The Divine Rest: God's Perpetual Work in Tranquility

He that is entered into His rest (Hebrews 4:10).—We lose much of the meaning of this passage by our superficial habit of transferring it to a future state. The ground of the mistake lies in misinterpreting the word "remaineth": taken to point to rest after the sorrows of this life are finished. Yet there is such a rest; but the truth taught here is that faith, and not death, is the gate to participation in Christ's rest. The rest remained over after Moses and Judaism, but came into possession under and by Christ.

I. The Divine Rest. It is the deep tranquility of a nature self-sufficient in its infinite beauty, calm in its everlasting strength, placid in its deepest joy—still in its mightiest energy, loving without passion, willing without decision or change, acting without effort. God is everywhere the same infinite love and infinite self-sufficiency; therefore His very Being is rest. God is changeless and ever tranquil, yet He loves, wills, acts—a mystery passing all understanding.

This Divine tranquility is also a rest full of work. God rests, and in His rest, to the present hour and forever, God works. Christ's work of redemption, finished upon the Cross, perpetually continues. His glorious repose is full of energy for His people. He intercedes above. He works on them, through them, for them.

II. The Rest of God and of Christ is the pattern of what our earthly life may become. We cannot possess that changeless tranquility, but we can possess the stable repose of that fixed nature which knows one object, and one alone.