A Life at Rest

For anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from His. Hebrews 4:10

One of the most challenging things many believers face is entering into and remaining in the rest of God. If you have ever experienced the rest of God, you will quickly know when you have stepped out of it. There is so much peace and faith in His place of rest.

You will find no laboring in the flesh, no toiling.

Hebrews 4:10 says when we enter into the rest of God, we cease from our own works. In other words, we stop trying to make it happen in our own strength and simply believe what God says. And…we rest in that truth.

For some of us, who are fixers or people who like to get it done this may be a difficult place to find. This place is a resting place, one definition calls it a calming of the winds place. I love that!

What happens is God will show us something or we find a promise in the Word. We begin to confess the Word and believe God to do what He has shown us. That’s exactly what we are supposed to do. Then what?

Then we rest in Him, knowing it is done.

Not all of us do that. Many of us continue to labor and toil, trying to make it happen. To help God out a bit. I have learned when I begin toiling, to stop and breathe a moment and seek God. You see, it is very likely that I have stepped out of the rest of God if and I have stepped into toil and labor. Remain in His rest. It’s the very place you will find His blessing.

The rest of God is a place of trust. A place of knowing it is done. It is not a place of trying to make it happen by yourself.

You will know you have stepped out of the rest of God when you begin to get frustrated and weary of the battle. You will know you have stepped out of the rest of God when you are laboring hard to get it done, and nothing is going right. When you are out of the rest of God, you will feel pressured and pushed to get it done. God doesn’t pressure. God compels and leads and draws but He does not pressure or push. When you feel pressured, stop and get back into the rest of God.

Recently, I felt in my spirit it was time for a particular thing to take place. I began to try to make it happen daily. I knew it was time, and I was trying to help it out. For days, I headed in this direction, working toward the thing I knew in my spirit was time for. What did all that accomplish? Absolutely nothing.

I stepped out of the rest of God and into works, and I received nothing but frustration.

I quickly realized I was no longer in His rest in this area. I purposed in my heart to get back into the rest of God. To fully trust and rely on Him and His Word. I made a firm decision that the only labor I would engage in was the labor to enter into His rest by choosing to trust Him.

Then the strangest thing happened: I got a phone call, and everything was worked out. And it came to me…it came to me! I was at rest, no longer working for it. I had stepped back in the place I was destined to be, the rest of God and it worked itself out.

Ceasing from your works is ceasing from anything accomplished by your hand or mind. Even my mind had become weary from trying to work it out. That clearly indicates that I was no longer in the rest of God.

Have you ever found yourself in a situation similar to mine? Trying tirelessly to fix things, make them work, and figure it all out on your own? I’m sure many of you can relate. Has that experience left you feeling frustrated? I bet it has!

If you’re feeling that frustration and weariness, it might be because you’ve stepped out of God’s rest. Perhaps you have never truly entered into it. His rest is an amazing place to be, and it’s where I choose to dwell. God created everything effortlessly—He spoke it into existence and then He rested. He didn’t struggle; instead, He embraced His rest.

You and I are called to do the same. We pray about it, speak it aloud, and follow God’s instructions to bring it to fruition. However, after this, we must rest. We don’t keep fighting to make it happen, nor do we repeatedly do the same things while expecting different results. Instead, we enter His rest and choose to remain there, knowing that what we have birthed in the spirit and spoken from our lips is safe in Him.