(A)Introduction

This passage and the two closing verses in Chapter 3 deal with two different kinds of rest. There is the 'rest' of entering into the Promised Land which was denied the children of Israel under Moses but was achieved under Joshua. The writer also perceives that there is another kind of rest. He quotes Psalm 95, written long after the Israelites settled Canaan, to suggest that there is a Sabbath-rest for the people of God. This kind of rest was available when the Psalmist was composing his song. There is a sense in which it has always been there for God's people and never more so than in the day of Grace. The author of Hebrews was a very clever man to tease out this distinction from the Old Testament Scriptures.

(B) A Canaan-Rest.

There is a satisfaction and contentment on: achieving a goal, coming to the end of a journey, searching and finding. The goal of the Israelites in the wilderness was to enter Canaan and possess the land. Their desert wanderings ended when they took for themselves what God had promised. They could build a house and settle down. This must have given much happiness. However their work was not over. They needed to hold on to what they had gained and to withstand the attacks of enemies over many years. There are many examples of this kind of rest which is of importance to the Christian:

(1) The quest for relationships.
It is a wonderful moment when a man desperately in love with the woman of his dreams knows that she loves him and desires to commit herself to him in marriage. Such used to be the case anyway. It was certainly the case in Jane Austin's novel, 'Pride and Prejudice', when Elizabeth informed Darcy that her sentiment for him had undergone a material change so as to make her receive his assurances of love with gratitude and pleasure. Jane Austin writes, 'The happiness which this reply produced was such as he had probably never felt before.' The chase is over and yet the relationship is only just beginning - it has to develop and mature.

There is a parallel here with becoming a Christian - of entering into a relationship with Jesus. Many experience great joy in knowing that they are accepted by Christ and receiving, by the Holy Spirit, assurance of salvation. They enter God's Kingdom - it is a kind of Canaan-rest. The journey to faith has been completed but the journey of faith has only just begun. However wonderful the Canaan-rest, it is the Sabbath-rest that is most important. One leads to the other but not inevitably so - that is why Hebrews was written.

(2) Pursuing a goal
As I write this exposition I am pursuing a goal and that is to set up a web site so that you, the reader, can share my thoughts. I hope I achieve my goal. It will give me much satisfaction if I can. It will be a kind of Canaan rest. It is well worth while attaining such a rest. My task will not be completed when my site is on the World Wide Web. I shall keep adding to it, revising it and, hopefully, responding to criticism. My task will be complete when God calls me home - to my Sabbath rest.

(3) Searching for an answer.
Many years ago during a camping holiday in the English Lake District I overheard the tale end of a conversation between two young boys as I left the toilet block. I don't know what the oldest youngster had been saying but the smaller of the two stated with certainty and some pride, "God made me". I smiled and was glad. I expect the little chap had asked his mum, or his dad, where he came from and had received the reply that God made him. His question had been answered to his satisfaction and he was content. His mind was at rest.

Towards the end of his earthly ministry Jesus told his disciples that he was going back to God the Father to prepare a place for his followers. He goes on to say, almost as an aside, "You know the way to .... where I am going." John14v3 Thomas then asked a question to which he very much wanted an answer, "Lord we don't know where you are going, so how can we know the way?" Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me." This is a very wonderful answer to one of life's fundamental questions . We are assured that our final destination is with God our Creator if we believe on Jesus. He is the way to God. Those who take Jesus at his word do experience rest. He says in Mt 11v28"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest".

The rest we experience when the big questions are answered is a Canaan-rest. The lad's belief that God gave him life has implications that will not let him rest. He will need to go on and ask what God wants him to do with his life and then do it. Jesus does promise rest for the burdened but he goes on to say what is often forgotten, "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart." The apostle Paul finally found rest from the troubled goading of his conscience when he submitted to Jesus on the road to Damascus. We must not forget the second question he asked,"What shall I do, Lord?"

(4) Reclaiming the lost
It is difficult to rest when you are searching for what is lost. There is nothing more guaranteed to destroy one's peace of mind than to finish a day's work and lose your car keys. Such was my predicament one winter's afternoon as school ended. My keys had vanished. I could not drive home. Once home I would be unable to get into my locked house. I searched my classroom from top to bottom getting increasingly frustrated and looking in more and more unlikely places. It is just as well that I did because a pupil with a malicious sense of humour had hidden them at the bottom of a box of blackboard chalk. Great was my rejoicing when I found the keys that had been lost. My relief was immense.

It is easy see the point of Jesus' stories about the lost coin, sheep and son. There was no rest until they were found. I expect the father of the prodigal looked out into the distance many times a day in the hope of seeing his boy coming home. So it is that many pray for the lost - for an husband, a mother, a son, a daughter, a brother, a friend. There is no peace of mind, no rest, until they are found. I have friends who stopped close to their phone throughout last Christmas waiting for a call from their estranged son. Perhaps there is no rest yet.......

Most of the Children of Israel who left Egypt for the Promised Land did not enter in. They had no rest from their wilderness wanderings. They remained for ever restless in the desert. The reason for this is given in verse 2: the message they heard was of no value to them, because those who heard did not combine it with faith. The spies made their report on the Land of Canaan, decision time arrived, the crunch came and the people funked it through lack of faith. I believe this happens for many young people bought up in Christian churches. For years they are happy to learn more and more about Jesus until a time of decision is reached. They come to a crisis and have to choose whether they are going to commit themselves wholeheartedly to Jesus and follow him or, for example, marry that non-christian boy. The truths they have heard all their lives become of no value because they do not combine hearing with faith. Similarly we can fail to achieve our goals as Christians or stop praying for the lost because of lack of faith. Perseverance, persistence and honest endeavour are all qualities associated with faith. How they are valued by a teacher of Geographer who prepares pupils for public examinations. Conversely impatience and discontent that produce miserable, peevish and grumbling students are hated by the teacher because they are harbingers of failure.

(C) A Sabbath-rest

The Sabbath-rest is the peace of mind, the satisfaction and joy, of completing a task, such as when:

(1)God completed Creation. Gen2v1: Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array.
God in creation made something good in itself. It is wonderful and beautiful. God made it to share. I had an old neighbour who was a very keen gardener until his wife died. He lavished much care and attention on his garden and created something very lovely to share with his wife. He took far less pleasure in his colourful flowers and attractive shrubs when there was no one to share them with. I like to think that when I am out walking on a brilliantly sunny autumn day, with the golden light illuminating the seasonally rich leaf colours, and I almost sob with pleasure and thank God -that he is pleased.

God also made provision for us in his creation - a world fit to live in. We are so like God in this. It gives us satisfaction, too, to make provision for those we love insofar as we are able. My brother enjoys expressing his love for his friends by cooking them a meal.

At the end of the sixth day God saw all that he had made and it was very good. Gen1v31. He had finished to the highest standards, it was just right, and so God rested.

(2) Jesus did God's will and finished the work of salvation
There is no doubt that Jesus became increasingly aware during his earthly ministry of the great work of redemption before him. He had to: rescue mankind from a lost condition, repair a broken relationship and give hope of a brighter future. Jesus was aware on the cross, before he dismissed his spirit, that his work was done; he cried out in triumph, "It is finished". I think it most significant that following this cry Jesus asked for a drink. It is almost as if for the first time during his ordeal on the cross he is able to relax and consider his own interests. Jesus knows that fellowship with his father has been restored and that at any time he is permitted to dismiss his spirit. The work has been done - so Jesus can just spare a minute for one last celebratory drink. It was his Sabbath-rest.

Man emulates God or Jesus.
There is a kind of Sabbath-rest when we finish creating something, whether it be a great work of literature or a fruit cake. I was once the secretary of a Village Hall Planning Committee. It gave me great satisfaction when the Brockley Village Hall was built and stood available for use. We are like God and take pleasure in the same things as he does.
We can also be like Jesus and rest content when a saving work has been accomplished. The great Antarctica explorer Ernest Shackleton rescued the men he had to leave on Elephant Island whilst he sailed in an open boat to South Georgia for help. Once that epic and heroic feat had been achieved he dashed off a letter to Emily his wife: 'I have done it. .......... Not a life lost and we have been through Hell. Soon I will be home and then I will rest.'

(D)Conclusion

Christians have a saving and a creative work to do: to reach the lost with the gospel and to make provision for the people of God. Shackleton was motivated to move mountains for his marooned colleagues by three things at least:

(a) Love for his men
(b) A sense of duty. They were his men and he felt an obligation to them
(c) An invincible hope. He never doubted but for a moment that he would bring off the rescue.