Entering REST

"Therefore since a promise remains of ENTERING HIS REST, let us fear lest any of us seem to have come short of it" 

The first generation who received the promise of entering His rest failed to enter after God swore they would never enter into it because of their disobedience. This unbelief within the heart manifested itself when the report of giants before them reached their ears. 

Facing the difficulty ahead and their own inadequacy - they failed to mix the hearing of the promise with faith in God's power. 

Disobedience will always cause us to stumble when faith in God's power is left out of the mix. If we focus on the difficulty and measure the possibility by our own inability - we too will fail to be persuaded to act upon the promise of God. 

Two men did "mix" faith in God with the things they saw and heard and so Joshua and Caleb were the only two out of 603,500 men of their generation to actually enter the promise land. The others who had not been persuaded were rewarded according to the measure of their faith. They believed and spoke it would be better to die in the wilderness than enter the promise land and that was their end - according to their unbelief. 

This happened to them as an example and was written down for us as warning not to follow their example of "not mixing faith" in God when realizing the difficulty we face and the strength we lack. Abraham refused to consider his nearly dead body and chose instead to mix faith in God. He is the father of faith.