ONE-YEAR JOURNEY OF THE BIBLE
Day 182 - Psalm 91-102 (Have You Entered God's Rest?)
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"Today, if you will hear His voice:
"Do not harden your hearts, as in the rebellion,
As in the day of trial in the wilderness,
When your fathers tested Me;
They tried Me, though they saw My work.
For forty years I was grieved with that generation,
And said, "It is a people who go astray in their hearts,
And they do not know My ways.'
So I swore in My wrath,
"They shall not enter My rest.'"
(Psalm 95:7b-11)
The other day, I pushed myself too hard at a paint job that I had to rest the following day. In our Scripture text for today, God talks about His rest which He has prepared for all those who believe in His promise of salvation through the finished work of His Son Jesus Christ.
The Psalmist David above was referring to the rebellious Jews who, because of their unbelief in God's promise to bring them into the promised land also referred to as God's rest, were not allowed to enter it. Only Joshua and Caleb believed God's promise and were allowed to enter God's rest of those who were twenty years old and above who came out of Egypt.
To our great benefit, the book of Hebrews in the New Testament gives us a commentary or explanation of our text above. The author, speaking under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, confirmed that the rebellious Jews did not enter God's rest because of their unbelief. He goes on to say:
"Therefore, since a promise remains of entering His rest, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it (Hebrews 4:1)."
The same author explains that the prophet David in writing, "Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion (Hebrews 4:7b)", necessitates that "there remains therefore a rest for the people of God. For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His (Hebrews 4:10)."
God makes His point crystal clear: anyone who does not believe in the promise of eternal life (God's rest) through faith alone in the finished work of Christ apart from his own good works will not enter his rest.
Here's the conclusion of our lesson for today's devotion: we can either refuse to believe that God will bring us into heaven (His rest) by simply trusting in the finished sacrifice of Christ on the cross as payment for our sins or, we can refuse to believe God's promise as the rebellious Jews led by Moses did and find ourselves forever barred from entering God's rest.
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