This religion is of a sort that is public, and not private; plenty abroad, but none at home; plenty without, but none within; plenty in the tongue, but none in the heart. They are altogether unprofitable, good for nothing, they bear no fruit.
J.C. Ryle

How to enter Gods Rest

How to enter Gods Rest

Be sure to read the article first, omitting the Scriptures. Then look up the Scriptures and mark them in your Bible. Feel free to pass copies of this article to others who want to know God’s truth. You will be doing God’s Will when you show and tell others how to live this special Way.

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Entering God’s rest

The word ‘meat’ in the Bible has several meanings. It can mean eat, it can mean the flesh of an animal and can also mean strong spiritual food. So too, the Sabbath rest of God has more than one meaning. There is a physical Sabbath rest in which one rests from all his physical works of the flesh on the seventh day. There is also the spiritual Sabbath rest in which one rests from all his evil works of sin through spiritual acts of righteousness. Then there is the millennial Sabbath rest of God, when the whole earth will be at rest from war and man’s sinful ways. It will be a time when Jesus Christ will bring all the nations of this earth into subjection to the Father’s will. Jesus must reign for 1,000 years before the world will be converted to God the Father and His Will (1 Cor. 15:25). Jesus must reign until the people of the nations are born again.

Entering the spiritual rest of God with your physical body is done when the flesh has been crucified with its evil passions and desires (Gal. 5:24). You actually become a new creation or creature (Gal. 6:15). You become a person who no longer carries out the sinful desires of the flesh (Gal. 5:16). With God’s love, you simply serve others (Gal. 5:13). That’s how you clothe yourself with Christ and have Christ formed in you (Gal. 3:27; 4:19).

Paul knew what having Christ formed and revealed in him was all about (Gal. 1:15-16). He knew how to walk in a newness of life and that’s how he was made complete (Rom. 6:4; 2 Cor. 13:11). You do not have to be a slave of sin any longer (Rom. 6:6-7). Sin no longer has to master you, for greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world (Rom. 6:14; 1 John 4:4). Do you believe that?

True disciples of Jesus Christ are to consider themselves dead to sin and alive to God in righteousness (Rom. 6:10-13; 1 Peter 2:24, 16-19). We are putting to death the sinful deeds of the flesh by living to the Spirit (Rom. 8:12-14). When we live to the Spirit (live daily to please only God) we are no longer in the flesh but in the Spirit (Rom. 8:8-9).

The spiritual rest of God, then, is how you enter the kingdom within (Luke 17:21). The spiritual rest of God is entered when you do God’s Will from the heart (Matt. 5:20; Eph. 6:6).

Jesus said we are to be perfect (Matt. 5:48). Practicing daily righteousness for God is how we become perfect (Matt. 6:1; 1 John 2:29; 3:7, 10). It’s how righteous men are made perfect (Heb. 12:23). Remember always, it is God who does the perfecting in the same way that Jesus was made perfect by the Father and learned obedience to Him (1 Peter 5:10; Heb. 5:8-9). We cannot fully understand this message or comprehend it unless we live it daily.

Remember, God causes the growth but we must practice the righteousness (1 Cor. 3:7). Otherwise God has nothing to work with (Phil. 2:13). Practicing righteousness is repentance. Glorifying God by good works is repentance and doing good works in Christ’s name is the Will of God (Col. 3:17; Matt. 5:16; 7:21). We must do the Will of God to abide forever (1 John 2:17). That’s why Paul buffeted or forced his body to be in subjection to Christ. He did not want to disqualify himself from being a minister of God (1 Cor. 9:27). We are to clean out the old leaven (our old sinful ways) and become new lumps (1 Cor. 5:7).

The whole reason for coming together is not to play church, but to provoke one another to more works of love, works of charity, works of giving, sharing, caring, loving and serving (Heb. 10:24). That’s how you become a doer of God’s word instead of remaining a hearerÑdeluded that you are a true disciple when you are not (James 1:22; Rom. 2:13).

Yet people will say, ‘I don’t understand.’ Jesus says if anyone is willing to do God’s Will, he will understand the teaching (John 7:17). This is the Way to salvation, the narrow Way that few find (Acts 16:17; Matt. 7:14). This is the Way that allows the God of peace to soon crush Satan and put him under your heel (Rom. 16:20). You will no longer be held captive by Satan, doing His will (2 Tim. 2:26). You overcome Satan’s will by doing the Father’s Will on earth daily as it is in heaven. That Will is righteousness and that righteousness is good works done in secret daily for the glory of God in Christ’s name (Matt. 5:16; 6:1; Col. 3:17).

If Jesus Christ came to show us how to be servants of others for the glory of God, and he most certainly did, then it is imperative that we start so we can truthfully call ourselves His disciples. Jesus Christ’s Way of life is so easy and so rewarding. It is a shame that so many are cheating themselves out of the good life as well as salvation.