Brother Sikes wrote:
The first major factor in entering or returning to the rest of God is the knowledge that YOU ARE NOT IN IT! Of equal importance is the knowledge, that for a period of time you can walk in His rest in certain areas and be out of it in others. Eventually, however, restlessness will take its toll in those areas as well.
As we become sensitive to factors that remove us from the rest we become more apt to stay in it. We will address this in more detail later. Our peace and joy are the first things to go, and joy is the source of our spiritual, mental, and physical strength. From here we begin to experience confusion and anxiety, and finally, we see that in giving up our rest, our physical bodies begin to suffer extraordinary fatigue and even sickness. Migraine headaches tormented me for years, but as I have yielded to the rest of God, they have become practically non-existent. To reiterate, the progression is first a lack of peace and joy, which introduces confusion and anxiety, then fatigue and eventually sickness.
In examining the cause for Adam’s fall from rest to restlessness in Genesis 3, where the desire to self-rule caused the original fall of man, we again see scriptural evidence that when we take God’s place and begin to self-rule, we fall into the trap of our own carnality and leave “the rest” of God. Make no mistake about it; self-rule in the eyes of God is the highest form of selfish ambition. With that understanding, let us examine a poignant New Testament scripture – “For where you have selfish ambition, there you will find disorder and every evil practice” (James 3:16). There is no greater form of “selfish ambition” than to rule what is designed to be led by God’s Spirit (Romans 8:14). The disorder, or lack of it, in our lives today is gauged by our propensity to rule self strictly through intellect rather than God’s Spirit.
When we worry, when we doubt, when we fear, when we accept an evil report, we are accepting that God cannot be trusted. It is during these times that we are inclined to come up with something to help ourselves and form our own direction. It is during this hour of testing that we are revealed. How many Ishmael’s must I birth before I realize that God only desires Isaac? God’s purpose can never be found in the life of Ishmael, only in Isaac. One of God’s loudest prophetic pronouncements for this hour – Ishmael and Isaac can no longer live in the same house! Works of the flesh can no longer live comfortably with life in the Spirit. Ishmael will always taunt Isaac.
Upon recognizing that we have left the rest, we now have an incumbent responsibility to re-enter the rest. We must recognize that there will be no restoration without we first enter into the rest. There are times that we must labor, even fight to get back into the rest of God (Hebrews 4:11), but just how do we do this? If we have recognized that we have left the rest, and that the aforementioned downward spiral is now taking place in our lives, what must we do to return to the rest? We must first identify the areas in which we left (the rest); areas that we have stepped back into depending upon self. Once we recognize the area or areas, we must repent and RELEASE everything to God (Isaiah 30:15) and strive, even fight in the Spirit to stay in the rest. We must recognize who is sitting on the throne of our hearts – us or God?
Release is the key to rest. Recognize and practice this key because it also is also the key to walking in true Sonship, without which there is no Kingdom walking, no Kingdom power, and no Kingdom inheritance in this earth (Romans 8:14-17). What you cannot truly release to God, you cannot truly rest in. There will never be rest without release. Let me risk redundancy by writing this again – There will never be rest without release. Release is as tantamount to rest as sun is to light. Release is often impossible with man, but what is impossible with man is possible with God. When we humble ourselves before God, the grace will come to enable us to release our fears, cares, concerns, and ambitions to God. ONLY HUMILITY will draw the enabling grace; not a false carnal humility, but rather a Godly humility that allows us to come as a little child, broken but confident that “our Father will.”
As we begin to press back into the rest by ceasing from our own efforts, we soon see the revelation of Hebrews 4:10 (Amplified), “For he who has once entered God’s rest also has ceased from the (weariness and pain) of human labors, just as God rested from those labors…”
Once we recognize that we are back into doing our own thing, we must quickly “cease from our own labor,” or as the NIV states, “For anyone who enters God’s rest also rest from his own work…” The “God Thing” can never get done as long as we are doing “our thing.” In order to enter into the true rest, where we are able to flow with the Spirit of God, we must RELEASE everything to God, even labor to stay in the rest. “Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall…” (Hebrews 4:11). Rest is a prerequisite to restoration. Rest will initiate restoration as surely as restlessness will stop it! God is in the restoring business and desires us to recover all, but for this season to be initiated in our lives we must ACCEPT that restoration will only come through our “rest” in Him. God cannot and will not work through our anxiety, bitterness, backbiting, fear and complaining.