Tim Forand

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Sunday Morning Service

Jeremy Richards

Copalis Community Church

30 August 2026

Bible References

• Hebrews 4:6-10

Audio MP3 PDF

So we're in Hebrews chapter four, Hebrews four.

So we've been talking about the promise of rest for the people of God. I believe this rest that is being talked about can easily be. We can easily use different words to describe this rest. And I believe it is this rest that every individual is, is earnestly seeking. We could use words like happiness, contentment, acceptance, joy.

You and I as human beings cannot escape the search we are in for these things. Significance, happiness, rest, contentment, joy. We are by nature and individuals, creatures who are hardwired to seek after these things. We want to be satisfied. We are, like some people have said, this God shaped box that can never be satisfied or rest until it is filled.

We are looking for these things. But just because we are all looking does not mean we are all looking in the same places and that all of those places can provide what we're looking for. We are all looking, yes, but what we find is actually drastically different.

That which is drastically different cannot provide the same thing. Here we're going to look at this rest. We've been looking a little bit up until now that Moses could not provide this rest. Moses could not lead people into the promised land. Still today, it is the same.

Moses cannot provide the rest that the soul is looking for. People think or feel, I just need to be a little bit better. I need to be a little more focused. I need to have my life in order. I need to be doing some more good things and less of some bad things.

And when I can get it straight, then I'm sure my soul will rest. If I can just do the things that make God happy, then I will be content. And some people spend their whole life searching through Moses to find rest. Hebrews tells us, Moses cannot give you rest. You as a person will never be good enough.

Your past cannot be atoned for by your works. Your future cannot be planned in such a way that you can engineer its cleanliness to a degree that your soul will finally say peace. I used to think, or at times, especially when I first came to the Lord, I thought that if I could go back to the stores that I had been robbing, stealing from, that I could, my soul would be at rest when I paid them back. I thought, surely when I go back and give them the money that it would have cost when I stole from them, then my soul will stop accusing me. It didn't.

It got worse.

Moses cannot give people rest. You will never be good enough. You can contort your body in all sorts of crazy positions, try to manipulate your Mind to only thinking one thing, and still you will be the same unrested person. Rest does not come from the law. Okay, we're going to move on from there.

Hope I said that in the clearest way. I don't want to allow any way of escape. You cannot find rest through Moses, but that does not mean there is not rest. Just because Moses can't lead you into the rest does not mean that rest doesn't exist. It says in verse five, speaking about those led by Moses in chapter four and verse five.

And again in this place they shall not enter my rest. Verse 6. Since therefore it remains that some must enter it, and those to whom it was first preached did not enter. Because disobedience, Moses law is not made to make a man righteous. Moses law is made to show a man his unrighteousness, show a man his disobedience.

They could not enter in because of their disobedience. Verse 7. And 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 heart. We began to look at this a little bit last week. That rest is found today, it is not found yesterday.

You might think that's a little bit strange, but if you think about how much time we invest in the past, how much of today's time, your current time, you and I are investing in our past, as if we could somehow find, fix it to a degree that would make us happy. I'm an idiot. I still think if I would have made that shot on that last game, I would be more happy today than I am now.

I'm such a retard. Can I really go back and fix it? Would it really make me happier? And yet some of us are spending much of our current time trying to fix the past.

Rest does not happen yesterday. It only happens today. It does not happen tomorrow. Some of us think that if we can regulate our circumstances to such a degree, plan our future, then somehow we could finally tomorrow we will for surely enter his rest. If I can get my business in order to than tomorrow, no rest happens right now.

There's a time period we can enter into God's rest when we're trying to enter it. Yesterday or tomorrow, you will find yourself always failing. Because that door which he opens, he only opens today.

Today. Stop worrying about yesterday. Stop fretting about tomorrow. Today is the day of salvation. Today is the day which he opens a door into his rest.

It says, today, if you will hear his voice, do not harden Your hearts. Now we're going to look in V8 just a little bit, continuing on. Well, what about your circumstances? Can you regulate your circumstances to a degree that you can enter rest? Some of us are planning for the future.

I'm not necessarily saying that planning for your future is a bad thing. I'm not. But can a planned future give a person rest? Can you arrange your circumstances to such a degree to put them in kind of an order? So finally, you will enter the promised land, your finances will be in such a good state, your relationships all smoothed out, that you're living with the people in the environment you want to live.

And finally, after all these years, you will have arrived, you've retired and entered rest. Is that true? What I find it's kind of a funny kind of a story an old guy told me is like, yeah, when, when I was small, I went to school. When I was a little bit older, I went to work. And now that I'm older, I go to doctor.

And that's kind of the change in lifestyles, right? Three different areas. School, work, and then you start going to doctor after that. But some of us think that, hey, I'm going to plan for my future. I'm going to arrange things to such a degree that I enter rest.

Is there a future physical spot that you could prepare for and make everything as suitable as possible, whereby entering into that physical position, your soul would be at rest? Finally, I remember the pastor who came and we were probably showing off our garden and our cows and such, and he looked at us and he's like, oh, you got the good life. Like somehow going back to the land or something and raising a garden give you satisfies the soul. It really gives you what you need. That's obviously not true.

Just a mess as anyone else. But there's a thing here, it says in verse 8, for if Joshua had given them rest, then he would not afterward have spoken of another day. So many times we hear about people trying to make, from the Jewish perspective, a journey. I believe if I said it super wrong. I'm sorry about Aliyah or Eliu, but basically making the transition from the secular world to the nation of Israel.

I'm going to go to Israel, and there in Israel I'm going to be at peace. I'm going to be at rest. I'm going to find there what my soul is looking for. But here, the author of Hebrews is saying, Joshua did not give them rest. You could find that perfect piece of property, that perfect house, that perfect amount of finances, and resources.

Jeshurin was talking to me last night about a guy. They did a job from yesterday and they got a motorcycle from this guy. It was some sort of big,000cc motorcycle with all these boxes and fancy stuff. He had fancy cars. He had a whole wall full of AKs and pistols and all this stuff.

He had a house overlooking the city with Mount Rainier in the background. He had stables for the horses that his wife wanted. And the feeling was, man, he must be at rest.

Everything. Can your physical position give you the rest that your soul craves? Is it possible to enter into the promised land by arranging your feet, physical reality to meet your desires? Here we're seeing in Hebrews, the author says it was not possible. Joshua did not give them rest.

There has not been, there is not a more disputed territory, a more sought after territory than the land of Israel today. And for the last however many thousands of years, there is no territory that would rather be gathered, be inherited than the nation. That place, that little piece that connects the Far east to Europe and to Africa, the nation of Israel. And yet even that land cannot provide rest to people who seek for it physically. And yet you and I are tempted at times to think that if we can just get our little piece of heaven, finally my corruption corrupted soul will settle down and be at peace.

Can it give us rest?

In verse 8 it says, for if Joshua had given them rest, he would not have spoken of another day. Before we move on, just for a second, a little bit of side note, if you would try to keep the thought of where we're going. This has the name Joshua here in a King James version. What word does it have there? Jesus.

Now, obviously this is not talking about or saying that Jesus cannot give you rest, but it is indicating something substantial about names. Here. Our name Jesus comes from the Greek, which, please, I don't ever say anything right, But I try. It's Jeus, a Greek word for Jesus, which is a Greek version of the name Yeshua, which is the shortened version of Yehoshua. Joshua, Right?

So the name here, even though it says Jesus, it is Jesus, but the name Jesus is Joshua. And still, if you would go to Israel, or individuals who like to think about Israel, many of them will use the name Joshua, which is Yeshua. Right? And so that is the discrepancy. Don't think that the King James is leading you astray by saying that Jesus can't give you rest.

No, Joshua can't give you rest. Jesus can. Okay, so in verse nine, just because Joshua can't give you rest. Just because your physical circumstances can't be arranged. Your financial that where you live, of where you spend your life.

Just because those things can't give you rest does not mean that rest is not available. It says in verse nine. There remains, therefore, a rest for the people of God. There is a rest which is offered, which is only offered to believers, irrelevant or not dependent upon their physical position.

Let me try it again. There is available for the people of God a rest that is irrespective of their financial position. It is not dependent upon how much land they own or whether they can see Mount Rainier from their living room windows. It is dependent upon something else. It has nothing to do with their physical situation.

Whether they have no money or lots of money, whether they're free or in jail, whether they own land or they're landless, whether they are employers or slaves. It is not important or it is not dependent upon any of these things. This rest, that which our soul desires, craves after and spend its life searching for, is not depend upon physical. Physical things. Someone's just like, well, you haven't seen what I've seen.

When I heard it go by, it was like, whoa.

And we're deceived. And we start thinking, you know, if I had those things, then I would be at rest. If I owned, if I possessed, if I are able to enter into these physical things, then I would feel good too. He said, no, there's a rest for the people of God irrespective of their condition, their position, physically. This is described in verse 10.

For he who has entered his rest has himself also ceased from his work, as God does from his. The ability to experience rest is. Is to experience a similar condition that God did upon ceasing from six days of labor and entering into the seventh day.

Some of us are like, that sounds great. Permanent retirement, right? No labor. But that's obviously not what it's saying. Jesus says, my Father has been working until now, and I have been working.

What we engage in is rest. When you compare what we engage in now compared to what we engaged in then six days, they are different. One is described as work and the other described as rest. The Jews had it all conflagrated. They said, you're working on the Sabbath day.

You're healing people. No. Jesus said, no, what I am doing on the Sabbath day is rest.

What you're doing every day is working. What I do all the time, from when I finished the foundation of the world until even though it is activity, though even though it is Times tiring, emotionally draining. It is rest. I take a part of what God is doing, that yoking up with him is rest, not any other thing.

I'm trying to be real nice and say that some of you are looking for rest in places that you will never find it. It's not mean to tell people they're looking in the wrong spot.

It's mean to tell people who are looking in the wrong spot that they're looking in the right spot. That's mean. Go to the doctor and they tell you got cancer. You say you're mean, but go to them and they tell you don't have cancer, which is meaner. I would rather know the truth about my search and circumstances than not know about it.

Some of us are looking for something good in the wrong spot. I think there are songs written about that from people who don't even know the Lord. They're looking for love in all the wrong places.

I'm not saying this in a strong way because you are guilty and I'm not. I'm saying we have a condition that leads, that facilitates a wrong way of thinking of which we are all participants.

For he who has entered his rest has himself also ceased from his work, as God did from his. This rest that God encourages us to enter not only encourages, but also knows that we will find rest for our souls. It says in verse 11, let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest lest anyone fall. According to the same example of diligence. Just because there is a door of rest doesn't mean that you're going to trip and fall through it.

It's not a hole in the ground that opens in front of you that you automatically fall in at some point of your life when the stars align. There is a diligence. There is an understanding, okay, if there is a door into God's rest, I need to look for it. I need to find find it. I need to hunger for it until I possess it.

There is a diligence associated with every individual who enters God's rest. We know the individuals that entered God's rest were Joshua and Caleb, if you remember. Caleb says, you know, when I come back to this, I want this mountain to be my inheritance. When everyone else his age had fallen in the desert those 40 years, Caleb was old, and do you know what he still wanted to do? I want that mountain.

I want the mountain I spied out. I'm going to attack those cities fortified up into heaven. Those people, the Anakim, of whom in whose sight I am but a Grasshopper, I'm going to go up and possess that land and take it from them.

Whoa, old man, you're not the same person you used to be. He said, no, I'm going to possess that land that was promised to me on the day I went up to spy out the land by Moses. There's a diligence that comes into possessing the land. Without that diligence, you're going to go back into the desert, round and round again until your corpse is consumed with every other individual who didn't enter in.

Without a diligence to enter. You and I are absolutely no different from any other person that has ever existed. Diligence, it takes diligence because you and I are deceived by professions of rest around us. We're told that things will offer rest. We're made sure of.

If you just do these things, then surely if you can just have this thing, if you just own that thing, then I know you'll be restful. It takes a diligent person to understand that those are attacks against rest, not open doors into rest.

I'm going to go to Luke 12, kind of give an idea about this rest.

In chapter 12 of Luke, verse 1.

In the meantime, when an innumerable.

People had gathered together so that they trampled one another, he began to say to his disciples, first of all, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. There is something still in our culture today that is influencing all the rags we pour our milk through. We can't see it, but we should be able to recognize the evidence that bacteria exist there, right? I like Pacific bread. Pacific bread makes bread.

But on their label, they say in our factories that make bread, we do not make any bread that has leaven or yeast in it. Because in a factory that makes any bread with leaven or yeast, all breads made within that factory have leaven or yeast. It is gone, goes everywhere.

We're going to Skip to verse 49. 49, same chapter. And from what I just read, chapter 12 until now, I believe we're given examples of what the leaven of the Pharisee is. But we're going to go to what Jesus is offering, this rest that he is inviting us to take part of, of which the leaven of the Pharisees takes away from us. This is the rest that Jesus wants for all of us.

I came to send fire on the earth, and how I wish that were already kindled. But I have a baptism to be baptized with. And how distressed I am till it is accomplished. Do you suppose that I came to give peace on the earth? I tell you, not at all, but rather division.

From now on, five in one house will be divided three against two and two against three. Father will be divided against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter in law against mother, in law against her daughter in law, and daughter in law against her mother in law. We're like, whoa. This is the rest that Jesus was talking about. This is what he wants.

This is the family plan for those who are at rest. This kind of division, Jesus is distressed. He said, I want this so bad. I'm willing to endure the cross so that individuals can enter into this position. It's not because he loves family splits that he's wanting this for you and I.

It's not because he enjoys families disintegrating and being at war. There is something that Jesus loves, a rest. We're going to keep our hands there just for a minute and go to Proverbs.

In Proverbs, chapter eight, we get a beautiful picture of the creation of the world. And probably someone knows better than me. I haven't come to the conclusion whether this is the Holy Spirit speaking, whether this is Jesus speaking or some other unknown voice of which I am not aware. But this individual speaking with of the author of Proverbs is dictating claims to be there when creation is made. I love it.

Starting in verse 27, not because that's the beginning, but because of time. It says, when he prepared the heavens, I was there. When he drew a circle on the face of the deep, when he established the clouds above, when he strengthened the fountains of the deep, when he assigned to the sea its limit so the waters would not transgress his command, when he marked out the foundations of the earth, then I was beside him as a master craftsman. Like I say, if you feel like you have understanding better than me, whether that's Jesus or the Holy Spirit, I would love to hear from you. You're your conclusion on that.

But we see they were involved in a work. We say, this was a beautiful work, but it was a work. But the work was not the focus. The work was only something to be done for six days. Because after that six days, he could enter into what he really wanted to do.

He could enter what would give him rest. In verse 30. Then I was beside him as a master craftsman. I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him, rejoicing in his inhabited world. And my delight was with the sons of men.

Here we see Something that which he created physically was work. The boys and I build things, build houses and such. It's work. But the real purpose isn't to work, it's for someone to live in. The work is for something, to enjoy it, to participate in it, to use it and hear the same way.

Jesus was working for six days, but his goal was to his delight. His focus was the enjoyment he would get working in the lives of people, the fellowship that he would have with them. His rest came from engaging in what delighted his soul. There's a difference between an individual who is a mechanic and someone who is building a car to take it into the demo derby. Everyone hear what I'm saying.

Stacy's brother's mechanic and he hated being a mechanic. I hate this job. This is the only job I can do, but I hate it. But then he started to build his demo derby car. He's like, I love working on cars.

What's the difference?

One thing was work and another, what he delighted in was not work to him. And so to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, the opportunity to engage with mankind is not work, only delight. Jesus takes great delight in rescuing people from sinful conditions, delivering from the dead ends of unrest, of turning them aside from the cliffs of hell. That is the thing he desires to do more than anything else. And what he wants to do in your life.

Also beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. We're going to work towards the conclusion. Those things are things that sneak into our life, telling us that satisfaction is found other places.

Jesus says no real rest is joining with me and my work. I have a mission and I will do it at all cost. I rescue people, even though sometimes it turns three against two. I go into houses where sometimes I'm just invited by one house and it turns the family into shambles. But in that rescue mission, I turn three people from hell below.

I delight in it, I love it. Sometimes it turns a man against his wife. But I'm willing to engage in it because I rescue someone from an uncertain future. I deliver them from a dead end of an empty lifestyle and give them eternal life. I'm willing to turn a daughter in law against her mother in law just for the chance of rescue one of them.

There is something that he is earnestly desiring to do so much that he will risk apparent disaster. You and I are called to enter that rest.

Ouch. You or I are called on a mission to enter, to yoke up with Jesus Christ, to bring life to individuals who otherwise may never receive it. His delight is the sons of men. My hope is that you and I would get to ask ourselves an honest question. Is my delight the same thing as God's?

Do I want to see people, other people, satisfied? If we do, we'll resist the leaven of the Pharisees, the temptation to use our resources on ourselves only. The temptation to use our time to store up for stuff in big barns. We'll resist those things because. No, I want to use every resource I have to enter into the rest that Jesus has offered to me.

I hope in your soul, after you've spent a lifetime under the torturous sting of the law, the faulty promises of Joshua, that your soul is saying, you know, I want rest. I want rest. And Jesus says, I want to give you rest. Come and walk with me. But it's not going to be an easy walk.

It's not going to be a walk without labor. It's not going to be a walk without diligence. But it will be a walk that gives rest to your soul. Soul. And I trust him because he's true.

There's no one who spoke the words like Jesus did. And I say, yes, Lord. Lord, it hurts. But I still say, yes, Lord. Yes, Lord.

And I pray that's our heart cry too. He's not saying it doesn't need to sting or it always has to feel good. No, that's our cry culture. Who's saying it's got to feel good? Jesus says, no, it's going to hurt.

But he says, come, it's going to give you rest. Amen. I hope you can take this in some way and benefit from it. Let's pray. Oh Father, we do come to you.

Lord, needy of rest. Our whole body crying for rest, crying for satisfaction and pleasure, Lord, only we've looked for it in the wrong places. Lord, we come to that humble Galilean, that man of Nazareth, that lowly carpenter. They don't even know where he's from. Speaking words of eternal life.

Rest, Rest. Eternal rest. Lord, we thank you. Call to our hearts we ask, Lord, help us to beware of that leaven of the Pharisees in Jesus name. Amen.