Here will be rest, perfect eternal peace. The promise is, “in righteousness shalt thou be established; thou shalt be far from oppression; for thou shalt not fear; and from terror; for it shall not come near thee.” “In that day shall this song be sung in the land of Judah: We have a strong city; salvation will God appoint for walls and bulwarks.” God Himself will be with His people for evermore, “and they shall see His face,” and therefore they will have rest, for He said, “My presence,” literally, My face, “shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest.”
Why will men nullify all these glorious promises, by reading them as though they taught merely the temporal possession of a ruined city on this old sin-cursed earth? It is because they limit the Gospel, not realizing that all the promises of God are in Christ, to be enjoyed by none except those who are in Christ, and in whom He dwells by faith. Would that God’s professed people might speedily receive “the Spirit of wisdom and revelation” in the knowledge of God, that the eyes of their understanding might be enlightened, that they might “know what is the hope of His calling, and what the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints,” and that it is to be gained only by “the exceeding greatness of His power to usward who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead, and set Him at His own right hand in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 1.17-20
Now that we have taken this hasty glance ahead, and have seen the consummation of God’s promise to give His people rest in the land of Canaan, we may return and fill in a few of the details, which will be more easily understood by reason of this outline, and which in turn will bring out in still bolder relief the view we have already had.
The paper in this series, which appears next week, will consider—under the title “Another Day”—the rest that now remaineth for the people of God. Hebrews 4