his work. And God blessed the seventh day and declared it holy, because it was the day when he rested from all his work of creation. Genesis 2:1-3 NLT
I can imagine God walking Adam and Eve through the garden that very first Sabbath. Having been created the day before, Adam and Eve didn’t need a physical rest after a long week. As God showed them all His created works that first Sabbath, they rested in the fact that it was God who made them and not they themselves. See Psalms 100:3
When God had finished our creation, He rested and gave us the Sabbath as a sign that He created us. We mark a year by the sun. We mark a month by the moon. We mark a day by the earth’s rotation. What do we have to mark a week? The Sabbath, which takes us to creation and reminds us that we have a Creator.
“It is finished,” and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. John 19:30 ESV
When Jesus finished the work of our redemption He again rested on the Sabbath, this time in a tomb.
Be careful to keep my Sabbath day, for the Sabbath is a sign of the covenant between me and you from generation to generation. It is given so you may know that I am the Lord, who makes you holy. Exodus 31:13 NLT
The Sabbath is not only a sign of God’s power to create, but also a sign of His power to redeem and to make us holy.
An old story tells of a little boy who had built a wooden sailboat and took it down to a creek by his home. He had tied a string to it so he could watch it float, and then reel it back in, but the string broke. His boat went sailing down the creek and out of sight.
Image © Providence Collection from GoodSalt.com
A few days later when the boy was walking with his father downtown, he saw his boat in a toy store window. “That’s my boat!” The boy exclaimed. He went inside and told the store keeper that it was his boat. But the store keeper informed him that, since he had no way to verify the boy’s story, if he wanted the boat back, he would have to pay for it.
After working for several weeks at extra chores the boy earned the money to buy his boat back. He walked out of the store, clutching the boat to his heart and was overheard saying, “Little boat you are twice mine. First I made you. Then I bought you.”
Today the Sabbath is a sign from God that we are twice His. Once, at creation He made us, then on the cross He bought us.
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Image © Jim Work from GoodSalt.com
Hebrews 4:4-7 quotes both the creation account and Psalm 95:11 in the context of talking about the unfaithfulness of the Israelites and, hence, their failure to enter into the rest that God wanted for them.
Indeed, Psalm 95:8-11 connects Israel’s wilderness experience with God’s rest and includes the divine oath that faithless Israel would not enter into His rest, originally associated with the Promised Land.
Of course, Israel did enter the Promised Land. A new generation crossed the border and, with God’s help, took the strongholds of the land and settled there.
They did not, however, enter into God’s rest, the idea being that many did not experience the reality of salvation in Jesus because their lack of faith was manifested by flagrant disobedience. Even, though rest was associated with the land, it included more than just where the people lived.
“Today” expresses urgency. “Today” means that there is no more time to diddle around. “Today” requires a response and decision now.
Paul grabs hold of the word semeron, “today,” and really emphasizes how important it was in the context of rest. Psalm 95.7-8, meanwhile, is a warning and a plea to God’s people not to repeat the mistakes of their ancestors and fail to enter into the true rest that is found only in the salvation God offers us.
| What should it mean to us, now, when we hear the words “Today, if you will hear His voice: ‘do not harden your hearts’” (NKJV)? What is so important about the word today? After all, Psalms used it thousands of years ago. Nevertheless, why should it still be just as important for our “today” as it was for those who heard it thousands of years ago? |
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