Hebrews 4:9

therefore--because God "speaks of another day" (see on Heb 4:8).

remaineth--still to be realized hereafter by the "some (who) must enter therein" (Heb 4:6), that is, "the people of God," the true Israel who shall enter into God's rest ("My rest," Heb 4:3). God's rest was a Sabbatism; so also will ours be.

a rest--Greek, "Sabbatism." In time there are many Sabbaths, but then there shall be the enjoyment and keeping of a Sabbath-rest: one perfect and eternal. The "rest" in Heb 4:8 is Greek, "catapausis;" Hebrew, "Noah"; rest from weariness, as the ark rested on Ararat after its tossings to and fro; and as Israel, under Joshua, enjoyed at last rest from war in Canaan. But the "rest" in this Heb 4:9 is the nobler and more exalted (Hebrew) "Sabbath" rest; literally, "cessation": rest from work when finished (Heb 4:4), as God rested (Rev 16:17). The two ideas of "rest" combined, give the perfect view of the heavenly Sabbath. Rest from weariness, sorrow, and sin; and rest in the completion of God's new creation (Rev 21:5). The whole renovated creation shall share in it; nothing will there be to break the Sabbath of eternity; and the Triune God shall rejoice in the work of His hands (Zep 3:17). Moses, the representative of the law, could not lead Israel into Canaan: the law leads us to Christ, and there its office ceases, as that of Moses on the borders of Canaan: it is Jesus, the antitype of Joshua, who leads us into the heavenly rest. This verse indirectly establishes the obligation of the Sabbath still; for the type continues until the antitype supersedes it: so legal sacrifices continued till the great antitypical Sacrifice superseded it, As then the antitypical heavenly Sabbath-rest will not be till Christ, our Gospel Joshua, comes, to usher us into it, the typical earthly Sabbath must continue till then. The Jews call the future rest "the day which is all Sabbath."

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Heb_4:9

There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God

The rest for Gods people

I.

THE PERSONS FOR WHOM THIS REST IS DESIGNED. The people of God.

1. By their eternal election of the Father (Rom_11:5).

2. By complete and final redemption (Joh_1:29).

3. By perfect righteousness imputed (Isa_45:24-25).

4. By the renewing of the Holy Ghost (Col_3:10).

II. THE MANIFESTED DIFFERENCE IN GODS PEOPLE FROM THE REPROBATE, AFTER THEY ARE CONVERTED TO GOD BY THE HOLY GHOST.

1. in a deep sense of divine things (1Co_2:10).

2. Of their miserable state as sinners (Luk_5:31).

3. Of creature-insufficiency (Isa_64:6).

4. Of Christs fulness (Php_3:8).

5. In a change of will and purpose (Son_1:4).

6. A cordial covenanting with Christ (Jer_50:5).

7. Persevering grace (Mic_7:8).

III. THE EXCELLENT NATURE OF THIS REST. ITS excellency is beyond the power of language to describe.

1. Purchased rest (Eph_1:14).

2. Gratuitous rest (Isa_55:1).

3. Peculiar rest (Joh_14:22).

4. Divine rest (Rev_21:23).

5. Seasonable rest (Gal_6:9).

6. Suitable rest (Joh_14:2).

7. Perfect rest (Rev_21:4).

8. Eternal rest (1Pe_5:10).

9. Of body and soul (1Co_15:57).

It is a rest from pain, sorrow, disappointment, persecution, sin, lust, and infirmity; a rest of peace, joy, love, knowledge, freedom, and a rest in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. (T. B. Baker.)

Earnests of ultimate rest

The earnests of this rest which are given to the saints in the present dispensation. There is a threefold earnest--an earnest of joy, an earnest of holiness, and an earnest of power. This threefold earnest corresponds with the character of the inheritance itself--it is an inheritance of joy, an inheritance of holiness, and an inheritance of power, of dominion. The earnest corresponds with the blessings to be enjoyed; the earnest corresponds with the salvation to be enjoyed. Now, what is the salvation to be enjoyed? Salvation menus the recovery of all we lost in Adam in a more glorious way than he had it. What did we lose in Adam? We lost the presence of God first; we lost the image of God secondly; and we lost the power of exercising dominion under God. These three things we lost in Adam; these three things we gain in Christ. We shall have the joy of God, going into His presence where there is fulness of joy. We shall have the likeness of God--we shall awake, and shall be satisfied when we awake in His likeness; we shall be conformed to Him who is the image of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change our vile bodies, and fashion them after His own glorious body--we shall see Him as He is. We shall have dominion; for the saints shall reign with Christ; the bridegroom and the bride shall reign together. (N. Armstrong.)

The connection between the Sabbath of earth and the engagements of heaven

Heaven may be denominated a Sabbath, if the following reflections be seriously considered.

1. It may be so called for its repose. An eternal rest! Oh, happy thought, amidst the toils of the wilderness, amidst the fears with which we are now agitated, that we shall soon find rest; like the coming of eventide to the labourer, like the appearance of home to the traveller as he is advancing to repose amidst his household, so shall heaven be to the soul!

2. Heaven may well be called an eternal Sabbath for its sanctity. Holiness is its character, not holiness which arises merely from the absence of sin, but holiness which is inherent; that holiness whereby we are prepared in all we do, and all we enjoy, to possess more and more felicity, in proportion as we accomplish more and more the will of the great Creator so that we are absolutely a living sacrifice to God throughout ceaseless ages.

3. Heaven may be denominated an eternal Sabbath for its services.

4. Heaven may be called an eternal Sabbath for its society. Never would the Church of Christ realise a fulness of fellowship but for the engagements of the Sabbath.

5. Heaven may be called an eternal Sabbath for its delights.

6. Heaven may be called an eternal Sabbath because of the termination of all secular eras and events. Just as the Sabbath crowns and hallows the week, so heaven comes at the close of time to crown and hallow the whole.

7. Heaven may be called an eternal Sabbath for the perpetual commemoration of the history of all things. (R. S. McAll, LL. D.)

The rest of Gods people

I. IT IS A FUTURE REST. It is not on this side the grave. This--it is emphatically said--this is not your rest. Ye have not yet come to the rest and to the inheritance which the Lord your God giveth you. We must go over Jordan--we must cross the river of death before we can reach our home. But till then, while we continue in the world, it is vain and fruitless to expect rest. There may be seasons of refreshment: pauses, like the Sabbaths pause, for recruiting our tired spirits; but these seasons and pauses are but for an instant. Work--work of one kind or other presses upon us, and we cannot, if we would, be long at rest.

II. HEAVEN, whatever other notions we may have about it, WILL BE, BEFORE ALL THINGS, A PLACE TO REST. (R. D. B. Rawnsley, M. A.)

The rest of the saints

Scripture allows us to know so much of the future state as to satisfy us that it is a state of continual exalted employment.

I. They rest FROM THE TOILS AND PURSUITS OF THE PRESENT LIFE. Toils and pursuits of various kinds, and in different degrees, necessarily occupy much of our attention. We are animated with a strong desire of preserving ourselves and those who depend upon us in life and comfort, hence much labour and exertion fall to the lot of the generality of mankind; it is also a part of the curse denounced against our apostate race: In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread. Of the small proportion of men who do not procure their subsistence by bodily labour, exertion of another kind is required; they have to undergo the labours of the mind, study, and reflection, and extensive research in managing the religious and the civil concerns of their fellow-creatures. To those who exert themselves vigorously and conscientiously in the one or the other of these kinds of labour, it is no unpleasant view of heaven that it yields a relief from such toils and pursuits.

II. In heaven there is rest FROM THE TROUBLES OF LIFE. These are inseparable from our present condition, being the natural and penal consequences of sin. Although affliction cometh net forth of the dust, neither doth trouble spring out of the ground, yet man is born unto trouble as the sparks fly upward. It arises from what we feel in ourselves, from disease, and pain, and weakness, and from the fear of death; it arises also from our connection with fellow-creatures: those with whom we are united by the most tender and endearing ties are subject, like ourselves, to a variety of distresses. How soothing in such situations the belief, the hope, and the prospect of that rest which remaineth for the people of God--a state where disease and pain are wholly unknown, or remembered as former things which have passed away; a land, the inhabitants whereof shall no more say, I am sick; and where those whom death had separated shall meet to part no more!

III. There remaineth a rest to the people of God FROM SIN AND TEMPTATION. The former views which have been presented of this rest may engage the attention and please the imagination of all men, Whatever be their slate and character. It is natural to human beings to desire exemption from toil and from trouble. Too many, it is feared, wish for heaven chiefly or wholly on these accounts; they have little or no desire of heaven as a deliverance from sin and from temptations to sin; they are the justified and sanctified alone who delight chiefly in this view of a future state. Besides this painful contest with inward corruption, there is also a conflict to be maintained with Satan, the great spiritual adversary. The world also in which they live, both the men of the world and the things that are in the world, present many powerful temptations; snares beset them on every side; prosperity and adversity have each their several dangers to Christians. It is, therefore, to them the most pleasing view of heaven that it is a rest from sin and from all temptations to sin. (J. Burns, D. D.)

Rest

Have we not all seen a Sunday which was a Sunday indeed--a day of calm and of cheerfulness, a day of thankful repose, a day of quiet devotion, a day in which God was present as the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort? Witness, you who have known such a day yourselves or seen it in another, what a look it wore I how bright it was with a light not of this world I how it seemed at once to refresh and to invigorate, to soothe without relaxing and to animate without exciting, every part of that complex being which man is! And then say to yourselves, Such, even such, only tenfold more perfect and more glorious, is the rest which remaineth in heaven for the people of God! No day of wearisome forms, of gloomy bondage and austere observance, of lifeless monotonous worship, or listless irksome vacancy, but one instinct with peace, with life, and with happiness. There remaineth a rest--a rest like the most delightful of Sabbaths, even because it is long waited for, and because, when it comes, it is a day better than a thousand.

I. A rest FROM what?

I. From our own works. Ye who have known what it was to have reached the end of a six days or a six months toil, and to awaken the next morning to the rest of an earthly Sabbath, where there was no duty before you for twelve hours but that of thanking and praising God, and enjoying to the full His gifts and His revelations--judge ye what that morning will be when you awake in heaven, never again to toil unto weariness!

2. But who has not felt that there is a weariness far greater than that of simple work, and, by consequence, a rest far more desirable than that from mere labour? In heaven there will be rest from all anxiety and care.

3. And shall I mention yet another weariness of life, one which besets in these days some of every condition and every rank of men? I speak of doubt--of religious doubt--doubt as to the reality of truth, or doubt as to its application to ourselves. Of all the joys of the first morning of heaven, to many souls in our generation, surely this will be the greatest--that doubt is no more; that Christ Himself is there, seen face to face, and the truth which was dim upon earth is there irradiated by His presence.

4. Lastly, the rest which remaineth is a rest from sin. Grieved and wearied with the burden of our sins: that is the account which we all give of ourselves when we kneel at Christs holy table. Wherever Christ is sought in humble faith, the pilgrims burden unties itself at the sight of the Cross, and falls off from him, to his great comfort. But old infirmities continue, and lead to new transgressions. Only in heaven will the power of sin be ended.

II. Rest IN what?

1. In thankfulness. Dangers escaped--infirmities healed--sins forgiven--sorrows cheered on earth or explained in heaven--an arresting,controlling, guiding, and supporting hand, now believed and then seen to have been over us all our life long--the forbearance of God--the map of our pilgrimage, inward and outward, at last spread out before us, and the light of heaven thrown upon its windings and its wanderings; in all this there will be matter for an eternity of thankfulness.

2. In occupation.

3. In contemplation. The contemplation of God Himself. The understanding, as never before, of His works, of His ways, of His perfections.

4. In Christs presence. This completes, this embraces all heaven. (Dean Vaughan.)

Heavenly rest

I. I shall try to EXHIBIT the rest of heaven; and in doing so I shall exhibit it, first by way of contrast, and then by way of comparison.

1. The rest of the righteous in glory is now to be contrasted with certain other things.

(1) We will contrast it with the best estate of the worldling and the sinner. The worldling, when his corn and his wine are increased, has a glad eve and a joyous heart: but even then he has the direful thought that he may soon leave his wealth. Not so the righteous man: he has obtained an inheritance which is undefiled, and that fadeth not away.

(2):Now let me put it in more pleasing contrast. I shall contrast the rest of the believer above with the miserable estate of the believer sometimes here below. Christians have their sorrows. Suns have their spots, skies have their clouds, and Christians have their sorrows too. But oh! how different will the state of the righteous be up there, from the state of the believer here! Sheathed is the sword, the banner is furled, the fight is over, the victory won; and they rest from their labours. Here, too, the Christian is always sailing onward, he is always in motion, he feels that he has not yet attained. Like Paul, he can say, Forgetting the things that are behind, I press forward to that which is before. But there his weary head shall be crowned with unfading light. There the ship that has been speeding onward shall furl its sails in the port of eternal bliss. Here, too, the believer is often the subject of doubt and fear. Hill Difficulty often affrights him; going down into the valley of humiliation is often troublesome work to him; but there, there are no hills to climb, no dragons to fight, no foes to conquer, no dangers to dread. Ready-to-halt, when he dies, will bury his crutches, and Feeble-mind will leave his feebleness behind him: Fearing will never fear again; poor Doubtingheart will learn confidently to believe. Oh, joy above all joys! Here, too, on earth, the Christian has to suffer; here he has the aching head and the pained body. Or if his body be sound, yet what suffering he has in his mind! Conflicts between depravity and gross temptations from the evil one, assaults of hell, perpetual attacks of divers kinds from the world, the flesh, and the devil. But there, no aching head, no weary heart; old age shall find itself endowed with perpetual youth; there the infirmities of the flesh shall be left behind, given to the worm and devoured by corruption. There, too, they shall be free from persecution. Here Sicilian Vespers, and St. Bartholomew, and Smithfield are well-known words; but there shall be none to taunt them with a cruel word, or touch them with a cruel hand. There emperors and kings are not known, and those who had power to torture them cease to be. They are in the society of saints; they shall be free from all the idle converse of the wicked, and from their cruel jeers set free for ever. Alas! in this mortal state the child of God is also subject to sin; even he faileth in his duty and wandereth from his God; even he doth not walk in all the law of his God blameless, though he desireth to do it. And last of all, here, the child of God has to wet the cold ashes of his relatives with tears; here he has to bid adieu to all that is lovely and fair of mortal race. But there never once shall be heard the toll of the funeral bell.

2. And now I shall try very briefly to exhibit this contrast in the way of comparison. The Christian hath some rest here, but nothing compared with the rest which is to come.

(1) There is the rest of the Church. The Church-member at the Lords table has a sweet enjoyment of rest in fellowship with the saints; but ah! up there the rest of Church fellowship far surpasses anything that is known here; for there are no divisions there, no angry words, no harsh thoughts of one another, no bickerings about doctrine, no fightings about practice.

(2) There is, again, a rest of faith which a Christian enjoys; a sweet rest. Many of us have known it. We have known what it is, when the billows of trouble have run high, to hide ourselves in the breast of Christ and feel secure. But the rest up there is better still, more unruffled, more sweet, more perfectly calm, more enduring, and more lasting than even the rest of faith.

(3) And, again, the Christian sometimes has the blessed rest of communion. There are happy moments when he puts his head on the Saviours breast--when, like John, he feels that he is close to the Saviours heart, andthere he sleeps.

II. I am to endeavour to EXTOL this rest, as I have tried to EXHIBIT it. Oh! for the lip of angel to talk now of the bliss of the sanctified and of the rest of Gods people I

1. It is a perfect rest. They are wholly at rest in heaven.

2. Again, it is a seasonable rest.

3. This rest ought to be extolled because it is eternal.

4. And then, lastly, this glorious rest is to be best of all commended for its certainty.

There remaineth a rest to the people of God. Doubting one, thou hast often said, I fear I shall never enter heaven. Fear not; all the people of God shall enter there; there is no fear about it. I love the quaint saying of a dying man, who exclaimed, I have no fear of going home; I have sent all before me; Gods finger is on the latch of my door and I am ready for Him to enter. But, said one, are you not afraid lest you should miss your inheritance? Nay, said he, nay; there is one crown in heaven that the angel Gabriel could not wear; it will fit no head but mine. There is one throne in heaven that Paul the apostle could not fill; it was made for me, and I shall have it. There is one dish at the banquet that I must eat, or else it will be untasted, for God has set it apart for me. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

Divine rest

I. WHAT MAN SUPREMELY NEEDS IS NOT REST FROM WORK BUT REST FROM CARE.

1. What is care? It is the experience of the man who is bent on being his own providence; who takes on himself the whole responsibility, not of the conduct of life only, but of the conditions and results which are absolutely beyond his power of regulation, and which God keeps calmly under His own hand.

2. This rest from care has been the great aim and desire of man through all his generations. The problem of mans higher life has always been how to secure emancipation.

3. But the sad part of the matter is, that man does not and cannot rest in mere renunciations and denials. There is a question in the background which has its origin in every conscience. How, on this principle, can the worlds business be carried on? No! there is no rest for the human spirit in this burying the head in the sand when troubles throng around.

II. THE ONLY POSSIBLE REST FOR MAN IS THE REST THAT HE FINDS IN GOD.

1. The lowest, but by no means the least burdensome and distracting class of our cares concerns the great bread-and-cheese question and its surroundings.

2. A nobler form of care is that which has to do with persons, that which springs out of our affections, sympathies and loves.

3. The same faith lifts the burden from the heart of the Christian lover of mankind. In truth we are always calling for the twelve legions of angels to finish the work swiftly and usher in Messiahs reign. And God answers, Patience, and points us to the redemptive purpose which stamped its impress on the first page of revelation and sets its seal on the last; and bids us wait His time. The man who trusts most perfectly, works most heartily. Christ, while He lifts the burdens, braces the energies, inspires the will, and parades all the faculties of man in their noblest form for service. The man who believes, understands perfectly that the most strenuous use of all the powers of his being is one of the high conditions by which God is seeking to work out blessing for him self, for his dear ones, and for the great world. (Jr. Baldwin Brown, B. A.)

The true rest of heaven

Our notions of bodily rest rarely extend beyond mere cessation from muscular exertion. Our ideas also of mental rest are commonly limited to a similar period put to the labours of the mind. It is easy, and perhaps not always displeasing, to apply similar expectations to spiritual as well as bodily and mental relaxation, and to regard the promised Sabbath in heaven as a complete termination of every spiritual effort. Hope is a work; faith is a work; love we look upon as an emotion. The two former will not be called into action in the mansions of eternity. The latter, we are apt to conceive, will fill our breast with infused delight. There are indeed agreeable views of the saints everlasting rest; but are they also in accordance with the revelations of Scripture? You will find not: you will see that the people of God in an after-state will truly rest from their pilgrimage through this weary world; but from the worship of God His saints will rest no more; with kindred spirits they will day and night for ever cry, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts, who wert, and art, and art to come. Now, while heaven is the abode of love, that love will have utterance; while the object of our love and gratitude and joy is before the glorified, the tongue of love and gratitude and joy will never fail. No rest for happiness; no rest for worship, no more than we should desire new a rest from breathing. And we have glimpses here of the true character of happy rest. Were the father of a family to return to his home after a tedious and toilsome journey and long absence, and instantly, without saluting wife or children, to cast himself upon his bed and fall asleep, this would be rest certainly, but of what a low, animal character I And were another father under like Circumstances to embrace wife and children with fondest affections, and to assemble them around him to narrate the adventures he had met with, and ask of them a similar return, whether, think you, would be the preferable rest? I anticipate but one answer. But it may be said that extreme fatigue might overcome even the strongest regard, and that the most loving parent might be unable to enjoy the society of his household. Do you suppose that this, which is quite in accordance with earthly experience, could be so in heaven? Would God receive us into those blessed abodes, and leave us destitute of the faculty of enjoying them? You well know that that would be far from Him. No; they who are brought into that future world will be gifted with every capacity suitable to the most perfect use of it. And as this life is a training for the next--a probation wherein is practised the conduct and temper which shall endure for ever--does it not follow that you should now cultivate those habits and feelings which alone will find admittance there? (J. S. Knox, M. A.)

The rest of Gods people in heaven

1. We shall rest from the labours of our calling, wherewith we arc turmoiled. The husbandman shall follow the plough no longer, the weaver shall sit no longer in the cold in his loom, the clothier not ride up and down in the ram, frost and snow, about his wool and cloth; the preacher shall no longer be turning over books and taking pains in his study and pulpit; we shall ride no more to market to buy corn, to make provision for our houses; we shall no longer take thought for ourselves, our wives and children; we shall have all things provided to our hands, and eat of the hidden manna and of the tree of life in the paradise of God for ever.

2. We shall rest even from the works of religion, which are now chariots to carry us to heaven. We shall no longer be turning over the Bible in our houses, catechising and instructing of our families; no more go many a mile in the dirt and wind to the church, shall no more be praying with cries, sighs, and tears; thanksgiving shall remain in heaven. It shall be all our work to be praising of God, but petitions shall then cease; no need of the ship when we be in heaven.

3. We shall rest from the works of sin; here in many things we sin all. Noah is sometimes overtaken with wine, David falls into adultery and murder, Peter into the denial of Christ, Paul and Barnabas are at jars between themselves. The good that we would do, that do we not, and the evil we would not, that do we. Sin makes us to cry out like tired porters, O miserable men that we are, &e. Then we shall rest from all sin, and be like the angels in heaven for ever.

4. We shall rest from all the crosses and calamities of this life.

5. We shall rest from death. It is a work to die; it is a main enemy with whom we struggle. But then this last enemy shall be put under our feet, death shall be swallowed up into victory. O what an excellent rest is this I (W. Jones, D.D.)

The world not a fit place for rest

1. This world is not a fit place, nor this life a fit time to enjoy such a rest as is reserved in heaven.

2. Rest here would glue our hearts too much to this world, and make us say, It is good to be here (Mat_17:4). It would slack our longing desire after Christ in heaven. Death would be more irksome, and heaven the less welcome.

3. There would be no proof or trial of our spiritual armour, and of the several graces of God bestowed on us.

4. Gods providence, prudence, power, mercy and other like properties could not be so well discerned if here we enjoyed that rest. (W. Gouge.)

Rest elsewhere

Rest elsewhere, was the motto of Philip de Marnix, Lord Sainte-Aldegonde, one of the most efficient leaders in that great Netherlands revolt against despotism in the sixteenth century which supplied material for perhaps the most momentous chapter in the civil and religious history of the world. For a man such as he, living in such a time, no motto could well mean more. A friend of freedom and of truth, in that age, could never hope to find rest in this world. A good motto, also, is it for the Christian worker. When there is so much to be done, who would be inactive here? Weary not in well doing. There is rest elsewhere. Retire not from your labour. Work on! There will be rest hereafter.

Rest in eternity

Arnaulds (of the Port Royal Society), remarkable reply to Nicolle, when they were hunted from place to place, can never be forgotten. Arnauld wished Nicolle to assist him in a new work, when the latter observed, We are now old, is it not time to rest? Rest! returned Arnauld; have we not all eternity to rest in?

The weariness of life

For the young, this is fresh, beautiful, sunlit life; to the old, it is often what Talleyrand found it, who in the journal of his eighty-third birthday wrote, Life is a long fatigue. Weary eyes droop, weary shoulders bend, weary hands tremble, weary feet drag heavily along, weary brows burn, weary hearts faint everywhere. The primary cause of the universal weariness is universal sin. The needle forced from its centre is in a state of tremulous motion; man wandered from his God is in a state of weariness. Though now on the way back, he will never be perfectly at rest until finally at home. (C. Stanford, D. D.)

The final Sabbath

The final Sabbath will not, therefore, be realised till time is swallowed up of eternity, and mortality of life. It will be the eternal conclusion of the week of time, as seven is the numeric symbol of perfection and rest. (F. Delitzsch.)

Rest in heaven

Once I dreamed of being transported to heaven; and being surprised to find myself so calm and tranquil in the midst of my happiness, I inquired the cause. The reply was, When you were on earth, you resembled a bottle but partly filled with water, which was agitated by the least motion,--now you are like the same bottle filled to the brim, which cannot be disturbed. (E. Payson, D. D.)

Image of heaven

A sorrowing mother, bending over her dying child, was trying to soothe it by talking about heaven. She spoke of the glory there, of the brightness, of the shining countenances of the angels; but a little voice stopped her, saying, I should not like to be there, mother, for the light hurts my eyes. Then she changed her word-picture, and spoke of the songs above, of the harpers, of the voice of many waters, of the new song which they sang before the throne; but the child said, Mother, I cannot bear any noise. Grieved and disappointed at her failure, she took the little one in her arms with all the tenderness of a mothers love. Then, as the little sufferer lay there, near to all it loved best in the world, conscious only of the nearness of love and care, the whisper came, Mother, if heaven is like this, may Jesus take me there! (Baxendales Anecdotes.)

Heaven the place to rest in

The earth is our workhouse, but heaven is our storehouse. This is a place to run in, and that is a place to rest in. (T. Secker.)

The work over

Mr. Mead, an aged Christian, when asked how he did, answered, I am going home as fast as I can, as every honest man ought to do when his days work is over; and I bless God I have a good home to go to.

The people of God

The people of God

I. THE GREAT FACT WHICH IS HERE IMPLIED. That God has a people--a people who are peculiarly His own and devoted to His service.

1. Let us look into the past history of the Church. What illustrious examples of faith, and piety, and real devotedness to God do we discover!

2. In the present day there ate many such.

3. If we look at prophecy, we shall find that the number of Gods people are numerous indeed.

II. SOME TRIALS IN THEIR CHARACTER.

1. The real servant of God, to whatever community or church he may belong, is deeply convinced of the value and importance of personal religion.

2. The true servant of God renounces self and all else as a ground of dependence in the sight of God, and depends entirely on the atonement, sacrifice, blood, and righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ.

3. He cultivates universal holiness of heart and life.

III. THE FUTURE DELIGHTFUL AND GLORIOUS PROSPECTS OF THE TRUE CHRISTIAN. Lessons:

1. The awful state of those who do not come up to this character.

2. How great are the obligations of real Christians to serve God.

3. How amiable is the character of the real Christian! (D. Ruell, M. A.)

The people of God

All nations in the world are His people by creation, but these are His people by adoption.

1. Every people is gathered together by some means or other; a people is a collection of many men. So we that are the people of God, are gathered together with the trumpet of the Word.

2. A people gathered together must have laws to rule them by, otherwise they will soon be out of order, otherwise they will range beyond limits, even so Gods people have Gods laws set down in His Word.

3. Every people must have a king or ruler. Even so the ruler of Gods people is Jesus Christ.

4. A people must have some country to dwell in. So the country where this people dwell is the Church militant in this life, and triumphant in the life to come.

5. All people are distinguished by some outward habit and attire. So Gods people have the sacraments to distinguish them. Baptism is Christs mark, and the Holy Supper His seal.

6. People must live in obedience to the laws of their king. (W. Jones, D. D.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Heb 4:9. There remaineth therefore a rest, &c. — Since neither of the two former rests is intended by David, and there was no new rest for the people to enter into in the days of David, and the psalm wherein these words are recorded is acknowledged to be prophetical of the days of the Messiah, it unavoidably follows that there is such a rest remaining; and not only a spiritual rest, in the peace and love of God, and in the enjoyment of communion with him entered into by believing in Christ, (Mat 11:28-29; Isa 32:17-18,) but an eternal rest in the heavenly world. “The apostle having established this conclusion by just reasoning on the sayings of the Holy Ghost, uttered by the mouth of David, they misrepresent the state of the Israelites under the Mosaic dispensation who affirm that they had no knowledge of the immortality of the soul, nor of future retributions. They had both discovered to them in the covenant with Abraham, as recorded by Moses, and explained by the prophets. The apostle here, in this conclusion, substitutes the word σαββατισμος, sabbatism, for the word καταπαυσις, rest, in his premises. But both are proper, especially the word sabbatism, in this place, because, by directing us to what is said Heb 4:4, it showeth the nature of that rest which remaineth to the people of God. It will resemble the rest of the sabbath, both in its employments and enjoyments. For therein the saints shall rest from their work of trial, and from all the evils they are subject to in the present life; and shall recollect the labours they have undergone, the dangers they have escaped, and the temptations they have overcome. And by reflecting on these things, and on the method of their salvation, they shall be unspeakably happy, Rev 21:3. To this add, that being admitted into the immediate presence of God to worship, they shall, as Doddridge observes, pass a perpetual sabbath in those elevations of pure devotion, which the sublimest moments of our most sacred and happy days can teach us but imperfectly to conceive. Here it is to be remarked, that the Hebrews themselves considered the sabbath as an emblem of the heavenly rest: for St. Paul reckons sabbaths among those Jewish institutions which were shadows of good things to come, Col 2:17.” — Macknight.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Hebrews

ENTRANCE INTO GOD’S REST

Heb 4:9-10

WE lose much of the meaning of this passage by our superficial habit of transferring it to a future state. The ground of the mistake is in the misinterpretation of that word ‘remaineth’; which is taken to point to the ‘rest,’ after the sorrows of this life are all done with. Of course there is such a rest; but if we take the context of the passage, we cannot but recognise this as the truth that is taught here, that faith, and not death, is the gate to participation in Christ’s rest - that the rest remained over after Moses and Judaism, but came into possession under and by Christ.

For the main scope of the whole passage is the elucidation of one of the points in which the writer asserts the superiority of Christ to Moses, of Christianity to Judaism. That old system, says he, had in it for its very heart a promise of rest; but it had only a promise.

It could not give the thing that it held forth. It could not, by the nature of the system. It could not, as is manifest from this fact - that years after they had entered into possession of the land, years after the promise had been first given, the Psalmist represents the entrance into that rest as a privilege not yet realised, but waiting to be grasped by the men of day whose hearts were softened to hear God’s voice. David’s words clearly, to the mind of the writer of the epistle, show that Canaan was not the promised ‘rest.’ David treats it as being obtained by obedience to God’s Word; and as not yet possessed by the people, though they had the promised land. He treats it as then, in his own ‘day,’ still but a promise, and a promise which would not be fulfilled to his people if they hardened their hearts. All this carries the inference that the Mosaic system did not give the ‘rest’ which it promised. Hence, says the author of the Hebrews, that ‘rest’ held forth from the beginning, gleaming before all generations of the Jewish people, but to them only a fair vision, remains unpossessed as yet, but to be possessed. God’s word has been pledged. He has said that there shall be a share in His rest for His people. The ancient people did not get it. What then? Is God’s promise thereby cancelled? ‘They could not enter in because of unbelief,’ but the unbelief of man shall not make the faith of God without effect. Therefore, as the eternal promise has been given, and they counted themselves unworthy, the divine mercy which will find some to enter therein, and will not be balked of its purposes, turns to the Gentiles; and the ‘rest’ provided for the Jews first, but unaccepted by them, remains for all who believe to partake.

And, still further, the writer establishes the principle that the rest promised to the Jew remains yet to be inherited by the Christian, on a second ground: ‘For,’ says he, in the tenth verse of the chapter, ‘for He that is entered into His rest, He also has ceased from His own works, as God did from His.’ How is that a proof? It is not a proof that there is a rest for us, if you interpret it as people generally do. But it is so if you give to it what seems to be the correct interpretation - by referring it to Christ and Christ’s heavenly condition. ‘He that has entered into His rest - that is Jesus Christ, ‘He has ceased from His own works’ - His finished work of redemption - ‘as God did from His’ His finished work of creation. And there is the great proof that there is a rest for us: not only because Judaism did not bring it, but because Christ hath gone up on high. We have a great High Priest that is passed into the heavens. Christ our Lord has entered into His rest - parallel with the divine tranquillity after Creation. And seeing that He possesses it, certainly we shall possess it if only we hold fast by Him. ‘There remains a rest’ - proved by the fact that Christ hath gone into it, and carrying the inference, ‘Let us labour, therefore, to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief.’

We find here, then, three main points. First, the divine rest, God’s and Christ’s. Secondly, this divine rest, the pattern of what our life on earth may become. And lastly, this divine rest, the prophecy of what our life in heaven shall assuredly be.

I. In the first place, then, we have here the divine rest.

‘He hath ceased from His own works, as God did from His.’ The writer is drawing a parallel between God’s ceasing from His creative work and entering into that Sabbath rest when He saw everything that He had made, and behold it was very good; and Christ’s ceasing from the work of redemption, and passing into the heavens to the Sabbath of His everlasting repose.

I need not dwell at any length upon a matter which, after all speech, remains for us but very dimly intelligible - the rest of God. ‘My rest’ - that rest belongs necessarily to the Divine Nature. It is the deep tranquillity of a nature self-sufficing in its infinite beauty, calm in its everlasting strength, placid in its deepest joy, still in its mightiest energy; loving without passion, willing without decision or change, acting without effort; quiet, and moving everything; making all things new, and itself everlasting; creating, and knowing no diminution by the act; annihilating, and knowing no loss though the universe were barren and unpeopled. God is, God is everywhere, God is everywhere the same, God is everywhere the same infinite, God is everywhere the same infinite love and the same infinite self- sufficiency; therefore His very Being is rest. And yet that image that rises before us, statuesque, still in its placid tranquillity, is not repellent nor cold, is no dead marble likeness of life. That great ocean of the Divine Nature which knows no storm nor billow, is yet not a tideless and stagnant sea. God is changeless and ever tranquil, and yet He loves. God is changeless and ever tranquil, and yet He wills. God is changeless and ever tranquil, and yet He acts. Mystery of mysteries, passing all understanding I And yet He says, ‘They shall enter into My rest!’ Now I believe, and I hope you believe, that the rest of Christ is like the rest of God, even in respect of this Divine and Infinite Nature. ‘He hath ceased from His works, as God did from His.’ Jesus Christ is ‘the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever.’ Whatsoever you can predicate of the settled tranquillity, and stable, necessary, essential repose of a divine nature, that you can predicate of Christ our Redeemer, of Christ the Son of God.

But still further. Besides that deep and changeless repose which thus belongs to the Divine Nature, there is the other thought which perhaps comes more markedly out in the passage before us - that of a rest which is God’s tranquil ceasing from His work, because God has perfected His work. When we read in the Old Testament, that at the end of the creative act, God rested upon the Sabbath day, and blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, of course the thought that comes into view is not that of a divine nature wearied with toil and needing repose, but that of a divine nature which has fully accomplished its intent, expressed its purpose, done what it meant to do, and rests from its working Because it has embodied its ideal in its work. It is the proclamation, ‘This creation of Mine is all that I meant it to be - finished and perfect’; not the acknowledgment of an exhaustion of the creative energy which needs to reinvigorate its strength by repose after its mighty ,effort. The rest of God is the expression of the perfect divine complacency in the perfect divine work.

And, in like manner, as after that creative act there came the Sabbath, when He saw that it was all very good, and the morning stars sang together for joy;-so after the mightier new-creative act of redemption, the Christ, who is divine, ceased and held His hand, not because Bethlehem and Calvary had wearied Him, not because after pain He needed rest, not because the Cross had tasked His powers, and His suffering had strained His nature; but because all that had to be done was done, and He knew it-because redemption was completed. The Sabbath on which God rested from His work, and the new Sabbath on which Christ rose from the dead, the conqueror of death, the destruction of sin, are parallel in this, that in either case the work was done, that in either case the Doer needed no repose after His finished task. And just as God, full of all the energy of being, operated unspent after creation, needed not that rest for His refreshment, but took it as the pledge and proclamation to the universe that all was done; so Christ, unwearied and unwounded from His dreadful close and sore wrestle with sin and death, sprung from the grave to the skies, and rests - proclamation and token to the world that His work is finished, that the Cross is enough for the race for ever more, that all is complete, and man’s salvation secured. As God hath ceased from His works, Christ hath ceased from His.

Still further: this divine tranquility - inseparable from the Divine Nature, the token of the sufficiency and completeness of the divine work - is also a rest that is full of work. When Christ was telling the Jews the principles of the Sabbath day, He said to them: ‘My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.’ The creative act is finished and God rests; but God, in resting, works; even as God, in working, rests. Preservation is a continued creation. The energy of the divine power is as mightily at work here now sustaining us in life, as it was when He flung forth stars and systems like sparks from a forge, and willed the universe into being. God rests, and in His rest, up to the present hour and for ever, God works. And, in like manner, Christ’s work of redemption, finished upon the Cross, is perpetually going on. Christ’s glorious repose is full of energy for His people. He intercedes above. He works on them, He works through them, He works for them. The rest of God, the divine tranquillity, is full of work. There, then, is a parallel: the rest of the Father, who ceased from His work of creation, and continueth His work of preservation, is parallel with that of the Son, who ceased from His work of sacrifice, and continueth His work of intercession and of sanctifying. These two are one. ‘My rest’ is the rest of the Father in the Son, and of the Son in the Father. That still communion and that everlasting repose are a prophecy for our lives, brethren. The ancient promise, long repeated, has come sounding down through the echoing halls of the centuries, and rings in our ears as fresh as when first it was spoken, ‘There remaineth a rest for the people of God,’ they shall enter into the stillness and the secret of His tranquillity!

II. Then, in the second place, the text gives us, The rest of God and of Christ as the pattern of what our earthly life may become.

Like Christ, like God - can it be? It can be, with certain differences; but oh! the differences drop into insignificance when we think of the resemblances. Whether a man is capable of knowing absolute truth or not, he is capable of coming into direct and personal contact with the absolute Reality, the Truth of Truth. And whether here below we can know anything about God as He is or not, this at all events the New Testament teaches us, that we can come to be like Him - like Him in the substance of our souls; like Him - copy of His perfections; like Him - shadow and resemblance of some of His attributes. And here lies the foundation for the belief that we can ‘ enter into His rest.’ We cannot possess that changeless tranquillity which knows no variations of purpose or of desire, but we can possess the stable repose of that fixed nature which knows one object, and one alone. We cannot possess that energy which, after all work, is fresh and unbroken; but we can possess that tranquillity which in all toil is not troubled, and after all work is ready for yet greater service. We cannot possess that unwavering fire of a divine nature which burns in love without flickering, which knows without learning, which wills without irresolution and without the act of decision; but we can come to love deeply, tranquilly, perpetually, we can come to know without questioning, without doubts, without darkness, in firm confidence of stable assurance, and so know with something like the knowledge of Him who knows things as they are; and we can come to will and resolve so strongly, so fixedly, so wisely, that there shall he no change of purpose, nor any vacillation of desire. In these ways, in shadow and copy, we can resemble even the apparently incommunicable tranquillity which, like an atmosphere that knows no tempests, belongs to and encircles the throne of God.

But, still further: faith, which is the means of entering into rest, will - if only you cherish it - make your life no unworthy resemblance of His who, triumphant above, works for us, and, working for us, rests from all His toil. Trust Christ! is the teaching here. Trust Christ! and a great benediction of tranquil repose comes down upon thy calm mind and upon thy settled heart. Trust Christ! and so thy soul will no longer be like ‘the sea that cannot rest,’ full of turbulent wishes, full of passionate desires that come to nothing, full of endless meanings, like the homeless ocean that is ever working and never flings up any product of its work but yeasty foam and broken weeds; - but thine heart shall become translucent and still, like some land-locked lake, where no winds rave nor tempests ruffle; and on its calm surface there shall be mirrored the clear shining of the unclouded blue, and the perpetual light of the sun that never goes down. Trust Christ! and rest is thine - rest from fear, rest from toil and trouble, rest from sorrow, rest from the tossings of thine own soul, rest from the tumults of thine own desires, rest from the stings of thine own conscience, rest from seeking to work out a righteousness of thine own. Trust Christ, cease from ‘thine own works,’ forsake thine own doings, and abjure and abandon thine own righteousness; and though God’s throne be far above thee, and the depth of that Being be incommunicable to and uncopyable by thee, yet a divine likeness of His still, and blessed, and unbroken repose shall come down and lie - a solid and substantial thing - on thy pure and calmed spirit. ‘There remaineth a rest for the people of God.’ Say then, my Lord rests and my Father: I Will trust Him; I will rest in the Lord, and He shall keep me in perfect peace, because my mind is stayed on Him.

III. Finally: This divine rest is not only a pattern of what our earthly life may become, but it is a prophecy of what our heavenly life shall surely be.

I have said that the immediate reference of the passage is not to a future state. But that does not exclude the reference, unless, indeed, we suppose that the Christian’s life on earth and his condition in heaven are two utterly different things, possessing no feature in common. The Bible presents a directly reverse notion to that. Though it gives full weight to all the differences which characterise the two conditions, yet it says, There is a basis of likeness between the Christian life on earth and the Christian life in heaven, so great as that the blessings which are predicated of the one belong to the other. Only here they are in blossom, sickly often, putting out very feeble shoots and tendrils; and yonder transplanted into their right soil, and in their native air with heaven’s sun upon them, they burst into richer beauty, and bring forth fruits of immortal life. Heaven is the earthly life of a believer glorified and perfected. If here we by faith enter into the beginning of rest, yonder through death with faith, we shall enter into the perfection of it.

We cannot speak wisely of that future when we speak definitely of it. All that I suggest now as taught us by this passage is, that heaven will be for us, rest in work and work that is full of rest. Our Lord’s heaven is not an idle heaven. Christ is gone up on high, having completed His work on earth, that He may carry on His work in heaven; and after the pattern and likeness of His glory and of His repose, shall be the repose and glory of the children that are with Him. He rests from His labours, and His works do follow Him. He sitteth at the right hand of God ‘expecting’ - waiting patiently and in the confidence of assured triumph, ‘till His enemies become His footstool.’ But yet the dying martyr saw his Lord standing, not sitting, ready to help, and bending over him to welcome; and though He has ascended, and left the work of spreading the gospel to be done on earth, ‘the Lord works with us’ from His throne, nor is untouched by our troubles, nor idle in our toils. All the rest of that divine tranquillity, is rest in rapid, vigorous, perpetual motion. Ay, it is just as it is with physical things: the looker-on sees the swiftest motion as the most perfect rest. The wheel revolves so fast that the eye cannot discern its movements. The cataract foaming down from the hillside, when seen from half-way across the lake, seems to stand a silent, still, icy pillar. The divine work, because it is such work, is rest - tranquil in its energy, quiet in its intensity; because so mighty, therefore so still! That is God’s heaven, Christ’s heaven.

The heaven of all spiritual natures is not idleness. Man’s delight is activity. The loving heart’s delight is obedience. The saved heart’s delight is grateful service. The joys of heaven are not the joys of passive contemplation, of dreamy remembrance, of perfect repose; but they are described thus, ‘They rest not day nor night.’ ‘His servants serve Him, and see His face.’

Yes, my brother, heaven is perfect ‘rest.’ God be thanked for all the depth of unspeakable sweetness which lies in that one little word, to the ears of all the weary and the heavy laden. God be thanked, that the calm clouds which gather round the western setting sun, and stretch their unmoving loveliness in perfect repose, and are bathed through and through with unflashing and tranquil light, seem to us in our busy lives and in our hot strife like blessed prophets of our state when we, too, shall lie cradled near the everlasting, unsetting Sun, and drink in, in still beauty of perpetual contemplation, all the glory of His face, nor know any more wind and tempest, rain and change. Rest in heaven - rest in God! Yes, but work in rest! Ah, that our hearts should grow up into an energy of love of which we know nothing here, and that our hands should be swift to do service, beyond all that could be rendered on earth, - that, never wearying, we should for ever be honoured by having work that never becomes toil nor needs repose; that, ever resting, we should ever be blessed by doing service which is the expression of our loving hearts, and the offering of our grateful and greatened spirits, joyful to us and acceptable to God, - that is the true conception of ‘the rest that remaineth for the people of God.’ Heaven is waiting for us - like God’s, like Christ’s - still in all its work, active in all its repose. See to it, my friend, that your life be calm because your soul is fixed, trusting in Jesus, who alone gives rest here to the heavy laden. Then your death will be but the passing from one degree of tranquillity to another, and the calm face of the corpse, whence all the lines of sorrow and care have faded utterly away, will be but a poor emblem of the perfect stillness into which the spirit has gone. Faith is the gate to partaking in the rest of God on earth. Death with faith is the gate of entrance into the rest of God in heaven.

Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

4:9 a special rest: Jesus’ sacrifice functioned as a Day of Atonement sacrifice (5:1-3; 9:13-22; see Lev 23:26-28, 32). Through Christ’s sacrifice, God’s promised rest for his people is available.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Heb 4:9. Ἄρα, therefore) For this reason, because He speaks of another day.—σαββατισμὸς, sabbatism, rest) The word is changed for κατάπαυσις, rest; comp. the following verse. In time there are many sabbaths; but then, there will be a sabbatism, the enjoyment of rest, one, perfect, eternal. The verbal noun is extremely emphatic: it is not met with in the LXX. There will be no elementary sabbath in heaven; because earthly labour shall have passed away: but the rest will be perpetual, which, however, itself will again have its own various modes (ways, divisions), according to the different state of the priests and of the rest of the blessed in their resurrection bodies (carnis beatæ), and according to the intervals of the heavenly times to which the new moons and Jewish Sabbath corresponded: Isa 66:21; Isa 66:23.—τῷ λαῷ τοῦ Θεοῦ, to the people of GOD) He had said absolutely, of the people, ch. Heb 2:17, when he was treating of reconciliation: but now, when he is treating of eternal rest, he says, to the people of God, that is, to the Israel of God, as Paul speaks, Gal 6:16. He therefore specially intends the Israelites (inasmuch as he is writing to the Hebrews), and them, too, believers.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Heb_4:9. Deduction from Heb_4:7-8, and consequently return to the first half of Heb_4:6. Thus still remaining, still awaiting its advent, is a Sabbath rest for the people of God, inasmuch, namely,what the author in reasoning with the Hebrews might presuppose as admitted,as from Davids time down to the present no one had entered into the κατάπαυσις of God. As Sabbatic rest the author characterizes the rest of God, in adherence to the thought of Heb_4:4. As a type of the everlasting blessedness do the Rabbins also regard the Sabbath. Comp. e.g. Jalkut Rubeni, fol. 95. 4 : Dixerunt Israëlitae: Domine totius mundi, ostende nobis exemplar mundi futuri. Respondit ipsis Deus S. B.: illud exemplar est sabbatum. R. D. Kimchi et R. Salomo in Psalms 92.: Psalmus cantici in diem Sabbati, quod hic psalmus pertineat ad seculum futurum, quod totum sabbatum est et quies ad vitam aeternam. See Wetstein and Schöttgen ad loc.

ἄρα] at the beginning of a sentence is, in prose, foreign to the classics. Comp. however, Rom_10:17; 2Co_7:12; Luk_11:48; Winer, Gramm., 7 Aufl. p. 519; Buttmann, Gramm. des neutest. Sprachgebr. p. 318.

The expression σαββατισμός (from σαββατίζειν, שָׁבַּת, to observe the Sabbath, Exo_16:30, al.) only here and with Plutarch, De Superstit. c. 3.

τῷ λαῷ τοῦ θεοῦ] to the people which appertains to God, is recognised and treated by Him as His people, since it has believingly devoted itself to Him. Comp. Gal_6:16 : ὁ Ἰσραὴλ τοῦ θεοῦ.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Verse 9. There, remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God.] It was not,

1. The rest of the Sabbath; it was not,

2. The rest in the promised land,

for the psalmist wrote long after the days of Joshua; therefore there is another rest, a state of blessedness, for the people of God; and this is the Gospel, the blessings it procures and communicates, and the eternal glory which it prepares for, and has promised to, genuine believers.

There are two words in this chapter which we indifferently translate rest, καταπαυσις and σαββατισμος. the first signifying a cessation from labour, so that the weary body is rested and refreshed; the second meaning, not only a rest from labour, but a religious rest; sabbatismus, a rest of a sacred kind, of which both soul and body partake. This is true, whether we understand the rest as referring to Gospel blessings, or to eternal felicity, or to both.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

(9) There remaineth therefore.—Or, therefore there is (still) left: the word is the same as in Heb_4:6. It is tacitly assumed that no subsequent fulfilment has altered the relation of the promise. Few things in the Epistle are more striking than the constant presentation of the thought that Scripture language is permanent and at all times present. The implied promise, therefore, repeated whenever the “to-day” is heard, must have its fulfilment. The rescued people of Israel did indeed find a rest in Canaan: the true redeemed “people of God” shall rest with God.

A rest.—As the margin points out, the word is suddenly changed. As the rest promised to God’s people is a rest with God, it is to them “a sabbath-rest.” So one of the treatises of the Mishna speaks of Psalms 92 as a “Psalm for the time to come, for the day which is all Sabbath, the rest belonging to the life eternal.”

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

9. There remaineth therefore a rest] Since the word used for “rest” is here a different word (sabbatismos) from that which has been used through the earlier part of the argument (katapausis), it is a pity that King Jameses translators, who indulge in so many needless variations, did not here introduce a necessary change of rendering. The word means “a Sabbath rest,” and supplies an important link in the argument by pointing to the fact that “the rest” which the Author has in view is God’s rest, a far higher conception of rest than any of which Canaan could be an adequate type. The Sabbath, which in 2Ma_15:1 is called “the Day of Rest” (katapausis), is a nearer type of Heaven than Canaan. Dr Kay supposes that there is an allusion to Joshua’s first Sabbatic year, when “the land had rest from war” (Jos_14:15), and adds that Psalms 92-104 have a Sabbatic character, and that Psalms 92 is headed “a song for the sabbath day.”

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Tamid, c. 7. sect. 4. T. Bab. Sanhedrin, fol. 97. 1, Shirhashirim Rabba, fol. 16. 3. Massecheth Sopherim, c. 18. sect. 1. Tzeror Hammor, fol. 3. 1. (l) Zohar in Gen. fol. 31. 4. Shaare Orn, fol. 17. 1. Caphtor, fol. 64. 1.

Tamid, c. 7. sect. 4. T. Bab. Sanhedrin, fol. 97. 1, Shirhashirim Rabba, fol. 16. 3. Massecheth Sopherim, c. 18. sect. 1. Tzeror Hammor, fol. 3. 1. (l) Zohar in Gen. fol. 31. 4. Shaare Orn, fol. 17. 1. Caphtor, fol. 64. 1.

Hebrews 4:10

heb 4:10

heb 4:10

heb 4:10For he that is entered into his rest, &c. This is to be understood not of believers, nor of their entrance into the Gospel rest, or into eternal rest, but of the Lord Jesus Christ; for a single person is only spoken of, and not many, as in Heb 4:3 and the rest entered into is his own, which cannot be said of any other; and besides, a comparison is run between his entrance into rest, and ceasing from his works, and God's resting the seventh day, and ceasing from his, which can only agree with him; and besides, Christ is immediately spoken of, and at large described in Heb 4:12. Now he entered into his rest, not when he was laid in the grave, but when he rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God, as having done his work; and this is the ground and foundation of the saints' rest under the Gospel dispensation; for these words are a reason of the former, as appears by the causal particle "for": and now being at rest,

he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his; Christ had works to do, as preaching the Gospel, performing miracles, and obtaining the redemption and salvation of his people: these were given him to do, and he undertook them, and he has finished them; and so ceases from them, as never to repeat them more; they being done effectually, stand in no need of it; and so as to take delight and complacency in them; the pleasure of the Lord prospering in, his hand, the effects of his labour answering his designs; just as God ceased from the works of creation, when he had finished them.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

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

Ver. 9. A rest to the people of God] Gr. A sabbatism, an eternal rest, a sabbath that hath neither evening, Gen 2:2, nor labour, Rev 14:13. But they shall enter into peace, rest in their beds, Isa 57:2; be ravished in spirit, receive the full import and purport of the weekly sabbath, rest from travail and trouble, Revelation 1:10. 2. Of the seventh-year sabbath; for the creature, the ground shall rest from its vanity and slavery, Rom 8:20-21. 3. Of the seventh seven year sabbath, the Jubilean sabbath; for their debts shall be all discharged, their mortgages released, their persons set at liberty from sin and Satan’s slavery.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

There remaineth, therefore, a rest - This is the conclusion to which the apostle comes. The meaning is this, that according to the Scriptures there is “now” a promise of rest made to the people of God. It did not pertain merely to those who were called to go to the promised land, nor to those who lived in the time of David, but it is “still” true that the promise of rest pertains to “all” the people of God of every generation. The “reasoning” by which the apostle comes to this conclusion is briefly this:

That there was a “rest” - called “the rest of God” - spoken of in the earliest period of the world - implying that God meant that it should be enjoyed.

(2)That the Israelites, to whom the promise was made, failed of obtaining what was promised by their unbelief.

(3)That God intended that “some” should enter into his rest - since it would not be provided in vain.

(4)That long after the Israelites had fallen in the wilderness, we find the same reference to a rest which David in his time exhorts those whom he addressed to endeavor to obtain.

(5)That if all that had been meant by the word “rest,” and by the promise, had been accomplished when Joshua conducted the Israelites to the land of Canaan, we should not have heard another day spoken of when it was possible to forfeit that rest by unbelief.

It followed, therefore, that there was something besides that; something that pertained to all the people of God to which the name rest might still be given, and which they were exhorted still to obtain. The word “rest” in this verse - σαββατισμὸς sabbatismos - “Sabbatism,” in the margin is rendered “keeping of a Sabbath.” It is a different word from σάββατον sabbaton - “the Sabbath;” and it occurs nowhere else in the New Testament, and is not found in the Septuagint. It properly means “a keeping Sabbath” from σαββατίζω sabbatizō - “to keep Sabbath.” This word, not used in the New Testament, occurs frequently in the Septuagint; Exo 16:30; Lev 23:32; Lev 26:35; 2Ch 36:21; and in 3 Esdr. 1:58; 2 Macc. 6:6. It differs from the word “Sabbath.” That denotes “the time - the day;” this, “the keeping,” or “observance” of it; “the festival.” It means here “a resting,” or an observance of sacred repose - and refers undoubtedly to heaven, as a place of eternal rest with God. It cannot mean the rest in the land of Canaan - for the drift of the writer is to prove that that is “not” intended. It cannot mean the “Sabbath,” properly so called - for then the writer would have employed the usual word σάββατον sabbaton - “Sabbath.” It cannot mean the Christian Sabbath - for the object is not to prove that there is such a day to be observed, and his reasoning about being excluded from it by unbelief and by hardening the heart would be irrelevant. It must mean, therefore, “heaven” - the world of spiritual and eternal rest; and the assertion is, that there “is” such a “resting,” or “keeping of a Sabbath” in heaven for the people of God. Hence, learn:

(1) That heaven is a place of cessation from wearisome toil. It is to be like the “rest” which God had after the work of creation (Heb 4:4, note), and of which that was the type and emblem. There will be “employment” there, but it will be without fatigue; there will be the occupation of the mind, and of whatever powers we may possess, but without weariness. Here we are often worn down and exhausted. The body sinks under continued toil, and fails into the grave. There the slave will rest from his toil; the man here oppressed and broken down by anxious care will cease from his labors. We know but little of heaven; but we know that a large part of what now oppresses and crushes the frame will not exist there. Slavery will be unknown; the anxious care for support will be unknown, and all the exhaustion which proceeds from the love of gain, and from ambition, will be unknown. In the wearisome toils of life, then, let us look forward to the “rest” that remains in heaven, and as the laborer looks to the shades of the evening, or to the Sabbath as a period of rest, so let us look to heaven as the place of eternal repose.

(2) Heaven will be like a Sabbath. The best description of it is to say it is “an eternal Sabbath.” Take the Sabbath on earth when best observed, and extend the idea to eternity, and let there be separated all idea of imperfection from its observance, and that would be heaven. The Sabbath is holy; so is heaven. It is a period of worship; so is heaven. It is for praise and for the contemplation of heavenly truth; so is heaven. The Sabbath is appointed that we may lay aside worldly cares and anxieties for a little season here; heaven that we may lay them aside forever.

(3) The Sabbath here should be like heaven. It is designed to be its type and emblem. So far as the circumstances of the case will allow, it should be just like heaven. There should be the same employments; the same joys; the same communion with God. One of the best rules for employing the Sabbath aright is, to think what heaven will be, and then to endeavor to spend it in the same way. One day in seven at least should remind us of what heaven is to be; and that day may be, and should be, the most happy of the seven.

(4) They who do not love the Sabbath on earth, are not prepared for heaven. If it is to them a day of tediousness; if its hours move heavily; if they have no delight in its sacred employments, what would an eternity of such days be? How would they be passed? Nothing can be clearer than that if we have no such happiness in a season of holy rest, and in holy employments here, we are wholly unprepared for heaven. To the Christian it is the subject of the highest joy in anticipation that heaven is to be “one long unbroken” sabbath - an eternity of successive Sabbath hours. But what to a sinner could be a more repulsive and gloomy prospect than such an eternal Sabbath?

(5) If this be so, then what a melancholy view is furnished as to the actual preparation of the great mass of people for heaven! How is the Sabbath now spent? In idleness; in business; in traveling; in hunting and fishing; in light reading and conversation; in sleep; in visiting; in riding, walking, lounging, “ennui;” - in revelry and dissipation; in any and every way “except the right way;” in every way except in holy communion with God. What would the race be if once transported to heaven as they are! What a prospect would it be to this multitude to have to spend “an eternity” which would be but a prolongation of the Sabbath of holiness!

(6) Let those who love the Sabbath rejoice in the prospect of eternal rest in heaven. In our labor let us look to that world where wearisome toil is unknown; in our afflictions, let us look to that world where tears never fall; and when our hearts are pained by the violation of the Sabbath all around us, let us look to that blessed world where such violation will cease forever. It is not far distant. A few steps will bring us there. Of any Christian it may be said that perhaps his next Sabbath will be spent in heaven - near the throne of God.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Here the Spirit concludes from his former proofs, that there is a more excellent rest revealed to faith in the gospel, which is remaining, future, and to come, and will surely and most certainly do so; though it be behind, yet it will be enjoyed. A sabbatism, which is a state and season of a most glorious rest, {see Heb 4:10} shall be enjoyed by sincere believers, the true Israel of God, of whom he is the Proprietor, and who are for their eternal state so excellently holy, and of so Divine a nature, that he is not ashamed to be called their God. They have an entrance here into the initials of this sabbatism in internal peace, and the glorious liberty of the children of God; and by it are secured of their full possession of it in the eternal inheritance of the saints in light, Col 1:12,13; 1Pe 1:3-5; Rev 14:13.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

9. Remaineth—The full conclusion given. There is a permanent rest underlying the Canaan rest, which is God’s and the believer’s rest. But, significantly, our author for the word rest, which has hitherto been αναπαυσις, a pausing, now substitutes σαββατισμος, sabbatismos, sabbatism, a sabbath-rest, thus finely identifying the saints everlasting rest with God’s sabbatic rest. On this Whitby gives a number of interesting extracts from the early Christian writers. “Irenaeus saith, ‘The seventh day, which was sanctified, and in which God rested from all his works, is the true sabbath of the just; in which they shall do no earthly labour.’ And Origen saith that ‘Celsus understood not the mystery of the seventh day, and the rest of God, in which all that had done their work in six, and had left nothing undone which belonged to them, should feast with God, ascending to the vision of him, and in that to the general festivity of the just and blessed.’ And again: ‘If we further inquire which are the true sabbaths, we shall find that the observation of the true sabbath reaches beyond the world; the true sabbath, in which God will rest from all his works, being the world to come, when all grief, sorrow, and sighing shall fly away, and God shall be all in all.’”

And as the early Christian writers are thus in accord with our apostle, so our apostle is in accord with the Hebrew doctors, it not being easy to say which made the earlier utterance. Says Whitby:

“Thus in their descants upon the 92d Psalm, which bears, both in the Hebrew and the Greek, this title, A Song of the Sabbath, (εις την ημεραν του Σαββατου,) they say, ‘This is the age to come which is all sabbath.’ ‘The psalmist,’ saith R. Solomon Jarchi on the passage, ‘speaks of the business of the world to come, which is all sabbath.’ ‘A psalm upon the sabbath day,’ saith R. Eliezer, cap. xix, p. 42, ‘that is, upon the day that is all sabbath and rest, in the life of the world to come.’ And again, cap. xviii, p. 41, ‘The blessed Lord created seven worlds, (that is, ages,) but one of them is all sabbath and rest in life eternal.’ Where he refers to their common opinion, that the world should continue six thousand years, and then a perpetual sabbath should begin, typified by God’s resting the seventh day and blessing it. So Bereschith Rabba, ‘If we expound the seventh day of the seven thousand years, which is the world to come, the exposition is, and he blessed; because that in the seventh thousand all souls shall be bound in the bundle of life; for there shall be there the augmentation of the Holy Ghost, wherein we shall delight ourselves. And so our Rabbies, of blessed memory, have said in their commentaries, God blessed the seventh day; the Holy God blessed the world to come, which beginneth in the seven thousand of years.’ Philo is very copious in this allegory, who, disputing against those who, having learned that the written laws were συμβολα νοητων πραγματων, symbols of intellectual things, did upon that account neglect them, saith that though the seventh day was a document of the power of God, and of this rest of the creature, yet was not the outward rest to be cast off.”

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rest a future portion of the Christian believer.

"There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God." We have already spoken of the rest which is the present privilege of the Christian: "We which have believed do enter into that rest." But that does not satisfy all our desire and aspiration. We crave a deeper, fuller, more perfect rest than we enjoy here. The higher life at present is one of intense and, at times, almost painful longing. Without the prospect of something better than our present best, our life would not be satisfactory. "There remaineth therefore a rest a keeping of sabbath for the people of God." This rest which is reserved is richer, fuller, more glorious than that which is at present realized. The words used to express them suggest this. The chief meaning of katapausiv (ver. 3) is cessation, as from work, pain, etc. The rest which it indicates is mainly negative. But sabbatismo (ver. 9) indicates a sabbath festal celebration, a holy keeping of sabbath; it comprises the rest of ver. 3 and considerably more. Let us consider what this sabbath rest which remains for the people of God consists in.

I IN THE ABSENCE OF ALL THOSE DISTURBING INFLUENCES WHICH CHARACTERIZE OUR PRESENT STATE. This is the negative aspect of the rest, or what we shall rest from.

1. Rest from the struggle against sin. The people of God in heaven are more than conquerors over sin and Satan "through him that loved" them. The great tempter, and solicitation to sin, will be entirely and eternally excluded from that bright and blessed world. "There shall in no wise enter into it anything that defileth," etc.

2. Rest from suffering, both physical and mental. "They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more". (Rev_7:16, Rev_7:17) "The inhabitant shall not say, I am sick." And God shall wipe away every tear from their eyes," etc. (Rev_21:4)

3. Rest from the mystery and burden of life. In our present state there are seasons of darkness and perplexity when trust and hope in God involve painful effort to some souls. Such efforts will not be demanded in the blessed hereafter. Much that to us is now obscure will then be perfectly clear. The pure light of eternity will chase away the grim shadows of time; and what is to us unknown in heaven will awaken neither dread nor doubt.

4. Rest from toilsome, anxious, discouraging labor. No more men and women and children compelled to labor on long after their physical powers are tired out. No more forcing of the brain to continued effort when it already aches wearily by reason of its toils. No further summons to works of social or moral amelioration, which must be prosecuted despite difficulty, discouragement, opposition, and seeming failure. The sabbath rest which remaineth for the people of God precludes all these things.

II IN THE PRESENCE OF ALL THE HARMONIOUS AND BLESSED CONDITIONS AND CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH OUR NATURE CRAVES. This is the positive aspect of our rest, or what we shall rest in.

1. In the conformity of our character to that of God. Purity is peace. Holiness is rest. The perfectly holy is the infinitely and ever-blessed God. The saints in heaven "have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." Nor is their holiness the mere negation of moral evil, but a positive and active condition of their being. Their thoughts, sympathies, aspirations, services, are all true and pure and benevolent. They are spiritually transformed into the image of the Lord. And in this there is rest and blessedness. "I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness.

2. In the progress of our being towards God. Stagnation is not rest. Stationariness is not rest; it is stillness, inaction, but not rest. But harmonious growth is both restful and joyous. One of the constituents of the future rest of the good is growth growth in mind and heart and spirit, in thought, and affection, and reverence, and holy action. In endless approximation to the infinitely Holy One will man find the rest and perfection of his being.

3. In the continuous service of God. As this rest is a "keeping of sabbath," it cannot mean a complete cessation of activity. Inactivity is not rest. "Sloth yieldeth not happiness; the bliss of a spirit is action;" An angel"s wing would droop if long at rest, And God himself, inactive, were no longer blest

So we read of the bright future that "his servants shall serve him, and they shall see his face." "They are before the throne of God; and they serve him day and night in his temple." T. Aquinas speaks of this service as videre, amare, et laudare. But it must not be limited to these exercises. Enough for us to know that there will be services for us to render continuous services, blessed services, and all of them in the service of our God. The rest and joy of this service will appear if we consider:

(1) Its inspiration. Love to God is the impulse of every action, and transforms every duty into a delight.

(2) Its nature. Every service will be sacred. The spirit in which it is done will make all the work religious, worshipful.

(3) Its conditions. Freedom from all obstruction, from all restraint, and from all fatigue.

4. In conscious and continuous communion with God. "He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, their God, And they shall see his face." "We shall see him even as he is." All the redeemed in heaven are through Christ perfectly one with God in sympathies, purposes, principles, and joys. God alone can satisfy them. In him they rest with deepest, holiest blessedness. They are "forever with the Lord." "In thy presence is fullness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore." This rest is "reserved for the people of God." Only the sincere and hearty believers in Jesus Christ will ever enter upon it. The character of the rest is conclusive as to this question. To experience the perfect rest of the glorious future we must first experience the spiritual rest which is available unto us at present. W.J.

The true sabbatic rest.

Note here the word employed sabbatismov . This the only occurrence of the word. It is preceded and followed by another word for rest katapausiv . There must be something in the abrupt utterance for just once of this word in ver. 9. The different word must emphasize difference of meaning. The difference seems to lie here, that there are two kinds of rest to be thought of one the rest from toil and exertion, the rest to the weary; the other rest of cessation from work, because something is complete. Thus we have two views of the Christian"s future.

I HE IS TO HAVE REST FROM ALL THAT MAKES LIFE WEARY. The sabbatismo must include the katapausiv : but, then, there may also be the katapausiv every day and all day long. To rest the body after toil is very important, but more important is it to be able to rest the heart. There are only too many who get no proper rest of body on Sunday because their hearts are full of unrest. It is more than can be expected from imperfect humanity that we should attain this constant restfulness of spirit; but let it be understood that the cause lies in our imperfections, and not in any absolute necessity of the case. Rest is begun in a trustful heart, and the more trust the more rest. Much of the weariness of life comes from our own needless, useless struggling. We make toilsome work by our ambitions and our fears. People prefer the toiling and the care of the life of sight to the rest of the life of trust. "Return unto thy rest, O my soul.

II HE IS TO HAVE REST AFTER COMPLETED WORK. This is the true sabbatismov . Why is the other kind of rest, the rest from toil, necessary? Because man is fallen. He works not according to the pure, original power of his creation, but under constraint; duty and inclination too often opposed; or, if not in opposition, there is immense friction between them. But if there had been no fall, the work of each individual man would have gone on calmly, equably, till it was done. Then the sabbatismo would come. Look at man on parallel lines from God. God works out the great scheme and order of creation, and then ceases creating; but he is not weary when the work is done. God makes men in his own image; and the universal human race has its work to do, with each individual working in his proper place. Then, when the work is done, comes the sabbatism. Let this nobler view of rest be ours. In the heat of noonday it is permitted that we look to the sunset and think of rest from toil. But let us also take pride in the work we have to do, thinking that some day, by the Spirit of God working in us, the workmanship will be complete. God will have his particular sabbatism in us; and. we, complete in Christ, shall get our sabbatism with God. Y.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Therefore - Since he still speaks of another day, there must remain a farther, even an eternal, rest for the people of God.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

rest

Or, keeping of a sabbath.

The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

From the foregoing premises the apostle draws this conclusion, That there remaineth yet a more glorious, perfect, and complete rest, for the people of God.

Observe here, 1. Something implied, namely, That the people of God, whilst here upon earth, have works to do, and labour incumbent upon them. Rest and labour incumbent upon them. Rest and labour are correlates, the one supposes the other; the apostle affirming, that there is rest remaining for them, strongly supposes that there is labour at present belonging to them; God’s people are and industrious, working people: Christ’s present call is to service and duty.

Observe, 2. That God has already given his people a foretaste of, and some entrance into, rest, during this present state of work and labour; the better to enable them for that, and the more to sweeten that to them. The state of sin is a state of all labour, and no rest; the state of glory is all rest, and no labour; but the state of grace is a mixed state, partly of labour, and partly of rest;; of labour in respect of ourselves, in respect of the world, against sin, under affliction and persecution; but of rest in Christ, in his love, in his favour, and grace; and thus our labour makes our rest sweet, and our rest makes our labour easy.

Observe, 3. That there is reserved and laid up in heaven for all the people of God that serve him laboriously and everlasting, rest; for its quantity it is full of rest; for its quality it is unmixed rest; rest, and nothing but rest: for its duration, it is an eternal rest; the least fear of losing or leaving it, would imbitter all the joy which the saints taste in the fruition and enjoyment of it: There remaineth, or there is laid up and reserved, a rest for the people of God.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

9. There remaineth therefore a rest. Since God has a rest for his people, and neither the Sabbath nor Canaan is the rest, these being only types of that rest, a rest remaineth to the people of God.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

9. ἄρα. In classical Greek ἄρα can never occupy the first place in a clause, but this rule is frequently violated in the N.T. (Luk 11:48; Rom 10:17, &c.); and, indeed, in Hellenistic Greek the delicate ironic use of ἄρα to express surprise (“it seems,” “after all”) is almost obliterated.

σαββατισμός. From σαββατίζειν (Heb. שָׁבַת, Exo 16:30). Since the word used for “rest” is here a different word from that which has been used through the earlier part of the argument (κατάπαυσις) it is a pity that King James’s translators, who indulge in so many needless variations, did not here introduce a necessary change of rendering. The word means “a Sabbath rest,” and supplies an important link in the argument by pointing to the fact that “the rest” which the author has in view is God’s rest, a far higher conception of rest than any of which Canaan could be an adequate type. The Sabbath, which in 2Ma 15:1 is called “the Day of Rest,” is a nearer type of Heaven than Canaan. Dr Kay supposes that there is an allusion to Joshua’s first Sabbatic year, when “the land had rest from war” (Jos 14:15), and adds that Psalms 92-104. have a Sabbatic character, and that Psalms 92. is headed “a song for the Sabbath day.”

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

9.] Consequence from the proposition in ver. 6. Some must enter therein: some, that is, analogous to, inheriting the condition of and promises made to, those first, who did not enter in because of disobedience. These are now specified as ‘the people of God,’ cf. reff., doubtless with a reference to the true spiritual character of Israelites indeed, represented under their external name: and their rest is no longer a κατάπαυσις, but (see below) is called by a higher and nobler name. Therefore (see above) there remains (see on ver. 6: remains as yet unexhausted, unoccupied, unrealized) a keeping of sabbath (as regards the word, it is only found, besides here, in Plut. de Superstitione, c. 3, ὦ βάρβαροι ἐξευρόντες, Ἕλληνες κακὰ τῇ δεισιδαιμονίᾳ, πηλώσεις, καταβορβορώσεις, σαββατισμούς, ῥίψεις ἐπὶ πρόσωπον, αισχρὰς προκαθέσεις, ἀλλοκότους προσκυνήσεις. It is regularly formed from σαββατίζω (reff.), as ἑορτασμός from ἑορτάζω. It is used here to correspond to the κατάπαυσίς μου, specified and explained in ver. 4. God’s rest was a σαββατισμός; so also will ours be. Thdrt. remarks: σαββατισμὸν δὲ τὴν κατάπαυσιν κέκληκεν, ἐπειδὴ ἐν τῇ ἑβδύμῃ ἡμέρᾳ κατέπαυσεν ὁ θεὸς ἀπὸ πάντων τῶν ἔργων ὧν ἐποίησεν, ἐν τῷ μέλλοντι δὲ βίῳ ἄλυπος ἔσται ζωὴ κ. πόνων ἐλευθέρα καὶ φροντίδων ἀπηλλαγμένη. σαββατισμὸν τοίνυν ὠνόμασε τὴν τῶν σωματικῶν ἔργων ἀπαλλαγήν. τοῦτο γὰρ δηλοῖ τὰ ἑξῆς. The idea of the rest hereafter being the antitype of the Sabbath-rest, was familiar to the Jews: see the quotations in Schöttg., Wetst., and Bleek. They spoke of the tempus futurum as the “dies qui totus est sabbathum.” It is hardly probable that the sacred Writer had in his mind the object which Calvin mentions: “Non dubito quin ad Sabbathum data opera alluserit apostolus, ut Judæos revocaret ab externa ejus observatione: neque enim aliter potest ejus abrogatio intelligi, quam cognito spirituali fine.” Still more alien from the sense and context is it to use this verse, as some have absurdly done, as carrying weight one way or the other in the controversy respecting the obligation of a sabbath under the Christian dispensation. The only indication it furnishes is negative: viz. that no such term as σαββατισμός could then have been, in the minds of Christians, associated with the keeping of the Lord’s day: otherwise, being already present, it could not be said that it ἀπολείπεται) for the people of God (the well-known designation of Israel the covenant people. It occurs again, ch. 11:25. Here it is used of that veritable Israel, who inherit God’s promises by faith in Christ: cf. Gal 6:16. So Photius: καὶ αὕτη οὐ τοῖς τυχοῦσι, ἀλλὰ τῷ λαῷ τοῦ θεοῦ ἀφιερωμένη, λαὸς δὲ ἀληθῶς τοῦ θεοῦ οἱ πιστεύσαντες εἰς αὐτὸν κ. φυλάσσοντες τὰ προστάγματα αὐτοῦ).

Ver. 10 is taken in two ways (not to mention the untenable interpretation of Schulz, which refers ὁ γὰρ εἰσελθών to the people of God, “for, when it has entered,” &c. This would be εἰσελθὼν γὰρ without the article): 1. as a general axiom, justifying the use of the word σαββατισμός above: For he that has entered into his (God’s) rest, has himself also rested from his (own) works, like as God rested from his own. This has been the usual explanation. Thl. says, ἑρμηνεύει πῶς σαββατισμὸν ὠνόμασε τὴν τοιαύτην κατάπαυσιν· διότι φησὶ καταπαύομεν καὶ ἡμεῖς ἀπὸ τῶν ἔργων τῶν ἡμετέρων, ὥσπερ καὶ ὁ θεός, καταπαύσας ἀπὸ τῶν ἔργων τῶν εἰς σύστασιν τοῦ κόσμου, σάββατον τὴν ἡμέραν ὠνόμασεν. This explanation labours under two difficulties: α. the aorist κατέπαυσεν, which thus is made into a perfect or a present. De Wette regards it as a reminiscence of the same word in ver. 4: so Delitzsch: but this is most unsatisfactory: β. the double reference of αὐτοῦ, first to God, and then to the man in question, especially when God’s works are taken up by the strong term τῶν ἰδίων. 2. The other interpretation has been that of Owen, Alting, Stark, and more recently Ebrard, who refer ὁ εἰσελθών to Christ: For He that entered into his (own or God’s) rest, Himself also rested from His works like as God rested from His own: and therefore, from our Forerunner having entered into this sabbatism, it is reserved for us, the people of God, to enter into it with and because of Him. Thus, as Ebrard says, Jesus is placed in the liveliest contrast to Joshua, who had not brought God’s people to their rest; and is designated as ‘That one, who entered into God’s rest.’ And to this view I own I am strongly inclined, notwithstanding the protest raised against it by Bleek, Lünemann, and Delitzsch. My reasons are, in addition to those implied above, α. the form of the assertion, as regards Joshua here and Jesus in ver. 14. That a contrast is intended between the Ἰησοῦς who did not give them rest, and the ἀρχιερέα μέγαν διεληλυθότα τοὺς οὐρανούς, Ἰησοῦν τὸν υἱὸν τοῦ θεοῦ, seems very plain. And if so, it would be easily accounted for, that Christ should be here introduced merely under the designation of ὁ εἰσελθὼν εἰς τ. κατάπ. αὐτοῦ. β. The introduction of the words καὶ αὐτός, lifting out and dignifying the subject of this clause as compared with ὁ θεός, in a way which would hardly be done, had the assertion been merely of any man generally. γ. Scripture analogy. This rest, into which the Lord Jesus entered, is spoken of, Isa 11:10, καὶ ἔσται ἡ ἀνάπαυσις αὐτοῦ, τιμή: and this work of His, in Isa 40:10, καὶ τὸ ἔργον ἐναντίον αὐτοῦ, and by Christ Himself, Joh 9:4, ἐμὲ δεῖ ἐργάζεσθαι τὰ ἔργα τοῦ πέμψαντός με ἕως ἡμέρα ἐστίν· ἔρχεται νύξ, ὅτε οὐδεὶς δύναται ἐργάζεσθαι. δ. The expression ἐκείνην τὴν κατάπαυσιν below, which stands harshly insulated unless it refers to the κατάπαυσιν in this verse. ε. The whole context: see summary at ch. 3:1. Render then: For He that entered into his (either, ‘God’s;’ or more probably merely ‘his,’ reflective, as in Isa 11:10 above: see also Mat 25:21, Mat 25:23, where the χαρά is τοῦ κυρίου σου) rest, He Himself also (on this, see above) rested from his works (see above) as God from his own (τῶν ἰδίων not with any distinction of kind, but used only to mark distinction of possession).

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

There remaineth therefore a rest [αρα απολειπεται σαββατισμος] . Remaineth, since in the days of neither Moses, Joshua, or David was the rest appropriated. He passes over the fact that the rest had not been entered into at any later period of Israel 's history. Man's portion in the divine rest inaugurated at creation has never been really appropriated : but it still remaineth. This statement is justified by the new word for "rest" which enters at this point, sabbatismov instead of katapausiv, N. T. o, o LXX, o Class., signifies a keeping Sabbath. The Sabbath rest points back to God 's original rest, and marks the ideal rest - the rest of perfect adjustment of all things to God, such as ensued upon the completion of his creative work, when he pronounced all things good. This falls in with the ground - thought of the Epistle, the restoration of all things to God 's archetype. The sin and unbelief of Israel were incompatible with that rest. It must remain unappropriated until harmony with God is restored. The Sabbath - rest is the consummation of the new creation in Christ, through whose priestly mediation reconciliation with God will come to pass.

For the people of God (tw law tou qeou). For the phrase see Rom 9:25; Rom 11:1; 1Pe 2:10. and comp. Israel of God, Gal 6:16. The true Israel, who inherit the promise by faith in Christ.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.