What is true rest? If the Lord is pleased to use senseless civil war, or self-serving judges, or the biting and devouring of one another, or prideful living where I basically say I don’t need God much at all day-to-day, to show me my need for true rest, what is that true rest that you cannot do without? It was not there in the time of the judges. Whatever glimmers of peace the judges brought was never enough to give Israel a permanent peace.
What about the time of the kings? The books of Kings and Chronicles highlight the same truth regarding the kings. The presence of a king did not automatically reverse Israel’s apostasy. There were a few good kings who led the people in the right direction, but the authors frequently highlight the flaws even of those kings. David was a man after God’s own heart, but he was also a sexual predator and a murderer. Asa was a godly man but, when threatened militarily, hired the services of Syria rather than relying on the Lord. Jehoshaphat feared the Lord but compromised morally in allying himself with godless King Ahab. Each of these kings led God’s people in spiritual reform, but each fell short of complete deliverance because of their own sin. Another kind of deliverer was needed.
The whole of the Old Testament cries out for a leader who will never sin and never have his rule ended by death. In the midst of constant failure by God’s leaders, the prophets began to speak. Jeremiah promised a better deliverer, one who would establish true rest (Jeremiah 33:14–16). And when that true King, that true Judge came, he proclaimed something that no one before him had every claimed. Jesus said, The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath
(Matthew 12:8). In other words, the Lord of Rest. Jesus came to be the eternal Sabbath, the eternal rest.
1 The men of Ephraim were called to arms, and they crossed to Zaphon and said to Jephthah, “Why did you cross over to fight against the Ammonites and did not call us to go with you? We will burn your house over you with fire.”