I was sitting in my prayer chair reading my Bible one day last week. One would think it would be the most relaxing place for me. Normally, it is.
However, with the challenge of the past 6 months, I noticed something alarming that morning.
I realized my body was not at rest – it was tense. It felt like my body was tightened awaiting attack. Suddenly, I could feel the tenseness over everything else and I knew God was showing me something that needed to change.
As soon as I realized this, I took a deep breath and forced my body to relax. As I did, God spoke gently to me and said, “Your body is not at rest – it’s time to labor to enter into My rest in your body.”
What it made me think was that I had battled so long that my body had become accustomed to staying ready for challenge instead of entering into the rest of God – which is the finished work of Christ.
Genesis 2:3 says, Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.
God rested.
However, we see that He didn’t rest until everything was completed. It was finished. It is the same with us today. Jesus declared, “It is finished.” With that declaration, everything we had need of was completed. Healing was ours. Prosperity belonged to us. Peace of mind became ours. Wisdom was now ours. It was finished.
Yet, we know there are times we must battle to appropriate the finished work of Christ. We do that by standing on His Word and declaring it over our lives.
That being said, there is also a time that battle is finished – even if we don’t see it in the natural – there is a time, we know in our spirit that it is done. That is when we must enter into the rest of God.
Hebrews 4:11 says, Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience.
In this scripture the writer is equating not resting with unbelief. To be completely in faith is to be at rest. That day, God was showing me that I was more ready for battle than at rest with the promises of God.
Therefore, I was not fully in faith. Ouch!
For the past few days, I have been laboring to enter into His rest, just as the book of Hebrews tells me to.
Each time I feel my body tense, I declare the Word of God over it and command it to be at rest. I remind myself that it is finished – healing is already mine. Wholeness belongs to me through the cross of Christ – it is a finished work. I am not fighting for victory – I already have it. Therefore, my body must line up with the Word of God and be at rest. I refuse to allow it to remain tense. It must be at peace.
To everything there is a season. A time to war and a time to enter into rest. I believe God is speaking to us to enter into His rest – His finished work.
Today, I don’t know what you are battling for, perhaps healing. Maybe your children or finances. I do know this. It is finished. It is a done deal. May God grace you to enter into His rest, knowing it is done, once and for all. As the Bible says, those who have entered into His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His. (Hebrews 4:10) May it be so for you this day!
