Preliminaries

In reading through Mark’s Gospel over the past few weeks, we’ve been looking at some of the different ways in which Jesus establishes His Kingdom, asserts His Authority, and calls His followers to give Him their absolute and uncontested Allegiance:  He heals diseases, casts out spiritual “principalities and powers,” challenges worldly “Arkys,” forgives sins “on earth,” and, most recently, proclaims Himself “Lord of the Sabbath.”  We’ve noted that in many of these instances, Christ seems deliberately (in the phrase of N.T. Wright) to “drive a coach and horses” through the revered and beloved institution of the Jewish Sabbath.  We’ve considered some of His reasons for doing so.

This week we’ll make a quick return visit to the book of Hebrews to see what it has to say on this subject.

Review

Last time we were in Hebrews the writer had just finished telling us that the New Covenant inaugurated by Jesus is superior to the Old Covenant inasmuch as Christ Himself is superior to both Moses and the angels.  He is, in fact, incomparably qualified to serve as High Priest (2:7) and Mediator between God and Man because He is both God and Man.  At that point the author launched into the second of five practical “warnings” or “exhortations” scattered throughout the book:  this one a warning about the danger of failing to enter God’s Rest through hard-heartedness and unbelief (3:7-19).

That warning is still in progress as we step back into Chapter 4.

Mixed with Faith

4:1 Therefore since a promise remains of entering His rest, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it. 2 For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it.  3 For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said:  “So I swore in My wrath, they shall not enter My rest,” although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.[i]

Three key words or phrases jump to the forefront in these verses:  promise, gospel, and “mixed with.”

Promise (Greek epangelia) is one of the most powerful grace words found in the New Testament.  It denotes something that is announced to someone.  There’s nothing you can do to earn or merit a promise:  you’re simply told that it’s coming your way, and it does. 

Gospel, as everybody knows, is another “announcement” word:  it’s a proclamation of good news.  Verse 2 uses the verb form of this word:  “We were evangelized (euangelismenoi) just as those people were.”  We today are like the ancient Children of Israel in that we also have received an announcement that something good is coming our way. 

“Mixed with” is the New King James Version’s rendering of the Greek synkerannymi.  It’s a good translation.  The word means “to mingle, blend with, connect, put together.”  The thought here is that faith – and remember that this faith (Greek pistis) is not just intellectual “belief”, but an act of the will and a commitment of the total self (i.e., allegiance) – is the catalyst that activates the effects of the announced promise in the life of the individual.  Without that connection, the “good news” is nothing but a dead letter.               

Rest

4 For He has spoken in a certain place of the seventh day in this way:  “And God rested on the seventh day from all His works”; 5 and again in this place:  “They shall not enter My rest.” 6 Since therefore it remains that some must enter it, and those to whom it was first preached did not enter because of disobedience, 7 again He designates a certain day, saying in David, “Today,” after such a long time, as it has been said, “Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts.” 8 For if Joshua had given them rest, then He would not afterward have spoken of another day.      

The important word in this section is, of course, rest.  It’s at this point that we are strongly reminded of Jesus’ conflict with the Jewish religious authorities over the observance of the Sabbath as recorded in the Gospel of Mark.  The word “rest” or “Sabbath rest” occurs no fewer than eight times in Hebrews 4:1-13.  In only one instance does the writer use the Hebraic term “Sabbath” (Sabbatismos, verse 9).  In every other case the word used is the Greek katapausis, which means “ceasing, cessation, calmness.”

There’s a significant message in all of this.  Verses 4 through 8 are all about the deeper meaning of “Sabbath rest.”  What the writer has in mind is not a weekly religious observance, but an experience of genuine fellowship with the true and living God – as the Lord Himself calls it, “My Rest.”  It’s the repose we find when we entrust ourselves to Him alone; a sharing in the rest into which He Himself entered at the end of His creative work.  It’s firsthand knowledge of the Reality behind all realities, which can only be accessed through faith, belief, and trust, by ceasing from self-dependence and leaning into Him – not just on the seventh day of the week, but Today and every day.  (Psalm 95:7, 8)                         

Claim Ticket

9 There remains therefore a rest for the people of God. 10 For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His. 11 Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience.

These three verses represent the focal point of this passage.  When the author says, “There remains therefore a rest for the people of God,” what he means is that the reality of the promise has yet to be claimed.  Despite their unrelenting emphasis upon Sabbath observance, the people of the Old Covenant never really cashed in on this promise.  They failed to go there.  They never actually possessed true Sabbath rest because they never really “got” what it was all about.  Accordingly, the substance behind this religious shadow-image has yet to be realized.  But we can enter into it now, “Today,” by putting all our confidence in the One who came to make it real in the presence of His Person.        

The Power of the Word

12 For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. 13 And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.

These are some of the most famous and best-beloved sentences in the entire New Testament; but it may be worth our while to ask ourselves precisely what they mean in this particular context.  The “Word of God” in this case is not simply “the Bible,” as we often assume.  Instead, it’s the promise of the gospel discussed above (verses 1 and 2).  It’s the Good News proclaimed by Jesus in Mark 1:15:  the announcement that the Kingdom is at hand, and that it can be accessed right now.  That’s why the writer describes this Word as living, powerful, active, vibrant, effervescent, uncontainable, and sharper than any two-edged sword.  It’s not a matter of dutiful religious piety, but of personal connection with (“mixed,” synkerannymi) and total allegiance to the King.         

Final Thoughts

Who is this King?  That question brings us back once again to our study of Mark.  This King, as we discovered in our last installment, is the uncontested Lord of the Sabbath.  In other words, the deeper significance of God’s Sabbath Rest is summed up in Him.  He is the unrivaled Master who, like His forefather David, comes to us in the “In-Between Time” with the message that everything we thought we knew about “religion” and “spirituality” is both wrong and right:  wrong because it cannot save us in and of itself; and right because it ultimately points to Him.         

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[i] This week’s Scripture references are taken from The New King James Version.