We are meditating our way through First Peter. Today we are going to think through 1 Peter 1:6-7.
“In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
We learned in the previous few verses that our inheritance is reserved and guarded for us in heaven, and we ourselves are protected by the power of God through faith. These are the strong and encouraging promises that cause the joy he writes about in verse 6. But it’s interesting to note that this joy is present even though they are going through difficult trials.
We too are not immune to the trials of life. Some are just hardships that are embedded in life itself, and some may be coming because we are Christians and carry His reproach with us. In spite of the hardships, wherever they come from, we can still rejoice because the promises are so tremendously great.
You might be thinking, “my troubles are so difficult that I have a hard time rejoicing even though God’s promises are powerful and encouraging.” Discouragement is one of the fiery darts of the devil and the defense against those is the shield of faith. The author of a devotional I’ve been reading lately says that we must pick up our shield and use it. What that means to me is that I need to talk to myself as David recorded in Psalm 42, “Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me?” Put your faith to work by grabbing the promises of God, meditating on them, and then claiming them once again for yourself. Take the promises in verses 3-5 and dwell on them until your heart begins to rejoice in the surety of God’s power to protect both our inheritance and ourselves until the final day.
This is one of the most important lessons I’ve learned in my life. And it’s not easy to apply. That’s part of why I keep coming back to it. Grace means a great deal to me, and I see many Christians struggling right here.
What I’m arguing is this: the Sabbath rest of God after creation is a picture—a type—of the kind of rest God is offering you and me today.
And I want to be clear about something right from the beginning. We’re not talking about death. We’re not talking about heaven. We’re talking about a rest that is available right now. Today is a day we can be entering God’s rest. And when tomorrow comes, it will be today again—and the same offer will still be there.
What Do We Mean by “Rest”?
Before we go further, it helps to slow down and ask what we mean by rest.
When we think of rest, we think of things like ceasing activity, relaxing, being restored, letting go of pressure. There’s even a kind of surrender involved. When you lie down for a nap, you’re letting something go. The pressure is off.
That idea—the pressure being off—is important. Because what we’re going to see is that God is offering something deeper than physical rest. He’s offering a rest that reaches into the heart.
The Warning from the Past
The passage we’re working through brings us into Hebrews 3, where the author quotes Psalm 95. And in that psalm, God is looking back to Israel in the wilderness. Those people had seen His works for forty years. And yet God says of them:
“They always go astray in their heart… As I swore in my wrath, they shall not enter my rest.”
The key issue wasn’t just outward behavior. It was the heart. And specifically, it was unbelief. The author of Hebrews presses that point. He warns:
“Take care… that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God.”
Notice how those words are tied together—evil and unbelieving. Disobedience and unbelief are not really separate things. They go together. At the root, the sin-issue is that we don’t believe what God has said.
Encouraging One Another—Today
Because of that danger, we’re told to encourage one another.
“Encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called ‘Today.’”
That word “today” keeps coming up. It’s not abstract. It’s immediate. When should we encourage one another? Today. And when tomorrow comes? It will be today again.
This isn’t something we put off. The reason we encourage each other now is so that none of us will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. There is a real danger, even for believers, of a kind of hardening that comes from not believing God.
And God uses both His Spirit and His people to keep us. Our security isn’t some detached guarantee. It’s something God actively sustains—through His Word and through one another.
The Problem: Hearing Without Believing
The Israelites had good news proclaimed to them. God promised to meet their needs. He promised provision in the wilderness. But the word they heard did not profit them.
Why?
Because it wasn’t united with faith. They heard it—but they didn’t believe it.
And that’s where this becomes very close to home. God says, “I will meet your needs.” But we find ourselves thinking, “I’m not sure He will—not in this situation.” God says He gives peace. And yet we say, “I don’t have peace.” If God gave it and we don’t have it, where did it go? At some point, that raises a question: do we really believe Him?
If we truly believed that God has given peace, then we would live in that peace. The issue comes back again to belief.
Entering the Rest by Faith
The writer of Hebrews makes a remarkable statement:
“We who have believed enter that rest.” Not will enter. Enter. This is present reality. This rest is something believers are meant to experience now. And to help us understand it, the passage reaches all the way back to creation:
“And God rested on the seventh day from all His works.”
That rest of God becomes the model. The author connects it with the rest Israel failed to enter—and then says that rest is still available. How do we know it’s still available? Because the word “today” is still being spoken.
The door has not closed.
There Remains a Rest
This leads to one of the most important statements in the passage: “So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.”
There remains a rest—for you, right now. Not next week. Not someday. Today.
And this rest is more than stopping activity. It’s something deeper than that. It touches the heart, the inner striving, the pressure we carry.
Resting from Our Works
The passage brings us to this final idea:
“The one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His.”
That’s the picture. God finished His work—and He rested.
And we are told that there is a way for us, in Christ, to enter into that same kind of rest. Not by ceasing all activity—we still live, work, make decisions, raise families—but by ceasing the inner striving, especially the inner striving to prove yourself to God somehow. The grace of God forgives all sins and declares us righteous. The striving for perfection is over!
Ceasing the pressure.
Ceasing the sense that everything depends on us.
What That Looks Like in Real Life
I’ve been trying to think through what this actually looks like.
You go through your day—running errands, making decisions, dealing with responsibilities. Nothing outward necessarily changes. But inwardly, something is different. You are at rest. You’re no longer carrying everything. You’re no longer striving in the same way. The pressure has been lifted.
That’s not easy. I can tell you from experience—it’s not easy. You face real situations, real concerns, real stress. And there’s something in you that wants to hold on—to keep worrying, to keep managing, to keep carrying it. And yet God says, in effect, “Trust Me.”
And we respond, “But if I don’t carry this, who will?” And the answer is—He will.
There’s that verse about casting your cares on Him. And I’ve come to read it this way: not just that He cares about me, but that He does the caring for me. He carries what I’ve been trying to carry.
That’s the rest being offered.
God finished His work. And in Christ, we are invited into that same kind of rest—to say, in the middle of life, “It’s in His hands.”
And the question that remains is whether we will believe Him enough to enter into it.
*Some articles on this publication or website are adapted from my recorded Bible teaching. I use transcription and editing tools (including AI-assisted editing) to convert spoken lectures into readable written form. The ideas, interpretations, and theological conclusions are my own and come directly from my teaching.
We’re still in Genesis chapter 1—five weeks in now. It’s been a little slow going, but I wanted to make sure we didn’t rush past the end of the chapter, especially beginning in verse 29, which we didn’t get to last time.
What God Gave for Food
At the end of Genesis 1, we’re told what God provided for food. He says:
“Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree which has fruit yielding seed; it shall be food for you.”
So what did Adam receive? Plants. Trees. Fruit. Herbs. Everything growing from the ground. And notably—no animals. We’re not even at the stage of clean versus unclean animals. There simply are no animals given for food at all. Both man and animals were plant-eaters. Verse 30 tells us that every beast and bird was also given green plants for food. That’s hard for us to picture. Lions eating vegetation. No predation. No death in that sense.And this is before the fall, so none of the frustrations we’re used to were present. No weeds. No disease. No fungus ruining crops. No worms in the fruit. Everything worked exactly as it was supposed to.
“Very Good”
Then we come to verse 31:
“God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good.”
Up to this point, God repeatedly said things were “good.” But here, at the completion of creation—especially after the creation of man—He says it is “very good.” The Hebrew intensifies it. Not just good—but fully, completely good. Everything is exactly as He intended. important. Creation wasn’t partial. It wasn’t unfinished. It wasn’t “good enough for now.” It was complete, and it pleased Him.
The Seventh Day: What God Did
As we move into Genesis 2:1–3, we’re really still finishing the creation account.
There are four things God does on the seventh day:
He finished His work
He rested
He blessed the day
He sanctified it
That sequence matters.
God Finished
When God finished, He didn’t stop because He ran out of time or energy. He stopped because there was nothing left to do. He had done everything that was necessary to complete His goals.
That’s different from how we experience work. We might stop working at the end of the day, but most of the time it’s not because everything is truly finished. There’s always more to do tomorrow. But when God finished, it was complete. Exactly as He intended. Nothing lacking. Nothing needing revision.
That’s how God works. He finishes what He starts.
God Rested
God rested—not because He was tired—but because the work was complete.
This rest is not inactivity. Later, Jesus makes it clear that God is still working. But He is at rest in the sense that His creative work is finished and fully sufficient.
God Blessed the Day
When God blesses something, He places His approval on it. It’s not a casual acknowledgment—it’s a full affirmation. He sets this day apart as something good for His creation.
God Sanctified It
To sanctify means to make holy—to set apart as special. So the seventh day becomes distinct. Not just another day, but one marked off by God Himself. Later, Jesus would tell us that the Sabbath was made for man and not the other way around. Unlike the pagan nations that would eventually live in the surrounding territories, God’s people are distinct. They understand that man should not work sunrise to sunset seven days a week.
“Hosts”: Everything Under His Command
Genesis 2:1 says the heavens and the earth were completed “and all their hosts.”
That word “hosts” is important. It can mean armies, but more broadly it refers to everything under God’s command. The stars, the heavens, all creation—everything exists under His authority. Nothing operates independently. Everything answers to Him.
The Sabbath in Israel
When we move forward to Exodus 20, the Sabbath becomes a command.
“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.”
Why? Because God already made it holy. Now Israel is commanded to treat it that way.
They were to rest completely:
No work
No labor from servants
No work from animals
The entire rhythm of life stopped.
And the reason given is creation itself—God rested, so they were to rest. In addition, God told them to keep the Sabbath because they had been a slave in Egypt. There again it pointed to the fact that His people were set apart, different.
Later, in Exodus 31, the Sabbath is described as a sign of the covenant between God and Israel. It wasn’t just a helpful practice—it was part of their covenant relationship with Him.
Before the Law: The Manna
Even before the Ten Commandments, we see a preview of Sabbath in Exodus 16 with the manna. They were to gather daily—but not hoard it. If they tried to store it, it spoiled. Except on the sixth day. On that day, they were to gather double, because no manna would come on the seventh day.
God was already teaching them a rhythm of trust and rest before formally giving the law. God would always make sure that they had enough.
What Happened by the Time of Jesus
By the time we get to the Gospels, the Sabbath had become something very different. The Pharisees had developed extensive rules—thirty-nine categories of prohibited work, each expanded into detailed restrictions. Simple actions—like picking grain, tying knots, carrying small items, or even writing a couple of letters—could be considered violations. The focus had shifted from the meaning of the Sabbath to the regulation of behavior.
Jesus and the Sabbath
In Mark 2, Jesus’ disciples pick grain on the Sabbath, and the Pharisees object.
Jesus responds with two key statements:
“The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.”
“The Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”
That reframes everything. The Sabbath exists for human good—not as a burden. And Jesus, as Lord of the Sabbath, has authority over how it is understood and applied.In another instance (Mark 3), Jesus heals a man on the Sabbath and confronts the question directly:
“Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath?”
The issue is no longer technical compliance—it’s the heart and purpose behind the command.
The New Testament Perspective
When we come to Romans 14, Paul addresses how believers treat days.
“One person regards one day above another, another regards every day alike. Each person must be fully convinced in his own mind.”
This is a shift. Under the new covenant, Sabbath-keeping as a legal requirement is no longer binding in the same way it was for Israel. Some believers set aside a particular day with special focus on the Lord. Others treat all days alike. Both can be done in a way that honors God.
The Meaning That Remains
Even though the commandment structure changes, the meaning of the Sabbath does not disappear.
God rested.
And He invites us into that rest.
That’s the deeper reality.
Not merely setting aside a day—but entering into a way of living where we trust God, where we are not constantly striving, where we rest in His completed work. That doesn’t mean inactivity. God Himself is still working. But it does mean confidence. Peace. Trust. And that’s something we struggle with.
We go through seasons where life feels like constant striving—pressure, confusion, responsibility. And in the middle of that, God says: enter My rest.
That’s not easy. It’s something we have to learn.
As Scripture says, we are to “strive to enter that rest.”
There’s effort involved—not in working more, but in learning how to rest in Him.
Living It Out
Even practically, there is wisdom in stepping back. Not as a legal requirement—but as something good for us.
We don’t need to live seven days a week at full speed. There is value in setting time aside—time focused on God, time that is not driven by work.
Some treat Sunday that way very intentionally. Others don’t structure it the same way. But the principle remains: we were not made for endless striving. We were made to rest in God.
And learning how to do that—really do that—is something we grow into over time.
For the next weeks I would like to draw some meditations from the book of First Peter. I have decided to use the books that Peter wrote to help me deepen my understanding of Jesus and the gospel since Peter followed Jesus around for so many years. These posts will give you the opportunity to think about Peter’s message along with me over the next several months.
Today let’s look at 1 Peter 1:1-2: “Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the pilgrims of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace be multiplied.”
Let me just give you a few quick thoughts to whet your appetite to study the passage more thoroughly:
My first thought is to remember who wrote this. It was Jesus’s disciple Peter who had a habit of putting his foot in his mouth, often speaking before thinking. But now he is a leader in the church and reaching out to scattered Christians all throughout Asia Minor.
Notice that Peter refers to these people, along with all other believers as chosen by God long ago according to the foreknowledge of God the Father. My purpose here is not to get into a big debate about how all of this works, but it is interesting that God the Father, who is all-wise and all-knowing, chose us to serve and follow Him. Whatever this means, and however it works, it is an amazing thought! But the next section is where I really want us to focus. All of this takes place through the sanctifying work of the Spirit of God for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.
What does sanctification of the Spirit mean? It means that the Spirit of God sets us apart for God’s glory and His service. We once were part of the world system and walked according to the prince of the power of the air (Ephesians 2). But now, we have been set apart for God’s glory by the Holy Spirit. That’s an amazing thought to me.
The second half of the phrase tells us the purpose of this setting apart: It is for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ. That means that God’s intention and goal is to make us obedient followers who have been cleansed and forgiven through the blood of Jesus. Putting this all together, you could say the Holy Spirit sets us apart to be cleansed by Jesus’s blood resulting in an obedient life. This is what the Christian life is all about. “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17). Paul, in Romans 16, speaks of the mystery “made known to all nations, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, for obedience to the faith (Rom 16:25-26). That’s God’s goal, isn’t it? Obedient followers?
As I have studied the Bible over the years, I sometimes want to go back and think about the beginning. We who have been raised in the church know a lot about the Old Testament through the Bible stories that were read to us as children. But I don’t think that we take enough time to really take in what the Bible says about the relationship and interaction of the True God with His creation. I’m going to take time over the next weeks and months to do that for myself to better inform my thinking and teaching.
The Bible starts out with the statement, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” My mind then wanders to questions like, “What was going on before time?” and “Why did God decide to create the universe at that particular place and time?”
Time itself deserves some attention. Time did not begin until God created it at the beginning. According to 2 Timothy 1:9, God’s purpose and grace were given to us “before time began.” With God there is no “before” or “after.” He just is. He is outside of time. I believe that when God speaks to us in terms of time, such as “before” or “after,” He is accommodating the fact that we as humans live in time.
Colossians 1:7 speaks of Jesus Christ like this: “He is before all things.” I think we would expect the word “was” in that context. Apparently, God is not just present everywhere in the location sense, He is present everywhere in time. That doesn’t just mean that God has always been present. It means that He is present right now at all times. He is as much present with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob now as He is with us. We don’t understand that of course, but the Bible seems to be pretty clear about that. At the time Jesus was walking the streets of the Holy Land with His disciples, He said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58).
Isaiah tells us that God inhabits eternity (Isaiah 57:15). Isaiah also quotes God as saying, “Even from eternity I am He” (Isaiah 43:13). Revelation 4:8 explains that Jesus is the one who “was, is, and is to come.” For God, a day is no different than a 1000 years (2 Peter 3:8; Psalm 90:4).
But, in my own feeble way, I still want to know what was going on before time began – before “In the beginning”? The Bible does give us some clues. In John 17:24, Jesus acknowledges that God loved Him before the foundation of the world. This means that love existed before there were any people. There was love between the Father and the Son. In Proverbs 8, wisdom is personified and says, “From everlasting I was installed,” and “Before the mountains…I was brought forth” (Proverbs 8:23, 25).
What else was going on “Before”? Titus 1:2 tells us that God promised eternal life before all time. Jesus was foreordained and considered slain before the world was created (1 Peter 1:20, Revelation 13:8). And we know that the kingdom was prepared for God’s people before the foundation of the world (Matthew 25:34).
So in the mind and heart of God, plans were in place to accomplish the complete work of redemption that would be needed to restore a broken world and broken people to Himself. You should never think that God must have a plan B or C depending on how we respond to events and circumstances. God encompasses it all.
I think I’ll wrap up my thoughts about the “Before” at this point. Next time I have a chance, I’ll write some of my thoughts related to the first few verses of Genesis 1.
This is a repost of a blog article I wrote in 2005 after I had read The Vanishing Word by Arthur W. Hunt III. I think the main points are still valid even after 20 years, and probably even more so considering the proliferation of visual imaging technologies including AI.
I have just finished reading a most fascinating book called The Vanishing Word by Arthur W. Hunt III. At the risk of oversimplification, let me summarize my understanding of Hunt’s thesis. Basically he ties classic Judaism/Christianity with word-based thinking and communication. On the other side, paganism throughout history has been associated with the image and image-based communication. Hunt compares paganism in the ancient history of Egypt and Babylon with the text-based culture of the Hebrews. He then explains how the “Dark Ages” were a return to the ancient paganism at the same time that the literary culture was falling by the wayside. With the invention of the printing press and the spread of the Reformation, textual based thinking and communication became dominate and true religion was able to flourish. His concern now is that with the advent of television, movies and the Internet, we are becoming an image-based culture, and as such, the danger of a return to paganism is very real. In using the image, paganism both ancient and modern involves a heavy emphasis on sex, violence, and celebrity worship.
I have been a public school teacher for over 30 years and I have been able to see the decline in verbal skills during that entire time. More recently with the advent of the Internet, students’ ability to communicate their ideas and thoughts verbally is very low. My son, who teaches engineering in college, is frustrated by the fact that students are not able to communicate to him their understanding of the concepts they are supposed to be learning. If they could accurately communicate their ideas, he would know whether they understood the concepts or not, and if not he could help them to correct their misunderstandings, but as it is, it is very difficult even to know what they understand.
This problem should be especially alarming to us as Christians because God has chosen to reveal Himself and the truth about Himself in words! If we cannot understand the words, we will not know who God is or what our condition is or how that condition can be rectified. The two components of the Great Commission involve proclamation of the gospel and teaching the Word of God. Although good teaching and even the proclamation of the gospel can be aided by illustrations and stories or can even be presented in dramatic form, it ultimately comes down to understanding the declarative propositions God has made of Himself.
Many of the recent innovations in worship style that have taken place in Evangelical churches in recent years have involved the reduction in word and the increase in image. Many churches have replaced the sermon with dramatic productions. Sermon outlines are now projected on lovely backgrounds using computer technology. Rather than encouraging people to have a copy of the Word of God in their hands, many churches are providing key passages on the screen using that same display. While it is the same word of God, it is my opinion that it reduces the church member’s appreciation for and respect for the Word of God. Reading the key passage in context used to be encouraged, but now with the display of a short passage, the context is missing. When the display changes, the reader can’t go back and re-read the text to allow it to settle into his mind. All of this tends to minimize the importance of the Word and to reinforce the cultural view that image is everything.
Another recent innovation that has been brought to us by our technological society is the commodification of faith and especially music. By commodification I mean the fact that aspects of Christian worship, especially music, has become a big business commodity. Most of the major Christian record labels are not owned by Christians anymore. CD’s are being produced and mass marketed and they are hyped over Christian radio in the same way that secular music is marketed. The result is that the consumer brings these newly developed tastes into the church and expects to be served the same fare. In many instances, there does not seem to be much thought given to the effect this market driven approach will have on the worship of God’s people. Who is asking the questions about what God has required in His word for His worship? Who is asking questions about what is being taught by the music (or the VBS materials, or the Sunday School youth magazines, etc.) that are being adopted for use in our churches? Do these increase our understanding of the Word or do they cater to the image saturation of our culture?
In concluding his book, Dr. Hunt gives several suggestions for reducing the impact of the image in our lives. To his thoughts I add my own. Most of these involve time and attitude adjustments. With respect to time, we need to give less time to the image and more time to reading. This means spending less time in front of the television and computer screens and more time reading and conversing. Churches can help by re-elevating the importance of the word in worship and in teaching. We are going to have to do some re-educating of the people in our churches who have been raised in an image based society. They do not know how to think in the thought patterns that the printed word requires. We are going to have to help them learn how to do this. I think of how Wycliffe Bible Translators and other groups have worked tirelessly not only to translate the scriptures, but to bring literacy to the people. We are going to have to have our own version of this in our churches as we seek to raise the literacy level of our members.
May God help us not to just jump into the cultural river and “go with the flow”. God calls us to be a distinct people. We must use the technological innovations whether printing press, TV or computer for God’s glory, but we must set the agenda based on God’s Word and not let the appeal of the pagan image lead the way.
Scripture tells us that it is God that is at work in us both to will and to do of this good pleasure. Sometimes, when I’m battling with some sinful attitude or practice, it is more a problem with the desire to change than the power to actually make the change. When we pray for God’s help in such times, it seems to me we could start with asking for a change of the will. We need to be willing to be made willing.
The start of a new year is often the time when many Christians commit to being more disciplined about their Bible reading. Bible reading plans abound, and you can easily find one that will help you read the Bible through in a year if that is your goal.
Some of you may be like me, in that you fall behind in a very short time and are tempted to give up. You may get to late February and March and get bogged down in Leviticus or Numbers. After you get a week or two behind, the temptation is to shelve the whole project and make it your goal to start anew next January. You become very familiar with Genesis and Exodus, but the rest of the Bible is still sort of in the dark for you.
A missionary friend of mine gave me the simple solution to this dilemma. Use a book mark! Use a book mark like you would when reading any other book. If some time has gone by, just open the Bible to the book mark and begin reading again. Don’t worry about how many days you are behind. Just keep at it and read as much or as little as you want on any given day. You’ll eventually make it through and it will be well worth your while.
Let me tweak that advice a little more. Many Bible reading plans have you reading something from the Old Testament, something from the Psalms and Proverbs, and then something from the New Testament. What I do now is use three bookmarks. One goes at the beginning of Genesis, another at the beginning of Psalms, and the third at the beginning of the New Testament. Then simply rotate through the sections as time and interest allow. Use the Psalms bookmark to work your way through Psalms, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes. Then move it back to the beginning of the Psalms again.
If you can develop the habit and routine to read the Bible like this, it won’t matter how long it takes you to read through the entire Bible, but you will do it, and your spiritual life will be strengthened as a result.
Next time we’ll talk about how to take it a little deeper.
Paul writes the following in Romans 10:2-3: “For I testify about them [his Jewish people] that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For not knowing about the righteousness of God and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God.”
He’s writing here about his desire to see his Jewish friends and relatives come to know the salvation that is found in Jesus the Messiah. But what he teaches us here about their error in thinking, could be said of most religious people, no matter what the religion.
He says that they “have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.” The Christian faith is built on truth and on knowledge of that truth. God has acted in history by sending his son Jesus into this world for the purpose of dying on the cross to pay the price for the sins of the whole world. The events surrounding all of what took place, happened on this earth in space and time. On the day Jesus was executed, the sun came up and a new day had arrived. When Jesus died, it was a specific time of day and his heart stopped beating. On the third day his heart began to beat again, and his entire body came alive. These are real events. Having a zeal for God outside the truth of these events is futile. Our faith must be according to knowledge of the truth, not just religious wishful thinking.
What did these religious Jews not know? They did not know about the righteousness of God. This is the plight of all human beings. We know a god exists and we also know we are not perfect, but we do not recognize or realize how righteous and perfect God is. That’s the problem. Further, these people, not knowing the righteousness of God, sought to establish their own. And that’s what we do. We establish our own standard of righteousness, making sure that it is a standard that we can attain. We say we treat others fairly and kindly, but what we mean by that is that we treat them as fairly and kindly as our own standard specifies. We never compare ourselves to the standard of kindness God requires.
And here is what Paul writes as the conclusion of the above passage: “They did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God.” We subject ourselves to our own righteousness which has a standard we can meet, but we don’t subject ourselves to the righteousness of God because we know that we can never reach that level of perfection. We recognize immediately that if we are subject to God’s standard, we are doomed! In Romans 3:23, Paul tells us that everyone has sinned and falls short of God’s glory. That’s the truth that we have to accept to be able to receive God’s solution to our problem.
What is God’s solution? The Bible speaks of the righteousness of faith. In Romans 10:9-10 he says, “If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, leading to righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, leading to salvation.” According to the Bible, God counts believing as righteousness. What we do is try to earn our salvation by trying to be righteous enough. But as we have seen, that is an impossible goal. There is a righteousness separate and apart from the list of rules. Romans 3:21-22 tells us that “the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and upon all who believe.”
God’s righteousness is given to all who believe what God has said. This is a crucial thing to understand. When we believe what God says about himself and about the accomplishment of his son on the cross; and when we believe the solution God has provided in Jesus the Messiah, our believing is counted by God as righteousness. It’s a gift from God because of his amazing grace toward us.
Here’s what Paul writes in Philippians 3:9 with my comments added in brackets: “I want to be found in Him, not having my own righteousness [because my righteousness will never ever measure up] which is from the law [the list of rules God has laid down for us to obey], but [the righteousness] which is through faith in Christ [believing that Jesus Christ bore all of my guilt on the cross], the righteousness which is from God by faith [by believing God and his word].
In other words, when we believe what God has said about his son Jesus, God declares us righteous and we are assured of Jesus’s life living through us here and now, and a home in heaven when we die, and the promise that there will be no condemnation for us ever! (See Romans 8:1). Rule-keeping plays no part in this righteousness. It is righteousness as a free gift from God when we believe the record that God has given of his son. Do you believe this?
The other day, I was listening to a song with the simple title, “Come!” Have you ever been at one of those points in life when you feel like you’re carrying a greater load than you can manage? You feel like you can’t multitask at a fast enough pace to meet the demands of life. Jesus issues an invitation recorded in several passages of the New Testament. His message is this:
“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, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30
The song I was listening to uses the text of verses such as this from the Bible where Jesus lays out the invitation and challenge, “Come!” I’ve known these passages for years, but for some reason, those words along with the musical setting made quite an impression on me as to how clear and simple and all-encompassing the invitation is.
This invitation from Jesus is for those who labor and are burdened down. It is for those who are thirsty to experience real life. It is for those who feel like everything is just too hard. Maybe we would use the expression “I’m stressed out.” Does that sound like anyone you know, maybe even yourself? Look at what Jesus says in another place:
“On the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, ‘Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.’” John 7:37-38
Who is Jesus that he can make such promises? The Bible tells us that Jesus is the creator of the universe. He is God and the Messiah. He has all authority in heaven and earth. He is the King of kings and Lord of lords. In other words, it is God himself who is inviting anyone who is weary, burdened, or desperate to really live and to be free from the weight that comes with life, to come to him. God is the source of everything that is good, and he invites each one of us to come to him for relief. In fact, the verse we just quoted promises that whoever believes in Jesus will have rivers of living water flowing from them. Jesus later explained that he was talking about the Spirit of God himself who will come and live in us and be that living water.
Look at what Revelation 22:17 says, “The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come!’ And let the one who hears say, ‘Come!’ Let the one who is thirsty come; and let the one who wishes take the free gift of the water of life.” To me, this is an amazing reality to grasp. Jesus calls out with a loud voice, “Come!” The Holy Spirit calls out, “Come!” The bride (which is the church) says, “Come!” And those who hear are so excited that they start yelling, “Come! Come! It’s true! Whoever wants to can come and drink of the water of life freely.”
At the beginning of Revelation 22, just before the invitation to come, Jesus says, “Look, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to each person according to what they have done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the Last, the Beginning and the End.”
When Jesus comes back again, he will give to each person according to what he or she has done. The problem is that we haven’t done so well. The Bible says no one is good and no one seeks God. Every one of us has sinned and broken God’s law. What Jesus shouted at that festival was that the rivers of living water would flow in those who believe on him. Believing is the key. It’s not just believing in something, as in “I believe for every drop of rain that falls a flower grows.” That kind of belief accomplishes nothing. Believing in Jesus means believing that he is who he said he is, that his promises are true, that his death on the cross really did pay the full penalty of all of our sins, and that he actually did come to life again three days after he died, and is now in heaven at the right hand of God, and that he is now the ruler and judge of the universe. Believing is not just saying you believe these things; it is actually believing them!
It’s that same Jesus who says, “If you are weary and burdened down, and if you desire to have all your sins, failures, and shame forgiven forever, come to me. I will forgive you and begin to restore you to the person I created you to be.” Believing this is what it means to come.
So, what did he say? He said, “Take my yoke upon you.” A yoke is the thing that joins two oxen together so that they can plow together. Jesus said we should take his yoke because his yoke is easy. It’s not a hard, difficult pull. I take it to mean that he carries the bulk of the load for us. In another place in the Bible Jesus says, “Throw your cares on me, because I care for you.” (1 Peter 5:7) He’s not only saying that he cares about us, he is saying that he’ll do the caring instead of us having to it ourselves.
The other thing that Jesus said in Matthew 11 is that we should learn from him. We take his yoke, and we learn. What do we learn? We learn how to live life God’s way, with Jesus as our yokefellow and his word as our teacher. His word is what we read in the Bible. What is Jesus’ promise? You will find rest for your souls. You will have rivers of living water, i.e., the Holy Spirit, living within. We believe, take his yoke, and learn from him. The result? Rest for our soul. This is the best news anyone could ever hear!
Jesus, the alpha and omega, the beginning and the end, the creator and king of the universe invites you to come. You will find in him all you truly need to face the ups and downs of life successfully. He does not promise that all your problems will go away; but he does promise to be there, helping you and guiding you each step of the way. Come!
In case you were wondering, the song that got me thinking about this is called “The Spirit and the Bride” sung by Joshua Aaron. It’s partly in Hebrew so turn on the closed captioning. https://youtu.be/W5BFmx7SdOY?si=cMscb_jR8fYyTF35
