Okay, we all know the beautiful passage in
Matthew 11.
Let's look at it, where Jesus explained the
Sabbath.
You probably didn't notice it, but in Chapter
12, by the way, of Matthew, you see
a number of places in Chapter 12 of
Matthew where Jesus is explaining the false keeping
of the Sabbath.
For example, Chapter 12, verse 1, they were
picking grains and the Pharisees said in Chapter
12, verse 2, see your disciples are not
doing what's lawful to do on the Sabbath.
And then again, another instance, when he went
into the synagogue, verse 10, is it lawful
to heal on the Sabbath?
And people complained against him because he healed
somebody on the Sabbath day, and so on.
But before that, you see the place where
the Holy Spirit has put this beautiful verse,
explaining what the Sabbath really is, Matthew 11,
28, come to me, all who are weary
and heavy laden, I will give you the
real Sabbath and take my yoke upon you
and learn from me for I'm humble and
gentle and humble in heart and you will
find the real Sabbath in your soul.
He explained the Sabbath there, and then he
went in the next chapter to destroy this
false Sabbath.
It's very important to understand it, but the
Pharisees were the most brilliant people at that
time, couldn't understand it.
And some of the things I said in
the previous session, you probably didn't understand either.
If you try to understand it with your
cleverness, you can be as blind as the
Pharisees.
And that's why immediately before he spoke about
this rest, he said something very enlightening, and
that's in chapter 11 and verse 25.
I praise you, Father, you have hidden these
things from the wise and the clever and
the intelligent on earth, but you have revealed
them to babes.
That is a great truth.
You try to understand spiritual truth with your
cleverness and your intelligence, you cannot get it.
God has hidden some of the greatest truths
in scripture from the clever and the intelligent.
I've seen this.
I mean, I've preached these truths in CFC
churches in India for many, many years, and
I've discovered people never entering into it.
Many people, they've understood it in their head
so well, they can explain it to somebody,
but it doesn't come into their life.
They don't come to a life of rest
in their place of work or in their
home, even after many years, because God has
hidden these things from the wise and the
clever and the intelligent.
Then I asked the Lord, I said, what
shall I do then, Lord?
I'm not a stupid person.
I'm a little clever and intelligent.
But the Lord said, it's not your cleverness
and intelligence that will hinder you from knowing
the truth.
It is your pride in your cleverness and
intelligence.
It's pride that hinders God from revealing himself
to us.
And if I'm willing to give up that
pride, it doesn't matter whether you're dumb or
clever, it makes no difference.
What is it that babes have?
It says, reveal them to infants.
What is it that babes have, which clever
people don't have?
Jesus himself explained it.
He took a babe and said, if you
humble yourself like this child, you will enter
God's kingdom.
Or I could say this, if you humble
yourself like this little child, that means you
acknowledge that you know nothing and you're willing
to learn everything and you're not a sharp,
clever, intelligent person.
When it comes to spiritual things, you can
enter into the new covenant.
The kingdom of heaven is the new covenant.
So there's something that babes have, which clever,
intelligent people don't have.
And that's what we can have.
If I come to the Lord with humility
and say, Lord, when I come to scripture,
I'm dumb as anything.
Out in the world, I use my cleverness
and intelligence for so many things.
I can use it to make money.
I can use it to accomplish things in
the world.
Good.
But when I come to scripture, I have
to say, Lord, I'm like a child.
I don't know.
Teach me.
There's a veil over me which has been
taken away.
And if I come with that humility, then
I will understand the meaning of these words.
Take my yoke upon you, verse 29, and
learn from me, for I am humble in
heart, not clever and intelligent.
I believe Jesus was probably the cleverest and
most intelligent person that ever walked on this
earth, without a doubt, because there was no
sin to pollute his mind.
But he never went from giving people the
impression that I'm so clever, I'm so smart,
and I can teach you a few things.
That's not how he, I mean, lepers and
adulterous women could come freely to him, because
he's not trying to impress people with his
cleverness.
I love that.
I see so many preachers today trying to
impress people with that cleverness.
They're not at all like Christ.
I'm not impressed by them at all.
Jesus said, learn from me.
He never told us to learn from him
how to be, how to preach or how
to sing.
He told us to learn from him humility
and gentleness.
So my dear brothers and sisters, if you
want to enter into the new covenant, come
to Jesus, and I'm talking about the Sabbath
now, and try to learn from him gentleness
and humility.
Take his yoke upon you.
Now, what does yoke mean?
We don't see it much here, but in
India we see it all the time.
A yoke is a wooden bar kept on
the shoulders of two bullocks, and they plow
the field together.
And if the one bullock is a junior
bullock trying to learn from the senior bullock,
this yoke makes sure that the junior bullock
doesn't wander off in some other direction and
doesn't go too fast or too slow, which
is where the senior bullock is saying, listen,
if you want to learn from me, you
have to move at my pace.
Don't rush ahead.
Don't lag behind.
What that means in practical terms is when
the Lord says, when I tell you to
do something, do it immediately without question.
When I tell you in your conscience, don't
look there.
Don't say that.
Do it immediately.
That's taking the yoke.
And don't lag behind and don't rush ahead.
Don't go off somewhere where I don't permit
you to go.
Don't rush ahead and don't lag behind.
Learn from me.
Learn humility from me.
And you will find, verse 29, what the
Sabbath is all about.
This is the New Covenant Sabbath.
And I want to tell you, just like
a lot of other things in the New
Covenant most people haven't understood, or sometimes think
they've understood because they've understood in their mind,
they have not entered into rest.
The test of whether I've understood the Sabbath
is, have I entered into rest?
Turn back to Hebrews in chapter 4.
In Hebrews 4, it says, there remains, verse
9, a Sabbath rest for the people of
God.
And the one who has entered into rest
has rested from his own works.
He's not struggling to become holy.
He's just responding to the promptings of God
within.
He's not a robot that God has programmed
him and he does nothing.
And God does everything.
No, that would make man a robot.
It'd be like the planets.
The planets don't do anything.
They just, God just makes them go round
and round and round.
Man was not made like that.
It's this delicate balance where I don't do
anything myself on my own, but I listen
to the promptings of the Holy Spirit.
That's why Jesus said, man shall not live
by bread alone, but by every word that
proceeds from the mouth of God, that proceeds.
That means God is always speaking.
And if I'm listening, I will know exactly
what to do every time.
And gradually I'll get used to responding to
God's promptings.
And that's what it means to rest from
my own works, my own bright ideas.
There's so many Christians who've got many bright
ideas of how to serve God.
They say, I'll go out and do this
here.
And I'll go out and plant a church
here.
It's chaos.
A lot of God's work today is wood,
hay, and straw, which is going to be
burnt up because God never initiated it.
Do you know that a work which God
did not initiate, however good it may be,
will be destroyed?
How many of you believe that?
That a work that God did not initiate,
however good it may be, however Christian it
may be, however wonderful it may be called
Christian work, it will be destroyed.
Turn with me to Matthew's gospel and chapter
15.
Yeah.
Chapter 15.
Listen to this verse and try and understand
it.
Verse 13.
Every plant which my heavenly Father did not
plant will be uprooted.
Lord, what about if it is a good
plant?
It'll be uprooted.
Because it came from the bright, brilliant brain
of some clever man.
The Lord, do you know what it means
to live by faith?
The best definition of faith that I've ever
understood, that I've ever seen in scripture, is
what Jesus said in John chapter 15 and
verse 5.
Without me you can do nothing, but like
the branch remains in the tree and produces
fruit, so you can also bear fruit, but
apart from me you can do nothing.
So my picture of faith is this.
It's not claiming a promise.
God will make me prosperous.
God will heal me.
Those are all people who have not understood
faith.
Faith is, Lord, I'm as helpless as a
branch by itself cannot produce a single fruit,
but it can produce abundance of fruit if
it just remains attached to the tree and
allows the tree to let the sap flow
into it.
It's almost effortless.
You go and ask a branch, how do
you produce all these wonderful apples or mangoes?
I don't do anything.
I just remain in the tree and the
sap keeps flowing in as a picture of
the Holy Spirit just coming in and produce
the fruit.
And any person who's really served the Lord
in this way will tell you that my
service for the Lord is effortless.
It's not a strain.
It's not something I get exhausted with afterwards.
No, it's effortless because it's like the branch.
This is the life of faith.
Fruit produced for the glory of God.
So that is how God wants us to
live.
And so God has to initiate it.
That's why it says we've got to wait
on the Lord.
God does not want man to initiate something.
He wants us to depend on him and
let him prompt me.
You know how Jesus would never do anything
on his own?
See John chapter 5.
Here also it's related to the Sabbath.
Ask God to give you revelation on this.
Not understanding, but revelation.
You know it says here that John 5
18.
The Jews tried to kill him.
One, because he was breaking the Sabbath.
And second, because he was calling God his
Father, making himself equal with God.
So why did the Jews want to kill
Jesus?
Number one, because he broke the Sabbath.
Understand this.
And secondly, because he said God is my
Father, making himself equal with God.
I mean, today people have a question whether
Jesus is equal with God.
The Jews understood it very clearly.
When he said God is my Father, that
I'm equal with God.
And then Jesus said, I can do nothing
of myself unless it is something I see
the Father doing.
That means the Father tells me something and
then I do it.
Or see verse 30.
I can do this beautiful expression.
I can do nothing on my own initiative.
Even if Jesus did something on his own
initiative as a man, it would be uprooted.
Every plant which my Heavenly Father has not
planted will be uprooted.
The man who has come to rest in
Christ, like the branch rests in the tree,
has understood the Sabbath and say, I'm not
called here to have bright ideas to do
this, that and the other for God.
No, those are all for businessmen who want
to start new projects and start new businesses.
They all have bright ideas, these venture capitalists
and all that.
I'm not one of those.
I'm like Jesus.
I say, I'm not going to do anything
on my own initiative.
I can't do nothing on my own initiative.
I want to encourage you, my brothers and
sisters, ask God to give you a revelation
on John chapter 5, verse 30.
If you want to know how Jesus lived.
We think of Jesus lived, he lived a
pure life.
He had a holy life.
He didn't fool around with women.
He was faithful with money.
No, no, no, no.
Those are all the external things.
But deep within the principle of his life
was he never did anything on his own
initiative.
He waited on the Father, what do you
want me to do?
For example, when a world around him was
dying of sin, you know what he was
doing?
He was making stools and benches in a
carpentry shop.
Why?
Lord, what are you wasting your time making
stools and benches here?
There's a world dying of sin.
Don't you go on?
You go out as a missionary like people
are today, challenged to go out as a
missionary because there are people dying over there,
people dying over there.
What are you doing?
You couldn't move Jesus like that.
He would not step out of that carpentry
shop until the Father told him to go.
And he would not leave Israel.
Lord, there are people dying in Africa, China,
Rome.
Don't you want to go there?
No, no, no, no.
The Father has told me to stay in
Israel.
Only once or twice he went outside to
Tyre and Sidon.
What a wonderful way he lived.
You meditate on the life of Jesus, you
learn so many things.
And at the end of three and a
half years without traveling to China or Africa
or India or Rome, he said, I'll finish
the work the Father gave me to do.
Lord, but there are so many needy people
in the world.
That's fine.
The Father gave me a certain work to
do and I did it.
And 90% of that work was making
stools and benches and taking care of my
younger brothers and sisters at home.
Really?
We have no understanding of what God's work
is because we are so clever and so
intelligent.
And we think we can do the work
of God.
The greatest requirement in Christians today is humility
to say, Lord, I'm a dumb, stupid person
when it comes to spiritual things.
I say that to God many, many times.
And therefore I want to learn.
Jesus said, learn from me for I am
humble.
Here is his humility.
I will do nothing on my own initiative
because if I do it, I'll bungle up
God's work.
I've traveled enough around the world to know
that a lot of so-called Christian workers
messed up what God wants to do on
this earth.
Absolute confusion because people are doing whatever they
come to.
They haven't come to rest.
They haven't come to that Sabbath rest where
they live before God like Adam the first
day.
Before I go out to serve God, I
must come to rest in God and learn
to do nothing on my own initiative.
Then I can go out.
But Adam did not learn it.
The very first day he went out, he
did something on his own initiative and ate
from the tree of knowledge of good and
evil.
And that's how chaos and confusion came into
the world.
So there's a lot more to say in
this.
As I said, I'm only giving you starters
here, but let me show you one more
verse before I finish.
And that's in Hebrews in chapter 8, where
it specifically speaks about the new covenant.
And it says here in Hebrews chapter 8,
this is Hebrews 8.10. This is the
covenant, the new covenant that I'm going to
make with the house of Israel.
And that applies to us today.
They will not try to keep my laws.
I will put my laws into their mind.
I will write it in their hearts.
What does that mean?
Let me explain it to you.
When God says, I will put my law
into your mind.
He's saying, I will give you a desire
to do my will.
And when he says, I will put my
law, write it in your heart.
He's saying, I'll give you the ability to
do my will.
There are two things God wants to do
for us.
Give us the desire to do his will
and give us the ability to do his
will.
Desire is in our mind.
Ability is in the heart.
Hebrews 13, in verse 9, it is good
for the heart to be strengthened by grace.
Grace is God's power.
To do his will.
So there are two things God wants to
give us.
In our mind, he wants to give us
the desire to do his will.
And in the heart, the ability to do
his will.
So I want to say to you, brothers
and sisters, if you have a desire to
do the will of God, don't think you
got it yourself.
Don't be so proud to say that I
got a desire to do God's will.
I'm not like these carnal Christians who have
no such desire.
Brother, be humble and say, it is God
who gave me that desire.
You're not one bit better than the worst
sinner on the earth.
I often say that to God.
I say, Lord, there's no difference between me
and the greatest terrorist on this earth.
Absolutely no difference.
I don't believe that.
There are people who despise other Christians, all
those people who have false teachings, Jehovah's Witnesses,
Roman Catholics.
They're all wrong teaching.
I say, Lord, I would be worse than
all of them.
I'd be the worst terrorist on earth if
you didn't put a desire in my mind
to do your will.
There's a fundamental lack of humility in most
Christians, born-again Christians, even among CFC believers.
They're proud of their knowledge.
They're proud they understand the new covenant.
And that's why in their personal life, they
never seem to come to rest in their
home life or in their mind.
I'm trying to urge you to really ask
God to give you revelation on the Sabbath.
It'll change your life completely, believe me.
Learn from me, the Lord says, for I
am gentle and humble in heart, and you
will find a Sabbath in your souls, which
all those Pharisees could not understand.
And what is the message of the Sabbath?
That I am the Lord who will make
you holy.
You cannot make yourself holy.
I will put my law into your mind,
and I'll write in your heart and give
you the ability so that finally, in conclusion,
one verse, 1 Corinthians chapter 1, verse
26 onwards, consider your calling, brethren, not many
wise among the flesh or according to the
flesh, not many mighty, not many noble.
See, I've traveled a lot around the world.
I've seen believers of all types.
And I find this to be absolutely true.
Some of the most noble, mighty, richest people
in the world are not Christians.
God has not chosen them because of pride.
But God has chosen the foolish to shame
the wise.
God has chosen the weak to shame the
things that are strong.
Verse 28, God has chosen the base.
These things mean the really low cost, despised,
lowest level of humanity type of Christians, people,
people.
He has chosen to nullify the things that
are people who think they are somebody.
Why?
Here's the purpose of everything.
Verse 29, so that no one will ever
boast before God, saying, I have done this,
or I did this for God, or, you
know, Nebuchadnezzar boasted about what he had done,
and God humbled him and made him like
an animal for seven years.
But by God's doing, it's a very important
verse, 1 Corinthians 1.30, by God's doing,
not your doing, you are in Christ Jesus.
If you're in Christ Jesus today, it was
God's work.
And he has become to us wisdom.
And he has become to us righteousness, not
I'm clothed with the righteousness of Christ.
No.
Christ himself is my righteousness.
Understand that distinction.
Not I'm clothed with Christ's righteousness.
Christ is my righteousness.
That's how I come before God.
Christ is my holiness.
Christ is my redemption.
Why?
So that, as it is written, if anyone
boasts, let him boast to the Lord.
That is why the Apostle Paul could say
he was the least of all the saints
and the chief of sinners, because he knew
if there was anything good in him, God
had done it all.
And if you've understood that, and if you
can live in that, not occasionally come there
and then forget all about it and go
back to boasting, but live there, then you
have entered into the Sabbath rest of God.
May God help us to get revelation on
this.
Amen.