The Rest is History

We are supposed to be people working to gain new followers for Christ along the way, and then all Christ-followers entering God’s rest by His grace. Our faith in action.

Maybe it’s silly, the chuckle I get out of this imaginary meme portrayal of God appearing on a podcast, being interviewed by Steve Bannon who is famous for talking about action, action, action:

• God: And on the 7th day I rested.  And—
• Bannon: “Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait, wait, hang on.  What do you mean you rested? Walk us through this.  You were doing all these miraculous things and you decided to what, slow down?!  Explain to the audience please.”

Why did God rest? 

“Genesis 2:2 By the seventh day God had finished the work He had been doing; so on the seventh day He rested from all his work. 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it He rested from all the work of creating that He had done.” 

At the conclusion, the finish line, there is no more work to be done, no further gain to attain, no more progress to reach perfection.  Six days of Creation and it was complete.  Perfect.  So, He rested.

I like to picture the days of creation as analogous to God’s installing software in the cosmos and in the world, programming the earth to sustain life.  He wrote the perfect software, made certain there were no bugs, and inspected the perfect installation, step by step. “God saw all that He had made, and it was very good.” Then He rebooted, shutting down and restarting.  “And there was evening, and there was morning. “ 

After it was all done, there was no more installation,
there were no more updates, it was finished.  
Perfectly ready to function. 
The Rest is History.  
That is, God’s rest is.

Another New Year resolution from the Book of Hebrews, then, is to “Embrace the promise of entering God’s rest.  Don’t fall short of it.”

Hebrews 4:1 Therefore, since the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it.

As people of action, we work daily (yes even on Saturdays or Sundays as your tradition suggests for a sabbath) … but that work is to advance the Gospel so no one falls short of God’s rest which is coming when our work is done.

Questions for today:

Do you rest when you’re tired or it’s refreshing after working hard? 

Is there anything wrong with that?  Why not?

What would make it wrong? Read Proverbs 24:33-34 and the sayings after observing “the sluggard.”

When will the work of sharing the Gospel be complete?