Hebrews 4 continues where the third chapter left off, using Psalm 95 as a warning and motivation to walk in faith and not allow unbelief to turn into disobedience. We are again jolted to reality by seeing that the generation of Israel that left Egypt but never entered the Promised Land fell short because of unbelief. They were preached the “Gospel” just as we have been but they did not mix faith with it. There is a tremendous difference between knowing the truth and believing the truth, one puffs up the other lives in humble obedience.
What I believe the author is trying to show is that the generation that died in the desert didn’t simply miss out on the Promised Land on earth, they lost their opportunity for rest, both in the temporary and the eternal. There is a rest for the people of God, a Sabbath that is not merely a ceasing from our physical labor but that is the end of our striving, our anxiety, our attempts at being made right and our fear of being rejected. Rest is found in Jesus, the place of knowing and believing that He is for me and that He has made me whole. Salvation is our rest, it is our gift of knowing that we have been set apart and have been chosen by God for now and forever. I pray today that we will not just hope for rest but that we will enter it; that we will take His burden and His yoke and that we will live lives that are not hoping that God will take us in but rather are confident that grace is sufficient and that I have already been hidden with Christ Jesus.