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What is the 'rest' described in Hebrews chapter 4?
Heb. 4:8 “For if Joshua had given them rest, then He would not afterward have spoken of another day. 9There remains therefore a rest for the people of God. 10For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His.†We need to take into consideration that Jesus is also called “Josua†as it is very nicely stated in Afrikaans that I quote below: Heb. 4: 8 “Want as Josua aan hulle rus gegee het, sou Hy nie van 'n ander dag daarná spreek nie. 9 Daar bly dus 'n sabbatsrus oor vir die volk van God; 10 want wie in sy rus ingegaan het, rus ook self van sy werke soos God van syne. Jesus’s name was Joshua but here it is talking of the Joshua of the exodus that could not give them rest. Some people think it is motivating them to have the normal rest of Sabbath but most Christians accept that in this phase of Christianity there was no question that every Christian followed the Bible seventh-day Sabbath and therefore no reason to motivate a group of strict Sabbath-keepers to keep the Sabbath. The piece uses the Greek ‘Kata pausis’ and ‘Sabbat ismos’ interchangeably, and remember in Exodus again, Moses got the Israelites to keep the Sabbath but the translators missed that and just used rest. The word used would not he allowed them to rest but he allowed them to Shabbat: Exo. 5:4 “Then the king of Egypt said to them, “Moses and Aaron, why do you take the people from their work? Get back to your labour.†5And Pharaoh said, “Look, the people of the land are many now, and you make them rest (Shabbat) from their labour!†Here we have the type of people persecuted because of honouring the Sabbath and maybe another study but there is an antitypical idea of in the final exodus out of this world people honouring the Bible Sabbath will again be persecuted. If one looks at your verse Jocelyn the explanation I postulate is that we also keep the Sabbath as an acknowledgment that we are not able to save our self and by keeping the Sabbath We accept what Christ has done and we now rest in His saving work for us and for most of us it is still something to really attain in the future. Sabbath-keepers are accused of legalism but this portion of the Bible supports the fact that real Sabbath-keepers by keeping the Sabbath confirm that they rest from trying to save themselves they rely completely on the complete atonement of Jesus and the work He has accomplished for us and by resting we allow Him to do the work in us! Pray this helps you in your relationship with Christ.