AN INVITATION
Part 2

“Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him . . . fret not thyself”
(Psalm 37:7).

We continue meditating on God’s invitations to live with Him in His life of rest.

TURN FROM MAN’S WAYS

Is your soul restless? Your stomach tied up in knots? Once again God invites you to return to Him and trust Him. He speaks to you in Isaiah 30:15: “For thus saith the LORD GOD, the Holy One of Israel; In returning and rest shall ye be saved: in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength.” Turn from trying to do it all in your own strength. Return from listening to ungodly counsel. Return from trusting in the strength of Egypt, which is the spirit of the world and man’s ideas (Isaiah 30:1-3). Turn back to God. His arms wait for you.

“Return unto thy rest, O my soul” (Psalm 116:7).

DON’T FORGET

Jeremiah 50:6 says: “My people . . . have forgotten their resting place.” Do you sometimes forget you have a resting place? Do you live in a state of turmoil instead? Your Savior, Jesus Christ, invites you to live in His rest. Nothing takes Him by surprise. Nothing gets Him upset. He doesn’t get into a stew and worry Himself sick. He is in control of all things and every detail of your life.

There is a place of quiet rest,
Near to the heart of God,
A place where sin cannot molest,
Near to the heart of God.

DO IT GOD’S WAY

Are you homeschooling, but find it overwhelming? You don’t have to continue in frustration. God shows the way. God’s way of teaching is “precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little” (Isaiah 28:10). Your children don’t need to learn everything in one day. Children learn better in bite-size pieces. And there is still tomorrow. There is a lifetime ahead!

What happens when we do it God’s way? God continues speaking: “To whom he said, This is the rest wherewith ye may cause the weary to rest; and this is the refreshing” (Isaiah 28:12). Did you get this dear, weary mother? It says: “THIS IS THE REST AND THIS IS THE REFRESHING!” Let me repeat it: “THIS IS THE REST!” God knows the best way for your children and they learn a lot more this way. And He knows the best way for you. You will enjoy rest instead of becoming a stressed-out, anxious mother.

Of course your will be diligent. Deuteronomy 6:6-9 tells us to DILIGENTLY teach our children. “Diligently” is not a half-hearted word. It means: “To impress sharply by verbal repetition, to point, to show, to engrave, to make them penetrate, and to whet as in whetting the appetite with repetition and diligence.”

How do we do this? God tells us to do it as we live life--when you sit in your home, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. He doesn’t tell us we have to complete every curriculum we purchased (just because we spent the money on it). He doesn’t tell us we have to accomplish the set block of teaching we planned for the day. He wants us to faithfully teach, but little by little, line upon line.

BUT THEY WOULD NOT

However, we have a problem. Many don’t believe God’s way. They think they have to do it like the school system, or like some other mother does it. Dear mother, don’t be like the people to whom God showed His way and their response was: “yet they would not hear” (Isaiah 28:1).

When God asked His people to return to Him in Isaiah 30:15, God lamentably said: “and ye would not.”

God spoke to the people of Judah in Jeremiah 18:11-17 and said: “Return ye now every one from his evil way, and make your ways and your doings good.” Did they return? No. They said: “But we will walk after our own devices, and we will every one do the imagination of his evil heart.” They turned from God’s ancient, timeless, and everlasting ways to go their own ways.

When Jesus cried over Jerusalem and longed to gather them under His wings as a hen gathers her chickens, He cries out again, “and ye would not!” (Matthew 23:37).

Why are we so stubborn? Why do we go our own way and get stressed out, when God invites us to His life of rest.

Don’t refuse God’s invitations. Embrace them with a great big “Thank You.”

Blessings from Nancy Campbell

PRAYER:

“Dear Father God, Thank You so much for inviting me into Your rest. I long to daily and moment by moment abide in Your restful presence. Save from having dull ears that do not hear; save me from resisting Your invitation. I want a willing heart to live Your way. Amen.”

AFFIRMATION:

Moment by moment embracing the rest of God.

FURTHER SCRIPTURES TO LOOK UP:
Deuteronomy 1:43; 2 Kings 18:12; Psalm 81:10, 11; Isaiah 32:18; 55:1-3; Jeremiah 29:19; AND Ezekiel 22:30.