'There Remains a Sabbath Rest for the People of God'
The book of Hebrews uses creative comparisons to emphasize to its Jewish
audience that the weekly Sabbath is a reminder of something more than just
that God was the Israelites' Creator and the One who had delivered them
from slavery in Egypt (Exodus 20:8-11; Deuteronomy 5:12-15).
The faithfulness of Moses and Christ is spoken of in the first six verses
of Hebrews 3. Beginning in verse 7, Psalm 95 is quoted
to document the failure of the first generation of Israel as a lesson to
God's people today. Unbelief was the main cause of their failure to enter
the rest promised to them (Heb 3:19).
The fourth chapter begins with an admonition to faith and obedience as
a prerequisite for receiving the rest that is still available to God's
people. No one has yet entered that rest, not because God hadn't readied
it; in fact, it was finished from the foundation of the world (Hebrews 4:3). That God rested on the seventh day from all His works indicates as
much (verse 4). David (in Psalm 95) spoke of a promise of rest long after
Joshua led the second generation of Israel to rest in the promised land.
This demonstrates that the rest fulfilled at the time of Joshua was only
a type of a greater rest to come (Hebrews 4:6-8).
