Amen. Isn't it good to be together in God's house today? I tell you what, I've missed church so much.
Be with spiritual family on Sunday mornings in the building. Uh, there's just nothing that compares to that. And, uh, Alamance, I want to welcome you guys. Everybody who's watching out there. I know you guys are excited to be together on a Sunday morning, um, as well. And, uh, I tell you what, we're fired up about serve day. Uh, want you guys to save the date for that March 14th on Saturday. Uh, it's just one of the best things that we do here at Grace church. Every single year, we go out and we just blitz our community, serve them, show them the love of Jesus in practical ways. And, uh, so we'd love for you guys to be a part of that with us. Uh, how many of y'all know we got a little football game today, right? A little something going on a little bit later, and I want to do this.
Alamance, I want you guys to do this out there as well. Uh, we're just going to make a little bit of noise. All right? So I want to know, uh, who today is pulling for the Seahawks. Make some noise.
All right, all right. Hoo hoo hoo! Today's pulling for the Patriots. Yeah yeah I thought it might go that way. Listen I never in my entire life thought that I would ever pull for the New England Patriots. But I'm just telling you today I'm pulling for former Tar Heel Drake Maye to win the Super Bowl. Baby, bring it home. Uh, that's that's where I'm at today. And so, uh, listen really I'm excited to share today we are right in the middle of our disciples series. And this series is all about what it means to be a follower of Jesus. And we've talked about follow me and become like me and be with me. And today we're going to talk about another very important part of our lives, our relationship with Jesus. And I would actually say that I don't think maybe we understand just how important this one really is, and in just how vital this one really is. Today, we're going to talk about Jesus's invitation to rest in me. And that's much more than a physical rest that Jesus invites us into. It's a rest that encompasses all aspects of our lives. There's a mental and emotional rest. There's a spiritual rest, a physical rest.
It's a rest for our hearts. And I think right away, for many of us, when we hear that word rest, we, we, we kind of know, like right away, there's probably some room for improvement in this area, right? We're just not that good at rest. Our culture is pretty good about just going a mile a minute and cramming more stuff into a day and into our lives than we can really handle, right? I mean, who's got time to rest? We've heard that old adage, like, I'm going to rest when I'm dead. Some of us think that we kind of attribute like rest, and needing rest is like a weakness. So not only are we fast paced, get it done kind of people, but how many of you know, there's just some things that we face in life that steal our rest? You guys know what I'm talking about. Things that steal our rest. Well, just to cheer us all up today, I went ahead and made a list of some things. Just a few things in life that that can steal our rest. We've got deadlines at work. We've got quotas that need to be met. My job security, my boss, my coworkers are slacking. I gotta pass my classes. The midterms, the finals, and the DMV. I hate the DMV, getting into college, choosing a career, finding a spouse. Am I doing enough for my children? We've got fast reforms. We've got hurricanes and the DMV. I hate the DMV. What about current events, the news, social media, comparing my life to others? We've got bills and finances and sickness, stress, anxiety.
Fear. My shame. Taxes, death. There's a pressure to perform. There's a pressure to prove ourselves. The expectations of others, strained relationships, bad drivers, in-laws, anniversary presents, dishes and laundry. Fear of the future. And oh yeah, don't forget this giant one. What's for dinner tonight, right? It comes every single night. What's for dinner? Praise God somebody's past the Tylenol. Right? We've. We've got lots of things in life that can steal our rest.
And yet rest is such a vital part of our lives and our relationship with Jesus.
And and so today, we're going to look at that invitation from Jesus to rest in me. What does God mean by by rest, and how do we experience that rest? And I actually want to start today by going way back to to the Old Testament in a story in the Old Testament. And this it really is kind of a foundational, very important part of Scripture. And you might be familiar with this story. You might not. But God had led his people, the Israelites, out of Egypt, where they had been enslaved and mistreated for for generations, and he sets them free. Through amazing signs and wonders and miracles and plagues. And it's amazing. And and Moses was leading them, and God was with Moses. And and now his people are free from the oppression of Egypt, but they're essentially kind of wandering around in the desert, homeless. But God has an incredible plan for his people. He has an incredible place for his people that he wants to bring them. He picked out the very best of the best land. Amazing place, and he's leading his people there. And God had promised his people that he was going to give this land to them. There's only one problem. The land is already occupied by some very powerful, very strong people. But God had told him. He said, hey, I'm with you. I'm going to, I'm going to give you this land. I'm going to go before you. I'm going to fight your battles for you. My heart is to give you this amazing land where you can flourish and find rest. And as they're getting people closer, the people are getting scared. So because of the reports they've heard and so they send 12 spies into the land to scope things out, and they come back with this report that, yes, the land is incredible. It's amazing. But even more important, they come back. And what they say is that the people are even stronger than we realize. And the Bible says that their hearts melted in fear and they said, we can't do this. We can't drive them out. But Moses, Moses speaks up, right? He's the leader.
And he reminds them. He says, remember who God is. Remember his promise. And and Moses says, don't be terrified. Don't be afraid of them. The Lord your God is going before you. He will fight for you as he did in Egypt before your very eyes. He's saying, you've seen this, and in the wilderness there you saw how the Lord your God carried you as a father carries his son. Moses is saying, God's got this. He's with us. You guys have seen it. You've seen his power.
You've seen his his faithfulness. All the things that he's already done for you. He promised to give us this land, right? Let's go. I mean, surely they're going to follow and go, right?
But it says in spite of this, you did not trust the Lord your God.
Even after everything that you have seen God do. You didn't trust him. And God's response to this it says, when the Lord heard what you said, he was angry and he solemnly swore, no one from this evil generation shall see the good land that I swore to your ancestors.
God was angry with his people for one simple reason they didn't trust him. After everything that he had done for them, to rescue them, to deliver them and provide for them, to defend them, he guided them with a, a cloud and a in a pillar of his presence of fire. He he'd been so good, he'd been so faithful to them, and yet they still didn't trust his heart for them. They didn't trust his goodness. They didn't trust his power to do it. And God was frustrated by this because he loved his people, and he had so much good plan for them. And in response to their unbelief in response to their disobedience because they didn't trust him, God says they're not going to enter the land. They're not going to see the goodness. They're not going to see the rest that I had planned for them. I want you guys to remember this. Alright, kind of put a placeholder there, and now we're going to fast forward and we're going to jump all the way to the book of, of Hebrews in the New Testament. It's probably about a thousand pages in your Bible, at least it is in mine. And and we're going there because the writer of Hebrews, he actually addresses and references this story, this time period from the Old Testament. Okay. And he's writing now to encourage God's people all these years later. And he's writing to encourage us today not to miss out on the rest that God has made available to us. I want you to listen to what he says. He's actually quoting from Psalm 95. In this it says, so as the Holy Spirit says today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts, as they did in the rebellion during the time of testing in the wilderness where your ancestors tested me and tried me, though for 40 years, they saw what I did right. That's what we just read about. That is why I was angry with that generation. And I said, their hearts are always going astray. They haven't known my ways. They haven't. They haven't known me. And so I declared on oath in my anger. What did he say? They shall never enter my rest. You see, God had a rest for his people in the Old Testament. The land that he promised them was was a picture, and it was a place of rest. And it was it was way more than just land. It was way more than just a place to live. It represented a place where God's people would live in safety and security, that they would live under God's protection and his provision and his care. They'd never experienced that before, right? They'd been slaves in Egypt. And and then they were wandering from place to place in the desert. But now there's going to be this peace in their hearts, because they know that that God's watching over them, that God's with them. The Bible says that he's going to give them rest on every side, that he's going to fight their battles, that he's going to be their refuge. And within that, there's this promise of joy in God's presence. God's favor and God's blessing was going to rest upon them, so much so that others would see that that was the rest that God had for them so much more than physical. But they didn't enter into that rest because they didn't trust God. That was the big issue. When he says that that their hearts were going astray, it's because they didn't trust him. They didn't believe his heart for them. Now I'm about to make this practical for us. All this stuff from the Old Testament long ago, what does this have to do with us today? Well, we're building to something because the writer of Hebrews goes on to say something so powerful and so encouraging for us today, and I'm just going to read this to us, and then we're going to look at four truths about rest. This is what he says.
Therefore, since the promise of entering his rest still stands. Let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it. For we also have had the good news proclaimed to us, just like they did. But the message that they heard was of no value to them, because they did not share the faith of those who obeyed, they didn't trust. Now we who have believed enter that rest are four truths about rest. Number one is this true? Rest is available to us like a true, deep, long lasting, abiding rest that we can have. It's real. It's possible. And it's not only possible, it's actually a promise. It's a promise that God gives to us. And and I don't know if you catch that when I read it, but but he said, therefore, since the promise, Underline that word in your in your Bible. Since the promise of entering his rest still stands, there is a promise from God that there is a rest that's available to us that we can enter into and stay in a place of rest. The promise of of rest from all the way back in the Old Testament.
It still stands for us today, but it's actually even better. The rest that he's talking about includes our salvation. That that we've been rescued. We've been forgiven of our sin, that we're deeply loved and accepted by God because of what Jesus did and accomplished on the cross. We don't ever have to worry about God turning away from us. We don't ever have to worry about punishment for sin, which that's unbelievable. We don't ever have to work to earn God's favor or perform to some kind of a standard to earn salvation. And God has this beautiful, perfect, amazing place for you that you get to spend with him for all of eternity. That truth alone like that right there is enough for to produce rest in our hearts. But there's more. He's not just talking about our salvation when it comes to rest. All that weight that we put on ourselves, all that weight that life throws on us, what can be overwhelming and exhausting at times? What what sometimes really does feel like like it's just going to consume us, that heaviness. There is a rest from that. There is a place that God has for us in the middle of all that, right in the middle of all the crazy circumstances where we can have a true and deep lasting rest on the inside. It's a rest for your soul. A rest for your heart. A rest for your emotions. A rest from fear. Fear loses its grip. Anxiety is replaced by peace. It's the rest where we have this overwhelming sense of the fact and the truth that God's in control. That he's got this, that he's got us, that he's leading, that he's guiding. There's a rest that says, my future really is in his hands. The kids are in his hands. It's a rest for us where the pressure is lifted and taken away. Where there's nothing left for us to prove. That is the picture of the rest that God has made available to us. It's real. It's available.
It's possible. No matter what the circumstances are, we can live in and experience that place of rest. It's a promise from God, so rest is available to us. But how do we enter into that rest? And that brings us to point number two. And that is this, that trusting God produces rest. And I know that sounds so simple. I wish I had something more profound or a special secret to share, but it really is that simple. He told us exactly how to enter into that rest. He said, now we who have believed enter that rest. The amount of rest that you experience is directly proportional to how much you're trusting God, how much you believe in him, how much you're trusting his character, his goodness, his power.
You know, when my kids were little, we used to love to go to the beach. I mean, the beach, the pool, especially when we were on vacation or when we were going to another state to to visit family. We loved to go to the pool and, you know, like we'd be there for, for hours, right. And and it was, it was a little bit crazy because we had four kids. All right. So it was a lot of fun, but there was a whole lot of crazy involved. And I love playing in the pool. I love doing the games in the pool. I love throwing the kids and all that stuff. But but I also like the kind of idea of thinking about, like, chilling at the pool a little bit. Right. Like like relaxing, getting some rest and recharging. I mean, we'd be there for, like, more than half the day. This is vacation time, right? Dad needs a nap every once in a while. But I was worried. I was always worried that something bad was going to happen, right? That the kids might might drown. And it was chaos. Y'all, we got four kids running in all different directions. They don't have floaties on yet. They're trying to jump into the pool. They don't know they can't swim, right? But they can't swim. And so I'm exhausted, right? Just trying to make sure everybody stays alive. I'm on high alert. There's no rest. How many of you know there's different kinds of pools, right? Some people have pools in their houses, right in their backyards. Or maybe there's like a neighborhood pool where there's no lifeguards. If it's that kind of a pool, no rest. Right? Head on a swivel. Every once in a while, you, uh, you go to a place where they have, like, one lifeguard, like a community pool, you know what I'm saying? And there's, like, a teenager there. And the only reason he's there is because he wants to make some money right over the summer. Or maybe he wants to connect with the ladies a little bit. And it's like working. The only thing this kid's working on is his tan. Right? And and he, like, does he even know how to swim? Is what I'm wondering. He's he's disengaged. His heart's not in it. And I'm looking at him going, ain't no way in the world I'm trusting you right with my kids. Right? So no rest, head on a swivel. But then one time we went to a pool while we were on vacation at Disney.
And let me just tell y'all. Complete game changer. All right. They got lifeguards everywhere.
They're watching every square inch of that water. They're watching every square inch of the property and everything around the pool as well. And they're not teenagers, y'all. They're responsible adults. And they are. They are diligent. I mean, I'm watching them and they are laser focused. They are taking their job so seriously. They've got this system where they've got every little quadrant of the water covered. And they would they would do this thing with their hands where they they did this and they would, they would walk back and forth. I don't even know what that was like. But it's cool. And I loved it. Right? And the more I watched these lifeguards doing their thing, and the more I saw how laser focused they were, I started to relax a little bit more and more. Right before you know it, I'm elbow deep in a bag of Cheetos. I got an umbrella drink in my hand, and I don't have a care in the world. Right? I'm not watching the kids anymore. I'm sitting in my chair. Y'all have all been there, right? The sun. It's coming down. It's a little warm. It's heavenly.
Before I know it, I pass out and I fall asleep. I take a glorious nap. I wake up and I'm like, I literally don't even know where my kids are and I don't care. I rested, and it was all because of the lifeguards, because I trusted them, and because of that, I was able to rest you all. I know it's a silly little analogy, but but it really is a picture of what it looks like to trust God. An experience. Rest when we aren't trusting him. We can't rest. We don't enter into that rest.
Our ability to rest is a direct reflection of how much we're trusting God. Trust equals rest when we're trying to control a situation or we're trying to make something happen. We're depending upon ourselves and our abilities. There's no rest when we think it's up to us. We can't stay in a place of rest when. When we're planning and plotting and we're worried and we're trying to figure it all out. That will never bring rest to our hearts.
Rest only comes by deepening our trust in God, by letting our trust in him mature and grow and develop. You know, humility produces rest because we're confessing in that humble place that, God, I can't do anything about this anyway, that I'm dependent upon you. I'm acknowledging that you're in control, not me. That's that's humility. And that produces rest. I absolutely love this verse. In Psalm 62, the psalmist says, In God alone my soul finds rest. Nothing else can bring that rest to our hearts. He says, in God alone. It's only in him that my soul finds rest. My salvation comes from him. He alone is my rock and salvation and my fortress.
And I will never be shaken, because I know that this is hard, I know it. Every single one of us struggles to stay in that place where we're trusting God, where we really are depending upon him, where we're pressing into his presence and and letting him take that weight.
This is not me wagging my finger at us, saying, hey, we all, you know, need to do a better job of trusting, right? I'm preaching to myself here, and I'm just reminding us of the truth today, that that God has rest for us and we enter into and we stay in that place of rest by trusting him. Right. Which pool do you want to live at? Right? No lifeguard pool, crazy pool, or the Disney pool where there's rest. I want us to live in and experience the rest for our souls that God has. It's just a better way to live. Which brings me to the next point. Point number three. It takes effort to rest. Now, I know that that sounds like an oxymoron, right? It takes effort. Strive labor to enter into rest. But that's exactly what he says here in Hebrews. It says there remains then, a Sabbath rest for the people of God. Praise God, it's there. It's available for anyone who enters into God's rest.
Also rest from their works, just as God did from his. But listen to this part. He says, let us therefore make every effort to enter that rest. He says, make every effort strive labor to enter into rest. We've got work to do if we want to, to enter into and stay in that place of rest. And what I believe that the work that he's talking about, the real work that we have to do, is reminding ourselves and fighting to lay hold of the truths and the promises that God has given to us. Right? We have to lead ourselves to trust him. That's the work that he's talking about. The striving is is a striving to lead our own hearts to that place of trust. I think striving is is speaking God's truth over your heart. In those moments where you can feel that rest slipping away in the face of those uncertain circumstances, what seems impossible? You speak God's truths. You speak God's promises. In Psalm 116, we we see this, y'all. The psalmist, he's been through some things. He says the cords of death entangled me, the anguish of the grave came over me. I was overcome by distress and sorrow. You've been there. You've been through the stuff. You might be in the middle of it right now. Right. Whatever it is, it's. It's causing you distress and sorrow. It might feel like it's about to overcome you. But listen to what he says.
He says, return to your rest, my soul. For the Lord has been good to you. And I love that he says, return to your rest, my soul.
Right. He speaks to his own soul, and he says, be at rest. Be at rest. Why?
Because God's been so, so good to you. And he's telling himself. Just remember.
Focus on God's goodness. He says, I'm not going to give in to these feelings. I'm not going to let the emotions that I'm feeling right now take control and you fight for that. You lead your emotions. You lead your mind. You lead yourself to God's presence, to God's Word. And you hold on to your trust, right? You put your trust in him. You make that choice. King David said it like that. This he said, when I am afraid because we all know that's going to happen, I put my trust in you. He made that choice I will trust. I will strive to enter into that place of rest that God has for me. That's the work that we have to do. Don't get the wrong idea about rest to enter into rest. We're actually active. It's not a passive thing.
We're we're not just laying around and staring at the stars. Right? That's that's not rest. That's laziness. Right? There's an active pursuit of God. There's actually taking steps as we trust God to be at rest doesn't mean that you you don't do anything.
You're cooperating with God's leading. You know, one of the funniest parts of the Bible to me is, is right before the Israelites cross the Red sea on dry ground at the time, there's this impossible situation in front of them, right? There's no way out. They've got the Red sea in front of them, and they've got the Egyptian army behind them. But then Moses, he gets a word from God, and God speaks to Moses. And so Moses tells the people, the Lord will fight for you.
You need only to be still. And if I'm in the army there, I'm going. Let's go. Right. That's exactly what I wanted to hear, right? God's going to fight for us, he said. All we have to do is be still right, be at rest and see what God does. Right. That's what he's saying is, trust me, right? Be still in your hearts. Be at rest. But the very next verse makes me laugh every time I read it. Then the Lord said to Moses, why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on. It's like, well, well, he just said, be still right, and watch what I do. And now God says, what the heck are you doing?
Right? Like you all get moving, get going. Rest doesn't mean that we don't do anything.
It's a heart posture of fully trusting God while we take the steps that he's calling us to take. And when we get out of that place of rest along the way, because we all know it's going to happen right when we get out of rest, that's we strive. We make every effort to bring our hearts back to that place of rest, back to that place of trusting in him. That's the work that we do. We lead our hearts to trust. We lead our hearts to trust that we really are forgiven that the shame is gone. We lead our hearts to trust that that God is the faithful provider. We trust him to move in our relationships and restore. As as we take steps to reconcile and love whatever it is that's causing you distress and sorrow. We lead ourselves to trust. We lead ourselves to rest.
And finally, point number four today Jesus modeled the importance of rest.
The world that we live in, it steals our rest, right? It's fast paced. It's busy.
But God designed us for rest. You guys know that's the way that we were made. That's how God designed us was for a Sabbath rest. And it is absolutely vital that we take intentional time to slow down, to get away from the noise, to get away from the stress and just rest. To let ourselves be refreshed with God. And Jesus was the perfect example of this. He modeled this for us, for his followers. It says very early in the morning while it was still dark. Jesus got up. He left the house and went off to a solitary place. Right? He went and he got alone. He got away from it all. Where he prayed, we connected with his father. And this is the Son of God. This is God himself in the flesh, fully God, fully man. And he needed time away with his father to rest. He sought that out. He prioritized it. How much more then do we need it?
We attribute rest as being weak. But. But it's actually one of the strongest things that we can do because rest strengthens us. Rest strengthens our faith and our trust in God. About 18 years ago, I started running. I wanted to take up like long distance running as a new challenge and a great way to exercise. And let's just say I was a lot younger then and my heart was probably filled with a lot of pride maybe. And I was like, I'm just going to go for it, right? I'm not going to look anything up. I'm not going to research. I'm just going to go out and start running. And I did, and I was getting better and better, and I was actually really impressed with with my results, you know, feeling pretty good about myself. And then all of a sudden I hit a wall. I mean, just bam, hit a wall wasn't progressing at all. And it was very frustrating.
And, you know, in my pride, I just got to tell you how I saw it, right? If I set a goal that I was going to run eight miles, then I had to run the full eight miles for it to count, right? If I if I had to stop and rest or walk, it's like in my own heart. I didn't count that right. That was weak sauce. If you had to stop and walk a little bit right. I judged those people when I ran by him on the trail. Right. I was prideful, but now here I'm hitting this wall, right? So I actually reach out to somebody who knows what they're doing, and I ask for some advice. And they told me about this method where you actually run for seven minutes, and then you walk for a minute, and then you run for seven minutes and walk for a minute, and you just keep repeating that. And he said, even if you're feeling great, even if you know, you don't even need to walk when you get to that first, first time to walk, he said, do it anyway, even if you don't think that you need it. And he explained to me why and why that was helpful for the body and how that helped you to break through. It was an intentional strategy of letting your body rest momentarily to produce better results. And man, I didn't want to do that right. Walking was weakness, but I was willing to try it because I hated being stuck and hitting the wall. And so I humbled myself and I tried it.
And man, did it work. I broke literally right through that wall right away. I started running farther and my overall times actually improved. Letting my body get those short bouts of rest, it actually propelled me to farther, much better long term progress and overall results. And it's not just true for running. It's true of life. I think it's so important that we pay attention to this pattern, this healthy rhythm that Jesus lived out for us. We can't ignore it. We can't explain it away and just say, well, you know, their culture was different back then. All throughout the Gospels, we see Jesus purposely withdrawing to to get alone, to rest, to pray, to be with his father. It was an essential part of his ministry. He needed that time to find strength to fulfill his calling. One time stands out to me in Luke five where it says yet the news about him spread all the more so the crowds of people came to hear him and to be healed of their sicknesses. And so I read that and go, hey, the plan's working, right? That's what Jesus came for. Tons of people are coming to him. The news about him is spreading. There's this tremendous opportunity for Jesus now to minister to these people to to heal more, to do more, to preach more, do more miracles. But it says Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed. Jesus purposefully withdraws from the people, from the crowds, from the opportunities to do good, the opportunities to to glorify God by what he was doing. That's how vital that time of rest was for Jesus. Instead of doing more, he opted to rest. He opted to get alone with God. You know, he could have kept going. He could have kept plodding forward in his own strength and and did more miracles, touch more people. He could have done more good. But he intentionally pulled away from the doing so that he could focus on the being.
Being with God, being strengthened and restored. That's what refueled him. He trusted that time with his father was actually more beneficial than just moving forward and doing more. Guys, there's always going to be more stuff to do. There's always going to be more stuff that we can try to cram into life. Isn't it be good to be busy and and to work hard and to achieve? Absolutely it is. As long as you're getting rest along the way, because rest refuel, it restores you so that you can continue to fulfill God's calling on your life, and so that you can be the person that God called you to be. Choosing to rest is an intentional choice. To trust God. That's what the picture of the Sabbath is all about.
That's why it's so important to God. It's not about some rule or law or regulation that we have to follow. It was it was something that God put into practice because he he wanted to get his people to trust him, to depend upon him, to rely upon him. Setting aside that time to honor God, to be with him, to rest from our effort and our work. When we do that, it's a demonstration that you're trusting God, that you're relying on him and not yourself. We've got to put our pride aside. That tells us to keep running, keep working, keep making it happen. Right? We gotta humble ourselves and make a purposeful decision in our hearts to trust God. God, I'm going to depend upon you in this. I'm not going to depend upon myself and my strength to make this happen. You know, this series is called disciple, and it's all about what it means to be a follower of Jesus and to be a follower of Jesus. It means what? That we follow his example, right? That we do what he did. And Jesus clearly modeled this rhythm of purposeful rest, this time away with His father to pray, connect with God, being with God, trusting that our rest, our time away from the effort and the stuff that are our choice to rest in God will actually produce more life for us. It's just a better investment of time. It's some of you today. You just need to give yourselves permission to rest. It's not weakness. It's okay to rest. It's okay to prioritize your need to rest. And I say this in the most loving way I can possibly say this. You're not God. He is.
It doesn't depend upon you. It depends upon him. And that's really, really good news for us.
And I just want to close this morning by reminding you one last time, there is a God given rest that is available for your heart. God has rest for you, and you experience that rest as you step into trusting him more and more. I actually want to go ahead and invite everybody to stand, everybody out and our man just go ahead and and stand up with us right now. And as you're standing, I want to just invite you to close your eyes for a moment, and I want you to just take a moment and think about the thing in your life. Or maybe it's the things in your life that are stealing your rest right now.
What's the biggest thing that's distressing your heart right now? We all have them. I want you to just think about that for a moment. Let it get in your heart. And even as you're thinking about that right now, I want you to just tell God. And you don't have to say it out loud. You can say it in your heart, but maybe it would be good to just say it out loud right now. I want you to just tell God. God, I trust you. God, I trust you.
God, I trust you with this. I trust you in this. God, I trust you with my marriage. God, I trust you with my kids. God, in that financial situation, that might seem impossible. God, I'm telling you right now, I trust you because we're not even worried about an outcome right now. We're not even asking God for anything yet. We're just telling him. God, I trust you. We're speaking to our own souls right now, and we're telling our souls. Return to your rest. Return to that place of rest. Because God is good. He is good. He has been good, and he always will be. He's so faithful. I want you to speak those truths over your own heart right now, specifically in regards to that thing that's weighing on you. God, I trust you. God, I choose right now to enter into your rest.
God, we thank you today that you have a rest that's available to us. I pray, God that you really would just strengthen our hearts, God, to trust you more and more. God, we want to grow in this. We want to focus on you, God, and who you are. God deepen our trust in you today. God give rest to your people. Lord, I pray God in every place in their life and every aspect of their lives, God bring new rest to their hearts right now. And God, I want to pray for anybody today, Lord, who would say, I don't even know God yet. I don't even have a relationship with Jesus yet. I want to tell you right now that the thing that will bring the absolute most rest to your heart is surrendering your life to Jesus, asking him to be your Savior and the Lord of your life.
It's simple. All you have to do is invite him to say, God, I want to surrender my heart in my life to you today. I want to give you control. I want to ask you to forgive me of my sin. Heal my heart. When you do that, he'll begin a relationship with you today. God, you're the best. Thank you for making rest available to us, Lord. And thank you for loving us the way that you do. Lord, we love you with all of our hearts. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.