to do the will of Jesus this is rest let's turn to chapter four and verse eleven which is a third of our insertion and you remember this one goes let us labor but interestingly enough as it reads what follows makes it a paradox let us labor to enter in to that rest. Now work and rest seem to be the antithesis, one of the other. How can you labor and rest at the same time? Now actually this is the only place in the Scriptures where the word in the original is translated labor. In other places it's translated give diligence, be diligent, and so on, be forward, and the thought is all of the time that of diligence. Three times it's translated endeavor. So it's not labor in the sense of manual work, or even striving in the sense of trying to produce something oneself. Those words of the hymn are the secret of course. To do the will of Jesus this is rest. Now what we're doing, that word therefore is building upon what has gone before. And we were talking about rest yesterday. I counted eight times and I may have missed one. In the verses that go before in this chapter that word rest. And I pointed out to you yesterday that's not all the same kind of rest. When it speaks of God's rest, it speaks of complete rest. And when it speaks of our final rest, there remains therefore a rest to the people of God. That is a sabbatical rest, and undoubtedly points us forward into the eternal future, where there will be nothing to cause turmoil, to disturb, and to distress, that will all be behind us. But when we are reading here, let us, therefore, earnestly endeavor or give diligence to enter into that rest. It is not a reference to the future rest. We don't strive to enter in to that rest in heaven that has already been guaranteed to us by the work of the Lord Jesus on the cross. but it is the thought of rest as we have it presented in the earlier verses and that is rest in the present I wonder if you ever try to conjure up an idea of what God must see when he looks down upon his church today seems to me that he must see a constant surging sea of threatfulness and worry, undue concern, indecision, vacillating, because that's how we human beings are. We believers are no different from other human beings. And yet it mustn't grieve God, because God has provided for us a complete rest. in the Lord Jesus now that is the concern of the writer in this verse eleven let me read the three verses that constitute the insertion to you and I want you to look for an earnest in an earnest attitude in verse eleven I just mentioned it I beg your pardon oh I'm reading from Hebrews chapter four and verse eleven an earnest attitude. What we have here, I pointed out to you, is not feverish activity, but a gentle, quiet, resting attitude, and an earnest endeavor not to come short of it. Verse twelve, for the word of God is quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Now there we have an uncompromising word, the word of God. And in verse thirteen, neither is there any creature. that is not manifest in his sight. But all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do. And there, of course, is an all-seeing eye. Now these are three little pegs upon which I want to hang the thoughts of the morning. An earnest attitude, an uncompromising word, and an all-seeing attitude. Now these are familiar verses to us, especially the middle one, which speaks about the Word of God. How often do we quote it? How often does it come to mind? We are very, very, well and very much acquainted with this Word. In the first verse, where the exhortation is to be earnestly desirous, of entering into the rest that's been described in the previous verses, there is a reason for this. It says in verse five, verse four of the chapter, God did rest the seventh day from all his works. And the word rest there means a complete rest. And it seems to me that rest is the evidence of satisfaction. When God rested, it was because he looked over the whole of his creation and he saw that it was good and he was satisfied. Now the reason why we don't know rest is because basically so often we are dissatisfied. Now that convicts me. And I'm sure it convicts you. But rest is God's evidence of satisfaction. Now we need to search our hearts and find out whether we are restless. And if so, why we are restless. And we need to face the fact that we are falling short. Falling after the same example of unbelief. Or as the margin says, disobedience, not resting in the Lord Jesus. Now the word that is translated fall here is a word that is sometimes means, and is used in this sense in the New Testament, to fall into ruin. Now it's a very, very solemnizing thought. that to go on in our lives restless and doubting because of rest not enjoying rest because of disobedience can actually lead us to spiritual shipwreck that's a very solemn thought and yet again I remind you as I remind my own heart the Bible says let he that thinketh he standeth Take heed, lest he fall. But rest is not only God's evidence of satisfaction, rest is God's provision for his own. He provided it for the Israelites, but many of them didn't enter into it. Where are the leaks? Where are the Golics that we had in Egypt? those things that had nauseated them because they sort of had to live on them during their period of captivity now here they are restless doubting challenging God God provided rest for them but they didn't enter into it and God has provided rest for his own New Testament believers but they choose whether or not they will enter into it. Obviously, the natural thing is to do the fretting and to do the worrying, worrying and to fail to rest. That's why we are told to earnestly endeavor to enter into that rest. Now it doesn't come from a struggling and a striving to try to attain something. It comes from an abandoning. I, said Paul, die daily. And that's the thought. The reason why we are fretful and the reason why we worry and the reason why things so often seem to be topsy-turvy and we can't adjourn it to them is because there's still too much of us struggling. I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. That's dying. Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone. But if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. and to die by faith with Christ is just simply moment by moment to abandon any claims for ourselves. We hear so much about rights these days. This kind of rights and that kind of rights and the other kind of rights. Civil rights are constantly coming into the picture and the courts seem to be overly concerned about them. But we believe as sometimes stamp of foot and do it a little indignantly and say, but it's my right. Correction. We don't have any rights. We do not, as believers, have any rights. If we had gotten our just deserts, you know where we would be. We would be lost eternally in hell, because that's precisely what we deserved. But God has not dealt with us after our sins. nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. It's of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed because his compassion fail not. But says the word of God, you are not your own. You are bought with a price, and that the precious blood of Christ. We don't have any rights. And we don't enter into rest very often because we are so busy sticking up for our rights. We are so busy trying to get what should be coming to us, and we worry about it, and we fret about it, and we have our doubts because of it. Earnestly endeavor to enter into that rest, and you do it by abandoning all claim upon yourself, and your own life, and the things that you have. You know, we're going eventually tomorrow, no, tonight. to talk about very briefly the tithe because it comes into the story of Melchizedek long before the law was given some people say that tithing isn't good it isn't good if you say this one tenth belongs to God and the other nine tenths belongs to me the fact is we should say ten tenths of what I have belongs to him, but there's one tenth of it, and of course we can always up that proportion, that I will not, cannot, and dare not touch. It's already given to him. Now out of the rest of what is his, I'll pay my electricity bill. If you can manage to, these days, I'll eat. I'll do this, or I'll do that, and this is how God intends it to be. The New Testament teaches proportionate giving. Giving is the Lord at Prosperous, but not so that we can say the rest is mine. The widow threw into the treasury two months, and it was everything she had. Now that's how you get rest. The Lord Jesus said she has thrown in more than they all. And he probably meant more than all of them put together, because she was the only one who cast into the treasury everything she had. Rest then is God's evidence of satisfaction. And rest is God's provision for his own. It's possible to miss it. The Israelites did. we'll only know it if we do the opposite from what the Israelites did they disobeyed we must obey they didn't have faith they were unbelieving the opposite is trust to trust and obey there's no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey and those were the two things that the Israelites didn't do and so although the rest was provided for them they didn't enter into it you can miss it but you will know it if you trust and obey but there's another thought another thought we should be committed to it there is no impact on the lives of others like the impact of a man or a woman who in the midst of deep distress and testing manifests an undisturbed, imperturbable peace. That honors God probably more than anything else. An earnest attitude. Sincerely endeavor to enter into that rest. Now the Word of God in verse twelve, an uncompromising word, and I choose that adjective very deliberately, because I don't know whether you've ever analyzed this verse, word by word. It's a very striking verse, and our familiarity with it sometimes dulls our senses of its truth. let me point out four things to you about the word of God that are said here we have first of all the nature of that word it's a living that's what the word quick means that's an old English word for living so we are told the word of God is living but mark you again in the original language there's a There's a deeper thought than this. Now you can go and visit in the hospital a person who's going to expire within the next hour and that person is still living. Now the Word of God is not living in just that sense. I remember a friend of mine who was an open-air preacher. Now we used to do a lot of open-air preaching in the old days. Some of us would spend six months a year as pilgrim preachers preaching every night in the week in the open air in marketplaces and and city squares and so on but this friend of mine used to go out on his own sometimes and he had I'm again yesterday the day before groping for a word he had a gimmick no that'll do very nicely he would put his hat on the ground and to gather his crowd he would walk around it, saying it's alive. It's alive. It's alive. What you got under there, they would say. It's alive. And when they had got a nice crowd, he would pick up his hat, and underneath it was his Bible. And that gave him a nice start for his open-air gospel message. It is alive. But the word implies that it is actively alive. Now that's something deeper still. It also infers that it is constantly, actively alive. And just imagine that's the book that we have in our hands. I heard about a little girl who had a great ambition. In her bedroom she was an English little girl and therefore they had no closet. They had wardrobes, a great big ungainly thing that took up space on the floor with doors on it. She had a great ambition to see if there was anything on the top of her wardrobe. And she would strive, standing tibito on her bedroom chair, and be disappointed. She still couldn't see, until one day, after a number of months, She thought she'd try again and sure enough, she'd grown just enough to be able to look and see what was on the top of her wardrobe. And on the top of her wardrobe was a thick family Bible, where they kept the birth certificates and pressed the flowers and so on. She was very excited. She ran downstairs. She said, Mommy, Mommy, whose is that big book on the top of my wardrobe? Her mother frowned in perplexity. A big book on... Oh, yes, she said, oh, that's God's book. The little girl said, Mommy, don't you think we ought to send it back to him? We never use it. My, what we miss when we've failed to utilize the Word of God, which is alive... actively alive and continuously actively alive. You pick it up and you've got the power of God in your hands. That's the nature of that word. And then there's the power of that word. It is invincible. The word of God is quick and powerful. There isn't anything that can successfully put itself against the word of God. In the Word of God we have that which is unconquerable, invincible, and its power is a shattering power. We've seen it work on the lives of men and women who were arrogant and proud, and as the Word of God worked upon their hearts they were reduced to just a little pile of shame. he that falleth on the rock will be ground upon whom the rock falls will be ground to powder but he that falls upon it will be broken and that is with contrition and sorrow for sin the power of the word and then there's the keenness of this word for the word of god is quick living and powerful invincible and sharper than any two-edged sword, the keenness of it. So much so that it pierces even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow. I don't know what you think about that word. Piercing and that word dividing. The word piercing doesn't mean just to like to pierce the skin, to stab. It means to go right the way through from the front to the back. That's the kind of piercing that the Word of God does. And then it divides. I don't know whether you think that when it says here the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, that is splitting the two of them. That's not really the right thought. because it goes on to say, and he's another illustration, the joints and the marrow. Now, since they don't touch you cannot, in that sense, divide them. The thought again is one of piercing the joints, piercing the marrow, piercing the spirit, piercing the soul. All of the time the word of God penetrating that's the thought and these illustrations are given to us to undermine that and then it says and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart this is the perception of that word and you know it's very interesting because do you know what the word is here in the original it's the word criticos. Now, does that bring any idea to your mind? The word of God is a critic. It not only perceives, but it makes known what it perceives. It's a critic. That's where we get our word critic from. And what does it criticize? What does it examine and perhaps declare not to be as they should be the thoughts? and intents of the heart. Now that word thoughts means reflections. Now there's a difference between a thought and a reflection. The devil will see to it that wrong thoughts come into your mind he'll send them. But you don't have to reflect upon them. It's reflections that God examines. Somebody said you cannot prevent the birds from flying over your head. but you can prevent them from making a nest in your hair. And that's the difference between the thought and the reflection. Now the Spirit of God is a critic. Don't think of that in a bad sense. There's good criticism, there's constructive criticism, and there's destructive criticism. Good criticism has been brought to bear on the Word of God, and it's been a tremendous boon and blessing to us, enabling us to understand it more. destructive criticism is something else again but God's word is a critic and it examines our reflections the things that we think about and roll like a sweet morsel under our tongues reflection and the word intent is the thought of what we conceive as a result of those reflections and remember The Word of God is doing this actively and continuously actively so that we need constantly to remember. You sow a thought, you reap an action, you sow an action, you reap a habit, you sow a habit, you reap a character, and you sow a character, and reap a destiny. And it all starts, as the Bible says, as He thinketh, In his heart, so is he. And I tremble, as I quote that. Finally, we have that all-seeing eye. Very interesting. It says of God that he observes all things. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight. Now we know that. You know that. You believe that maybe since before you were born. But although we know it, we don't get the import of it. Remember that robbing of the offertory box that I mentioned? Somebody stole the money out of an offertory box in an Anglican church and a newspaper reporter happened to be there immediately afterwards and was struck with the fact that a picture hanging above it was turned with its face to the wall. And when out of curiosity he turned it around, he found it was a picture of the head of Christ. And a robber couldn't steal the money until he turned those condemning eyes to the wall. He could turn the picture. But he couldn't avert the eye of God. God observes everything. He does more than that. He bears everything. Because it says, all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do. He bears everything. If everything is observed by him, there is no concealment from him. And if everything is bared by him, there is no illusion. God knows what's happening. And then he controls everything. Here's an interesting word. The word opened. Naked end opened. That word is the word from which we get our word for the windpipe. That's surprising, isn't it? Trachia. Now your trachia is your windpipe. It's very interesting to see why it's here. It's here for the purpose of describing, it's a descriptive word, It describes a man taking another and pulling back his head and exposing his throat and so making him vulnerable. Now that's the meaning of the word that is used here. Everything is naked and opened. It is as though our throat is exposed and our vulnerability is exposed. God controls everything. And there's never a moment when we can safely do our own will, go our own way, be our own man or woman. Never a moment. Because our throats are constantly bared. And we are exposed to God. Very vulnerable. The eyes of him with whom we have to do. And the thought there is, of course, that God is going to demand an accounting. God is going eventually to have us before him. We've read about the judgment seat of Christ. We've read solemnly about the judgment seat of Christ. We've thought about it. We've preached about it. We've listened to preachers preach about it. We know the fact. But we have to... moment by moment face up to the reality we are going to give an account you know I'm so very very grateful that God is so gracious and kind and in spite of all in spite of all our foibles and our failings our weaknesses and yes yes our sins and disobediences He looks down upon us in tenderness and kindness. He knows our circumstances. He knoweth our frame and remembereth that we are dust. How many times did we deserve to have that exposed throat slit? God never did it. But we have to remember there is coming a day. when we'll stand before the judgment seat and we'll give an account of the things done in the body. These insertions are very solemn, aren't they? They're very practical and they are stimulated for the writer by the things that have been written before. I want to finish on this note out of the hymn. To do the will of Jesus. This is rest. And that's what keeps us on the right track keeps us on the level that keeps us our lives honoring to God to do the will of Jesus let's pray shall we our Father again we thank thee for thy word and we thank thee for what we have read in thy word about thy word We realize there are so many things that slip by us as we read our English translations and get familiar with them. But we ask, Lord, that we might have learned something this morning which will make us appreciate the word for itself, but also to understand and appreciate its function and to realize that it is a word that constantly brings us into the light. and examines us. And we thank the Lord that the God who has an all-seeing high, has an all-loving heart. But Lord, we don't want to miss entering into this rest. Give us the spiritual ability to earnestly endeavor to enter into it by simply turning our back upon everything we have, and everything we are and letting the Lord Jesus take over and live his life through us. We ask seeking his glory in his name.