At this point, we are really beginning to grasp what it is to be dependent on God.
We realize that we are not sufficient within ourselves to be competent for any good work. Our only good comes from God.
We realize that to try to find sufficiency for good within ourselves is to depend on the strength of the flesh, which is to turn away from God.
We realize that in order to trust God, through Jesus, we cannot depend on what see and know naturally. We must have faith, and lean on his understanding rather than our own.
This is not an easy task to break out of the old way of doing things. It is a natural thing to depend our understanding on what we can see, and it’s not going to be easy to change.
In fact, when Paul was writing to the Galatian believers he said, “Walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.”(Galatians 5:16-17)
There is total opposition when you set out to do the right thing. This is to be expected. Nevertheless, we step out with courage, and boldness, being sure that we do not lose step with
the Spirit as we walk through our lives. It’s not going to be easy it will take all of you.
Maybe you’re saying to yourself, ‘I thought this chapter was called ‘Rest’, when exactly will we get there? Because we seem a little off track right now.
Not worry, here we go:
Rest starts with repentance. Remember what God said through Jeremiah; if you’re not resting in the strength of the LORD, you have turned from the LORD. The Hebrew word is ‘shuvah' (שובה), and it means to turn. Again, if you are not resting, you have turned from the LORD. How do you start resting? What is it going to take to get you back on track?
In order to achieve this place of victory over the flesh so that you can totally depend on God, and walk in the competence that he has given you, it’s going to take all of you. Totally and completely. You can leave nothing behind. This is
total surrender. A full and complete stop. Give up every ounce of energy to your King. This is where you will find your salvation. Don’t believe me? Look at what God says through Isaiah:
Thus said the Lord GOD, the Holy One of Israel, “In returning (repentance) and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.” But you were unwilling.19
Where will you find salvation? In repentance and rest. This is that same Hebrew word ‘shuvah' (שובה); turning back to the LORD. Stop finding strength in yourself! Let your strength be in God. Rest starts with repentance.
Where will you find strength? In quietness and trust will be your strength. A few chapters later Isaiah will be quoted famously saying, “Those who wait upon the LORD will renew their strength.”(Isaiah 40:31)
This is totally opposite from the rest of the world.
This is totally opposite from trusting in the strength of flesh.
This is in direct opposition.
You cannot have both.
It’s one or the other.
But the real question is in the last line of that verse.
Are you willing?
If you are willing to surrender, God is ready to be gracious to you.
Three verses down, in the same context, the Spirit gives this exhortation through Isaiah, and he says, “Therefore the LORD waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the LORD is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him.”
So the intended position is for you to be waiting on God. Yet, God is so often the one who is waiting for us. When we are trying to achieve anything with our own strength then we have turned from the LORD, and are unwilling to receive God’s help.
Check out the beginning of Isaiah 30
where these verses are from; this is the context.
“Ah, stubborn children,” declares the LORD, “who carry out a plan, but not mine, and who make an alliance, but not of my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin; who set out to go down to Egypt, without asking for my direction, to take refuge in the protection of Pharaoh and to seek shelter in the shadow of Egypt! Therefore, shall the protection of Pharaoh turn to your shame, and the shelter in the shadow of Egypt to your humiliation.
Does this describe you in any way? Do you make plans that are God’s plans or your own plans? Do you make alliances with people of the Spirit of God, or of your own wisdom? Do you go down to your own Egypt for protection; maybe a big, powerful government, or a powerful company, or person? Be careful not to do this.
Turn to the LORD your God.
He is waiting to be gracious to you.
If you seek out protection other than the LORD your God, your protection will only turn into your shame.
Earlier in the prophecies of Isaiah the LORD speaks of a similar scenario:
Your choicest valleys were full of chariots, and the horsemen took their stand at the gates. He has taken away the covering of Judah. In that day you looked to the weapons of the House of the Forest, and you saw that the breaches of the city of David were many. You collected the waters of the lower pool, and you counted the houses of Jerusalem, and you broke down the houses to fortify the wall.
You made a reservoir between the two walls for the water of the old pool. But you did not look to him who did it, or see him who planned it long ago.
There is nothing wrong with strengthening the wall of a city, or collecting water for the people. So what was the problem? They did not look to the LORD for their answer. It was the LORD who sending an invading army against them because of their sin. If they would have asked him, he would have helped. But as Isaiah would say in Chapter 30,
“They were unwilling.”
This is what it is to trust in the strength of man rather than coming to God in repentance, and trusting in him for your provision.
We must give up all the dependence on what we understand.
No matter the difficulty, God has the answer. He is the one who can tell you whether your difficulty is discipline to correct something you have done wrong, or if it is a test that he wants you to pass to prepare you for something great he has in store for you.
We must stop our striving, and rest in the LORD.
We need to repent from trusting in the flesh, and turn to God. He is willing. He is ready. He is waiting to be gracious to you. If only we will allow him to no longer need to wait for us, and begin to be the ones waiting on him, it won’t take as long as you might think. Trust him, not me. Just wait.
“My soul, wait thou only upon God.” -psalm 62:5
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