How To Enter God’s Rest? — Part 2: Maze of Views

In our world there are various kinds of rests.  But because neither the writer of Hebrews nor any NT writer ever defines or explains it, many different ideas have evolved during the course of church history concerning what “God’s Sabbath-rest” truly is.

 

The most popular view is it’s attainable only in heaven—i.e., it’s a “heavenly inheritance” and not earthly—i.e. it’s heaven itself. George Wesley Buchanan explains that “Canaan . . . . the promised land was a type of heaven . . . an imperfect type” (To the Hebrews, 65).

 

F.F. Bruce elaborates, “it is their participation in God’s own rest. . . . so his people, having completed their service on earth will enter into his rest. . . . Therefore, a sabbath rest still awaits the people of God. . . . [we] enter it at death. . . . this blissful unbroken fellowship with God” (The Epistle to the Hebrews, 109-110).

 

Others, on the other hand, see it as an earthly opportunity and reality. They cite Jesus’ words in Matthew 11:28-29 for support.

 

Buchanan also laments that speculation about the nature of this rest has “opened the door for extensive spiritualization on the part of scholars.” For instance, some attempt to differentiate between a “temporal rest” and the “true rest” (To the Hebrews, 72-3).

 

Many today, however, have been told that it’s being saved—i.e., “for those who have accepted the saving message by faith . . . that enter into the ‘rest’ of God.” And yet Bruce claims that this rest has “been available ever since creation’s work was ended” (106).

 

But many dispensational premillennialists insist that this rest will only be available (or fully available) in the millennium—a future and literal 1,000 year period of peace and prosperity on earth with Jesus sitting in a re-built temple in Jerusalem and in which all evil has been removed. Revelation 20:1-10 is cited in support (mistakenly, of course).

 

Kee describes this millennial hope and rest this way: “. . . the subordination of human choice to the divine plan for the universe, the hope for a new era in which God’s purpose will triumph, the expectation of the purgation of evil, the presence of signs of the end in present history, and the ultimate achievement of peace and harmony in the creation” (Howard Clark Kee, Understanding the New Testament, 220).

 

For some it’s a spiritual peace and/or mental state of resting from anxieties, preoccupations, and withdraw from intense concentration on serious pursuits. Or, it’s a termination of nervous activity or struggle. They frame it as surrendering to or trusting in God, turning everything over to Him, and practicing his presence.  So how many Christians live like this in your opinion?

 

Unfortunately, for far too many Christians this “rest” concept—present or future—has become a biblical excuse to do little if anything in society regarding Christian service after they have been saved—to stop working, stop worrying, withdraw from the world, go on extended vacation, take a nap, retire, etc.

 

Many classify it as a mystery. We don’t know how it works, it just does. It’s something that cannot be explained but has to be experienced.

 

Consequently, Christianity Today summarizes, “resting in, rejoicing in, and living out the Sabbath praise of God is regarded in Scripture as the very summit of earthly existence” (Wilkinson, March 2013, 29). In another article in the same issue, Susan Wunderink notes that while “faith is about a posture of rest . . . . Many of us are terrified by the life of faith.”  Of course, being terrified is not entering God’s rest.  She further adds and advises that “a Sabbath is an act of both worship and preparation. Preparation for what?” she asks. “For living in faith when the bottom drops out,” she answers (Wunderink, March 2013, 36).

 

Are any of these views valid or not?

 

Perhaps, there are other views?

 

One of the participants in my Bible study group volunteered that for him entering God’s Sabbath-rest is by having “reciprocal spiritual intimacy with God” through “absolute confidence in God’s grace, recognizing who God is in his fullness, and identifying your place in his plan.”

 

So what do you think?