Hebrews 4:1-10 - Frederick Brotherton Meyer's Commentary

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the Rest That Joshua Could Not Give

Hebrews 4:1-10

The good news of Canaan's rest was preached to Israel but availed nothing, because the hearers were destitute of faith. They said, Can God ? instead of, God can! They thought of their enemies as giants and themselves as grasshoppers, because they left God out of account. Take God into account -and we are giants and our enemies grasshoppers.

To all of us Christ offers rest, not in the other life only, but in this. See Hebrews 4:3; Hebrews 4:11. Rest from the weight of sin, from care and worry, from the load of daily anxiety and foreboding. The rest that arrives from handing all worries over to Christ, and receiving from Christ all we need. Have we entered into that experience? In Hebrews 4:6; Hebrews 4:11, where a.v. reads, “unbelief,” r.v., reads, “disobedience.” If we disobey, we cannot believe; but when we believe we are sure to obey. In Hebrews 4:10 we are directed to our risen Lord, who has finished the work of Redemption and rests, as God did when He pronounced Creation to be “very good.” When we understand what He meant by “It is finished,” we, too, shall rest.

Related Commentaries of Hebrews 4:1

Hebrews 4:1-10

1 Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.

2 For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the worda preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it.

3 For we which have believed do enter into rest, as he said, As I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.

4 For he spake in a certain place of the seventh day on this wise, And God did rest the seventh day from all his works.

5 And in this place again, If they shall enter into my rest.

6 Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to whom it was first preached entered not in because of unbelief:

7 Again, he limiteth a certain day, saying in David, To day, after so long a time; as it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts.

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

9 There remaineth therefore a restc to the people of God.

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