Rev. Johnson V.
7th November 2010

The television advertisement for a particular brand of batteries featured a toy battery-operated bunny rabbit that kept moving long after other brands of batteries had stopped. The company claimed that its batteries lasted longer than its competitors. While that toy bunny rabbit might be able to go on non-stop, we humans, cannot. We are designed to rest after a period of work. That’s the only way we can function properly. Our physical bodies need sleep and our emotional/spiritual bodies need the rest that only God can give. What is spiritual rest and how do we receive it?

Our Creator God intended for us to live a life that is free from stress, worry and anxiety, a life of rest. In Hebrews 3:16 – 19, the Bible talks about a group of people who should have and could have lived in God’s rest, and yet they didn’t. This group made God so angry that He barred them from ever entering His rest. Who were they? They were the ones who heard God’s voice and rebelled. They were His own children, His treasured possession, the Israelites, who experienced His mighty hand as He brought them out of Egypt.
 
The Israelites rebelled against God. Rebellion is like witchcraft (1 Samuel 15:23), which can be defined as ‘an activity that deals with demon spirits’. God does not want us to have anything to do with things that are bad for us and rebellion is one thing that leads us away from Him. We must be obedient, if we want to stay in God’s will. Obedience requires action. If we don’t act and we only listen to the truth, we add damnation to ourselves.

The Bible does on the say that they didn’t enter His rest because of their unbelief.

The Israelites started out from Egypt with a strong and pure faith. But somehow in the wilderness their faith weakened, giving way to unbelief. How does faith give way to unbelief? Imagine the process of how a person has a heart-attack. Fat cells in the blood stream, are deposited on the walls of the arteries of the heart. Over a period of time, there is a build-up of these cells which restricts the movement of blood to the heart. Eventually, unless checked, the arteries will be completely blocked and will completely cut-off blood supply to the heart. In the same way, if we allow impurities to remain in our lives unchecked, over a period of time these impurities will restrict faith in us and stop the flow of the presence of our Father in our lives. Religion will not help you, only a right relationship with God will and a right relationship is borne out of faith.

In Hebrews 4:4, the Bible says that because of their unbelief, God did not fulfill His promise to them. When you believe God, your actions are different. Faith changes your lifestyle. Faith gives you rest. When God created all things, He was not anxious whether everything will work out, or whether He had done a good job. He created it and then He rested. We also must learn not to be anxious after praying about a situation and after doing all that we need to do. We need to leave it in His able hands, rather than being anxious about it.  Anxiety is a sign of unbelief. Then we will learn to be in His rest.