For only we who believe can enter His rest. As for the others, God said, "In My anger I took an oath: 'They will never enter My place of rest,'" even though this rest has been ready since He made the world. We know it is ready because of the place in the Scriptures where it mentions the seventh day: "On the seventh day God rested from all His work." But in the other passage God said, "They will never enter My place of rest." So God's rest is there for people to enter, but those who first heard this good news failed to enter because they disobeyed God.
(Hebrews 4:3-6 NLT)
So you want to get ahead, you want to succeed in your career but have you ever stopped to ask yourself why? To what end and what purpose do you intend? If you set aside the fact that God says to rest for a moment, even forget all that God has given us and go back to the time before you believed, working all the time doesn’t make sense. In this life there are three areas that make up the reason for doing what we do – taking care of and being with family or those who depend on us and love us, living the lifestyle we choose, and a means to support those two things. Take any one of the three away and the other two crumble and life becomes unbalanced. We who work to support our families and our lifestyles spend most of our waking hours at our jobs. We wake up with just enough time to get ready for work and head out the door, we go to work, arrive and stay until evening, come home eat dinner, talk about the events of the day, get ready for bed, and then do it all over again. If you cannot get done all that has been assigned to you in 40 to 50 hours Monday through Friday then you are either not working efficiently enough, don’t have the right tools, or you are trying to do too much and all the reasons that go along with that. Working 45 hours per week Monday through Friday ends so that you can have two days set aside which provides time to be with family and take care of the things that need your attention at home and finally to rest before the new week comes.
Now let’s bring God back into it. Of course God is with us at all times whether at church, with family, or at work but He was also very specific about purposely entering His rest. Those who fail to do so not only end up with an unbalanced life but they are being disobedient to God’s commandment for His people and the Bible says that if we ignore the rest God has prepared for us His anger will be stirred against. Imagine the Creator of all life planned ahead of time what is good and right for those He created but somehow His people, the very beings He created thought they knew more about what was best for them than God did. Those who are parents of young children how do you feel when you have a rule that is good for the child but the child decides they know better? Do you not enforce it for the child’s own good? Now fast forward to teenagers, they believe they have lived a full life from school, work, friends, teachers, bullies, geeks, they’ve seen it all and even though you taught them when they were young surely they know more than you now; they are so ready to be independent, right? As a parent of a typical teen today if you were asked to describe your life using only one word many would use the word “frustration” because you can see the path their decisions are leading them down but they have to experience it for themselves. Now fast forward again but this time look at it from God’s point of view, do you still wonder why God becomes angry when we think we know what is best for our own lives and disregard what He says? Learn from your children the importance of listening and obeying and you will receive God’s blessing upon your life. So work hard but don’t forget why you are working. Love your family, pray for them, spend time with them, support them, take care of the things that need your attention at home, set time aside for the things you like to do to, and then rest. Of course seek God in all that you do and don’t forget He is always with you, how close He is depends on you, seek Him and you will find Him. Rest directly relates to our ability to listen and it allows us to be focused so that we may go forth with purpose.
