For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said: “So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest,’” although the works were finished from the foundation of the world. For He has spoken in a certain place of the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all His works”; and again in this place: “They shall not enter My rest.” Since therefore it remains that some must enter it, and those to whom it was first preached did not enter because of disobedience, again He designates a certain day, saying in David, “Today,” after such a long time, as it has been said: “Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts.” For if Joshua had given them rest, then He would not afterward have spoken of another day. There remains therefore a rest for the people of God. For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His. (Hebrews 04:03-10, NKJV).
A hallmark of faith is surrendering your pride.
Underlying all desire to please God through relying on ritual, or ceremony, or adherence to tradition, or charity, or kindness, or honesty, or refraining from evil behavior, is rebellion.
By doing so, you are demonstrating trust in yourself rather than trust in Him. Does this mean that we should't be kind, or generous, or refrain from evil, or tell the truth?
As the Apostle Paul would say, "Certainly not!"
It does mean acting out those things with the full understanding that it is God who works in you, both to will and to do His good pleasure. You deserve none of the glory.
We are not saved by good works, but are saved by grace through faith for good works.
Ceasing from your own works means not putting the cart before the horse.
You can't please God without first believing Him, and believing in Him. The gospel means that you are already dead in trespasses and sins, but Christ, through allowing Himself to be killed in your place, paid for those sins, and made you alive again.
He paid for all your sins.
Every last stinking one of them, from birth until the day you die.
The debt has been forgiven, not because you did anything to warrant it, but because Jesus paid it all.
Unless you realize that you are incapable of any goodness apart from Him, you are still working the penance angle, and not fully relying on His finished work on the Cross.
It means you are still in unbelief, just like the Children of Israel.
From the outside, your life may look good, but from the inside, your heart is still hardened, and you will not enter His rest.
Later in Hebrews, we will be told that there is one thing we are to do with the same agonizing effort and determination that a world class athlete employs to win first place, and it's this: we are to strive to enter His rest.
This means the giving up of self-reliance is difficult, like fighting a physical addiction.
If you've ever been successful at that, you know that even years after your last indulgence, that desire, that taste, that craving, can come back with unbelievable and surprising strength. It can literally knock you over with the force of it.
And unless you are fully prepared ahead of time to continue steadfast resistance, you can succumb to the old dependence.
Know that underneath stubborn self-reliance is a spiritual addiction to pride.
There is no craving stronger than that which drives you to uphold your self-image, no matter how torn and shredded it has become.
Even the most craven street addict, the most reprobate social outcast, the most hardened criminal, retains some semblance of this pride, and is concerned with some aspect of saving face.
So it's hard to cease from works. God knows that and gave you a perfect example.
When He, the omnipotent. omniscient, omnipresent God, the one worthy of all glory and power and honor and worship, finished Creation, He ceased working.
So when each one of His children by faith - who are sinners by birth and proclivity, worthy of nothing but condemnation - come to Him to be cleansed of our unrighteousness, we need to let Him do it all.
We need to be still and know that He is God, and watch Him work the miracle of transformation in our hearts and minds.
And that means giving up our own paltry and feeble attempts at self-righteousness and fully surrendering to Him.
When we do, we'll be changed from the inside out, and in the end, we will be transformed into the image of His Son.
That's His goal.
He will stop at nothing to achieve it.
