(True Faith and False) the Rest of Faith — Zac Poonen

The Sabbath Rest Entered Through Faith

Okay, we have been looking at the true faith and the false. We have seen the righteousness of faith and the race of faith. And now I want to speak from Hebrews chapter 4 on the rest of faith. It says in Hebrews 4 .9, there remains therefore a Sabbath rest for the people of God.

And it says here that we who believe, verse 3, enter into that rest. So there is a rest, an inner rest that God wants for His people, which is entered through faith. There remains therefore a Sabbath rest for the people of God.

And if you want to know how important this is, it says in the Old Testament that if a man did not keep the Sabbath, he was to be stoned to death. And in fact the law was so severe that there is an instance in number 16 or somewhere, where a man went out on the Sabbath day just to pick up sticks.

I mean you are not supposed to light a fire on the Sabbath day, that's understood. But this man just went out to gather sticks and they didn't know what to do with him. They brought him to Moses. Moses said, I don't know, I've got to find out from God.

And God said, stone him to death. It was a very strict law. Circumcision on the Sabbath were very strictly enforced. The removal of leaven was another thing like that. Very strictly enforced in the Old Testament.

And the Lord was trying to stress through that the importance of the Sabbath. And if that is true, and it is, then the New Testament equivalent of that, whatever the Sabbath symbolizes, must also be important.

If these are one of the two or three things which are very strictly enforced in the Old Testament law, to the point where people were killed when they did not keep it, it must mean that the New Testament, whatever the New Testament is, whatever is symbolized in the New Testament should be equally important in our lives.

So to understand what this rest and what it is to be in our life is very, very important. For many years I used to think of that verse, Matthew 11, 28, Come unto me all you that labor and are heavy laden, weary and heavy laden.

And I'll give you rest. The verse that we often quote to unbelievers. It's a very well known gospel text. But having been with Christian workers and Christians for many, many years, I find it's a verse that Christian workers need.

Come to me all you who labor and are heavy laden. And I'll give you rest. God's will is that we serve from a foundation of rest in God. Jesus said that my yoke is easy, my burden is light. The yoke of the law was heavy.

And we know that we are under the yoke of the law when we find the Christian life heavy, Christian ministry heavy, burdensome. The Apostle John said in 1 John 5 verse 3 and 4, After 65 years of being a Christian, at the age of 95 he says, here is my testimony, he says, God's commands are not a burden.

And we should be able to give that testimony. After 65 years of living for Christ and serving the Lord, His commands are not a burden. Serving God is the lightest burden I've ever had in my life. Because Jesus said my yoke is easy, my burden is light.

And if you find in your service for the Lord or in your Christian life, things are heavy, the burden, I would say something is wrong. God wants you to enter into rest. Rest does not mean the rest of inactivity, of doing nothing.

It means freedom from agitation and turmoil in what we do. You may be busy from morning till night, but there is no agitation or turmoil in your heart, no conflict or disturbance, no conflict with co-workers, no jealousy, because you are at rest.

The rest of faith. Come to me if you have a problem with that, if you are not at rest, Jesus says, come to me. If you find yourself burdened. And I'll tell you, see, I've through these 40 years of being a Christian, I've come across lots and lots of Christian workers and missionaries in India.

I'll tell you honestly, a lot of them are pretty weary and heavy laden. A lot of them have got complaints. Complaints against God, complaints against other people, they are comparing themselves with other people, they have got complaints against their mission organization, so many things.

And one would think that a person who served the Lord for even 10 or 15 years should be among the sweetest people on earth. They've served Jesus, walked with Jesus, or apparently should have been walking with Jesus, but they are not.

Some of them are sour and bitter and hard to get along with, and something is wrong somewhere. There remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for the servants of God. The rest of faith. They need to hear that same word which they've been preaching to all the unbelievers.

Come to me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, I'll give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and lowly of heart, and you shall find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

Words I want to say to you, my brothers and sisters, don't ever think that you are so mature as to go beyond having need for those words of Jesus. You shall find rest for your souls. There is an Old Testament verse in Isaiah which says, The wicked are like the troubled sea that cannot rest.

Maybe I should show that to you if you're not familiar with that verse. It's in Isaiah. The wicked are like the troubled sea which cannot rest. 44 is it? Yeah, 57. 20. The wicked are like the tossing sea.

It cannot be quiet. Its waters toss up refuse and mud. There is no peace, says my God, for the wicked. Whereas God's people are to find rest. This is the opposite. What is this tossing sea tossing up?

All the rubbish and mud that had gone into the sea ages ago. You know, whenever there's a turmoil in a lake, all the rotten tin cans and old tires and all were thrown into that years ago all come up to the surface.

And when you find things that should have been buried ages ago in your life coming up to the surface, you know that that's the lot of the wicked. That's not the way God's people are meant to be. It's like that story I heard about a husband and wife who went to marriage counseling and the husband said to the pastor, my wife becomes historical whenever she's upset.

And the pastor said, you mean hysterical? He said, no, historical. She brings up all the old stories of the ancient past. That's what's referring to here. It's being historical. All the refuse and mud from ages ago.

It's never brought to rest, you know. When those old rotten tires and tin cans come up to the surface, what we're supposed to do is pick them up and throw them out. But if you just let it sink, you're just giving an opportunity for it to becoming historical again after some years.

You get rid of it. You have to come to rest. There's a Sabbath rest for God's people where nothing in the past is going to disturb me anymore. I'm not going to be throwing up this refuse and mud. I have accepted what God has allowed in my life.

Acceptance of... There's a rest that comes through acceptance. First of all, one of the things which I particularly speak to young people. When I speak to young people, I say, you young people, the first thing you ever need to do is to accept, if you're born again, is to accept the way God made you.

You know, don't complain to God you're too short or too tall or too fat or too thin or too dark or too whatever. Accept the way God made you. You're not going to change some things in your physical characteristics and your intelligence level is not going to change that much.

And because you're born again, many things are not going to change. You've got to accept that God allowed you to be born with that temperament, that personality, that shape, that form, that intelligence quotient, that color, that height, those genes and those parents, that background, that upbringing.

Accept it. Don't have a perpetual complaint, unresolved complaint about something that happened way back in the past which you've never accepted. We've got to come to rest. It comes through faith. It comes through faith in the fact that God knew me in my mother's womb.

Like it says in Psalm 139, I was fearfully and wonderfully made. God knew me not only in my mother's womb, that's Old Testament. New Testament says, He knew me before the foundation of the world. Leave alone mother's womb.

Before my mother was born. Before my grandmother was born. Before Adam was created. He chose me in Christ before the foundation of the world. I'm not just a digit in this computer world, in somebody's records.

I'm a person with a name. And a name that was in God's mind way back in eternity. When there was only Father, Son and Holy Spirit and me in His mind. If you think that's arrogance, it isn't. It's just faith.

You can put your name there too, because that's what the Bible says in Ephesians 1 and verse 3 and 4. He chose me in Christ before the foundation of the world. What does that mean? That means long before Genesis 1 verse 1.

Before Genesis 1 verse 1. There's Father, Son and Holy Spirit and you in His mind. If you don't accept it, that's another thing. According to your faith, be it unto you. But I believe it. And it's brought great rest into my heart.

It's the first step to enter into the Sabbath rest. That long before I got into my mother's womb, I was there. And that every circumstance and detail of my personality, what shape I would be, what country I would be born in, when I would be born, which century I would be born.

Everything was determined. I was not an accident. No child of God is an accident. I was planned by God and into a sin-cursed earth where people have... I believe that even children born, there are many of God's people who are born out of wedlock, who are born by what parents may call an accident, born out of adultery.

But if they are born again children of God, they were still planned by God. I don't have the slightest doubt about it. God bypasses all that mess and sin that man makes and still produces something wonderful out of it, a child of His.

I believe that. So it doesn't matter what the circumstances of our birth were, even if you were born out of wedlock, born in adultery, if you are born again today, you were chosen by God before the foundation of the world and you are something special.

You got to accept it. And God didn't want you to be like somebody else. That's why He made you peculiar, special, different. There's got to be only one like you. Because God wanted one like you. Don't ever try to be like somebody else.

You know how when we are young, we want our heroes, we want to be like somebody else. But God doesn't want us to be like somebody else. I mean to be Christ-like like others, yes, but not to be in our personality or in our ministry like anybody else.

And that's something that comes, that brings rest. You know how difficult it is to act like somebody else. How easy it is to act like yourself. That's what we are supposed to be. We are just supposed to act like ourselves.

I don't mean by our Adamic character, but I mean, I don't have to pretend that I am more intelligent than I really am. No. Well, if somebody else is more intelligent than me, praise the Lord, I don't want to, I am not in a competition with him.

Jealousy, Cain, and the Body of Christ

This whole competition business, it started with Cain and Abel. You know, wherever there is competition, you have Babylon. In Jerusalem, there is no competition. The Bible ends with Babylon and Jerusalem.

Two religious systems. One, the true church of God and the other, a counterfeit of the true church. Babylon, I believe, is corrupt Christianity. It's not false religion. It's something claiming to be the bride of Christ, but actually a harlot.

You know, a non-Christian religion or a non-Christian person can never be a harlot. Because, they don't claim to be engaged to Christ. They are, they belong to the world and they are true to the world, which is their husband.

How can they be harlots? A harlot is one who claims to be engaged to Jesus Christ and plays the fool with the world. That's the harlot. So, Babylon is a harlot and is referring to counterfeit Christianity.

But it began with Cain and Abel. That's where Babylon and Jerusalem began. Cain and Abel were the founders of two religious systems. Remember, Cain was not an atheist. He was a deeply religious man. He was not spiritual.

It's those two streams that began there. Spirituality and religiosity. Spirituality in Abel and religiosity in Cain. And, which finally ends in Babylon and Jerusalem. But it's very significant to notice that the main thing there was jealousy.

Jealousy is the prime characteristic of Babylonian religion. And what was Cain jealous of? He was jealous of the fact that God was blessing Abel more than him. God's blessing was resting on that fellow's ministry.

And that fellow is supposed to be younger than me. He came to the Lord after me. And that bothers Cain. Does it bother you that God blesses somebody else whom you think does not deserve to be blessed, whom you think is junior to you, or not as gifted as you are, or should not be blessed as much as you?

It's the same thing in the story of the prodigal son, elder son, younger son. He cannot bear to see the father blessing the younger son. That's exactly the same old religion of Cain. And yet the elder son is supposed to be a very righteous fellow.

He's never disobeyed a commandment, but he's got this disturbance in his heart when he sees his younger brother being honored. And if you find a disturbance in your heart when you see somebody else being accepted, honored, blessed, anointed, or whatever it is, you got the religion of Cain.

Even if it's the doctrine of Evangelical Christianity. These are the things that bring unrest. An unwillingness to accept the way God has made you. OK. I'm not as gifted as that brother. Praise the Lord.

I'm so happy that he's so gifted and God's able to use him in this wonderful way. I'm not in any competition with him. I'm happy because he's my brother. He's a member of the same body. And I praise God that God's using him and blessing him and doing wonderful things through him.

Such a man will be at rest. And I want to say this, that jealousy is far more prevalent among Christians than we think. Right through the scriptures you see this green line of jealousy going right through scripture.

When Saul couldn't find a single person to deal with Goliath and young David came along and killed him. He was happy about that. But when people started praising David saying, boy, Saul slowly thousands, but David threw ten thousands, that bothered him.

And that jealousy, it says here, came to the place where an evil spirit possessed him. That's a warning to us. Jealousy can come to such an extent that we can become evil. He wanted to throw a spear at David.

He couldn't bear to see the sight of David being blessed. And that's what happens when jealousy eats up a person's soul. He can't bear to hear that person being appreciated. Do you find yourself like that with anyone?

I hope not. I hope I'm talking about some strangers far away and not anybody here. You can't bear to hear somebody being appreciated or well spoken of. Because you want to... We don't use physical spears nowadays.

Usually our tongue sharper than some other spears with which we want to hurt. And what do we do? What did Saul do? He destroyed himself. It's so important to be at rest. To accept what I say are boundaries.

God has drawn boundaries around all of us. There are certain things we can do. There are certain things we cannot. We must accept those limitations. And if you find somebody else can do that other thing which we cannot do, we must be at rest.

Well, if he can do it, praise the Lord. It's very interesting to see this story in Luke chapter 9. It begins with... You know, the disciples were not able to cast out a demon. Luke 9. There's a man whose son was demon possessed.

Luke 9 .38. He brought his son to Jesus after Jesus came down from the Mount of Transfiguration. And said, Please look at my son, teacher. Called his spirit, seizes him. Verse 40. I begged your disciples to cast it out and they could not.

Now remember, Matthew chapter 10. Jesus had very clearly given his disciples authority to cast out demons. Like he has given us today the authority to cast out demons in his name. He gave that authority very clearly to those 12 disciples and yet, they could not cast it out.

And when they asked Jesus why they couldn't cast out Jesus, he said, you folks don't believe. The problem is you don't have faith. You don't believe in the authority I gave you. You think the devil's got more authority.

That's why you can't do it. He told them very clearly. And then, a little later. You got to see this. This follows on from that. Verse 49. They met another man who was casting out demons who was not one of the 12.

And this really works them up. They said, we saw someone casting out demons in your name and we tried to hinder him because he's not with our group. He doesn't belong to our organization. We're the only ones who've been given this authority to cast out demons and this fellow's going around doing it and he doesn't join our organization.

He doesn't hold to all our doctrines. He's a bit peculiar fellow. And we tried to stop him and Jesus said, don't stop him. Jesus wasn't bothered. A lot of jealousy comes because somebody else can do what you can't do.

And he probably can do it much better. But instead of rejoicing, he's saying, praise the Lord. There's something being done for the Lord. I couldn't do it, but that brother's doing it. Wonderful. We've got to be very careful in this area.

That the Bible calls, Jude speaks about the way of Cain. The way of Cain. The way of jealousy. If we can be thoroughly fundamental and evangelical in our doctrine and we have jealousy, we're building Babylon.

Because Babylon originated in there that the fire of God falls upon someone. You know, I really believe we need to rejoice when we see the anointing of God on a brother. I have sort of trained myself to do this.

Lord, when I see a brother younger than me, who's got a fire and a zeal and anointing. I just want to rejoice the fire that's there. And when I see a blessing upon his ministry and that his boundary of his ministry is ten times bigger than mine.

Well, praise the Lord. My Lord's winning. We're on the same side. Okay, that fellow scored the goal. So what? He's on our team. He's not on the other team. It's we who got that goal. It doesn't have to be me always who scores the goal.

So what if I'm a quarterback or whatever it is who stands in the back never scores a goal. This fellow scores a goal and gets the credit. But it's our team that's winning. So, it's so important if we are to be at rest to see this.

To see the body of Jesus Christ. And the body of Jesus Christ is much bigger than your little group or my little group. It's much bigger. And to rejoice. To have nothing of that spirit of pain. Nothing of this spirit here.

Oh Lord, we saw this fellow doing this ministry and he's not with us. So what if he's not with us? He who is not against us is for us. Jesus said this. I find it very important to recognize boundaries in every area.

Contentment Within Financial Boundaries

Financially, how much you earn a month is, you can picture it like a circle God has drawn around you. And we have to stay in that circle. I remember when I left my job as a naval officer in India about 36 years ago.

My salary dropped 80%. Many of you who have been in jobs have probably suffered things like that when you experienced things like that rather when you came to serve the Lord. What did I do then? When my salary dropped 80

Well, this huge circle that I was living inside suddenly became very small. I said, fine. I got to live inside this circle now. This is my sphere in which I got to get educated. How to live within this circle.

That was 36 years ago. And I decided I would never borrow, never get into debt. By the grace of God, I haven't. And that taught me to teach other people in a poor country that you can live inside a small circle if you don't commit things which other people have.

Okay, I can't afford what that person has. So what? It's not necessary. That's not necessary to live. Despite all that the advertisement say that you cannot live without this. Man has lived without many of these things for 5000 years.

So we're not to be fooled by everything that the advertisers say. Millions of people have lived without those things that we see advertised for 6000 years. We can live if we value God's commands which says don't get into debt.

O no man anything. I will provide. Your father knows what you need before you ask him. And everything that you need my God will supply all that you need. He won't give you everything that you want or you ask for because it's not good for you.

But he'll give you what you need. That's accepting my boundary. And that's being at rest. Okay. I can't afford to get so many things. I'm happy that my brother can afford it. And he can afford to go around in a better vehicle than I have.

That's fine. Praise the Lord. But this is the circle God's drawn around me and I'm at rest. There should not be an atom of jealousy. There cannot be if I recognize God is the one who drew the circle around me.

God's the one who's drawn the circle around me. But you know how it is when the Lord told Peter in John 21 that when you're old somebody's gonna stretch out your hand and take you where you don't like to go.

And it says in John 21 that Jesus was prophesying how Peter would suffer and be crucified and killed. And Peter turns around and looks at John and says, what about this fellow? Is he gonna have a comfortable life?

Or is he gonna suffer like me? See, this is the question that always comes to us. Am I the only one who's gonna suffer? What about this other fellow? We're supposed to be co-workers. Why is he having an easy time?

And only me. You know the Lord's wonderful answer to Peter. That's none of your business. I'm paraphrasing it. That's what he said. That's none of your business. Your business is to follow me. Right? That's all I call you to do.

Do that. Forget about whether... If supposing I decide that John's gonna live till I return 2 ,000 years. What's that to you? What is that to you? Isn't it enough that you follow me? I believe that's a word we need to hear because we are so often tempted to compare our lot with other people's.

I've had to say, you know, to people in our church. It's particularly when we have children. I've seen the children come to you and say, Dad, please get me what he has. Somebody else's family can afford certain things, certain types of expensive gadgets and toys and shoes and clothes and...

I say, what are you supposed to tell your children? Well, God hasn't given us that much resources, money to buy those things. We're so happy that they can afford it. God's given that to them. But God hasn't seen fit to give that much to us.

So, we gotta learn to be thankful with what we have. And rejoice that those other people can have things which we can't have. There's nothing wrong in saying that to our children. To stay within that boundary.

I believe that the reason why many people never come to know God, I believe that's the most important thing we need to know is God Himself. Not the Bible, but God. The Bible was given to us to know God.

Unfortunately, a lot of people end up with knowing the Bible. They never reach the destination. They get stuck on the road. This is only supposed to be a road to lead us to God. And many people never get to know God because they never learn to stay within their boundaries.

The Serpent, the Wall, and God-Given Limits

There's a lovely verse in Ecclesiastes. A warning in this connection. It says in Ecclesiastes in chapter 10, the last part of verse 8. A serpent may bite him who breaks through a wall. And if God's put a wall around us, you try to break through it, you can get bitten by the serpent.

A boundary God's drawn around us saying, okay, this is your salary or this is your income and within which you must live. I'm perpetually dissatisfied, wanting to break through, borrow, beg. We get bitten by a serpent.

It's happened to lots of people. But if I can be content there, God can give me a ministry. I thank God for the years when my wife and I went through real financial hardship in the early years of our married life.

They were years, I believe, they were like a wedding gift God gave us. And I wish all married couples would have a few years of such a wedding gift of financial difficulty and struggle. I feel sorry when I see young people nowadays having everything that they want right from day one.

Well, I believe they're missing some education. Particularly if they're trying to break out of this circle, comparison, jealousy, unrest. When is it going to go? When am I going to have more? Are you content?

Are we following one who was born in a manger? In a cow shed and slept under the trees? Who had no place to lay his head? Is this the one we are following and who we are supposed to be lifting up to the world or have we got corrupted by today's so-called message of faith?

We have to learn to live within our boundaries and if God in His sovereignty one day chooses to expand those boundaries, well, that's fine. And He did expand our boundaries, but that was in His time. Not by our pushing that wall.

God knows when we can handle something. And the same thing in ministry. I've heard young people say, I'm not getting a chance for ministry. Who is the one who is supposed to give you ministry? Is it a man or is it God?

Contentment in Ministry and Faithful Service

I remember my younger days, I used to be in an assembly where elders would not give me much opportunity to ministry. I think they were jealous perhaps of my ministry. I don't know. But I said, fine. I was not allowed to speak in the they wouldn't, they would get up and speak in the assembly and not give me an opportunity.

So I went to the streets. You don't need permission to speak on the roadside. So none of those folks were interested in coming to the roadside. I'd go to, I think I covered I used to work in a naval base in Cochin and a couple of years I was there, I think I covered every single street in that town.

Every nook and corner in those twice a week fast and pray for part of the time and go out for 2 -3 hours of open air preaching. Every single nook and corner of that street of that town. Just two of us would stand there and preach the gospel and give out tracts and sell gospels and I learned to preach on the streets, not in an assembly.

I learned to be free from the fear of men on the streets where people call me the devil and all types of names and that's where I got free from the opinions of men. I thank God that when I didn't have the opportunity to minister in more respectable surroundings that I could preach to whoever was willing to listen to me on the street corners and accept that until God saw fit to give me a ministry somewhere else, on a platform or something like that.

To be content and never to say somebody is not giving me ministry. Be content with that little, little circle. I remember when I was more than 40 years ago in an assembly in Bombay and they had one family way out on the outskirts of Bombay who used to come to the assembly.

They wanted to have a weekly cottage meeting in their house and nobody wanted to go. I said, I'll go. And to take that train all the way that long distance and be 3 -4 people sitting in that meeting. I said, fine.

I don't have such high thoughts about myself that I need to speak to more than 3 or 4 people every week. So I'd sit and speak to them, 3 -4 people and share what little I knew. I knew only ABCD so I taught them ABCD.

That's about all of the Christian life. So I found that it's so important to be free from all this unrest and competition and wanting to suddenly have a ministry like other people have and say, Lord what you've given me is enough.

And God has got wonderful ways of expanding that. There remains a Sabbath rest for God's people. Whether it's in ministry, area of ministry or in the area of money or as I said, accepting ourselves the way God made us and everything.

God has drawn, God is the one we have to deal with. I've been tremendously blessed by this verse in Hebrews chapter 4 and verse 13. This little expression phrase at the end of verse 13 which says, Him with whom we have to do.

Him with whom we have to do. There's only one person with whom we have to do and that's God. And He is the one who determines everything in our life. And if we stay at rest in whatever God has allotted to us, we must have a passion, sure.

A passion to love Jesus more. A passion that God's kingdom will expand. I mean, we pray some mighty prayers in our weekly prayer meeting in our local church. Lord, break the backbone of idolatry in India and let the heathen in this country know that Jesus Christ is Lord and do signs and wonders and miracles and reach this country for Christ and all these things but that's good to have a burden for the whole land.

But God's the one who decides what portion of that work in India is allotted to me. He hasn't allotted the whole country to me. He's allotted one teeny weeny portion of that ministry in the body of Christ to me and I must be absolutely faithful in that and do it and I'm going to be at rest.

While I have a passion for the whole country, I have to be at rest in the particular task God's allotted to me. Not here to show anybody in the world that I'm doing a great work for God. I tell you my brothers and sisters, beware of this danger of trying to show people that you're doing a great work for.

God. That's.

How you'll destroy yourself. Be content. Have the passion to reach the world if you like but let God expand your boundaries. I've seen people who try to push and push and push and push and get bitten by serpents left right and center.

Be careful. Rejoice when somebody else can do what you can't do. And all of God's work is not committed to any of us. We got to have recognized that there's one corner of the vineyards allotted to us, another corner to somebody else and even in that corner there are specialties.

What were each of us supposed to do? To rejoice in that, to be at rest in it, not to be in competition with anybody. To have a passion for the world, to have a passion for our land but to recognize our boundaries is a very important part of the rest of faith is to believe.

God is the one who has determined what my ministry is to be. And I want to walk and it says prophesy according to the proportion of your faith. I'm not supposed to speak beyond the level of what I live.

As my life increases in content I can speak more, if it's less I don't have to. There's no rule that everybody should speak for even 15 minutes. The rule is prophesy according to the proportion of your faith.

The measure of your life. I remember the days in my early ministry where I prophesied beyond the proportion of my life because I wanted to impress and I became a backslider. It destroyed me inwardly. The more fantastic things I spoke about, the more I became a backslider inside till I was scared.

I was so scared I was going to quit the ministry. I said, Lord, I don't want this. Everything is unreal. What I'm preaching is not true in my inner life. Beware of that. Beware of speaking outside your boundary.

There's a boundary in your life. Be content to speak about that and be at rest. So very, very important. It has many, many applications and I believe as you seek the Lord, God will show you. One last thing.