Invitation to Rest Pt.2
Speaker: Pierre du Plessis
Read: Genesis 2:2, Deuteronomy 5:12, Ecclesiastes 3:1, Matthew 11:28-30, Mark 2:27, Galatians 5:1
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:
1. What resonated with you as you listened to this sermon and reviewed it?
2. How does God’s invitation to rest challenge our present-day culture and what some people believe is normal?
3. It was said that by practicing sabbath, the restfulness of God effectively counters the restless anxiety of Pharoah (the world’s system of enslavement). What does this mean
to you?
4. Read Psalm 23:1-3. How does this passage relate to the idea of rest?
5. When you think of practicing sabbath, what challenges do you think you will face in setting aside a 24-hour period to stop, rest, delight and worship?
6. What benefits, blessings or type of spiritual transformation do you think might come as a result of observing the sabbath?
7. It was said that the sabbath is one of God’s rhythms designed to be observed every seven days. Look up and define the word rhythm. Then read Ecclesiastes 3:1-8. What other rhythms do you see in life?
SERMON RECAP
Every invitation that God extends to us has spiritual transformation at its core. To experience this transformation requires that we not only accept His invitation, but that we participate in the process. Such participation may include a personal effort, planning, and sometimes a complete paradigm shift. In the Book of Matthew, God invites us to rest or to sabbath. But we are warned that “desire” can stand in the way of accepting this invitation and engaging in the practice. The concept of sabbath is not new. It was in the very beginning when God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis tells us that He rested on the seventh day, not because He was tired, but to illustrate the rhythm of life’s seasons and to be an example for us. He made us to have need for rest. Later, when the Israelites were freed from the slavery of Pharoah in Egypt, God commanded that they do all their work in six days and observe the sabbath on the seventh day, as a holy day or one set aside for Him. To practice the Sabbath, we too must defy the systems of life that enslave us and cause us to believe that we need to strive to acquire more in order to be satisfied with our lives. We are reminded that we too have been set free and should not allow desire, worry or anxiety to burden or enslave us. We can stay free by entering a time of rest. To sabbath, we need to set aside a 24-hour period when we rest from working, thinking about working and from wanting and worrying. This becomes a holy defiance and declaration to ourselves and the world’s system of Pharoah. In sabbath, God replenishes us and recalibrates what’s important, and as we enter rest, it carries His blessings for the other six days.
