Going Aside Privately

[00:00:00] This audio sermon is provided by AnabaptistSermons.com and may be freely copied and distributed. You may not sell or edit this sermon. Our prayer is that you would be blessed by this ministry. As we announced last week, we would like to think in terms of rest, of coming apart and resting a while. [00:00:42] What the Lord was saying when he said that, when he called the disciples to a desert place. What does that mean for us? And we would like to look at several passages. First of all, I would ask you to turn with me to Matthew chapter 11. Matthew chapter 11, some familiar words from the Savior. [00:01:21] Then we'll have prayer and then we'll continue our study together. Matthew 11, verse 28 Come unto me, all ye that labor, and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls. [00:01:54] for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. These are the words of the Savior extended to all of us. In America today there is, I believe, I believe a misunderstanding and misappropriation of the matter of rest [00:02:26] or what is sometimes called R&R, rest and relaxation. It is true that much of America in its individualistic approach to these sorts of things would spend more effort working at rest and relaxation [00:03:01] than they do at their work. And it often becomes frenzied, this so-called relaxation that Americans partake in. It becomes frenzied because they don't get it all in in the time they have and they're interested in a shorter work week so that they can work harder and faster at their relaxation. [00:03:35] It becomes a confusion of terms because it is not relaxing at all. Actually, it's more stressful than their daily work. Because of that sort of thing going on in our society, in our culture, we as Christians become confused at times. And we partake of some of those very things. and those relaxations of the world are not necessarily wrong in themselves. [00:04:10] Some of them are, but others are not. But when we partake in the frenzy, when we put that at the top of the priority list, when in fact we go about our daily work and jobs for the simple purpose to accumulate some funds so that we can do our thing on the weekend or whatever. When that becomes the issue, then it's wrong. But what we would like to look at particularly this morning is one aspect of that [00:04:45] and attempt in the light of the Scripture to examine rest and think of how it should apply to our lives and hopefully call ourselves to do it appropriately. Now the passage that we just read is a part of the call of the Lord Jesus to himself and [00:05:21] And thus it is a call of the gospel to us and a call to Christian living as well. He calls us to come to him and to find that rest. How does this compare to American R&R? It compares in this way. American R&R is frenzied, oftentimes, as I suggested. [00:05:54] And because of that, it does not contain elements of biblical rest. Jesus calls us away from the frenzy To a calmness, to a peace, spiritually primarily, but physically and emotionally secondarily as well. [00:06:28] And in that sense, he shoulders our frenzies, if we will lay them upon him, and he gives us peace. With him as God and within ourselves. And so the very basic issue of coming apart and resting a while, as he said to the disciples, and we'll look at that in a moment, the very basic principle is a rest in Christ. [00:07:03] So what we're about to say has very little application to those who are not in Christ For their very nature will be somewhat frenzied Oh, you may know some peaceful unsaved people But beneath the surface of that, there will be a frenzy That they may not even recognize But for us as Christians who have come to Christ, who have responded to this invitation to come [00:07:38] recognizing that we are labored and frenzied and heavy laden and come for his rest to us there are instructions for how to live it out. And that is the primary focus of our thinking today. Another aspect of this that we could turn to, but I think you're familiar with, would be Psalm 46.10, where the psalmist says, [00:08:15] Be still and know that I am God. In other words, stop the frenzy and consider our God. Stop the self-effort and rest in Him. That's primary. And so what we are about to say is somewhat secondary. But it flows from a right relationship with God through Jesus Christ. [00:08:54] We could not really call the world to come apart and rest a while in the biblical sense because that is predicated upon resting in Christ. The problem that we have as Christians is that we have come to Christ for spiritual rest, but we are in the world and we have become infected by the world's thought system. And so we are tempted at times to be very frenzied ourselves. [00:09:32] Most of us here are not into the heavy recreational sort of things. Maybe I could say none of us are, in the sense that the world gets into it, in that the world actually lives for it, and does their work for it, and all that. But we still can become very frenzied, even in our work, very driven, without peace. [00:10:10] And that is an infection that comes from the world. That does not come from God. Let me hasten to say, God intends us to work. But he does also intend us to be able to rest after our work. And I would say that the order is fairly important. I'd like us to turn to the text, and we are only using a text today, [00:10:43] although I believe it is expositional, our thoughts will be. If they're not, they're not worth your listening to. But in Luke chapter 9, as we have been studying in the Gospel of Luke, And verse 10, the second part of verse 10, and those of you with us last week will recall that the disciples were sent out to minister in a very special way. [00:11:22] The twelve were sent out to do a ministry which we would understand was primarily among the Jews and there were specific instructions for that ministry and they went out and they came back and they reported and then having come back after a major work in the kingdom or for the kingdom It says in verse 10, the second part, [00:11:53] And he, Jesus, took them and went aside privately into a desert place belonging to the city called Bethsaida. I'd like you to turn also back with me to Mark 6, which is a parallel passage. Mark chapter 6 and verse 31. And this same, it's a parallel passage to the one we read in Luke. [00:12:30] And he said unto them, Come ye yourselves apart into a desert place and rest a while. For there were many coming and going, and they had no leisure so much as to eat. And they departed into a desert place by ship privately. What I'd like to share this morning would be applications from what we have here [00:13:00] built on the foundation of the Matthew passage that we read earlier together with the Psalm 46 passage. Americans particularly have difficulty practicing What is taught here? We are given to great pendulum swings. There are some people that say, well, I ought to have rest. And so it seems that that's all they do. [00:13:34] And they don't work. And there are some that say, I have to have rest. And in their, quote, rest, they work harder than they do at other times, as we've suggested already. These extremes are a part of our culture. But the Bible does illustrate and call us to a rest, first of all in Christ, and then from time to time, otherwise. And it's that otherwise that we are particularly looking at today. [00:14:09] Some would say that the rest is simply a change of pace. And it is that, many times. I would find that true in my own life and experience. In fact, the first major idea in our culture about vacations came from the industrial world where it was found that if you worked somebody doing the same thing [00:14:49] over and over and over, day in and day out, that their efficiency declined unless they had breaks. And those breaks first came in terms of a shorter work week, and then they came in terms of what's called the coffee break, and then they came in terms of personal days and on and on it went. And vacation time that increased by years of experience and all of those sorts of things. That came generally where our industrial leaders learned that if you work somebody doing identical same process over and over and over [00:15:30] That they will lose efficiency, even in some cases lose their mind, but at least lose efficiency and not be productive and accidents increase and all of those things in terms of what the industrial leadership would look at because they're looking at the bottom line and they're saying, Hey, if I have more accidents, if I have less efficiency and all these things are going to cost me more money, therefore we'll shorten the work week. Or under pressure they were quite willing to do so, at least, and all these other features came in. [00:16:05] Which are features of rest, in a sense, where there would be a change of pace. You know, even if the workers went outside and played a game of ball during break and exercised themselves, but it was exercised in a different way. It was a change of pace and was helpful to the goal. And those of you, and I think it would be very few, if any, here, who work in a factory doing the same process with your hands or whatever, [00:16:40] Ever, day in and day out. My experience is that that is quite limited. I ran a punch-press for a few months one time, and that was about all I could tolerate of that—just hitting the pedal, putting something in place, hitting the pedal, putting something in place, hitting the pedal, for hours at a time. That was more than I could take for a life, at least. But those of you who may do that, if any do, realize that you need a change of pace from time to time. [00:17:15] And that is one part of rest. And for someone who serves, as I do, in a number of different ways, From preaching to study to visiting to counseling to writing to all of the various things that we have been called to do, that change of pace makes it possible to have very long work weeks. And I think that's fine. [00:17:48] You can correct me afterwards if you don't, but I think that's fine. But if I was doing any one of those things for 80 hours a week, It wouldn't work. I would probably lose my mind. If I haven't already. But if you have the variety. But that is not the final answer, nor the answer that the Lord gave them here. It wasn't that they just had variety or a change of pace. [00:18:19] There was something else. The variety is good. But there's something else that was needed. They were ministering in a frenzied way. And I know a little about that myself. They were ministering in a frenzied way. Mark says that they didn't have time to eat. They were ministering to people to the point where there was no regular meal time. Now you may disagree with me and you're entitled to do so. [00:18:52] So I think that's all right to a point in ministry. I think it's better than the other extreme at least. To so lock down your mealtimes that nobody can bother you for any reason. I think that it's all right to a point, but there has to be some release from that. And that's what the Lord asked for them. They had given their report. So now he says, come apart and rest a while. [00:19:28] And he took them to a desert place and guided them. And I'm sure there was interchange. I'm sure they just didn't sit there like bumps on a log on a bunch of tree stumps and look at each other. I'm sure that there was some conversation going on and some instruction. but the thing was slowed way down so that it could be called rest. And that also has to happen. It doesn't just pertain to those in ministry. [00:20:01] It pertains to you who farm and work in factories or drive vehicles or whatever you do for a living. There needs to be some time when there is rest. I'm not talking about six hours, seven hours a night or whatever of sleep. In addition to all of those things, the variety, the regular night's sleep, all that, in addition to that, there has to be a time when there is what we would call genuine scriptural rest. [00:20:38] Now, some of us do it to the extreme. I'll give you a personal illustration. Next week, our family will gather, as we do every summer, Lord willing, at the lake in New York. One or two or more of those days. After having gone to bed at a decent hour the night before, we will crash until 3 or 4 in the afternoon. [00:21:20] And we will maybe do some reading and sleeping and reading and sleeping and various other things. But it will be an almost total rest as far as we would define that for ourselves. Now some of you raised in fairly strict backgrounds will think of that as a very simple thing to do. You can think what you will, but I believe it's the correct thing to do. In other words, we have to have those times. [00:21:53] We don't have to have them real often, but I think all of us have to have them. And you may not define it that way. For laying around and reading and sleeping and so forth It may not be your rest. I'm not trying to put you in my mold. But there have to be those full, shall I say, full crash times. And I don't think bodily exercise is necessarily a part of them. I think it's something beyond that. Time when your mind rejuvenates and you start to remember the things that you've forgotten [00:22:28] and you allow that to sift and you spend time with the Lord in prayer and you allow that to work through your whole being and you come to rest. One of the things that I find in my own life, if I'm getting to the point where I need that crash, is that I don't sleep all night. I might wake up early. Err. And you start to observe things about yourself that are telling, at least they seem to be telling me, hey, you need to crash. [00:23:14] Now we've found ways, and some of you have learned about our ways, of short crashes, getting ready for a big one. So we can at times go back to the house and take the phone off the hook. We don't do that very often, but some of you caught us doing it. Take the phone off the hook and crash for a couple or three hours. And that does rejuvenate us. [00:23:47] I'm not trying to put myself forward and I don't have all the answers. But I am saying that if there does not come a time like this when you can pull back into the desert place and just have release and just let things, let your mind roll around issues and do some reading unless you just don't read [00:24:19] but do some reading or whatever just let it rest if you can't do that then I think you are in trouble with the Bible I really do and I do think most Americans are in trouble with the Bible on that issue there has to be rest and that is what the Lord called the disciples to Now, I want to underline a couple of things before we close. [00:24:56] Number one, we've already said it, but I want to underline it. It was after ministry. It was after work. Some people hearing this message may say, Oh, yeah, I need rest. They haven't done a day's work in a couple of weeks, so they're going to rest now. No, that's not what it's saying. After work. [00:25:28] After the intensity of work, yes, there comes a time for rest. And they went apart to evaluate because the Lord speaks to them about that. It was a recharging. They hadn't had any leisure, Mark says. They needed some recharging of the battery. [00:26:03] And it was very temporary. Some people think they're called to rest all the time. There are people that look at age 65 as great because now they can lay around for the rest of their lives. I don't find that in the Bible. Maybe a time in older years that you let up a little. That's fine. [00:26:37] But I don't find any justification in the Bible to lay around permanently unless you are disabled. I believe that we have to understand that it's temporary. Now, the people made it very temporary. As you read the context, the people found out where they were going, figured it out, and they walked around the lake and met them over there after a while. But the text would seem to indicate they had some time, some leisure time. [00:27:12] Some rest. We're on a holiday weekend as far as the American calendar is concerned. You might want to take a drive down to one of the bridges overlooking Interstate 81 this afternoon, tomorrow afternoon sometime. You'll see what America defines as resting a while. But that's not what the Bible defines. The rest that the Bible talks about, I believe, is a pulling back, closing out the things of the world and the ministry and all of that. [00:28:00] Not that you stop being a minister. We are all ministers if we're obedient. But we pull back and we just let things idle. and rest. It's a picture of what the Lord does for us when we're saved. When we're saved, we have come to a measure or other to realize that we are a prisoner. [00:28:34] We're a slave to sin. We don't like it. We hate sin, but we can't do anything about it. We're in a terrible mess, and our anxiety rises, and then we cast our trust on the Savior, and He gives us rest from all of that through His shed blood. And by the same token, physically and emotionally and mentally, [00:29:08] we need to come to the place in our lives on a regular basis when we rest. We unshoulder the burden and rest. It doesn't have to be a long time. It does follow work. We don't want to do more work doing it than we do working. It includes some time for evaluation, undoubtedly. [00:29:46] And the crowd is following. And so it's going to be temporary. But it is a part of our obedience to the Savior. For what He said to the disciples, He says to us. Come apart and rest a while. Have you done that? And if not, I commend you to the Lord to do it. [00:30:25] Not necessarily when you're supposed to be doing something else But to do it as unto the Lord Let's bow together in prayer Thank you Father for your word We've looked at a very simple principle One we as Americans have a hard time practicing Help us to first of all find our complete rest in Jesus and then help us to obey the command of the Savior to rest a while from time to time. [00:31:06] We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.