The Providence of Rest

God RESTED from His work of Creation on Day 7 (Gen 2:1-2)

Explanation: The text informs us that God completed His direct acts of creation at the end of Day 6. On the 7th Day there is no record of God creating anything at all. The language of the seventh day is different: there is no wording of “the evening and the morning were the 7th day.” This 7th Day is altogether different from the 6 days of Creation.

The text informs us that God RESTED on Day 7. The word rest means to cease or to stop a particular activity.

Illustrate: break time at HCC - it means to stop even if you don’t want to!

Argument: We rest from exertion, those activities that drain us, physically or socially or emotionally. Clearing brush, roofing a house, weeding a garden, performing surgery, doing homework - all activities that we cannot do continually with taking a rest break.

Does this mean that God was worn out from creating the earth and the heavens and the entire universe in the 6 days of Creation? Absolutely NOT!

God is infinite and He is Spirit - He has no physical limitations.

Jeremiah 32:17 KJV 1900

Ah Lord God! behold, thou hast made the heaven and the earth by thy great power and stretched out arm, and there is nothing too hard for thee:

Genesis 18:14 KJV 1900

Is any thing too hard for the Lord? At the time appointed I will return unto thee, according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son.

The idea of tiredness does NOT apply to the Creator God of the Universe. He is in a different category altogether from His creation.

Psalm 121:4 KJV 1900

Behold, he that keepeth Israel Shall neither slumber nor sleep.

Application: The concept of REST does not apply to God, but He rested on the 7th Day for us! He set the pattern for Humanity. He knows our frame and our limitations. He knows that we cannot function without rest so He graciously provides a period of rest from our labors.

God BLESSED and SANCTIFIED the 7th Day of Rest (Gen 2:3)

Explanation: The 7th Day (Sabbath) was given a special status amongst the days. God had already given His blessing on Day 5 and on Day 6. On those two days of Creation, God places His blessing on His creation - the birds of the air and the sea creatures (Gen 1:22) and He blessed the land animals and Adam & Eve (Gen 1:28). At this point, God specially places His blessing on the 7th Day itself.

CONSIDER: Most time intervals are established by objective standards:

1 day = rotation of the earth on its axis

1 month = revolution of the moon around the earth

1 year = 1 revolution of the earth around the sun

What is the foundation for a week? There is no reason for 7 days instead of 5 or 8 or 10 other than the reason that God ordained the week by tying it directly to Creation!

Illustrate: The cycle of a seven day week being directly connected to a belief in the biblical God has long been understood and opposed. The French Revolution in the late 1700’s was a movement to establish an entirely secular government. One feature that was put in place was the establishment of a 10 day week instead of 7 just to get away from the idea of God. It didn’t work out!

Argument: God established the Sabbath for the purpose of rest and worship AND as a reminder of His six days of Creation.

Exodus 20:8–11 KJV 1900

Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.

Application: God gave us one day in seven to REST from our labor AND for the purpose of Worship. The concept of the Sabbath is to remind us our our Creator. He is the Provider and we can trust Him. We do NOT have to go non-stop, desperately trying to get all we can. We can cease from our labors and worship Him. We are to give Him our time, our attention, our adoration and our worship - for He is worthy!

God is still working and we can still enter His REST

Explanation: It is important to stress that God ceased from His work of creation at the end of Day 6. God did NOT stop working or interacting with His creation. This is the mindset of DEISM - there is a Creator God, but once He created the world He then left it on its own. Like winding up a clock and then going off to some other place.

God is at Work around us, accomplishing His purposes through guiding, sustaining and redeeming. Jesus spoke about God’s work during His earthly ministry:

John 5:17 KJV 1900

But Jesus answered them, My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.

God’s work is centered around reconciliation. We are told in the NT that “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself” (2 Cor 5:19)

Argument: The writer of the Book of Hebrews referred to God’s resting from His acts of Creation (cf Heb 4:4) as he was persuading his audience of the superiority of Jesus. The writer was explaining that a Sabbath rest remained for the people of God and that TODAY was the day to enter into God’s rest (Heb 4:7-10).

The writer then warns his audience not to by like their ancestors who failed to enter God’s rest due to unbelief (Heb 4:6). Those OT Israelites were stubborn and hard-hearted - they wanted to do things their own way and they refused to accept God’s way. They perished in the wilderness due to unbelief.

You have heard the offer of God’s rest in the Gospel. You have sinned and come short of God’s glory (Rom 3:23) and you deserve death and hell (Rom 6:23a). Your own efforts at righteousness are woefully inadequate (Isaiah 64:6) and apart from the finished work of Jesus on the Cross, you have no hope.

However, Jesus did finish His work by dying as your substitute to satisfy the wrath of God and through faith in Christ as your Lord and Savior, you can enter into God’s rest.