REVIEW
 
Today, we will be concluding our “Stress(ed) Out!” teaching, and I hope that you have gotten as much out of these teachings as I have. It could not have been timelier for me personally, as the Lord knows what we need and when we need it. Amen.  
 
So, we started out talking about the spirit of stress—that is, what stress truly is and how it affects us. We then talked about how Jesus gave us His very own peace. Therefore, we do not have to let our hearts be troubled—for peace is in our boat. We then began breaking down Jesus’ words in Matthew 11:28-30 and saw that Jesus gave some solid, practical steps to entering His rest.
 
But last week, we moved over into Philippians chapter 4 and looked at the life of a man who had more opportunity to live in stress than any of us—the life of the apostle Paul. We saw how in Philippians 4:9 he said, “The things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and the God of peace will be with you.”
 
So, we saw that Paul was saying that everything that this body of believers learned from him by his teachings, received from Him by what he shared with them, heard in him by listening to the way he talked, and saw in him by observing how he lived his life—all of these avenues that Paul used to mentor them—if they would do these things, the God of peace would be with them. And, of course, the same is true for us too.
 
And we learned that when he said that the God of Peace will be with us when we do these things, this meant that the peace of God will be with us—for the fruit of having the God of peace manifested in our lives is having the peace of God manifested in our lives! In other words, when we live in the presence of the God of peace, we will live in the presence of the peace of God.
 
So, we learned that if Paul said that all we need to do to experience the peace of God in our lives is follow his example and his teachings, what is it that we need to follow? Paul said that the key to experiencing the manifest presence of the God of peace in our lives—which results in us walking in the peace of God—is “doing” the four things he listed in Philippians 4:9.
 
Now, the first thing we focused on were the two words “these do” because it is very easy for us to slip into the deception that because we are hearing the Word of God, that it will begin to automatically work in our lives. The Word most definitely works, but it only works for those who do it. So, we learned that we need to look at this from time to time and honestly evaluate ourselves by asking the following question: “Am I being a doer of the Word or just a hearer?”
 
But the main thing we focused on last week was how the apostle Paul himself walked in this peace. And I mentioned that we could attribute the level of peace that he experienced to two things—his passion and his perspective. 
 
We saw that by his own testimony, Paul “labored more abundantly than” even all of the rest of the apostles (First Corinthians 15:10). And I mentioned how I have found that when we are truly seeking first the kingdom of God, this will automatically cause us to slip into that manifest peace that passes all understanding.
 
I also made the statement last week that our peace is found in our place! For example, some of the most peace I have personally ever experienced has been when I was on the mission field. When I am truly seeking first the kingdom of God and it is all about ministering to others, there is a great peace that is experienced. And so, I said that because Paul was a more earnest laborer, it yielded a peace in his life that was greater than most Christians have ever experienced.
 
Secondly, we looked at what caused this passion and zeal to seek first the kingdom of God was his perspective: You see, the apostle Paul was the professor of “Perspective 101!” Amen! This guy saw things through a different filter than even some of the other church leaders.
 
We saw this in his second letter to the church of Corinth, when he called these painful situations— “light afflictions” (see Second Corinthians 4:17)! The word he used for “light” here literally meant “non-burdensome” and was a reference to the weight of his trials. In fact, this is how Jesus described His burden (i.e. load) that is “light” (see Matthew 11:30). Therefore, Paul was saying that the afflictions that he suffered were not heavy, weighty, or burdensome at all. But aren’t these trials, tribulations and afflictions one of the primary causes of the stress that we experience in our lives? Sure, but Paul said that, when looked at from the correct perspective, they are actually light.
 
So then, the apostle Paul is a great example how one can live in the peace of God. But he not only exemplified how one can experience the peace of God by the way he lived his life, he also taught us, in a very practical way, how we can walk in peace, and I gave you some homework last week regarding his instructions. I asked you to read Philippians 4:4-9 several times this week because these verses are some of Paul’s most detailed instructions on how we can walk in peace.
 
THE ATTITUDE OF PEACE
 
So today, let’s begin to cover these verses, by backing up to verse 4 in this same chapter. Yes, we are going to look at the steps to walking in this peace: In this familiar verse, Paul tells us to “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, Rejoice.”
 
Now I am not going to take the time to break this verse down today, but I begin here because we need to understand that joy & peace work together. Someone might say, “What does rejoicing have to do with living in peace and freedom from stress?” My answer to this question is—more than you might think.
 
You see, I think far too many people live too seriously, which leads to the stress they experience.  What do I mean by that? I mean that they are far too intense and do not ever allow their heart and mind to rest.
 
I once heard a quote from C.S. Lewis that echoes what I am attempting to communicate to you today— “Joy is the serious business of heaven.” You see, when we get all grown up and all, we tend to think that we need to get serious about things, and that having fun and enjoying life like a child is a sign of immaturity. But I’m here to tell you, saints, that if you do not have a steady diet of joy and rejoicing in your life, you will have a hard time not getting wound up like a knot. Didn’t Jesus teach us that one cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven unless he change, becoming like a child? (see Matthew 18:3) We have to learn to relax, be free to be ourselves, and have a little fun in life. Why? Because it will help us to decompress and enter into rest a whole lot better. 
 
Don’t the Scriptures teach us that a merry heart does good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit dries the bones. (Proverbs 17:22)? So, having a merry heart evidently has a medicinal effect on our bodies, all the way down to the bone. And I’m sure this positively affects the soul too. Amen!
 
So, learning to rejoice all the time is a major key to maintaining peace. And one of the reasons why is because a lot of times we lose our peace simply because we lose our focus. We stop being thankful for what we have and enjoying the life we do have and begin to become discontent because of what few things we lack.
 
You see, the apostle Paul tells us in Romans 1:21 that one of the main reasons that unbeliever’s hearts become hardened is because they do not “glorify Him as God, nor are thankful.” This begins that steady drift from the things of God. And this process is not just true for unbelievers, but it is true for Christians as well. When we stop praising, worshiping, and thanking God for all He is and for all He has done, our hearts, too, can become hardened. And a result of our hearts becoming hardened is, of course, a lack of peace in our hearts. 
 
So, peace is an attitude—an attitude that is established in joy. Like we have learned when studying the fruit of the Spirit, joy precedes peace for a reason—and that is because joy will lead one into this peace and freedom from stress.
 
Which leads me to what the apostle Paul went on to say in verse 5, “Let your gentleness be known to all men. The Lord is at hand.” 
 
So, what does this have to do with walking in peace? I believe it means that we must make sure that we are living in such a way that we are representing the Lord properly.   
 
You see, the word “gentleness” essentially describes someone who is the opposite of a religious person. They are gentle, gracious, and patient, unlike someone who is very legalistic and judgmental. Which ought to teach us something about walking in peace—for how many of you know that there are not too many religious people (in the negative sense of the word) that have peace in their hearts.
 
Yes, peace is found in living the Christian life the way Jesus intended us to—not being law-based, judgmental and legalistic people, but also not living loose and lascivious lifestyles either. Both of these are ditches that we must avoid to walk in the middle of the road where the pure peace is.
 
Church, there is such a contentment and peace that comes over us when we do our best to live right in front of the world. Our conscience will stay clear and we will stay full of peace as a result, because our heart will not be condemning us.
 
So, peace is an attitude—an attitude that begins in rejoicing and results in living a life free from both legalism and lasciviousness. It is behaving properly and enjoying life in the freedom that Christ has given us.
 
THE PEACE SURPASSING ALL UNDERSTANDING
 
Now in verse 6-7, Paul specifically began his exhortation on walking in peace by saying, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.”
 
So, notice that Paul promises in verse 7, that if we do what he said in the sixth verse, we will experience the peace of God—a peace that surpasses all understanding.
 
Now what does that phrase mean? This means that this peace is a peace that transcends all comprehension. To put it in layman’s terms, it’s a peace that simply doesn’t make sense. When we have this supernatural peace in the midst of difficult circumstances, people will not be able to comprehend it. They will not be able to understand why we do not panic or get flustered when we receive bad news. But as I said earlier, not only will others not be able to understand it, we will be overwhelmed by it at times too! 
 
I can remember one specific day when I was just overwhelmed by this peace of God: I had spent the early portion of the day praying and studying the Word and then, that evening as I was spending time with a group at church, I just had to stop and tell them the awesome peace that I was experiencing. It was incredible—like I cannot explain! That experience was so paramount that I knew I had gotten a glimpse of something more that is available to us!
 
My friends, I can personally testify that there is more to the Christian life than the peace we experienced at salvation. Sure, that peace was great, but there is the peace that is available through the abundant life that Jesus died to provide for us! How many of us could honestly say we are currently experiencing that much peace in our lives? Sad to say, there are not many who do. 
 
But peace is a fruit of the Spirit and in order for it to be produced in our lives, our hearts must be cultivated properly to produce it. Wouldn’t it just be awesome to have this peace that surpasses all understanding working in our lives all the time? I’ll tell you—that is a recipe for a blessed life right there!  
 
So, let’s apply these truths from Philippians chapter 4 to our lives—for God gives us a solid promise that when we do, His supernatural peace will guard our hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. That means that both our hearts and minds will be guarded from the barrage of worry, anxiety and fear that the enemy likes to throw at us. His fiery darts will not be able to affect us any longer when this peace that surpasses all understanding is standing at the gate, keeping us safe and secure. Thank You, Jesus!
 
But the fact is, verse 6 of Philippians chapter 4 is the specific instructions that Paul gave us to experience the promise made in verse 7. So, let’s break verse 6 down in order to learn how to walk in the promise of the peace that surpasses all understanding.
 
BE ANXIOUS FOR NOTHING BUT IN EVERYTHING
 
Notice that the first exhortation he gives in Philippians 4:6 is to “be anxious for nothing.” This is just an old English way of saying— “Don’t worry about anything.”  But although in its purest definition this word “anxious” describes worry and anxiety, the Greek word literally means “to divide into parts.” Therefore, this word “anxious” describes having a preoccupation with other things that causes us to worry and be anxious.
 
You see, I consider the greatest robber of our peace to be the distractions of the world.  We have to learn to guard our minds from the cares of everyday life. If we let the anxiety, worry, and cares of the world take the place of precedence in our minds, then it will be downright impossible for us to walk in God’s peace. Why is this? It is because where the mind goes, the man will follow. Another way of saying this is what we allow our minds to meditate on will determine the state of our feelings and emotions. That is why it is imperative that we do not become entangled in the affairs of this life, because if our focus is on this fluctuating world, the peace of God will rarely affect our hearts and minds.
 
However, by giving us this command to “be anxious for nothing,” Paul was basically telling us to decide to stop worrying. In essence, he was saying, “Do not ever allow anxiety or fear to remain in your thought life! Make the choice to live worry-free!” You see, before we do anything else, we need to understand that it is never acceptable for a child of God to worry. Therefore, we have to, first of all, make the decision that worry, anxiety and fear are not to have a place in our lives. Amen?
 
But how do we cope with these opportunities to fret and worry when they are presented? How do we effectively deal with these temptations when they are thrown at us? The apostle Paul gives us the answer to these questions in the rest of this verse …
 
Notice again that Paul says, “Be anxious for nothing, but…” This one little word “but” carries with it the idea of “on the other hand.” So, what Paul was essentially saying was— “This is what you do since you are not to worry.” And what does he go on to say we can do to keep from worrying? He says, “but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.”
 
You see, the way we cope with the temptations to worry and fret is by, first of all, choosing not to meditate on the problems of life for any period of time. But we do that by immediately lifting those things up to the Lord in prayer. Paul tells us that in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. What this means is that we have to maintain a vibrant prayer life in order to quench worry and anxiety. When those temptations come, we should immediately cast all those cares over on the Lord because He cares for us (First Peter 5:7). It does not matter what the problem is, “in everything … let your requests be made known to God.” In other words, take those things that are trying to steal our peace to the Lord in prayer. Just ask and, as Jesus promised, you will receive. We know that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us, and if we know that He hears us, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him (First John 5:15).
 
These words “in everything” also teach us something very important. They show us that this response to fear and anxiety is not something we are to occasionally practice; this is to be our lifestyle. These two words teach us that casting our cares over on the Lord must become a regular practice that is generated from a close walk with the Lord. If we only communicate with the Lord when we have big problems and do not include the Lord “in everything,” we will experience very little peace in our lives. Therefore, our constant communion with God is essential to walking in the supernatural peace of God. 
 
Now I wish that this was all that is involved in keeping ourselves in the peace of God, but it isn’t. Why? It is because if all we do when there is a crisis in our life is just pray a little quick prayer and try not to worry, we will have far too much idle time for our mind to gravitate back towards the storms surrounding us. This is why the other part of this verse is so important where he interjected— “by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving…” These words are so important because they describe the manner, whereby we are to let our requests be made known to the Lord.
 
So, let’s look at these three words—prayer, supplication and thanksgiving—and find out the prayerful attitude we should have.
 
THE TRAIN, THE CARS, AND THE CABOOSE
 
Notice, first of all, that the first two words Paul used were “prayer and supplication.” Isn’t it interesting that Paul makes a distinction between “prayer” and “supplication”? The word “supplication” literally describes fervently asking God for things. So, what is prayer then? Some only view prayer as asking God for things, but that would basically make prayer no different than supplications, right? You see, while prayer can most certainly include our requests and petitions, evidently Paul thought there was a difference between what “prayer” is and what petitioning God is. 
 
So, if prayer is not just made up of our requests and petitions, what is it? The Greek word used for “prayer” here literally means “coming face to face and making a vow or declaration.” The first part of this definition—coming face to face with God—denotes closeness and intimacy and describes having a close relationship with God. But notice that the second part of this definition for “prayer”—making a vow or declaration—describes a statement, not a request. You see, a “vow” denotes making a commitment or a promise to someone, and these statements of commitment (i.e. vows) generally come during our times of worship. Coincidentally, making a “declaration” is proclaiming a statement of truth, and these declarations of who God is and what He has done are statements of praise. Therefore, this second part of our literal definition of prayer shows us that prayer is simply our fellowship with God and our praise & worship of Him. Herein lies the difference between what prayer truly is and what man has considered it to be: Prayer, in its purest form, is simply our communication with God based on the relationship we have with Him. It is not just us petitioning Him for our needs to be met, but includes fellowshipping with Him through praise & worship.    
 
So, what does our fellowship with God have to do with walking in the peace of God? It has everything to do with it! You see, we were created for relationship with God. It is the foundation of our very existence and purpose. Therefore, if we are not fulfilling our primary purpose, how are we going to experience all that God has provided for us to walk in? If we are not planted in the root of our salvation, how can we produce the fruit of our salvation? As we have previously mentioned, peace is a fruit of the Spirit. Therefore, peace is a product of our relationship with God which is to be developed through the person of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, our fellowship with the Holy Spirit through what the Bible calls “prayer” is going to greatly determine our peace level.
 
But does this mean that there is no place for bringing up our issues and needs to the Lord? Of course, it does not! While our fellowship with God and our praise & worship of Him are listed first in Paul’s response to anxiety for a reason, he then specifically made mention of supplications. Again, this word “supplication” literally describes our fervent petitioning of the Lord. No, not those long, drawn out times of petitioning the Lord where we tend to spend 90% of the time focusing on the problem and 10% on the solution; these “supplications” are referring simply to making our request in a spirit of faith. 
 
Now this too is an important part of the equation if we want to walk in the peace of God. The reason for this is because we have to learn to look to the Lord for our help instead of just trying to figure out what we are going to do. And this is the value of making supplications to the Lord:  It is us seeing the Lord as our solution and knowing that He is willing to both hear our requests and speedily meet them. And when our trust is in Him like this, we will take our problems to the Lord and leave them there, knowing He will handle it from there.
 
So, I would describe the “prayer” here as the train—for it is what drives everything in our prayer lives and it is what powers our peace. The “supplications” are simply just the cars that bring our needs to the Lord, but they are not to be what we begin our prayers with, nor are they to be what we end our prayers with either.
 
So how do we end our prayers? Let’s look at the last of these three words that the apostle Paul used to describe making our requests known to God—thanksgiving: With thanksgiving being mentioned last here in Philippians 4:6, this is why I like to call it, “the caboose of prayer.” Now this in no way indicates that giving God thanks is last in order of importance. The fact is, thanksgiving is an extremely important part of our prayers especially during these times of anxiety. So, let me explain to you why I believe it is mentioned last here. 
 
You see, it is so vital that our prayers and supplications are prayed in faith—that is, with a confidence and persuasion that God has not only heard our prayers, but that He will answer them. So, if we truly believe that our prayers and supplications are being both heard and answered, then what do we have left to do? You got it! Our response should be— “Lord, thank You for hearing me! Thank You that the answer is on the way! Thank You that You love me so much and, therefore, will perfect that thing which has concerned me (see Psalm 138:8)! Thank You for all that You are, all that You do, and all that You’ve promised! Amen!” You see, thanksgiving should always follow our prayers and supplications because being thankful is the true response of faith.
 
But there is another very important part that being thankful plays in us experiencing the God of peace in our lives: You see, one major reason that we lose our peace is because of what I would call a “perverted perspective.” For example, it is so easy because of the nature of the flesh, to put our attention on the few things that are going wrong in our life instead of all the things that we have to be thankful for. Therefore, when we focus on the few things that we lack instead of all that God has blessed us with, it is only natural that we will be filled with turmoil and anxiety. But what if we a cultivate a lifestyle of thanksgiving—constantly thanking God for all of His blessings in our life—instead of letting our souls gravitate towards the things we lack? What if we started thanking God for everything that is going right in our lives instead of focusing on everything that is going wrong? I guarantee you that this change of perspective will greatly promote the peace of God in our lives because, the truth is, our peace level is oftentimes a result of our perspective.       
 
So, do you see the role that prayer, supplication, and thanksgiving all play in us experiencing the God of peace and, therefore, the peace of God in our lives? Yes, having a vibrant prayer life is a vital key to maintaining peace. When we maintain a vibrant prayer life that consists of fellowship, praise, worship, thanksgiving, and casting our cares over on the Lord, then we will experience what verse 7 said— “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.”
 
THINK ON THESE THINGS
 
Now, in conclusion, I want us to continue in Philippians chapter 4 and discuss another very
important ingredient to maintaining the peace of God in our lives. You see, we just saw the important role that prayer, supplication, and thanksgiving play in our walking in the peace of Christ, but our prayer life is not all that is important for experiencing the fruit of these two blessed virtues of joy and peace. Why? Because we have to remain offensive in this thing! We have a lot of other time in the day to allow our minds to wander. So, there is a very important truth found in Philippians 4:8 that I want us to end with today that teaches us how to aggressively pursue peace in our lives.  
 
The apostle Paul said in Philippians 4:8— “Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy- meditate on these things.” What a powerful verse, Church! This very truth would absolutely transform our lives if we began to apply it.
 
Some of us have heard good teachings on the importance of the mind and learning to manage our thought life, but what I have found is that many of these teachings only deal with what we shouldn’t be thinking on. Yes, they only seem to stress the importance of not thinking on things that would lead us into sin, doubt, fear, etc. And while it certainly is important to not think on these negative things, I want you to notice a relatively simple yet profound truth found in Philippians 4:8: In this verse, the apostle Paul doesn’t tell us what not to think on; rather, he tells us things that we are to think on. In other words, he does not spend his time saying, “Alright guys, do not think on the following things…” No, he gives us a list of specific things that we should be thinking on. Why is this so important? The reason is because it is imperative that the Christian not just be defensive, but that we also be proactive and on the offensive in our thought lives.  
 
So, what are some of these things we should be thinking on, you ask? The apostle Paul lists them in specific detail in this verse. So, let’s begin to look at these different things that Paul told us to fill our minds with in order to be “mind-full” of the truth with no room for those renegade thoughts to rent space in our minds.  
 
In the beginning of Philippians 4:8, Paul said, “whatever things are true…” My friend, in order to live in joy and peace we must learn to think on things that are “true.” There are a lot of thoughts and imaginations that enter into people’s minds that they perceive to be true, but do not line up with God’s Word. Saints, God’s Word is truth (John 17:17). So, if what we are thinking on does not agree with what God has said in His Word, then it is not true. Period! It might seem right or even be considered a fact, but that does not make it true in the kingdom of God. No, what is true is the Word of God, and therefore, filling our minds up with God’s Word—meditating on His Word day and night—is part of what it means to think on things that are “true.”
 
What I believe so many of us struggle with, which causes us to lose our joy and peace, is thinking on things that are not even real. I have heard this spiritual epidemic called, having a “speculative imagination.” Let me give you an example of this: Say you are at work one day and one of your co-workers looks at you in a strange way. What so many of us tend to do is start speculating as to why they had that look on their face. Our minds will begin to formulate all kinds of ideas of what they might have been thinking. Mind you, this is pure speculation on our part. My point is this—our tendency is to take these situations personally, thinking everything everyone does is aimed at us somehow. And why is this? It is because most people are so self-centered. We think the whole world revolves around us. We usually do not think, “Maybe they are just having a bad day” or “Perhaps they had something else on their mind.” No, most people automatically assume the worst and take these things personally. But what if we were to just decide to think on what is true, and not on what we think is true? What if we would just lay aside all of our speculations of what others might be thinking about us and choose to think on what God truly thinks about us? I guarantee you that this will only result in us enjoying our day more. Amen?
 
So, Paul said that we are to think on whatever is “true”—to meditate on what God’s Word says because it is the truth. Sure, there will be times when people will say things about us that they believe are true. We may even adopt certain negative concepts about ourselves that we believe are true. But these things should not be allowed to rent space in our minds because the only thing that is “truly true” is what God thinks about us. 
 
Indeed, let God be true and every man a liar (Romans 3:4)! A “liar” is one who believes what is contrary to what God has said. God’s opinion of us is the only “true” opinion, my friend! So, only think on these things that are true. Amen.
 
The apostle Paul said next that we should think on “whatever is noble”: This word “noble” literally describes things that are “worthy of respect and reverence.” Did you know that there are a lot of things that we let ourselves meditate on that do not deserve the amount of attention that we give them? In other words, they are not worthy of the respect and reverence we give them. For example, staying with the last example we used, when we allow our minds to focus on what others believe about us over what God thinks of us, we are honoring what they think over what God thinks. The truth is this—what we think upon most is what we honor the most. If we are constantly giving our attention to one thing more than others, then we are acting as if that thing is worthy of more honor than other things. 
 
Here is a good question: What is worthy of our respect and reverence? What is really important to think about? How about the Lord, His Word, and all that He has done for us in our lives? These are things that are truly worthy of our focus and attention—not the things of this world. These are the things that deserve that place of “nobility” in our minds. When we allow our minds to be dominated by thoughts of this present evil age, we are giving them the place of honor that God alone deserves. 
 
Jesus told us that the first and greatest commandment is to love the Lord God with all of our heart, all of our soul, and all of our mind (see Matthew 22:37). So, by referring to our “mind,” the Lord was indicating that He desires for our minds to be dominated by thoughts that are directed towards Him. Some might see this as a little too radical, and others might consider this unreasonable, but the truth is that God considers this normal. To Him, it is simply natural that we esteem Him in our thought life. He alone is worthy of our thoughts, saints! So, think on these things that are truly noble!
 
When you study the next two words Paul used in Philippians 4:8— “just & pure” —you will find that they are basically synonyms for the terms— “righteous & holy.” Now these two words are incorrectly thought of in the modern-day Church as having the same meaning--perfection. If you were to ask many Christians— What is the difference between being “holy” and being “righteous?”—you would probably not find too many who could tell you the difference because they are generally both viewed as being totally absent of mistakes and faults. But this is simply not correct.
 
The word “righteous” describes “the state of being or doing what is right and in agreement with God’s standards.” I don’t have time to go into a lot of detail about this, but if you study “righteousness,” it was almost always used in connection with God’s heart of freeing the oppressed, giving to the poor, providing for the orphans and widows, etc. And with as much as you see in God’s Word of Him dealing with these issues, it is clear that doing these things are what is “right in God’s sight.” In other words, taking people who are in helpless situations and lifting them up out of their afflictions, is God’s standard for all of us.
 
On the other hand, the word “holy” describes “being set apart, different, clean and uncorrupted.” Like this word “pure,” it describes not letting our garments get dirty or soiled by the filth that is around us. Now most of the time, when we think of this word “purity,” we associate it with being sexually pure. And while that is most definitely a part of purity, being faithful and pure in our relationship with our Husband, Jesus Christ, is the big picture we should be looking at. So, what Paul was saying by instructing us to think on whatever is pure is to think on the things that promote faithfulness to our Lord.
 
So, when you apply these truths to your thought life, you find that God wants us to think on things that are right and in agreement with His standards—namely helping the helpless. He wants our hearts and minds to go out towards those who are in need around us. He wants us to think on things that promote holiness, not on things that are impure and, therefore, corrupt our relationship with Christ. Think on these things that are just and pure.
 
The next group of things that Paul says we are to think on is whatever is “lovely.” By using this word “lovely,” he was saying to think on things that are adorned and arrayed in love. In other words, “lovely” thoughts are thoughts of love. 
 
Now this is certainly not the only verse that tells us to think on thoughts of love: We are told in several Scriptures to think on things that promote the love of God—especially when it comes to our brothers and sisters in Christ. One in particular, tells us to “consider one another in order to stir up love and good works” (see Hebrews 10:24). The word “consider” in this verse literally means “to think about from top to bottom.” In other words, as Philippians 2:4 also says, this word describes focusing on and looking out for the interests of others and esteeming them better than ourselves. You see, what the flesh tends to gravitate towards is thinking about itself. From childhood, that fallen nature that we inherited veers towards these self-centered thoughts. But what the Holy Spirit desires to lead us into is thinking about others. His will is for us to begin to consider what is in their best interests, and He desires for us to think about things we can do that might bless them.
 
Based on Hebrews 10:24, by “considering” one another—that is, being mindful of everything which concerns them—we can actually stir up the love of God in our lives. By thinking these thoughts of love, we can begin to generate love and good works in our life because our focus will be on the needs and wants of others. This is a practical way that we can grow in walking in love and there are not many better ways to walk in the Lord’s joy and peace than to walk in His love. Therefore, think on things that are lovely.
 
But not only does the flesh have the tendency to think self-centered thoughts; it also has the tendency to be pessimistic---that is, to think on things that are negative. We have all witnessed this. There are certain people who just cannot seem to think on the positive side of things. Their focus is always on what they do not have, what they cannot do, and what they do not know. This is a characteristic of the flesh and is most certainly not having the mind of Christ. This is why Paul goes on to tell us to think on things that are of “good report.” Church, God desires for His people to trust and believe Him and this involves thinking on what He has done and what He has promised. He wants us to have His perspective on things—to be able to see people and circumstances through His eyes. 
 
There is perhaps no greater example of this than in Numbers chapter 13. In this account, twelve leaders of the children of Israel were sent to spy out the land. But when they returned, ten of the twelve gave a “bad report”—stating that they were like grasshoppers compared to the giants who were already dwelling in the land. Therefore, they did not believe that they could possess the land that God had promised them. You see, these ten spies were thinking on things that were of a “bad report” because they were looking at the impossibilities instead of the “good report” that God gave them.
 
Now before we condemn the children of Israel here, let us ask ourselves: How many times have we done this same thing? Problems arise in our lives, and instead of considering that God is on our side and He is resolved to fight our battles for us, we begin to fear, thinking about what these problems might result in. This is thinking on things that are of a bad report. But we are told to think on whatever is of a good report, saints! 
 
This is what the other two spies did: Joshua and Caleb did not ignore the fact that there were giants in the land, but their focus was so much on both God’s presence and His promises that they encouraged the people that they could go up at once and possess the land. Therefore, Joshua and Caleb were thinking on things that were of a good report, and this different spirit in them produced the faith and confidence we see that they obviously had. We too, when confronted with difficult challenges, should choose to think on who God is, what He has done, and what He has promised. This will likewise lead us into our Promised Land of peace!  Think on things of a good report.
 
MEDITATE ON THESE THINGS
 
The apostle Paul then goes on to conclude his list of things that we should be meditating on by summing up everything else we should purposefully be thinking on:  He says, “if there is any virtue or if there is anything praiseworthy— meditate on these things.” This phrase makes such an important point that every Christian would do good to understand.
 
You see, there is something that I have noticed in my relatively short walk with the Lord amongst “religious” people: They tend to always focus on the negative in people and circumstances. For example, they will look at someone whom they consider to not be as “spiritual” as them and magnify their faults and shortcomings. They will focus on the sin that they see in that person’s life and can only seem to see the areas that they fall short in. But this is not the way a Christian ought to think, Church! God is love, and love covers a multitude of sins (see First Peter 4:8). Love believes the best in people. It sees the potential in others and expects them to reach that potential.  So, love is not critical; it thinks on the positive.
 
Now that leads me to this final phrase in Philippians 4:8: What did Paul say that we are to think on? He said, “if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy…” Someone might say, “Yeah, well that’s the problem, pastor! There isn’t anything!” I am here to tell you—that is simply not true. There is always something we can find that is virtuous and praiseworthy to think on even when it comes to those who irritate us. So, what should we be thinking about our neighbor? We should be thinking on their virtues—that is, their good qualities and moral excellencies. We should be thinking on the things in their lives that are praiseworthy—things that are worth talking about and that deserve to be praised and glorified. 
 
And even if you are certain that they possess no virtues and there is nothing praiseworthy about them (which I highly doubt), you can meditate on the opportunity you have to develop character, patience, etc., simply by having them in your life. Did you know that this is what James used as his basis for instructing us to “count it all joy when you fall into various trials” (see James 1:2)? It was that the testing of our faith would produce more patience in us! So, if you cannot find a silver lining in the person themselves, think on the virtues that your positive response to them will produce in your own life. If we were thinking spiritually, this would be our mindset.   
 
But what do so many in the Church do? They do not focus on the virtues of people both in and outside of their church; they think on and point out their not so virtuous qualities and characteristics. They choose not to look at the things that are worthy of praise in individuals. In fact, what they do “praise” is their sins and shortcomings. This, my friends, is ungodly! Aren’t you glad God does not do that with us? Contrary to popular belief, God does not focus on our weaknesses and mistakes; He focuses on our potential. Take any good parent for instance: They have an uncanny ability to only see the good in their children and are oftentimes blinded to the things in them that are not so virtuous. And why? The reason for this is because this is what true love does. It focuses on the virtues and things that are praiseworthy in the ones it loves. Again, a parent will do this to the point where they cannot even see their child’s weaknesses.
 
The same can be said for circumstances: Some people just tend to focus on things that are negative and depressing like the condition that the world is in, political and social issues, the state of the Church, etc. Sure, these things are unfortunate and we should desire to see them change, but there is a bright side to everything. God is working in the earth today and people are getting saved by the droves every day. So why not praise the things that are worthy to be praised instead of “praising” what the devil is doing? This should also be applied to how we think of ourselves. We should not allow our unregenerate minds to always focus on our not-so-virtuous qualities that are not yet crucified or on the negative situations in our lives.
 
The bottom line is that we need to think on the things that have any virtue or are praiseworthy. It is not “spiritual” to focus on the negative. In fact, it is very unspiritual. As believers, we should be the most positive people on the planet. My friend, thinking like this will lead our emotions and attitude where they need to be—full of peace. Amen.
 
So, to summarize the things Paul told us to think on in this verse, they could be summarized in God Himself. Our Holy, Triune God—the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit—He is true and He is the Truth. He is noble and honorable. He is just and righteous. He is holy and pure. He is the good report—the Gospel. He is wholly virtuous and He alone is praiseworthy. So, to think on these things is to think on God Himself; and nothing will yield greater pleasure in our hearts than to keep our minds full of Him. Amen?  
 
And the awesome promise we have in the Scriptures is that when we keep our minds stayed on Him, He will keep us in perfect peace. So, this is the key to walking in the peace that surpasses all understanding. It is aggressively keeping our minds stayed on Him—by the way we think and also by living in constant communion with Him. This is how Paul experienced the presence of the God of Peace in his life and how we can too. Amen. 
 
Church, this is how we can get the stress out and keep it out. It’s a mentality—a non-compromising attitude that we will live free from stress—and that we will follow His instructions to walk in the peace He has already sown into us. Peace is our inheritance! Stress is not! So, let’s fight for it! Amen! 

​REVIEW
 
Today, we are continuing our series entitled “Stress Out!” and most recently, we’ve been breaking down Jesus’ words in Matthew 11:28-30. So, let’s quickly review what we’ve been learning:
 
The first thing we learned is how the Lord was addressing “all you who labor and are heavy laden.” We saw that this is just another way of describing a stressed-out people and that those who are experiencing this stressful life need only do one thing—to come to Him! Yes, Jesus invited everyone who labors and is heavy laden to come to Him in order to receive rest for their souls.
 
And we covered a couple of weeks ago what this rest truly is: We learned that while one rest is given (vs. 28), the other is found (vs. 29). Yes, one is experienced when we come to Christ upon making Him our personal Lord and Savior. This is the positional rest we have entered into—and many of us can attest to immediately receiving this rest the moment we called on the name of Jesus and were saved from the burden of sin. However, we saw that there remains a rest that we can partake of experientially—and that is when we exchange our weakness for His strength and learn to wait on the Lord and draw near to Him in fellowship. But like we saw, this rest for our soul must be found—which indicates that we have to search for it. 
 
So, we learned some very practical ways to do so: For example, we have come to learn that it actually is a good thing for everyone to rest one out of every seven days. Therefore, we said that this is a good principle for each of us to live by in order to live free from stress: have a day each week where we detach, disconnect, and decompress—that is, where we lay down every project, where we turn the phone off, where we don’t even try to problem-solve in our minds; just a day of rest where we put our relationship with the Lord as our priority and we even enjoy some nice recreational things that do not require a lot of physical or mental energy. I bet if we would make sure to schedule this on a weekly basis, we would live more stress-free lives. Amen?   
 
But we also learned that it is wise to schedule periodic times of rest throughout the year where we can cease from the physical and emotional labor and focus on the spiritual side of our life. Not only that, but we learned that we also need a certain period of time every day in order to find rest for our souls. What I mean is, we need that period of time every day to “come to Him,” simply meditating on His Word, praising & worshipping Him, etc., to where that rest is found daily.
 
And, finally, we learned that what we do during those “sabbaticals” is important as well. Yes, reading the Bible is important, praying for others is important, but there is something very specific that you and I can do that actually causes us to enter into His rest. And one of those things that we can deliberately do to enter into His rest is to speak in tongues! Yes, Isaiah chapter 28 teaches us that this is the rest that is available for us.
 
Now, last week, we looked at another qualifier that Jesus mentioned for finding this rest for our souls: It is what Jesus said at the beginning of verse 29 when He said, “Take My yoke upon you…” We went into great detail on what this means and learned not only what His yoke is, but how to take it up.
 
In answering the question of what this yoke is, we found that this was an interesting way to describe how one can find rest for their souls. I mean, to use the example of wearing a yoke—which was used for laboring, not resting—that seems like the opposite of finding rest. Amen?
 
But the first thing we said is that it is obvious that the Lord was differentiating between the former and first yoke—that is, the first covenant, which came to be called by the apostle Paul, the “yoke of bondage” (see Galatians 5:1). So, His yoke—which would be this new covenant that Jesus’ blood provided for us—is what He is offering for everyone who labors and is burdened down to take up. And in this new covenant of grace is found all the rest and freedom from stress that we will ever need!
 
You see, grace always precedes peace, and this peace is what we are striving to live by. We see this in many of the apostle Paul’s blessings that He spoke over his churches. For example, here in Galatians 1:3 he says, “Grace to you and peace from God…” Therefore, understanding the grace of God will always promote peace in one’s life—which as a result will yield freedom from the stresses of life.
 
Now we also found out what Jesus was not saying: He was not saying that there is another yoke out there other than the yoke of bondage—the law—that we are to take up and put on in place of the old yoke. Jesus did not go to the Cross to provide us with another updated and improved yoke of religion. That is not what the new covenant of grace is, and is not what Jesus was saying here.
 
You see, the example that is being used here is not of us exchanging one yoke for another, but of us getting yoked up together with Him. We learned that the word Jesus used for “yoke” here literally described a wooden yoke that joined two animals together. So, it was not describing one yoke for each animal. No, the purpose of this particular yoke was so that they, through their combined strength, would pull a load that generally would have been too difficult for one animal to pull by itself. Therefore, this “yoke” made the two one.
 
Now let’s relish in this one truth for a moment: Me … You … All of us … Have the glorious opportunity to get yoked up together with Christ. This describes us co-laboring with Him just as we have been made joint-heirs with Him. It is not Jesus way up there, and us way down here. In His righteousness, Jesus has made available a way for everyone who believes on Him to share equally in His righteousness. Yes, and He has also offered for everyone to come labor work together with Him in the same field and on the same footing. What an honor and a privilege! Amen? Glory to God! 
 
So, back to this yoke Jesus referred to: As a result of being yoked up together, these two cows, bulls or ox were collectively stronger, and their combined strength made their task easier. Now the obvious reason that they did this was because even the strongest “beast of burden” could not pull the load on some jobs. There were certain things that needed to be done that required more strength than their strongest animal could carry alone.
 
You see, we might be the strongest one in God’s flock, but we still have our limits on what we can carry on our own. Yes, every single one of us has a limit to what we can do for Him. But the error I see most of us making at times is that since we feel we can do it, we do it, and because we might seem to be strong enough to handle something, we grin and bear it. While that might sometimes be what needs to be done, I don’t think this is the primary way that the Lord would have us live the Christian life. That’s right: I believe that we need to have the wisdom to know that things like working harder, toughing it out, and doing things in our own strength is generally not God’s best. So, what is God’s best? Getting yoked up together with Him, and letting Him provide the strength and power that we need to carry our load.
 
You see, there is One who is stronger than I—and His name is Jesus! And He has promised me that if I will take His yoke upon me, I will experience a light and easy load and that I will find rest for my soul. And why? It is because Jesus is the strongest Ox of them all and, therefore, He is carrying the brunt of the weight. In fact, if we would just consider the strength of the Savior, I think it would be clear that He doesn’t need any of our help. Yes, Jesus is doing just fine pulling the full weight of the work, thank you very much. We are just along for the ride. Glory to Jesus!
 
And this beautifully illustrates this new and better covenant. There is nothing you and I can do to add to the work of Christ! Jesus paid it all! He carried it all! Our sins are no longer to be carried. Our cares are to be cast over on Him. Jesus, and Jesus alone, has done the work of salvation. And this is not just in regard to our eternal security. Jesus also wants to carry the full brunt of the things you need in your everyday life as well.  
 
I’ll tell you—this is the LIFE. Learning to do things His way and resting in the finished work of Jesus is a stress-free way to live.  And He goes on to say this about His yoke in verse 30—It is easy and it is light. 
 
We saw that the word Jesus used for “easy” literally describes something that is “fit, manageable, and pleasant.” Therefore, His yoke is “easy” because it fits, is easy to handle, and is simply pleasant. He goes on to say that His burden is light, and we saw that the word “burden” is a poor translation. It is actually the same word we looked at in Galatians 6:5, which was correctly translated as “load” in the NKJV. You see, nothing in the New Covenant is “burdensome.” The moment we begin to feel “burdened” is the moment we have become unyoked from Christ. Yes, every believer is called to carry their own load (see Galatians 6:5), but when a Christian is burdened down, that is when we are supposed to help alleviate those burdens from our brothers and sisters. So, the Lord was literally saying here that His load is light. In fact, the only other time this word for “light” is used in the New Testament is in Second Corinthians 4:17 when the apostle Paul referred to our “light” afflictions. (We might get into that a little today)
 
My point is that the Lord said that His yoke and His load are easy and light, as opposed to hard and heavy. The moment things begin to get hard and heavy is the moment that we are carrying those cares ourselves. “Burnout” comes as we do all the pulling ourselves. This is not what the Lord intended. If we are yoked up with Christ, what we will sense is a much more light and easy experience in the difficult situations we walk through in life. This is when we must learn to yoke ourselves up together with Him to where He does the majority of the pulling.
 
Friends, the Christian life is meant to be light and easy, not heavy and hard. And the moment we begin to feel like our burden is heavy and hard is the moment we have simply realized that we are taking our own yoke and are not benefiting from Him pulling the weight for us. The only time that it becomes laborious is when we, of our own accord, unyoke ourselves from Him and try to carry the weights of this life ourselves. This is when the Christian life becomes burdensome and overbearing and we, as a result, lose our peace.  
 
So, the next question we asked was—How does one take His yoke upon themselves?
 
Well, the first thing we need to understand is that He is not going to make us take it. He doesn’t tell us to pray that God throw this yoke upon us. Yes, I don’t see in the Lord’s prayer—Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be your name, Your yoke come, Your putting it on me be done…” No, Jesus tells us to take His yoke upon us ourselves.
 
I said that I believe we find that answer back in verse 28 when Jesus said, “Come to Me … and I will give you rest.” So, it would be incorrect for one to start assuming that we take His yoke upon ourselves all kind of other ways without considering the context. Amen?
 
So, I think it is safe to assume that the way we take His yoke upon ourselves is by first coming to Him. Now, again, coming to the Lord describes both proximity and perspective—meaning, it describes us literally drawing near to Him and abiding in our True Vine and it also describes us turning our attention to Him and looking unto the Author and Finisher of our faith. Therefore, when we do that, we take His yoke upon us and benefit from the strength He has to offer.
 
We then looked at several Scriptures that talk about how we can “Come to Him” and receive His strength. So, if you missed last week, you can listen online.  But the main point that was made is that it is imperative that we learn to “come to Jesus” when we are feeling overburdened and stressed out. And we come to Him by setting aside times to draw near to Him and draw our strength from Him that way, but we also come to Him by putting our focus and attention on Him and what we say as a result.
 
I can assure you that if you make your personal relationship with Jesus a priority in your life and then adopt the mentality of faith that takes His Word at face value, you can “take His yoke upon you” and as a result “find rest for your souls.” Like we learned—it is an easy fit and not a burden in the least. It is a light and easy yoke, and that is because Jesus has both done the work for us on the Cross and because He is doing the same today, carrying the load. 
 
However, the next point that I want us to move into today is that Jesus did not just encourage us to take His yoke upon us in order to find this rest for our souls; He included in this verse that we are also to “learn” of Him.
 
THE YOKE OF HUMILITY
 
But before we get into what this means to learn of Him, I want you to notice one of the motivations for Jesus telling us to do these two things. He said, “for I am gentle and lowly in heart.” So, it was because of this “gentle” nature and how He is “lowly in heart” that we can both take His yoke upon us and learn of Him.  
 
Why did He describe Himself this way? What does this have to do with us entering into His rest? Well, the word “gentle” is only used this one time in the New Testament, and describes one who is gentle, mild, meek and humble. The phrase “lowly in heart” also describes “humility” as it denotes someone or something that does not rise far from the ground. Therefore, this person who is “lowly in heart” is someone who is “base” or of “low degree”—not that they are less and lower than others, but that they choose to lower themselves for other’s benefit. So, this is how Jesus described Himself—with the characteristics of humility—and this is what He told us to learn from Him.
 
Now it stands to reason that if the High & Lofty One Himself was able to humble Himself like this, don’t you think you and I ought to do this as well? Yes, if Jehovah Elyon can lower Himself to this degree, then we ought to operate with the same lowliness of mind ourselves. Again, not thinking lower of ourselves than we ought to think, but choosing to not think more highly of ourselves than we ought to think either (see Romans 12:3).
 
And make no mistake about it, this humble opinion of ourselves has a lot to do with us finding this rest for our souls. Why? Because don’t you know that the things which produce stress in our lives—things like worry, anxiety and fear—contain an element of pride in them?
 
You see, pride is not exactly what we think it is. While pride certainly includes haughtiness, arrogance and being a braggart, at its root, pride is simply “self”—self-centeredness & self-reliance. This certainly includes these more obvious forms of pride that scream— “look at me!” but they include the other more subtle forms of pride that only looks to itself as well. So, for you or I to worry about something that the Lord has told us not to worry about and that He said He would provide for us would be pride on our part because we are not humbling ourselves to our Creator and trusting in who He is and what He has said.  
 
But the fact is that Jesus described Himself this way to us for a couple of reasons: Number one, it was to show us that this is how the Godhead operates. You see, the Lord is not in the business of forcing things on us and driving us like the former yoke—the law—did. No, God is gentle, meek, mild and humble. He does not force His yoke on us; He wants us to take it up and put it on ourselves. As the Lord Jesus said to Pastor Robert, He has come to us, now we must come to Him. But the second reason I believe that Jesus described Himself this way was because He wants us to learn to become that way as well. That is why He didn’t just say for us to take His yoke upon ourselves but also to “learn of Me.”
 
LEARN FROM ME
 
So, what did He mean by this? Well, in my opinion, the phrase “learn of Me” is not the best way to translate this. The word “of” here comes from the Greek word apo which literally denotes coming away from something. In other words, it describes where something originates from. So, perhaps a better translation would be— “learn from Me.”   
 
Now there are a couple of ways that we can “learn from” someone else. One is obviously by listening to their words and learning by what they are verbally teaching us. But another, arguably more effective, way to learn from someone is by their example—that is, we watch how they do it themselves and learn by observation.
 
Therefore, I believe what Jesus was saying here was for us to learn by His example and how He lived His life. So, apparently, we can look at Jesus’ life and learn how to live this stress-free life of rest that He described here. But we can also learn from Him personally too—for Ephesians 4:20-21 teaches us that we can learn directly from Jesus Himself. Amen?
 
Now we could certainly go through the Gospels and find instance after instance where Jesus Himself kept His heart free from the troubles that surrounded Him, but lest we look at the example of Jesus’ life and think— “Oh, well, that was Jesus. We can’t do that. He was the Son of God … Yadda, yadda, yadda …”--I feel led for us to look at someone else who learned from Christ just like we would have to and see how this man walked in this peace that passes all understanding. No, I am not talking about Peter, James or John. I am talking about the apostle Paul!
 
You see, the apostle Paul invited us to follow him even as he followed Christ (see First Corinthians 11:1). So, even though this apostle didn’t physically walk with Jesus while He was still on the earth, he had learned how to follow Him and walk with Him by faith. And one could make a case that He knew the Lord Jesus even better than the likes of Peter and John. I know that is strong statement, but there are a lot of things in the New Testament that point to that.  My point is that we can follow this man’s example, trusting that he was following Christ himself.
 
So, let’s turn over to one of this man’s writings—Philippians chapter 4—and begin looking at a passage of Scripture that I believe teaches us how to eliminate the stress from our lives in a very practical and clear way. Yes, I believe these verses we will begin looking at this week are a way for us to “learn from Him” and find rest for our souls.
 
But I want us to start expounding on the end of this range of verses because this verse shows us why the apostle Paul is such a great example of living free from stress: Notice how in Philippians 4:9 the apostle Paul says of himself, “The things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and the God of peace will be with you.”
 
So, Paul was saying here that everything that this body of believers learned from him by his teachings, received from Him by what he shared with them, heard in him by listening to the way he talked, and saw in him by observing how he lived his life—all of these avenues that Paul used to mentor them—if they would do these things, the God of peace would be with them. And, of course, the same is true for us too.
 
THE GOD OF PEACE
 
First of all, what did Paul mean when he said that the God of peace will be with us if we do these things? Didn’t the Lord promise to never leave us nor forsake us? Didn’t He promise that He would be with us, even to the end of the world? Sure, He did! So, why did Paul say that God will be with us if we do the things that He both taught and demonstrated in his life? That seems contrary to these other Scriptures that teach us that God is with us simply because of who we are, not because of what we do, right?
 
But we must understand that there is a difference between God being with us spiritually and Him being with us experientially (i.e. tangibly in the physical realm around us). God most certainly is with us all the time positionally—in the spiritual sense—but we also have the ability to have Him be manifested in our lives in an experiential and tangible way.
 
But we need to understand that us physically experiencing Him is not automatic. If it were, we would all be experiencing it—for God is no respecter of persons. No, in my experience, only a few believers consistently carry the presence of the Lord with them in their everyday lives. But this is a blessed place to live, saints—where His presence is experienced, felt, and tasted. Amen!
 
But the apostle of faith had a specific fruit of God’s tangible presence in mind here. Mind you, the context of all that he was teaching in Philippians 4:6-9 revolved around peace. So, it can be surmised that he is concluding his instructions on walking in the peace of God by saying “the God of peace will be with you,” right? Therefore, it is clear to me why Paul referred to God as “the God of peace” here: Again, it was because the subject up to this point in Philippians chapter four is the peace of God.
 
Now here is a powerful truth: The fruit of having the God of peace manifested in our lives is having the peace of God manifested in our lives! In other words, when we live in the presence of the God of peace, we will live in the presence of the peace of God. So, when we have peace, we’ve experienced a piece of God. Hallelujah! That is what the Holy Spirit had in mind as He inspired this truth to be recorded!
 
Therefore, the examples that the apostle Paul gave through his words and deeds are how we can experience more of the God of peace in our lives which, in turn, causes us to experience more of the peace of God in our lives. Peace is the manifest presence of the God of peace.
 
You see, peace is the manifest presence of God. This is why time spent in the presence of God is so important! Strife is the manifest presence of the devil. But when you have the peace of God all around you, that’s proof that you have God all around you. Fear and strife are the devil personified, while love, joy and peace are the Lord personified! 
 
So, if Paul said that all we need to do to experience the peace of God in our lives is follow his example and his teachings, what is it that we need to follow? Well again, what did he say in verse 9? “The things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and…” Therefore, the key to experiencing the manifest presence of the God of peace in our lives—which results in us walking in the peace of God—is “doing” these four things.
 
BEING DOERS OF THE WORD
 
Now, first of all, we need to camp on these two words “these do” before we move into the four other things that Paul listed. Why? Because it is very easy for us to slip into the deception that because we are hearing the Word of God, that it will begin working in our lives. The Word most definitely works but it only works for those who do it.
 
Sure, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. Sure, there are benefits to continuously hearing the Word of God, like it will renew our minds and can produce fruit in our hearts. But, as James said in his epistle, we need to “be doers of the Word, and not hearers only, deceiving ourselves” (see James 1:22).
 
Saints, it is apparently very easy for us to slip into the mentality that we are “doing” the Word simply because we are coming to hear the Word. There is a subtle lie that our flesh and soul will feed us, and that is, by coming and at least hearing the Scriptures being taught and proclaimed that this is enough to get us blessed. But this is simply not true!
 
James goes on to say in James 1:25 that when we are a doer of the Word, we will be blessed in what we do—not what we hear, but in what he or she does. Amen!
 
For example, this is why someone can come to church, attend bible studies, go to Sunday school, listen to teachings through various forms of media like television, CD’s, etc. for year after year and not grow, and not experience change, and not see the fruit of the Word in their lives. Why? Because, as Jesus taught us in His Sermon on the Mount contained in Matthew chapters 5-7 and Luke chapter 6, we must build our house not on just hearing His Words that He taught them on that day, but on applying those principles in their lives. He said this is what will cause their house to be built on the rock and what will enable them to overcome the rain, floods and winds of life.
 
You see, what were the similarities between both of these guys? They both heard the Word and they both were hit with winds, rains and floods. The only difference was that one did what he heard, and the other didn’t.
 
Just look at Matthew 7:24, where Jesus concluded all of these strong teachings on asking, seeking knocking, not judging, forgiving, turning the other cheek, etc., etc., etc. with “Therefore, whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock…”
 
So, Jesus is saying here that the person who does these specific sayings that He laid out in His Sermon on the Mount will be the ones who will overcome when the tough times come against them. And do you see why so many believer’s houses seem so broken and they seem to not overcome the trials and tribulations that the devil throws at them?
 
For example, do you know what Jesus included on His Sermon on the Mount? In Matthew 6:25-34, Jesus told His followers— “Do not worry!” Amen! He gives us specific instructions regarding worrying that help with the perspective issue, but what does He tell us to do as an alternative to not worrying? Verse 33 says, “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things (that you tend to worry about) will be added to you.”
 
So, again, what should we focus on doing when we are tempted to worry? Determine that we will start seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness! This might be us getting our minds off of those troubling thoughts and us seeking ways to put God’s kingdom above our own problems. For instance, when those dark clouds are trying to move in over our heads and its quickly closing in, we rise up immediately and determine to seek first God’s kingdom by finding someone we can bless, listen to, etc. (i.e. meeting others needs first). This releases a supernatural anointing that releases us from the clutches of anxiety. Amen?
 
So, we need to look at this from time to time and honestly evaluate ourselves by asking the following question: “Am I being a doer of the Word or just a hearer?” Amen?
 
HOW PAUL HAD PEACE
 
Now this leads me to my next point because this seeking first the kingdom of God and how it frees us from worry is what we see in the life of the Apostle Paul: Notice what specifically the apostle Paul said that we are to make it a point to do in order to experience more of the God of peace in our lives. Again, he said, “The things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and…” So, the apostle Paul was using His own example as the basis of experiencing this peace that passes all understanding—specifically what they had “learned, received, heard and saw” in him.
 
Now what is so powerful about considering the apostle Paul’s example is that this great example of walking in peace had many opportunities to not experience and walk in the peace of God. In other words, His circumstances did not constitute living a life of peace. He had far worse problems and experiences than most of the other apostles, much less than us. Yet, he experienced the manifest presence of the God of peace which enabled Him to walk in the peace. This is what caused him to pray and sing hymns unto God at midnight in that Philippian jail cell. Amen!
 
So, this should expel all of the ideas we have that— “Well, if this happens to you, then you can’t expect to have peace.” No, if Paul practiced the presence of the God of peace, then you and I can too!
 
Now Paul was using the example of the things he taught them (i.e. learned, received, and heard) as well as his own example (i.e. saw) to illustrate how we, too, can walk in the peace of God. And while I do not want to necessarily go into an in-depth study of the life of Paul right now, if I could name a couple of things that I have “learned, received, heard and saw” in the life of the apostle of faith that teaches me how I can walk in the peace of God, it would have to be His passion and perspective.
 
You see, by his own testimony, Paul “labored more abundantly than” all of the rest of the apostles even (First Corinthians 15:10). And I have found that when we are truly seeking first the kingdom of God (as we just saw), this will automatically cause us to slip into that manifest peace that passes all understanding.
 
You see, the reason some are not experiencing the peace of God is because their focus is on their own kingdom rather than on God’s kingdom. Your peace is found in your place! For example, some of the most peace I have personally ever experienced has been when I was on the mission field. When I am truly seeking first the kingdom of God and it is all about ministering to others, there is a great peace that is experienced. And so I say that because Paul was a more earnest laborer, it yielded a peace in his life that was greater than most Christians have ever experienced.
 
Secondly, what caused this passion and zeal to seek first the kingdom of God was his perspective:
 
You see, the apostle Paul was the professor of “Perspective 101!” Amen! This guy saw things through a different filter than even some of the other church leaders. Part of the reason for this was because He had been forgiven of much, therefore, he loved much. But he truly saw things through the eyes of eternity.
 
We see this in his second letter to the church of Corinth, when he called these painful situations— “light afflictions” (see Second Corinthians 4:17)! The word he used for “light” here literally meant “non-burdensome” and was a reference to the weight of his trials. In fact, this is how Jesus described His burden (i.e. load) that is “light” (see Matthew 11:30). Therefore, Paul was saying that the afflictions that he suffered were not heavy, weighty, or burdensome at all. But aren’t these trials, tribulations and afflictions one of the primary causes of the stress that we experience in our lives? Sure, but Paul said that, when looked at from the correct perspective, they are actually light.
 
How could he say that? A better question though is how could he view all of his incredibly difficult problems as just being light and we view our much smaller problems as enormous?
 
The reason the great apostle of faith could view his circumstances in this light is found in the same verse—Second Corinthians 4:17. He went on to reveal in this powerful verse two very important truths regarding his light afflictions:
 
Number one, he said that they were “but for a moment.” This means that they were temporal—only lasting a short while. But what we need to understand is that many of these afflictions were not just momentary, naturally speaking. Many of them lasted weeks, months and even years. Therefore, Paul could not have been referring to them just being “for a moment” according to this present life. So, what was he referring to? He was saying that they were “but for a moment” in comparison to eternity!
 
You see, in comparison to eternity, our present life is extremely temporal. In comparison to eternity, our life on this earth is just a brief moment. This is why you see the Bible compare our life to a vapor and to a blade of grass. It uses both of these examples because a vapor appears for a moment and then vanishes away, and a blade of grass appears one day and is gone the next. Saints, our life is but a speck of sand in the beach of eternity. Never forget that.  
 
But Paul does not stop there! He goes on to describe the main reason that he was able to disesteem and devalue his afflictions so much. He said that they are “working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.”
 
The apostle Paul was saying that his difficulties could in no way compare to the reward for successfully enduring and overcoming them! In other words, he saw his afflictions as light because he saw the glory he would receive in exchange for them as heavy! So, in comparison to what he would receive in the kingdom of heaven, his problems were not problems at all for two reasons: Number one, because the reward would be so glorious and magnificent. And, number two, because this awesome glory would be eternal. When we see the riches of His glory in this light—as awesome and eternal—there is truly no comparison. Therefore, our afflictions must be viewed as light and non-burdensome! Thank you, Jesus, for this living and blessed hope we have! 
 
Now let me say this though: this is in no way intended to teach us that our sickness’ and pains are just to be simply endured. No, Jesus paid the price for those kinds of afflictions on the Cross, through His stripes. But the purpose of why we are talking about this is to remove the care and stress over these physical ailments so that we can experience peace. Saints, when we experience the God of peace, we can more readily receive the God of freedom, the God of deliverance and the God of healing! Amen?
 
So, Paul’s example of passion & perspective certainly provide us with a road map for walking in the peace of God, but notice in Philippians 4:9 how he also referred to the things he taught them as being a part of how they would experience this supernatural peace.    
 
Now in order to find these wonderful words of exhortation of how to walk in the peace of God, we need look no further than the very chapter this promise was made in. So, next week, we will look back at the preceding verses of this chapter so that we can find out how Paul specifically taught us to walk in the peace that he did.
 
But Paul’s example is a good first step to experiencing the manifest presence of the God of peace in our lives. If we view things like he did and do the things he did, we have the promise that supernatural peace is ours. Determine today to follow Paul as he followed Christ, and you too will walk in the peace of God and freedom from stress. Amen.

REVIEW
 
So, today, let’s pick up our teaching on the subject of stress again and learn a little more about what God’s Word has to say about how we can deal with it.
 
The first thing we learned in this series of teachings is what the spirit of stress is—that is, we found out what it truly is and learned a Biblical way in which we can deal with it when it tries to creep up. We then learned how we already have peace in our boats, so we do not ever have to let our hearts become troubled. Yes, we have learned that stress is not an acceptable part of our lives and saw how we can speak to those waves that crash into our boat and experience a great calm even when the storms of life try to sink us.
 
Then over the past couple of weeks, we have been looking in depth at Matthew 11:28-30 where Jesus said, “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”
 
Now the first thing we learned is how the Lord was addressing “all you who labor and are heavy laden” and this is just another way of describing stressed-out folks, right? And we saw that those who are experiencing this stressful life need only do one thing—Come to Him! Yes, Jesus invited everyone who labors and is heavy laden to come to Him in order to receive rest for their souls.
 
And this is what we covered last week—what this rest truly is. We learned that one rest is given and the other is found. Yes, one is experienced when we come to Christ upon making Him our personal Lord and Savior. This is the positional rest we have entered into—and many of us can attest to immediately receiving this rest the moment we called on the name of Jesus and were saved from the burden of sin. However, we saw that there remains a rest that we can partake of experientially—and that is when we exchange our weakness for His strength and learn to wait on the Lord and draw near to Him in fellowship. But like we saw, this rest for our soul must be found—which indicates that we have to search for it. 
 
We looked at the 23rd Psalm where we see the heart of our Good Shepherd to lead us beside these waters of rest. In other words, if we’ll let him, the Lord will lead us into restful and relaxing places in Him where we can experience a perpetual “Sabbath”—that is, experiencing life in the promised land as opposed to a life of stressing out in the wilderness.
 
We saw how that Jesus, being the fulfillment of the Sabbath, offers us this promise of rest—where we can rest in His finished work on the Cross. Therefore, this rest is rooted in knowing that the work of salvation is complete—everything from our eternal security to the temporal situations we find ourselves in. All of these battles belong to Lord, and He has already fought them for us. So, us learning to enter into His finished work is a big part of finding rest for our souls.  
 
However, we learned that this is not to say that the physical observance of the Sabbath has no benefits: Yes, although we are not bound to legalistically observing a day like the Sabbath anymore, this does not mean that there are no benefits to observing a day of rest every week. Yes, like it is with many things contained in the Mosaic and Levitical laws, there are certain natural benefits to observing certain things that the law tells us.
 
For example, we have come to learn that it actually is a good thing for everyone to rest one out of every seven days. Therefore, we said that this is a good principle for each of us to live by in order to live free from stress: have a day each week where we detach, disconnect, and decompress—that is, where we lay down every project, where we turn the phone off, where we don’t even try to problem-solve in our minds; just a day of rest where we put our relationship with the Lord as our priority and we even enjoy some nice recreational things that do not require a lot of physical or mental energy. I bet if we would make sure to schedule this on a weekly basis, we would live more stress-free lives. Amen?   
 
But I also made the point last week that I think it is wise to schedule periodic times of rest throughout the year where you can cease from the physical and emotional labor and focus on the spiritual side of our life. Not only that, but we learned that we also need a certain period of time every day in order to find rest for our souls. What I mean is, we need that period of time every day to “come to Him,” simply meditating on His Word, praising & worshipping Him, etc., to where that rest is found daily.
 
And, finally, the last point I made with this is what we do during those “sabbaticals” is important as well. Yes, reading the Bible is important, praying for others is important, but there is something very specific that you and I can do that actually causes us to enter into His rest. And one of those things that we can deliberately do to enter into His rest is to speak in tongues! Yes, Isaiah chapter 28 teaches us that this is the rest!
 
 
Church, I’m convinced that if we did these four things: Made sure we scheduled a week or more of rest during the year, made sure we had a day every week where we rested, and made sure we spent a period of time daily in His rest, we would live in this supernatural Sabbath that Jesus said was ours. Especially, when we include praying in other tongues all along the way, every day.
 
Now, this week, I want us to look at one of the qualifiers that Jesus mentioned for finding this rest for our souls: It is what Jesus said at the beginning of verse 29: Notice how Jesus said, “Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”
 
WHAT IS HIS YOKE?
 
So, what did Jesus mean by saying, “Take My yoke upon you”? This is an interesting way to describe how one can find rest for their souls, isn’t it? I mean, to use the example of wearing a yoke—which was used for laboring, not resting—that seems like contradicting terms.
 
First of all, let me say that I think it is obvious that the Lord was differentiating between the former and first yoke—that is, the first covenant, which came to be called by the apostle Paul, the “yoke of bondage” (see Galatians 5:1). So, His yoke—which would be this new covenant that Jesus’ blood provided for us—is what He is offering for everyone who labors and is burdened down to take up. And in this new covenant of grace is found all the rest and freedom from stress that we will ever need!
 
Now we also need to understand what Jesus was not saying: He was not saying that there is another yoke out there other than the yoke of bondage—the law—that we are to take up and put on in place of the old yoke. Jesus did not go to the Cross to provide us with another updated and improved yoke of religion. That is not what the new covenant of grace is and is not what Jesus was saying here.
 
You see, the example that is being used here is not of us exchanging one yoke for another, but of us getting yoked up together with Him. Let me explain: The word Jesus used for “yoke” here came from the Greek word zugos, which literally described a wooden yoke that joined two animals together. So, it was not describing one yoke for each animal. No, the purpose of this particular yoke was so that they, through their combined strength, would pull a load that generally would have been too difficult for one animal to pull by itself. Therefore, this “yoke” made the two one.
 
So, back to this yoke Jesus referred to: As a result of being yoked up together, these two cows, bulls or ox were collectively stronger, and their combined strength made their task easier. Now the obvious reason that they did this was because even the strongest “beast of burden” could not pull the load on some jobs. There were certain things that needed to be done that required more strength than their strongest animal could carry alone.
 
You see, we might be the strongest one in God’s flock, but we still have our limits on what we can carry on our own. Yes, every single one of us has a limit to what we can do for Him. But the error I see most of us making at times is that since we feel we can do it, we do it, and because we might seem to be strong enough to handle something, we grin and bear it. While that might sometimes be what needs to be done, I don’t think this is the primary way that the Lord would have us live the Christian life. That’s right: I believe that we need to have the wisdom to know that things like working harder, toughing it out, and doing things in our own strength is generally not God’s best. So, what is God’s best? Getting yoked up together with Him, and letting Him provide the strength and power that we need to carry our load.
 
You see, there is One who is stronger than I—and His name is Jesus! And He has promised me that if I will take His yoke upon me, I will experience a light and easy load and that I will find rest for my soul. And why? It is because Jesus is the strongest Ox of them all and, therefore, He is carrying the brunt of the weight. In fact, if we would just consider the strength of the Savior, I think it would be clear that He doesn’t need any of our help. Yes, Jesus is doing just fine pulling the full weight of the work, thank you very much. We are just along for the ride. Glory to Jesus!
 
And this beautifully illustrates this new and better covenant. There is nothing you and I can do to add to the work of Christ! Jesus paid it all! He carried it all! Our sins are no longer to be carried. Our cares are to be cast over on Him. Jesus, and Jesus alone, has done the work of salvation. And this is not just in regards to our eternal security. Jesus also wants to carry the full brunt of the things you need in your everyday life as well.   
 
I’ll tell you—this is the LIFE. Learning to do things His way and resting in the finished work of Jesus is a stress-free way to live. 
 
NOT HARD AND HEAVY
 
As He goes on to say this about His yoke in verse 30—It is easy and it is light.  
 
The word Jesus used for “easy” literally describes something that is “fit, manageable, and pleasant.” Therefore, His yoke is “easy” because it fits, is easy to handle, and is simply pleasant.
 
He goes on to say that His burden is light: Now the word “burden” is a poor translation. It is actually the same word we looked at in Galatians 6:5, which was correctly translated as “load” in the NKJV. You see, nothing in the New Covenant is “burdensome.” The moment we begin to feel “burdened” is the moment we have become unyoked from Christ. Yes, every believer is called to carry their own load (see Galatians 6:5), but when a Christian is burdened down, that is when we are supposed to help alleviate those burdens from our brothers and sisters. So, the Lord was literally saying here that His load is light. In fact, the only other time this word for “light” is used in the New Testament is in Second Corinthians 4:17 when the apostle Paul referred to our “light” afflictions.
 
My point is that the Lord said that His yoke and His load are easy and light, as opposed to hard and heavy. The moment things begin to get hard and heavy is the moment that we are carrying those cares ourselves. “Burnout” comes as we do all the pulling ourselves. This is not what the Lord intended. If we are yoked up with Christ, what we will sense is a much more light and easy experience in the difficult situations we walk through in life. This is when we must learn to yoke ourselves up together with Him to where He does the majority of the pulling.
 
Friends, the Christian life is meant to be light and easy, not heavy and hard. And the moment we begin to feel like our burden is heavy and hard is the moment we have simply realized that we are taking our own yoke and are not benefiting from Him pulling the weight for us. The only time that it becomes laborious is when we, of our own accord, unyoke ourselves from Him and try to carry the weights of this life ourselves. This is when the Christian life becomes burdensome and overbearing and we, as a result, lose our peace.  
 
But, no, Christianity is not intended to be burdensome. Certainly, there is discipline over the flesh and the resistance of temptation involved in the life of a Christian, but in regard to our growth and increase in every area of our walk, it is God Who carries that entire burden. Praise the Lord!
 
HOW DO WE TAKE HIS YOKE?
 
So, a good question then is—How does one take His yoke upon themselves? I believe that to find that answer we need to go back to verse 28 and see what Jesus said there again: Jesus said, “Come to Me … and I will give you rest.” So, it would be incorrect for one to start assuming that we take His yoke upon ourselves all kind of other ways without considering the context. Amen?
 
So, I think it is safe to assume that the way we take His yoke upon ourselves is by first coming to Him. Now, again, coming to the Lord describes both proximity and perspective—meaning, it describes us literally drawing near to Him and abiding in our True Vine and it also describes us turning our attention to Him and looking unto the Author and Finisher of our faith. Therefore, when we do that, we take His yoke upon us and benefit from the strength He has to offer.
 
Let’s now look at some other Scriptures that talk about how we can “Come to Him”:
 
You have likely heard me say before that our attitude determines our altitude, and this is so true. Do you know where I get this from? From the Scriptures! Let’s look over at Isaiah chapter 40 and see one place where this principle is described:
 
Beginning in verse 27, the Lord said to His people through the prophet— “Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel: “My way is hidden from the Lord, and my just claim is passed over by my God”? So, what the Lord was asking His people was why were they letting come out of their mouth that He didn’t know what they were going through and was not concerned with helping them? Now I know that none of us have ever let things like that come out of our mouths 😉, but when people talk like that, would you characterize that as faith? Of course, not! And I’ll promise you this: when one talks like that, they are even further away from the help they need than they were before. Why? Because the way we talk, determines where we walk.   
 
And I just love the Lord’s response to their negativity: He said in verse 28— “Have you not known? Have you not heard?” Did you know this is why it is important what you hear and what you know? So, be careful what you allow in your ear-gates and what you believe—because that will determine what comes out of you when you’re in a squeeze.
 
He then says in the remainder of verse 28 through verse 29— “The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might He increases strength.” What I hear the Lord saying is that He is all-powerful and all-knowing! Therefore, there is nothing He cannot do and there is nothing He does not understand! Glory!
You see, He is not like us—who even at our strongest point can faint and be weary. That is why He says in verse 30— “Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall.” But His promise to us is found in verse 31— “But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”
 
Church, I think we have missed what it really is that causes us to experience this life where we run our race, completely dispelling the weariness, and where we walk (by faith and in love) without fainting. And did you know that this is available to us? A life where we renew our strength?  
 
As a matter of fact, the Hebrew word for “renew” here literally means “to exchange” and was used to describe someone changing their clothes. So what this promise is describing is not us having our own strength renewed (notice that the word “their” is in italics—meaning it was not in the original text), but rather describes us exchanging (or changing) our own strength for another kind of strength (which I believe to be God’s strength). So, what we are seeing here, that is available for us, is an “exchanged life,” not just a “changed life.” Amen!  
 
This is a supernatural strength that would also cause us to mount up with wings like eagles! This here is some supernatural grace given by God where we begin to “rise or ascend” (definition of “mount up with wings”).
 
Have you ever noticed how these larger birds like eagles seem to rarely have to flap those wings? They just seem to glide and soar with the wind. Well, most Christians do not operate like this. They are flapping their wings trying to stay at the level they are at. They are doing things in their own strength, just “flapping” around, and are therefore getting weary and fainting. This should not be so with us, saints! We are to mount up with wings like the eagles—letting the wind of His Holy Spirit carry us! Hallelujah! I liken this to that law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus (see Romans 8:2) where the law of lift supersedes the law of the gravity (or, the flesh).
 
Saints, this is a place in God that we can all experience and consistently walk in—where weariness and faintness never set in, where a supernatural strength is tapped into, and where we just seem to soar with the Lord by His supernatural grace! Amen!
 
But there is obviously a part we have to play in it or we all would be experiencing it. Amen? So, what part do we have to play in it? Isaiah says at the beginning of this verse— “But those who wait on the Lord.” These are the ones who shall renew their strength. These are the ones who will mount up with wings like eagles. These are the ones who will run and not be weary and walk and not faint.”
 
So, what does it mean to “wait on the Lord.” Well, the word “wait” comes from the Hebrew word qavah (pronounced kah-vah) and means “to wait for” but also means “to look for, expect or hope.” This verb qavah is actually the root of the noun tiqvah which describes “hope or expectancy.” Therefore, this word for “wait” literally means to “wait on the basis of hopefulness and expectancy.” So, what we see in the word “waiting” is what the Bible refers to as “hoping.”  Amen!
 
You see, nowadays when we see this word “waiting,” we see a passive and lethargic kind of waiting. So, when we see the phrase “waiting on the Lord,” we might think that this is just us patiently waiting on God to do something—if it be His will, whenever it’s His timing etc. But, as we have seen, this is not the picture this Hebrew word is painting. When we are waiting on the Lord, we are actively looking for and placing our expectations on the Lord and His promises. That is a far cry from just sitting back and waiting for God to do whatever He wants to do! 
 
My point is that the key to us clothing ourselves with His strength is our hope. Yes, if we expect to walk in His strength, we will. And if we don’t, we won’t. This is where our attitude determines the altitude we reach in resting in the Lord’s strength. It is that simple.
 
Now there was someone else who possessed this positive mentality—the apostle Paul: In Philippians chapter 4, after talking about the varying circumstances that he had in His life, he boldly declared this. In Philippians 4:13, he said, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
 
I think it’s just awesome the faith this man possessed. He didn’t moan and gripe about his situation or focus on what He didn’t have and couldn’t do. He confidently declared what He could do and how He could do it. Church, don’t major on what you cannot do; major on who He is on the inside of you—for this is a part of walking in His strength. Amen!
 
Oh, how this applies to us: You see, when we are stressed out and overburdened, what is our tendency? To tell someone. To give them that “woe is me,” “it’s tough,
 and “I’m just so busy” kind of talk. What is the wise thing to do if we are feeling this way? To major on His grace that is available and frame the world we want to see with our faith filled words. Amen. 
 
So, our attitude and mentality play a big part in how we take His yoke upon us—for the way we think and the way we talk is another way we can “come to Him.” But like we said, another way we come to Him is by drawing near to Him and drawing our strength from Him that way.
 
We see this described in Isaiah 41:10 when the Lord said, “Fear not, for I am with you; Be not dismayed, for I am your God…” Now while these terms describe things that we are afraid of or worry about, we’ve learned that those are the things that lead to stress in our lives. Therefore, the Lord is addressing those who are living in stress. Not to mention, the word “dismayed” literally describes the feeling of distress. What word can you see in the word “distress”? Stress!  
 
So, what does the Lord promise to us when we are being tempted to be stressed out? He said, “… I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.’”
 
Praise God! He said, He would strengthen, help and uphold us! How? With His righteous right hand! Well, that denotes that we are close to Him since His right hand is what is strengthening and upholding us. Amen?
 
You see, this being yoked up together with Him is critical to even being able to carry the weights that He has commissioned us to carry. We see this in Ephesians 6:10 when the apostle Paul said, “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.”
 
You see, the apostle Paul prefaced his teaching on the spiritual warfare and the armor of God with us first being strong in Him. Why is this important to understand? It is because in order for a soldier to wear all of that heavy armor and be able to fight in it, he would have to be a strong person. Likewise, for us to be able to carry the things that the Lord has called us to carry into our wrestling with the kingdom of darkness, we have to be spiritually conditioned first. And can you guess how this spiritual strength comes? It’s found “in the Lord and in the power of His might.” Amen. So, again, it is all about staying connected with the Lord Jesus and benefiting from His strength.
 
So, church, it is imperative that we learn to “come to Jesus” when we are feeling overburdened and stressed out. And we come to Him by setting aside times to draw near to Him and draw our strength from Him that way, but we also come to Him by putting our focus and attention on Him and what we say as a result.
 
I can assure you that if you make your personal relationship with Jesus a priority in your life and then adopt the mentality of faith that takes His Word at face value, you can “take His yoke upon you” and as a result “find rest for your souls.” Like we learned—it is an easy fit and not a burden in the least. It is a light and easy yoke, and that is because Jesus has both done the work for us on the Cross and because He is doing the same today, carrying the load. 
 
May we all learn to take His yoke upon us daily and consistently lean on His strength. Amen.

REVIEW
 
Today, we are continuing our teaching entitled— “Stress Out!”—where we are learning how to get the stress out of our lives and keep it out.
 
And the first thing we learned in this series of teachings is that the things that cause stress in our lives—things like fear, worry, and anxiety—are not to be tolerated. We saw that we have a myriad of Scriptures that teach us to not have anxiety about anything, to not worry, and to fear not. Therefore, what stress really is, is a result of disobedience, because if we would choose to live a care-free life, stress would be a non-factor.
 
Someone will say, “Yeah well, living a life free from all cares doesn’t seem possible. I mean, how can you expect me to do this, pastor!?!” Well, first of all, it is not me who set the bar; this is what thus saith the Lord, not thus saith Trey. Therefore, we saw that with the words that tell us to live this way comes the ability the walk in those words. So, just as Peter walked on that one word from God that said, “Come,” and did what most of this world would call impossible by walking on the water, likewise, you and I can walk on these words that we have from God and walk in supernatural peace and rest. Glory! 
 
And these words that we have been looking at in Matthew 11:28-30 hold the same power. So, let’s look at them again: Jesus said, “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”
 
Now we began last week breaking down Jesus’ words in this passage of Scriptures because I believe there are keys contained in His words that will unlock this stress-free life that we all desire.
 
The first thing we looked at is how the Lord was addressing “all you who labor and are heavy laden.” This is just another way of describing stressed-out folks, isn’t it? So, the Lord is addressing all of us out there who “labor and are heavy laden” with the cares and stresses of this life and inviting us to come to Him.
 
Now we looked at these two types of people in detail—those who “labor” and those who are “heavy laden”—and we found that the word “labor” describes “the feelings of being tired, fatigued, or weary that come as a result of the hard work one is doing.” Therefore, it denotes working hard, laboring, toiling, and the physical and emotional effects that this effort can have on us. And we saw that while this word was primarily used to describe physical labor, the likelihood is Jesus was using it to describe those whom were fatigued, weary, and stressed out in the spiritual sense. In fact, I’ve found that jobs and projects that require a lot of hard work both mentally and emotionally are oftentimes even more exhausting than the hard, physical labor that one can do. Sure, working hard with our hands can make us physically tired, but that soulish stress can leave one feeling even more fatigued than someone who works a very physically demanding job. So, Jesus was including “all who labor”—both from the physical sense of working hard, physically and mentally demanding jobs to those who are feeling the fatigue from other spiritually related things that they have been carrying. 
 
Then we saw that even though there is a good kind of “labor” for the Lord, there is also a bad kind. That is because there is a laboring with Him and then there is a laboring for Him, and there is big difference between these two. One can work for the Lord, but it not be Spirit-led or Spirit-empowered—meaning, they can do a lot of good, well-meaning and religious duties, but it not be what the Lord has directed us to do or how He directed us to do it at that specific time. I can assure you that if a believer is becoming stressed out over the good works that they are doing for the Lord then one of two things are true: Either they are doing something that the Lord did not tell them to do or they are doing what He might have told them to do, but in their own strength. How can I be so confident in this, you ask? It is because, as we’ve seen, the Lord’s yoke does not have stress accompanying it. It is really that simple.
 
Then, of course, there is the laboring we do that is not only not with Him but isn’t even for Him. This would be all of those worldly—not necessarily sinful, but just natural things of life that we work so hard at that leads to us getting stressed out. So, even in these normal routines of life, we still ought to include the Holy Spirit, asking Him what His plan is.
 
But we saw that Jesus also invited those who are “heavy laden” to come to Him.  And this is not terminology that we might use today. What it means to be “heavy laden” is a burden is placed upon someone to where they are overloaded. And, oh, how this is certainly a cause of stress because if you recall, one of the definitions used for “stress” is to put force or pressure on something to where it might even begin to bend. Well, this is what happens when one becomes overloaded or burdened by something. It will place stress on our souls.
 
Now we saw that this being overburdened would describe people who are overloaded with the cares of this world and also those overburdened by the law and the keeping of religious rules and rites. All of this leads to stress—for when we try to work harder, even in our spiritual lives, we add stress that is unwarranted. You see, many people have the mentality that with anything from our vocation to our spiritual walks that if we just work harder, everything will be better. But that is not necessarily the case: working harder is not always the answer and certainly is not wisdom. Like they say in the business world, we need to learn to work smarter and not just harder. This applies to the kingdom business world too! We need to learn to work smarter for the Lord and not just do more and more.  
 
So, we saw last week that those who are in these situations need only do one thing—Come to Him! Yes, Jesus invited everyone who labors and is heavy laden to come to Him to receive rest for their souls. Sounds like living stress-free to me!
 
However, we saw that just because the invitation has been sent, not everyone will respond to the invitation. We looked at Jesus’ Parable of the Great Supper to validate this, and can even see in Revelation 3:20 that the Lord is said to be standing at the door of our heart knocking. Many use this as an evangelistic verse, but the fact is, this is written to a church full of believers—not to unbelievers. So, is it possible that a born-again, Spirit-filled Christian can have the Lord knocking at the door of their hearts and not already living in their hearts? Apparently so. Now that doesn’t mean that they are not saved; it just means that Jesus is not occupying their lives like He desires to. And that is a major point: He obviously desires to or He wouldn’t be standing at the door knocking. Amen?
 
However, He is not going to kick the door down. He will patiently wait until we decide to open the door and invite Him in. This is the beauty of the way He operates!
 
I was reminded of what Pastor Robert had the Lord Jesus tell Him in response to Him coming back with him to show Himself to the world. Jesus said, “I have come to man, now man must come to me.” This means that Jesus already came and made everything available—all things that pertain to life and godliness and every spiritual blessing. Now it is up to us to come to Him and receive everything He died to provide for us. Amen?
 
But my point is that, just like in this Parable of the Great Supper where they all made excuses that were based on their stuff and relationships being more important than the supper they were invited to, this is when the stress enters in. In other words, when those who “labor and are heavy laden” do not “come to” the Lord, they will automatically and unnecessarily live in the stresses of life.
 
We then looked at an example of this found in Luke chapter 10 of Martha & Mary: In this story, we see Martha was distracted with much serving, and how she resented her sister for not helping her. Eventually, she had had it with her sister and decided to interrupt Jesus to get Him to correct Mary. But we saw that Jesus said that this one thing Mary was doing is the good part of our calling. And He went on to say that it is not just a good idea; He said that this one thing is “needed.” This is something that we desperately need to understand—that spending time in God’s presence is an absolute necessity and not just beneficial.
 
So, what He was essentially saying to Martha was— “Martha, Martha, you are troubled and stressed out about too many things. All of these things that you are doing are not what is truly important. Only one thing is necessary, and it is not even all of this serving that you are doing. The one thing that is needed is that you ‘Come unto Me’ and sit at my feet.” Amen.
 
So, we saw that herein lies one of the primary reasons that we live stressed lives: it is because we do not make our personal relationship with God our priority. I am convinced that if we would make the “first thing first” and accept the invitation to “Come to Him,” we would be more at rest in our souls.  And the awesome thing about it is this: when we draw near to Him, He draws near to us.
 
Yes, coming to Lord in fellowship and focus is our Christian duty! It is what we are primarily called to do. So, if we fail to make the first thing first, stress will be the by-product—even when it comes to other good, well-meaning things we do for Him. Amen. Therefore, although we ought to strive to live for God and serve Him, we do not need to view what we do for Him as being our most important calling. Our relationship with God is our most important calling! It is our “dyuty” as Christians. Amen.
 
THE REST THAT IS GIVEN VS. THE REST THAT IS FOUND
 
Now, this week, I want you to notice Jesus’ promise to those who come to Him when they are carrying all of these burdens: He said, “And I will give you rest.” So, when we learn to come to Jesus—whether that be us simply turning our attention towards Him or us actually drawing near to Him—He has promised that we will be given “rest.”
 
So, what can we determine if we are not at rest? That we haven’t come to Him like He described in this passage. And I’ll tell you—people don’t like to acknowledge that, but either Jesus is telling the truth here or they are. Which one of these options do you think is true? I, for one, choose to believe Jesus over my own experiences. Amen?
 
But I want you to notice that although Jesus said in verse 28 that He will give us rest when we come to Him, in verse 29, He said that we will “find” rest by taking His yoke ourselves and learning from Him.
 
You see, we must understand that one rest is given and the other is found. Yes, one is experienced when we come to Christ upon making Him our personal Lord and Savior. This is the positional rest we have entered into—and many of us can attest to immediately receiving this rest the moment we called on the name of Jesus and were saved from the burden of sin.
 
However, there remains a rest that we can partake of experientially—and that is when we exchange our weakness for His strength, when we learn to wait on the Lord and draw near to Him in fellowship. But like we saw, this rest for our soul must be found—which indicates that we have to search for it.  
 
How do I look for this rest, you might ask? We find it through our fellowship with the Lord—through learning to sit at His feet like Mary did and seeking Him, not seeking it. Yes, we are not going to find peace by seeking for it, but by seeking the Lord Himself. In other words, once we find that secret place in the presence of the Prince of Peace, we will find the peace we desire. 
 
You see, oftentimes we gravitate towards doing things in our own strength and we begin to pull that “Martha” that we talked about last week—and that happens even with trying to find peace. This is when we must become more like Mary who learned when to sit at the Master’s feet and draw her strength from Him. Strength comes from fellowship—strength for everything from serving the Lord to simply being calm and quiet.  
 
But this rest and freedom from stress only comes through Him, and that is the point we need to take away from this.
 
THE REST THAT REMAINS
 
In fact, all of Psalm 23:2 teaches us this one principle: In it, King David said of His Good Shepherd, “He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters.”
 
First of all, the entire phrase at the beginning of this verse— “Me makes me to lie down”—comes from one Hebrew word, the word rabats. This word literally means “to stretch oneself out or lie stretched out.” Thus, the reason that this word is translated “to couch” in a couple of places. Therefore, this word describes “reclining.” So, we might translate this first half of Psalm 23:2 like so today: “He helps me to take a load off and to rest & relax.”
 
You see, if we are not joyfully serving the Lord, then we are not serving the Lord the way He intended for us to. When we are living the Christian life correctly, we will live a life that is full of rest & relaxation. It is only when we try to live the Christian life in the arm of the flesh that we become stressed-out and lose our peace.
 
Saints, it is not the Lord’s will that any part of our Christian walk feels like “work.” Sure, it is not always pleasant putting the flesh under, and sure, it is not always easy to go through the various trials we fall into. But if everything always seems arduous and an uphill battle, then we are likely missing it in some way. Therefore, to lie down in green pastures describes our Good Shepherd leading us, His sheep, to places of comfort, rest and relaxation—like a spiritual couch or recliner. Amen!
 
Now the next thing David said in Psalm 23:2, essentially teaches us the same thing: “He leads me beside the still waters.”  
 
The phrase “beside the still” comes from the Hebrew word menuwchah and describes a “rest or resting place.” It carries the idea of a comfortable, still and quiet place or thing (and in this case, that thing is “water”). So, these “still waters” that David describes here could literally be described as “waters of rest” and for us to be led beside these still waters would describe us being led and guided alongside places of rest—places that are quiet, still and comfortable. Amen.  
 
So, again, this is what happens: We come to Jesus in our stress and anxiety and He—our Good Shepherd—leads us into our resting place. In other words, there remains a rest for the people of God—a stream that makes glad the city of our God. It is beside these still waters that we find rest for our souls.
 
In fact, this is actually the same word that was used to describe the Rest of God referred to in Psalm 95:11--the same Rest that the writer(s) of Hebrews describe in Hebrews chapter 4.
 
Now most people associate this rest referred to in both the 95th Psalm and in Hebrews chapter 4 as heaven and us passing through death’s doors to enter into His rest in eternity. And while in all likelihood, we certainly will experience a peace in that day that will by far transcend what we will walk in on the earth today, it is entirely incorrect for us to just roll with the punches of this world and only expect to find rest for our souls when we die.
 
If you recall, we spent a good amount of time in our study of the 23rd Psalm emphasizing the fact that it is not just a funeral psalm. No, it is a life psalm because the language in it indicates that the Lord’s sheep is walking through the valley of the shadow of death, fearing no evil, and that the Lord has prepared this table for us in the presence of our enemies. There are no enemies in heaven! There is nothing to fear there—no valleys of the shadow of death, only mountains of life! Amen?  
 
You see, this “Rest” was an obvious reference to Canaan, the Promised Land, and was described as a rest in contrast to their 40-year journey in the wilderness. Canaan had giants in it; heaven won’t. So, the promised land that you and I can possess today is a life of overcoming those giants that oppose us from receiving our inheritance, which certainly includes peace.
 
Now this “wilderness” period was certainly that feeling of no rest—for it involved always moving and striving and never experiencing the peace the Lord has for His people. Well, likewise, there is rest that you I can enter into in this life! That is those still waters of rest that He leads us beside! That is that spiritual recliner that He makes us to lie down on! All of this is for us now in this life.
 
And sadly, that is where many Christians live—in the wilderness, living from miracle to miracle (which means they are also living in crisis to crisis) and experiencing this striving, working, and arduous lifestyle. There is a better life that that, saints! Yes, I said there is a better life! And that is—living in the blessing of Canaan where we enter into His Rest and throw off all stress! Yes, there remains therefore a rest for the people of God—where we can cease from our works, our striving and busyness. This is the Sabbath that we are called to observe—where we learn to rest in the work of another—namely, the Lord Jesus Christ’s work on the Cross. Its ultimate fulfillment will be when we leave these tents and live in the eternal rest in the Kingdom of God, but there is also a rest to be experienced now. A sabbath if you would. Amen.
 
JESUS, OUR SABBATH
 
And this is why Jesus said for us to come to Him in order to receive His rest—because He is the fulfillment of the Sabbath!
 
Now this leads us into an important biblical principle that was first referred to in the beginning during creation, then was instituted under the Law, and finally was fulfilled in Christ—the Sabbath, which is symbolic of this rest we are talking about today.
 
So, let’s start out by looking at this commandment that God gave His people: In Exodus 20:8-11, God gave them the Ten Commandments and said, “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.”
 
In this Scripture, we see how He gave His chosen people the Sabbath by comparing it to when He rested from His work in creation.
 
Now it is important to understand that God did not “rest” in the sense that we think of resting. When we think of resting, we think of recuperating because of fatigue, but this is not what is implied here. God rested on the seventh day, not because He was tired and exhausted. He rested because the work was finished and complete. There was nothing left to do.
 
This word “rest” described more of a cessation of activity, the ending of effort. A good example of what transpired here is an artist who was working to paint a beautiful masterpiece and then when his or her picture was completed, they lean back in their chair observing their completed masterpiece maybe with their brush in the mouth. This image in no way describes an artist laying down his brush because it got too heavy. No, he rested from his work because his work was finished and complete.
 
God had created the heavens and earth and all that is within them and saw that it was all “very good” (Genesis 1:31). It was finished! His work was complete! So, He was attempting to get His people to see that the work of creation had been completed. Therefore, He gave them the Sabbath to illustrate to them that they are to rest in God’s finished work of creation and redemption. 
 
So, what is our attitude to be regarding the Sabbath? Are we to keep the Sabbath or not? Well, let’s look over at Colossians chapter two and, in this passage, we will see the true purpose of the Sabbath and how we should be fulfilling it.
 
THE SHADOW OF THE SABBATH
 
Colossians 2:11-15 says, “In Him you were also circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, buried with Him in baptism, in which you also were raised with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.”
 
So, notice here that things like circumcision (another big point of contention), water baptism, and all the other “handwriting of requirements” (i.e. the commandments of the Law) have been fulfilled in us who are in Him. Amen! 
 
Now notice this: Paul goes on to say in Colossians 2:16, “So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths…”
 
In other words, because the law has been fulfilled in us through the finished work of Christ (i.e. “so”), we are to let no one judge us in food or in drink (this is dietary laws of the law), or regarding a festival (all the feast days) or a new moon (some other requirement for the Jews to keep) or SABBATHS. Or what? Or SABBATHS! This implies we are not to let anyone judge us regarding keeping the different Sabbaths because we are now under the perfect law of liberty.
 
But why? Why are we free from keeping the Sabbath today under our new and better covenant? Well, continue reading: In verse 17, Paul goes on to say, “which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.”
 
Do you see this? All of these requirements of the law—the dietary laws, the feasts, and, yes, even the Sabbath—are shadows of things to come! This means that all of these commands the Lord gave them were meant to foreshadow something which was to come, namely, SOMEONE who was to come—and that is Christ! Praise the Lord!
 
Actually, this word “substance” literally means “body.” So why would we continue hugging the shadow of the One we love when we have their body? That would be kind of weird, wouldn’t it? 
 
So, what does this teach us? It teaches us that the Sabbath is simply a shadow of Christ and, therefore, Christ is the fulfillment of the Sabbath. Yes, saints, JESUS IS OUR SABBATH REST!
 
IT IS FINISHED
 
Let’s look at another passage where the Lord gave His chosen people a command concerning the Sabbath and we will see this more clearly:
 
Deuteronomy 5:15 says, “And remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there by a mighty hand and by an outstretched arm; therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.”
 
Notice the word “therefore” in this verse: Being redeemed from Egypt is a type of our salvation, so this is why He commanded them to keep the Sabbath. He did it with His mighty hand and outstretched arm. Therefore, Jesus brought us out of the kingdom of darkness and we should rest in His finished work.
 
Practically speaking, God gave them one day a week not to work to illustrate to them that they are not their own source. In other words, the Sabbath had an element of trust to it. You had to trust the Lord that He could do more by His mighty hand and outstretched arm in 6 days than you could do by your arm and hand in 7 days. It was to illustrate to them that they are not their own Savior and Provider—God is. 
 
So, this is what we need to understand about the seventh day—that when we were made a new creation in Christ that His work in us is complete. Therefore, we are not a work in progress. His work of grace in our spirit is finished! And it was not by our own hands that we are saved—Jesus did the work Himself.
 
This is why Jesus said on the Cross just before He gave up His spirit that “It is finished!” He was saying that the price that needed to be paid for our salvation was complete. He was saying that what He hung on that Cross to accomplish was sufficient. Nothing else needed to be done! The price needful for our redemption had been fully satisfied and we are complete!
 
You see, the word “sabbath” obviously means “rest.” In fact, the words “seven, sabbath, & rest” all come from the same basic word in the Hebrew shabat. And we know the number seven in biblical numerology describes “completion.” Therefore, we see the meaning of the Sabbath: It is that God indeed rested on the seventh day because His work of creation was completed. Amen.
 
So, we being children of God who have been made new creations in Christ Jesus ought to also follow our Heavenly Father’s pattern—know that the work of the new creation (i.e. salvation) has been completed within us and now we are to rest from our works of the flesh that seek to accomplish what has already been accomplished in us through Christ Jesus. Amen. We are complete in Him. The work of salvation has already been accomplished within us, so now we can cease from our works (i.e. works that seek to justify and obtain what can only be received by faith in His grace) as God ceased from His works. We must cease our WORKS of righteousness (which are not good enough) and REST in the work that Christ did to atone for our sins. Therefore, we can rest in all the works that Christ has done for us! He has paid the price and done everything that needs to be done in regards to our salvation!
 
The number seven in Biblical numerology describes “perfection and completion.” Thus, our salvation and the new creation we were made is perfect and complete! There is nothing left undone! God made all things good in the beginning and God has made all the things that are new in us good! When God looked over all that He had made, He said it was very good! Likewise, God looks at His work in us and says it is very good! We have passed inspection!
 
Therefore, the rest is essentially learning to rest in God’s finished work!
 
You see, so many believers never learn to do this. They see Christianity as a religion, based on a bunch of rules and regulations, and if we do all of these things, or rather, simply avoid certain things, then we find ourselves in the good graces of God. But this is not Christianity! Christianity isn’t even a changed life; it’s an exchanged life. It is where we, as Jesus said in Matthew chapter eleven, “take His yoke upon us.” In other words, it is all about Jesus—learning to come to Him, trust in Him, and letting His life be lived through you. It is resting in His finished work on the Cross! Amen!
 
Boy, I can tell you, this alleviates the stress from our lives when we learn that Jesus has done this “very good” work of salvation and it is truly is finished! Now you and I can learn to not only let our salvation rest in Him, but also every other battle of life. Yes, every need, every care, every trial, etc., etc., etc.—all of these are His concern, not ours. So, that resounding truth that we have all likely heard (i.e. the battle is not yours, but God’s), is true in every situation we find ourselves in. Amen.
 
Therefore, this rest is rooted in knowing that the work of salvation is complete—everything from our eternal security to the temporal situations we find ourselves in. All of these battles belong to Lord, and He has already fought them for us. So, us learning to enter into His finished work is a big part of finding rest for our souls.  
 
THE WISDOM IN THE SABBATH
 
However, this is not to say that the physical observance of the Sabbath has no benefits: Yes, although we are not bound to legalistically observing a day like the Sabbath anymore, this does not mean that there are no benefits to observing a day of rest every week. Yes, like it is with many things contained in the Mosaic and Levitical laws, there are certain natural benefits to doing certain things that the law tells us.
 
For instance, how many of you know that even though we are freed to eat bacon, crab, porkchops and lobster today, it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to make these things a large part of your diet. Why? Because the world will even tell us that these things are not the healthiest things we can put in our bodies. Likewise, even though we are not bound to observe the Sabbath, that does not mean that there are no benefits to observing a day of rest every week. In fact, we have come to learn that it actually is a good thing for everyone to rest one out of every seven days.
 
Therefore, I would say that this is good principle for each of us to live by in order to live free from stress: have a day each week where we detach, disconnect, and decompress—that is, where we lay down every project, where we turn the phone off, where we don’t even try to problem-solve in our minds; just a day of rest where we put our relationship with the Lord as our priority and we even enjoy some nice recreational things that do not require a lot of physical or mental energy. Amen? I bet if we would make sure to schedule this on a weekly basis, we would live more stress-free lives. Amen?    
 
However, like I stated earlier, the one day a week Sabbath is not the only Sabbath instituted under the law; there was also the seventh year Sabbath. And what this teaches me is that there are obviously other periods of rest that are wise to do as well. For example, it’s obvious that annual vacations are good for the soul too, right? Yes, having a week of rest can really help to rest and rejuvenate you. Likewise, I think it is wise to schedule periodic times of rest throughout the year where you can cease from the physical and emotional labor and focus on the spiritual side of our life.
 
We do this as pastors: Because of all of the burdens of the people that we try to help carry, it is easy for a minister to become weary and overburdened. This is when that term “burnout” can occur. So, a wise decision is for those who minister full time is to take a regular “sabbatical”—which is a time period, whether it’s a day, week, month, etc. to disconnect and get refreshed in the presence of God. 
 
But I’ll add this one thing: I think if we really wanted to be balanced and enter into His rest consistently, then it’s not only just one day a week or one week a year that we need to strive for; we need a certain period of time every day in order to find rest for our souls. What I mean is, we need that period of time every day to “come to Him,” simply meditating on His Word, praising & worshipping Him, etc., to where that rest is found daily.
 
Which leads me to my next point: What we do during those “sabbaticals” is important too. Reading the Bible is important, praying for others is important, but there is something very specific that you and I can do that actually causes us to enter into His rest. Are you interested in knowing what that is? Speaking in tongues! The Scriptures teach us that this is the rest!
 
In Isaiah 28:11&12, we are given a prophetic glimpse of this benefit of praying in other tongues. In this passage of Scripture, we have what many consider to be the only reference to this particular manifestation of the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament. In fact, we know these verses in Isaiah are prophetic of this New Covenant gift because the Apostle Paul made reference to this Scripture in First Corinthians 14:21 when admonishing the Corinthians on the subject of tongues. So, let’s look at these Scriptures in Isaiah chapter 28:
 
In verse 11, Isaiah says, “For with stammering lips and another tongue He will speak to this people…” The Apostle Paul used this particular statement to show how one of the many diversities of tongues is to be a sign for the unbeliever (see First Corinthians 14:21-22), but if you look on to verse 12, I believe the Holy Spirit through Isaiah gives us a result of these “stammering lips and other tongues”… He says, “To whom He said, ‘This is the rest with which you may cause the weary to rest.’ And, ‘This is the refreshing’; yet they would not hear.” Notice in this verse we are told that two of the results of praying in other tongues are that we enter into a rest and that we experience a refreshing. These are two of the specific characteristics of what Paul deemed “edification.”  
 
Did you know that when you become weary in well doing and begin to grow faint in your race of faith, that praying in other tongues is a way that you can enter into a supernatural rest? Did you know that when you feel dry and empty in your soul that you can experience a supernatural refreshing through your prayer language? That’s right! You don’t need to run to someone else to pray for you or to the nearest revival service to get a fix.
 
You see, this is what so many believers do: They look for a place where God is moving and drive miles to go get that quick fix from God. But that is only a superficial way of experiencing a personal revival. The best way to experience a personal revival is to get it from the inside/out and not the outside/in! All you need to do to enter into the rest and refreshing of the Holy Spirit is to set aside a period of time, go into your prayer closet and pray in other tongues for an extended period of time. I guarantee you if you do this, your battery will get charged up and you will experience more peace and joy than you were previously experiencing!
 
Church, I’m convinced that if we did these four things: Made sure we scheduled a week or more of rest during the year, made sure we had a day every week where we rested, and made sure we spent a period of time daily in His rest, we would live in this supernatural Sabbath that Jesus said was ours. Especially, when we include praying in other tongues all along the way, every day.
 
May you find your Resting place in Him today and always. Amen.