And He Rested

Introduction

At the risk of starting on a down note, I want to at least acknowledge the challenging events of this past week. We grieve the division in our world and we grieve political violence. And not just this week, but over the past few months we’ve seen other instances of violence, tragic natural disasters, daily reports of war from across the globe. We look at the world and we look at the news and we says: this isn’t how it’s supposed to be. We are not, let alone our kids, are not meant to be exposed to such violence; we’re not meant for such strife and division.

And so much more. We’re not meant for such striving, sorrow, or grief in this very good creation that God has made. It’s part of the challenge of studying Genesis 1-2 together, because we look at the goodness of creation and we grieve how far it has fallen.

But in some ways, that’s the point of Genesis 1-2, that we recognize so deeply that the world around us now is not the way it ought to be. And we’ll see today in the opening verses of chapter 2 a reminder and an invitation. A reminder of our God who finished His good work and took up His rest with His creation, His intent was and is to dwell with his creation. And an invitation to cease in our striving, to put away that which divides and causes strife, and instead to find our ultimate rest in Him. We see that invitation reflected in God’s own rest and that’s our main idea today: God takes up His rest so we can rest in Him. We’ll unpack this throughout our outline today.

God rested to delight in His finished work.

We’ll start with what God did on the seventh day and why He does it. I’ll start here by commenting that a pet peeve of mine is that these three verses really shouldn’t be a part of chapter 2. This so clearly belongs in chapter 1 with the rest of the seven-day creation story. It’s not over at v. 31 of chapter 1. Creation is finished, God’s work of creating the universe, the heavens and the earth has ended. All that God had willed and designed for the universe is now in place, but that is emphatically not the end of the story. Disconnecting these three verses from chapter one has an effect on us as readers: it removes God’s seventh day rest from the rest of the story!

Think of Genesis 1-2:3 as a single literary unity, a single story. Think back to your High School English classes, a good story has a set up (God starts creating!), followed by rising action (each day brings more creation) leading up to the climax! In this case the climax of creation is humanity: God making man and woman in his image! But most stories don’t end at the climax, there must be resolution, that good English-class word: denouement. It’s when the loose ends are tied up and the story comes to a close. Think of it this way: the story is wrapped up and everything settles into a new sense of normal based on what came before. So the resolution of the creation story? God takes up His rest, God delights in His creation, we can think of this way, as a new sense of normal—there was nothing, now there is everything created, and God takes His place of rest and delight with His creation.

The whole intricate design of Genesis 1 and the creation story are meant to draw us toward the absolute importance of this resolution: God’s rest. Humans are the climax of the story, but the resolution is God taking up rest with us on the seventh day.

Seven is a significant number throughout scripture, symbolizing wholeness and completion. Biblical scholars have noticed that the number seven appears throughout Genesis 1 in intricate patterns - in Hebrew word counts, key phrases, and structure.

Genesis 1:1 is a Hebrew sentence that has 7 words. Verse 2 has 7 x 2 words: 14, God’s name is mentioned 7 x 5 times. The phrase: it was good: 7 times.

This isn't coincidence - it's meant to draw us to the absolute importance of the seventh day and God's rest. The seventh day is not an after thought, it is a statement of creation’s completeness, it’s goodness, and God’s delight in what He has made. We’re meant to take seriously this seventh day.

Genesis 2:2 “2 And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done.” There’s two aspects of the idea of rest in scripture. The first sense is to stop, to stop work; to pause (the word Sabbath means literally to stop). That’s what God does here because His work had been finished. He was done creating all things. But we also recognize that this was not a rest of total inactivity, it is a sabbath rest of satisfaction, of delight in what He had made. He declared creation to be very good and he stopped and he delighted in it. And we know that God will carry on with his “work,” He is still active in the world, he nurtures and cares for what He has created. We must not think of this as God setting all things in motion and then walking away for a long vacation.

And this is where we get to the other sense of rest for the ancient reader of Genesis. And that is a sense of “settling in;” to take up residence. The image is of God as a King, having built His cosmic temple (remember that from a few weeks ago, creation is meant to be a temple to glorify God), He now takes up His place on the throne to carry on with overseeing and nurturing His creation.

Though the work of creation has finished, God has not stopped. It reminds me of the image of Christ in Hebrews 1:3 “3 He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,”

After finishing His work on the cross, Jesus sat down, he settled into His rule on His throne. This doesn’t mean that he kicks back and puts his feet up. No! Later in the book of Hebrews we’ll see that Christ continues to work on our behalf—he is an advocate for us, He intercedes on our behalf. And look right there in verse we just read: He upholds the universe with by the word of His power. He is still at work sustaining all things, keeping all things held together.

The invitation for us is twofold: First is to trust in the continuing work of God, trust that our creator who made all things good is continuing to carry us along until that day when He will restore all things. And secondly, this is our second point in the outline, we’re invited to follow in His example: to rest in and delight in Him.

God calls us to rest and delight in Him

Genesis 2:3 “3 So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.” Since the beginning the seventh day has been marked out and blessed to be a day that is holy, set apart, and for rest for His people. This became one of the most important practices for God’s people when he rescued them from slavery—a time in which they had no rest from their work and toil. He rescued them and promised them something they had never had before: rest. The once a week, 24-hour period of stopping, resting, and delighting in God is a practice that has continued on for thousands of years.

The purpose then in God sharing with us this seventh day rest, is that the Sabbath would be an interruption in the regular flow of our weekly lives that reminds us that our work, our constant doing and being busy, these things do not save us and they do not keep the universe running. We stop and we rest and we remember that we continue on by God’s good grace. Not because of how hard we worked, how many errands we ran, how many emails we sent this past week.

Sabbath as a practice for those who follow God is one that directly pushes against the most important values of our culture. Our world is full of alternative religions—consumerism, politics, wellness—but the most prevalent of these might be Workism. Workism is this, the idea that we not only pursue work because it’s necessary but because it will give us ultimate fulfillment and meaning in our lives. We are restless people looking to find meaning and we have become very good at finding our meaning in the things that we do. We're like my three-year-old who will be exhausted but fight taking a nap with everything in her. Everything in us says 'keep going, keep doing' even when we desperately need to stop and rest.

The antidote for our restlessness is not more work or more doing! St. Augustine knew this 1600 years ago when he wrote: “O Lord, our heart is restless until it rests in you.” We are invited to rest in the Lord and it is only in this that we will be most satisfied and content.

Just as the ancient Israelite, we are invited to stop work every week, to rest, and to delight in a world we did not create and one we do not uphold by sheer force of will. We rest, worship, and enjoy the provision of God for us.

Our family has attempted to maintain a more regular rhythm of Sabbath rest in our house. And I’ll be honest, it’s not easy. But when we practice Sabbath, we say these four things: We rest, we play, No work, God loves us! It’s two things we do: rest and play (or delight). One thing we don’t do: work. And the final thing doesn’t depend on anything else: God loves us.

For us, it’s looked like more advance planning, preparing for our Sabbath. It looks like simpler meals, being present together. It has looked like intentionally creating time to thank God for what he’s given us. It’s slowing down. And I am the first to admit, we’re not good at this. There are so many obstacles that get in the way.

For some of us it’s our work, your job makes something like this impossible. For others, you’re internally rolling your eyes at me because your kids are young and there’s just no rest at this stage in my life. Anyone who is a caretaker—whether your own kids, or aging parents—you know you don’t get to just stop caring for those who depend on you. Or there is just too much to do, too many responsibilities. That’s why this is so hard. I would offer this encouragement: start small and be intentional. Maybe you don’t check your email or you save grocery shopping for a different day. Whatever it is you can do to create space to stop and rest in the Lord. But remember this: Sabbath is not something we do to achieve a great level of spiritual status. It’s not about earning anything and we can’t lose our standing with God if we mess this up.

Instead, this is an invitation to move toward the rhythm of creation that God set in motion in Genesis 1. To align our lives around the reality of God and his created order, to interrupt the world around us with worship of God and rest for our souls. And this gets us to the final point in our outline, that God dwells with those who rest in Him.

God dwells with those who rest in Him

This is why Sabbath rest is so valuable and essential, because we are called to rest in the presence of our God who restores our soul. What we see here in Genesis 2 is the beginning of a pattern that will continue throughout the rest of the Bible all the way to the end. That’s one of the things we’re trying to do with this Genesis series, to trace these themes far beyond the book of Genesis. God taking up His rest is linked with God giving His presence to humanity.

Here it is God taking up his rest on the seventh day and the state of creation, we’ll see, is a garden in which Adam and Eve had access to God’s presence, walking with Him in the garden.

Throughout scripture, we see this pattern repeated. In the tabernacle and later the temple, after the work was completed, God's glory and presence filled and took up residence with His people. Solomon declared, at the consecration of the temple, after God’s presence had filled it in 1 Kings 8:56, 'Blessed be the Lord who has given rest to his people Israel.' When He rests, He gives His presence to His people that they may rest in Him.

This comes to a climax in Jesus Christ, who comes to earth, which was created through Him, to dwell with us. Though we might say that Jesus upends our expectations, he comes not to rest, but to work on our behalf. He said of His ministry in John 5:17 “My Father is working until now, and I am working.”” Jesus comes to work on our behalf and what is the invitation of his work and ministry? Matthew 11:28 “28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” He takes up work that we might take up rest in Him. Jesus’ work comes to its completion on the cross when he declared, It is finished. Like Genesis 2, "thus the heavens and the earth were finished,” so it was with the work of Christ in securing our salvation. In doing so, Jesus secures not only our rescue from sin but the open door for all of us, here and now, to take up our rest in His presence through the Holy Spirit.

And having finished His work, Jesus takes up His rest, settling in on the throne to rule and reign on high over all things. This rest we can have is not something we earn; we don’t get the privilege of resting in His presence only if we’re really good at keeping the Sabbath. No, he secured this for us, so we can rest in His presence here and now and into eternity.

I want to close with that promise we have for eternity. If we go all the way back to Genesis 2, our passage breaks a very important pattern in the seven-day creation story. Every day of creation ends the same way: “And there was evening and there was morning, the first day...and there was evening and there was morning, the second day...and so on.”

But day seven doesn’t end this way. Of day seven there is no evening or morning. It’s as if to say, this rest that God takes up with His people and creation, this is meant to go on forever. This is the right way of things, that this rest would go on and on. Of course, this is not what became of things when sin entered the garden, rest become fleeting, humanity removed from God’s presence, but it’s not the way it was supposed to be. The hope we have is that eventually we’ll get back what was lost. Look at Revelation 21, a chapter I seem to go to so often. After we get that great statement of the New Creation without pain or sorrow or loss or tears, we get this description:

Revelation 21:22–25 ESV

22 And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. 23 And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. 24 By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, 25 and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there.

Do you see? It’s a restoration of that never-ending seventh day. There will be no night! That day, when God dwells with His people perfectly we will find perfect rest in His presence, that day will not end! One of the final images of scripture is a restoration of what God started here in Genesis 2:1-3, His dwelling with us, His presence giving us joyous rest. This is our hope. Though we are tired and weary now, we can find rest in Christ here and trust for perfect rest with Him in eternity. Amen.