Rest is our Reward
Though times and priorities are changing, behind the American spirit is still a deep-rooted value of hard work and determination. The American dream is about cherishing the opportunity before us and taking advantage of it. For many, the old adage, “There is no rest for the weary” is a war cry, of sorts, to keep pressing on and achieving the next milestone. And there always is one, because as they also say, the sky is the limit.
Hard work is absolutely important. It is a scriptural principle. If you don’t work, you don’t eat (2 Thessalonians 3:10). Those who plan and toil will be rewarded; the lazy will receive their just due as well (A major reality check at harvest time! See Proverbs 6:6-11). Without hard work, we are one day away from economic collapse and starvation.
Why, then, does God seem to value rest so much in His Word? How does that square with the call to work hard?
The answer to that has to do with cause and effect perspective. Here’s the question: Do we rest so we have strength to do more work, or do we work so that we can finally rest? It’s a matter of priority. What do we value most: work or rest?
Living in a world that has been cursed because of sin is not for the faint of heart. Genesis 3 describes the result of disobedience to God’s command, which was for our greatest good. What once was an experience of perfect life, abundance, and God’s very presence, became pain, struggle, heartache…death. Humanity would from then on struggle with the forces of evil and with each other. Bringing life into the world would be laboriously difficult (in childbirth and cultivating the ground), and so would the days each was given to live until death would finally take them.
But praise God He chose not to leave us in such a perpetually hopeless state!
When God created the world, He worked for six days and rested on the seventh. The goal of creation was not work. It was working so that enjoyment of that work – rest – could be experienced. When He established the nation of Israel, God commanded them also to rest on the seventh day (Sabbath), following that same pattern. This was not some sort of cold, illogical, legalistic requirement as the Pharisees and others would later contort it. It was a great blessing for those who gave their lives to God’s work and will in the world. It was a reminder of God’s intention for us all before sin entered the world.
Now I’m not talking of “laziness” when I speak of rest. That is clearly what God’s Word denounces, for it is laziness that leads to struggle on many levels. Rest is different. Rest is good. Rest is a goal.
The prophets throughout Israel’s history looked forward to a new covenant with God in which this rest would finally be a reality. No longer would it just be a glimpse through observance of God’s Law. It would be achieved through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God in flesh, who took care of the effects of sin on humanity once and for all.
When Jesus walked our sin-cursed earth, He taught clearly about the rest He came to bring:
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28).
He did not want the people to be burdened down with laws and expectations they could never fully obey in their cursed state. It was never the Law that saved anyone. It was what the Law pointed to. It was the One who fulfilled the Law completely and thus secured God’s favor and unmitigated, eternal blessing. When we commit our lives to Christ, we are hidden in Him, and we secure that same, eternal blessing.
Yet the fullness of that blessing will only be experienced in the future, in the new heavens and new earth that God will establish at the end of time, when His plan on earth is finished. This is the picture shown in Revelation 21, when once again God is fully present with His people, as He was in the Garden. And this time it will be for eternity.
Until that day that we as His people will experience such final rest, we have work to do. We are living in the six days, seeking and longing for that seventh.
Jesus understood the importance of what He came to do, and by extension the work that His followers are called to do. Just as day eventually becomes night, the time that they had to call humanity to repentance, which will lead to that perfect rest one day, was limited.
He said: “As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work.” (John 9:4).
The author of the book of Hebrews echoes this urgency. After relaying Israel’s sordid, unfaithful history and its inability to secure fully the promise of rest given by God, he reminds his first-century listeners that God’s promise is still available for those who turn to God in faith, trust, and obedience:
“For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day. There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his. Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will perish by following their example of disobedience.” (Hebrews 4:8-11).
Right now, all living in this temporary, troubled world, are longing for rest. We long for peace, for restoration, for things to be as they once were, before sin entered the world. That longing coincides with work, but work is not the end goal. Rest is not just for the weary to regain strength to face another day. Rest is the goal. Rest is the reward.
Rest is peace – trusting Christ who does not give us heavy burdens (Matthew 11:28), but who took our burdens upon himself.
When we give our hearts and lives to Christ, we are filled with the precious Holy Spirit who gives us strength and wisdom to do the work God has called us to do, and sustains the hope of perfect rest to come. In that hope, we can be content in all circumstances. We know fulfillment is not found in achieving temporary dreams. Our fulfillment is found in doing the work that leads to rest: calling people to repentance, to salvation, to the same hope. In this work, we find rest, even as we wait.