New Testament Rest

I. EXORDIUM:

Are you resting today? Are you at rest today?

II. AUDIENCE PROFILE:

Believers

III. OBJECTIVES:

To show that we are already at rest because GOD, thru JESUS CHRIST has conquered everything and even redeemed us from everything that can stop us from resting.

IV. TEXT:

Hebrews 4:8 (Amplified Bible)

4:8 [This mention of a rest was not a reference to their entering into Canaan.] For if Joshua had given them rest, He [God] would not speak afterward about another day.

Hebrews 4:8 (New International Version)

4:8 For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken later about another day.

Hebrews 4:8 (King James Version)

4:8 For if Jesus had given them rest, then would he not afterward have spoken of another day.

V. THESIS:

I am at rest, GOD is at work in me.

VI. TITLE:

New testament rest

VII. EXPLICATION:

A. Date of writing: Before AD. 70

B. Style of writing: Best Greek style

C. Authorship: Not specific, but generally attributed to Apostle Paul. Can be also ascribed to Barnabas, Luke, Apollos

D. Audience: Hebrew Christians

E. Theme: Christ is superior to the prophets; Christ is superior to angels—J. Vernon McGee's Thru The Bible

F. Purpose: The chief doctrinal purpose of the writer was to show the transcendent glory of the Christian dispensation, as compared with that of the Old Testament.—Thompson Chain - Bible Book Outlines

G. Keyword: better

VIII. MAIN BODY:

A. Joshua did not give them rest in Canaan

"[This mention of a rest was not a reference to their entering into Canaan.] For if Joshua had given them rest,"

Joshua came from the Hebrew word, meaning "Jehovah-saved". Joshua is a type of Jesus, proclaiming and declaring the GOD saves, not him, the LORD JESUS delivered them to the Promise Land - that is New Testament Rest. Joshua is rendered as "Jesus" in the King James version but it's actually "Joshua", but of course, we know that JESUS actually delivered them from their enemies into the promise land, Canaan, into that time.

Acts 7:45 (Amplified Bible)

7:45 Our forefathers in turn brought it [this tent of witness] in [with them into the land] with Joshua when they dispossessed the nations which God drove out before the face of our forefathers. [So it remained here] until the time of David,

Deuteronomy 32:49 (Amplified Bible)

32:49 Get up into this mountain of the Abarim, Mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, opposite Jericho, and look at the land of Canaan which I give to the Israelites for a possession.

Joshua 3:14-17 (Amplified Bible)

3:14 So when the people set out from their tents to pass over the Jordan, with the priests bearing the ark of the covenant before the people,

3:15 And when those who bore the ark had come to the Jordan and the feet of the priests bearing the ark were in the brink of the water—for the Jordan overflows all its banks throughout the time of harvest—

3:16 Then the waters which came down from above stood and rose up in a heap far off, at Adam, the city that is beside Zarethan; and those flowing down toward the Sea of the Arabah, the Salt [Dead] Sea, were wholly cut off. And the people passed over opposite Jericho.

3:17 And while all Israel passed over on dry ground, the priests who bore the ark of the covenant of the Lord stood firm on dry ground in the midst of the Jordan, until all the nation finished passing over the Jordan.

B. GOD spoke of another day of rest

"He [God] would not speak afterward about another day"

Our rest is like GOD's rest.

Hebrews 4:10 (King James Version)

4:10 For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his.

GOD did rest, not because He got tired, but GOD restrained Himself from work, because there's no more work to be done.

Rest from the Greek, here means:

1. to make quiet, to cause to be at rest, to grant rest

2. to rest, take rest

3. to still, restrain, to cause (one striving to do something) to desist

4. to colonize

5. to desist

Joshua admitted that he was not the one who brought the Israelites to the land of rest - Canaan but the LORD Himself.

Joshua 1:15 (Amplified Bible)

1:15 Until the Lord gives your brethren rest, as He has given you, and they also possess the land the Lord your God is giving them. Then you shall return to the land of your possession and possess it, the land Moses the Lord’s servant gave you on the sunrise side of the Jordan.

Canaan means "humiliated, merchant, traffick"

Joshua 22:4 (Amplified Bible)

22:4 But now the Lord your God has given rest to your brethren, as He promised them; so now go, return to your homes in the land of your possession, which Moses the servant of the Lord gave you on the [east] side of the Jordan.