Vol. 11, The Symbolic Code, No. 6
Vol. 11 No. 6
APRIL, 1956
FAITH AND WORK BRING REST 3
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6 2
FAITH AND
WORK BRING REST
(The sermon selected for this issue of The Symbolic
Code was delivered by Brother V.T. Houteff
PRAYER THOUGHT: "Elijah
had thought that he alone in
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God said, 'seven thousand in
"If, under trying circumstances, men
of spiritual power, pressed beyond
measure, become discouraged and desponding; if at times they see nothing
desirable in life, that they should choose it, this is nothing strange or
new. Let all such remember that one of
the mightiest of the prophets fled for his life before the rage of an
infuriated woman. A fugitive, weary and
travel-worn, bitter disappointment crushing his spirits, he asked that he might
die. But it was when hope was gone, and
his life-work seemed threatened with defeat, that he learned one of the most
precious lessons of his life. In the
hour of his greatest weakness he learned the need and the possibility of
trusting God under circumstances the most forbidding.
"Those who, while spending their life
energies in self-sacrificing labor, are tempted to give way to despondency and
distrust, may gather courage from the experience of Elijah. God's watchful care, His love, His power, are
especially manifest in behalf of His servants whose zeal is misunderstood or
unappreciated, whose counsels and reproofs are slighted, and whose efforts
toward reform are repaid with hatred and opposition.
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"It is at the time of greatest weakness
that Satan assails the soul with the fiercest temptations. It was thus that he hoped to prevail over the
Son of God; for by this policy he had gained many victories over man. When the will-power weakened and faith
failed, then those who had stood long and valiantly for the right, yielded to
temptation. Moses,
wearied with forty years of wandering and unbelief, lost for a moment his hold
on Infinite Power. He failed just on the
borders of the promised land. So with Elijah. He who had maintained his trust in Jehovah
during the years of drought and famine; he who had stood undaunted before Ahab;
he who throughout that trying day on Carmel had stood before the whole nation
of Israel the sole witness to the true God, in a moment of weariness allowed
the fear of death to overcome his faith in God.
"And so it is to-day. When we are encompassed with doubt, perplexed
by circumstances, or afflicted by poverty or distress, Satan seeks to shake our
confidence in Jehovah. It is then that
he arrays before us our mistakes, and tempts us to distrust God, to question
His love. He hopes to discourage the
soul, and break our hold on God.
"Those who, standing in the forefront
of the conflict, are impelled by the Holy Spirit to do a special work, will frequently feel a reaction
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when the pressure is removed. Despondency may shake the most heroic faith,
and weaken the most steadfast will. But
God understands, and He still pities and loves.
He reads the motives and the purposes of the heart. To wait patiently, to trust when everything
looks dark, is the lesson that the leaders in God's work need to learn. Heaven will not fail them in their day of
adversity. Nothing is apparently more
helpless, yet really more invincible than the soul that feels its nothingness,
and relies wholly on God.
"Not alone for men in
positions of large responsibility is the lesson of Elijah's experience
in learning anew how to trust God in the hour of trial. He who was Elijah's strength is strong to
uphold every struggling child of His, no matter how weak. Of every one He expects loyalty, and to every
one He grants power according to the need.
In his own strength man is strengthless;
but in the might of God he may be strong to overcome evil and to help others to
overcome. Satan can never gain advantage
of him who makes God his defense.
'Surely, shall one say, in the Lord have I righteousness and strength.'
"Fellow Christian, Satan knows your
weakness; therefore cling to Jesus.
Abiding in God's love, you may stand every test. The righteousness of Christ alone can give
you power to stem the
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tide of evil that is sweeping over the world. Bring faith into your experience. Faith lightens every burden, relieves every weariness.
Providences that are now mysterious you may solve by continued trust in
God. Walk by faith in the path He marks
out. Trials will come; but go
forward. This will strengthen your
faith, and fit you for service. The
records of sacred history are written, not merely that we may read and wonder,
but that the same faith which wrought in God's servants of old may work in
us. In no less marked manner will the
Lord work now, wherever there hearts of faith to be channels of His power.
"In the vision of the prophet Ezekiel
there was the appearance of a hand beneath the wings of the cherubim. This is to teach God's servants that it is
divine power that gives success. Those
whom God employs as His messengers are not to feel that His work is dependent
on them. Finite beings are not left to
carry this burden of responsibility. He
who slumbers not, who is continually at work for the accomplishment of His
designs, will carry forward His work. He
will thwart the purposes of wicked men, and will bring to confusion the
counsels of those who plot mischief against His people. He who is the King, the Lord of hosts, sitteth between the cherubim; and amidst the strife and
tumult of nations, He guards His children still. When the strongholds of kings shall he
overthrown,
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when the arrows of wrath shall strike through the hearts
of His enemies, His people will be safe in His hands." -- Prophets and
Kings, chapter 13, excerpts only.
________________________
The subject for today is taken from
Heb. 4:1-11 -- "Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering
into His rest, any of you should seem to come short of it. For unto us was the gospel preached, as well
as unto them: but the Word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with
faith in them that heard It. For we which have believed do enter into
rest, as He said, As I have sworn in My wrath, if they
shall enter into My rest: although the works were finished from the foundation
of the world. For He spake
in a certain place of the seventh day on this wise, And God did rest the
seventh day from all His works. And in
this place again, If they shall enter into My
rest. Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to whom it
was first preached entered not in because of unbelief: again, He limiteth a certain day, saying in David, Today, after so
long a time; as it is said, To day if ye will hear His
voice, harden not your hearts. For if
Jesus had given them rest, then would He not afterward
have spoken of another day.
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There remaineth
therefore a rest to the people of God.
For he that is entered into His rest, he also hath ceased from his own
works, as God did from His. Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall
after the same example of unbelief."
In Heb. 4:9 Paul tells us that there remaineth a rest and that to the people of God.
Heb. 4:2 --
"For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the Word
preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard
it."
The "them" in this verse refers to
ancient
A rest was promised to ancient
"Joshua" (Heb. 4:8, margin) led
ancient
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"There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God." Heb.
4:9.
If we are the people with the last message,
then we must be the ones who are to be among the first to enter into that
rest. Since rest comes when one's work
is done, it is only when we have done our work that we can have rest. What is our work? the work we must
perform before we may have rest?
In verse 4 of this chapter Paul refers back
to the time of creation. We shall
therefore turn our attention now briefly to Genesis 1 which is a record of creation as you well know. There we are told that the earth and all that
is in it was created in six days, and that God rested the seventh day. God rested on the seventh day, and Adam took
part in the celebration or commemoration of the completion of God's work. Adam could not rest, for he had not
worked. He could only keep the day holy
as a memorial of the completion of God's work.
Gen. 1:27, 28 -- "So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created
He him; male and female created He them.
And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be
fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have
dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every
living thing that moveth upon the earth."
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This was the work God gave man to do. He created the earth to be inhabited. It was the duty of Adam and Eve to replenish
the earth with saints and to bare rule over all the earth. Obviously this work has not yet been
finished, for not all on earth is yet under subjection to man as God
intended. The earth
was originally created and provided with righteous people, but because Adam
sinned all his children were born in sin. Had our first parents been faithful there
would have been only righteous inhabitants.
Since all born of Adam are sinners, there is therefore need for all to
be born again. Then because sin entered
all man's work is multiplied, for the additional labor to bring salvation by
preaching the Word became necessary.
Gen. 3:16,17 -- "Unto the woman He said, I
will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy
husband, and he shall rule over thee.
And unto Adam He said, Because thou hast
hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I
commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it:
cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt
thou eat of it all the days of thy life."
God here greatly multiplied sorrow and
conception. Woman-kind, because of sin,
had to give birth to many more children than otherwise
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she would have had sin not entered. So, then, we see that the complete number
that God wanted to inhabit the earth would of course have been made up sooner
had Adam and Eve not sinned.
God rested the seventh day because His
creative work was finished, but man's work was not yet done. Man's work in reality started where God's
sole creative work ended. Therefore, man
joins the Lord in resting on the Sabbath day in commemoration of the completion
of the Lord's work, but the rest that is to be man's will be given him when his
part of the work is finished. When the
gospel work has replenished the earth with born-again people, then probation
will cease and our work will be ended.
Then will we enter into our rest, the rest Paul is speaking about.
The earth today (including the dead) is
perhaps inhabited with the number God had intended should inherit the
earth. But when all those who will not
be saved are eliminated, the complete number may not yet be made up, nor is the
gospel work finished. Regardless how
great the world's population may be, if the people are not saved the earth is
still empty in God's sight.
Adam was to carry on his work of
replenishing the earth with saints (which is in reality an extension of
creation itself) with the aid of the Trinity. It was the Word which wrought
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creation in the beginning and it is the Word that is to
finish the work of the earth. The Word
is nothing more or less than the Trinity speaking to us. God's commission to man joins him to the
Trinity and shows that God wants us to be colaborers
with Him. Man the mouthpiece, and the Bible the
Word. Here we can see that God gave man
a very great part in the work of creation, and He has given us His Spirit to
aid us in doing it.
"After these things the Lord appointed
other seventy also, and sent them two and two before His face into every city
and place, whither He Himself would come." Luke 10:1. The disciples were sent to every place
wherever Christ Himself
would come, showing that they would have Christ at their side
while they were doing their work.
"And as they went to tell His
disciples, behold, Jesus met them, saying, All hail. And they came and held Him by the feet, and
worshipped Him. Then said Jesus unto
them, Be not afraid: go tell My brethren that they go
into
"And this gospel of the Kingdom shall
be preached in all the world for a witness unto all
nations; and then shall the end come." Matt.
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24:14. "Go ye therefore, and teach all
nations baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the
Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded
you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end
of the world." Matt. 28:19, 20. This commission extends down to us in the end
of time; likewise also does the promise that He will ever be with us to aid us
in our work. Yes, all God requires of us
is to speak the Word, and He has pledged Himself to be with us to aid us.
Man was commanded to replenish the earth, to
bring forth children. He was to teach
his children and convert them as soon as they have sufficient knowledge; and he
was to wipe out wickedness. Wicked men
do not perish forever from the earth until after the gospel has been
preached. There is then a lesson in this
that we should not fail to see; namely, that the slower you work in God's
service, the greater the sorrow. If the
church had been faithful, much labor and means could have been saved. Therefore many others have to be brought into
the world to take the place of those lost.
The Trumpets chart proves that man is to
replenish the earth with righteous people only, for it was Noah's preaching
that brought the flood which saved the righteous and destroyed the wicked
antediluvians. It was the church's going
out of
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in the
"The portion of Jacob is not like them;
for he is the former of all things: and
"In the beginning God created the
heaven and the earth. And the earth was
without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face
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of the waters.
And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and
God divided the light from the darkness.
And God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. And the evening and the morning were the
first day." Gen. 1:1-5.
There was light before the fourth day when
the sun and the moon were created. Light
was the first to be created. At this
point it is interesting to notice how the days of creation and the seven
trumpets somewhat coincide: (1) First
day -- Spirit moved upon waters and light was created; First trumpet -- hail
(water) and fire cast upon the earth representing the Truth preached by Noah to
enlighten the people to escape the destruction by flood. (2) Second day -- waters divided by the
firmament; Second trumpet -- affected the "sea." (3) Third day -- sea and earth divided and
vegetation created; Third trumpet -- Star fell into waters. (4) Fourth day -- sun, moon, and stars
created; Fourth trumpet -- sun, moon, and stars smitten. (5) Fifth day -- fowl created; Fifth trumpet
-- concerned locusts having wings. (6)
Sixth day -- beast and man were created; Sixth trumpet -- concerned horses and
men, and it is in the sixth trumpet that God's Kingdom is to be restored and
man is to fill the place that was
intended that he should fill. (7)
Seventh day -- rested; Seventh trumpet -- Mystery of God finished.
God finished His work on the sixth day of
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creation, and man will finish his part of the work in the
sixth trumpet. Just as God rested from
His work on the seventh day, so man, in the seventh trumpet at the close of
probation when the gospel work is finished, will receive the rest of which Paul
spoke. By this we see that it took God
six days to do His work and it is taking man 6,000 years to do his. Then comes the
millennium. All God's people are to keep
the seventh-day Sabbath in commemoration of the completion of God's work before
they will receive the rest which they themselves have earned. To enter into their rest, however, requires
faith and belief which our forefathers did not possess.
Heb. 4:1 --
"Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into His
rest, any of you should seem to come short of it."
It is for God's people today to have not
just the promise of rest but it is for them to experience it in reality.
Heb. 4:2 --
"For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the Word
preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard
it."
At this time, the time in which the prophets
longed to live, the gospel of the Kingdom is to be preached even more fully
than it was to the
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early Christians.
But it still will require faith and belief on the part of all who would
enter into that rest. Those who do not
now possess more faith and belief than our forefathers who could not enter
because of their unbelief, will not be profited either.
Heb. 4:6, 7 -- "Seeing therefore it remaineth that some
must enter therein, and they to whom it was first preached entered not in
because of unbelief: again, He limiteth a certain
day, saying in David, To day, after so long a time; as it is said, To day if ye
will hear His voice, harden not your hearts."
The time is limited to a certain day
"in David" -- the time
Heb. 4:8, 9 -- "For if Jesus had given them rest, then
would He not afterward have spoken of another day. There remaineth
therefore a rest to the people of God."
After the close of probation God is to make
a memorial forever affirming that we have finished our work. The Sabbath points forward then to the rest
which we may enter into forever when we have finished our work as God finished
His.
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Heb. 4:9-11 -- "There remaineth therefore a rest to the
people of God. For he that is entered
into His rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from
His. Let us labour
therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of
unbelief."
Are you growing daily in faith? Do you see that the just shall live by
faith? If you are sure that you have
sufficient faith, are you mixing it also with corresponding works? Are you doing all you can to help replenish
the earth with saints? Brethren, these
questions are solemn ones, especially when one contemplates the thought that
the only way we can really rejoice in God's creation is to have a part in
it. It was for this very reason borne of
God's everlasting love for man that caused Him to grant to man so great a part
in establishing the world after His righteous order, and the Lord has given us
in this day an accurate and reliable blueprint in His eleventh-hour message so
that none of us need err in knowing how great a privilege we have to be a true
witness for Him in word, deed, and action.
Let us not, therefore put off the work and thus prolong the world's
sorrow and suffering, but let each of us be among those who shall fulfill the
purpose for which we were created -- to verily help bring about complete and
true "rest," an everlasting joy.
God has faithful ones who will do it.
Will you be one of them?
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