Overtaken and Into God's Rest

I've been realizing that there is a higher realm out there available to us in the Christian life.  There's a life beyond temptations, struggles and "falling from grace".  There's a life where God make things easier.

"For anyone who enters God's rest also rests from their works, just as God did from His."

Hebrews 4:10

This verse has taken on a newer, deeper meaning recently.  I think the Holy Spirit wants to shine on us so that the meaning of all scripture is always evolving and progressing into the Heavenly mind.  

Naturally speaking, life is hard.  Even for Christians -- sometimes, life is hard!  It may be hard to not lose it when your brother says something annoying; it may be hard to stay peaceful when everyone is crowding the kitchen, it may be hard to avoid all semblance of road rage...it may be hard to pray for a stranger in the grocery store.  These are all mindsets we've gotten stuck in somewhere in our past.

Truthfully, though, this isn't the most accurate way of thinking.  It's not God's way.    To the extent that we are not tapping into God's way, we are denying the fullness of what Messiah did for us on the cross.  If the majority of what we experience as a Christian seems hard, then we are living under an illusion.

To rest from your own work takes a lot of power.  Not your own power, though!  It takes the power of the Ruach inside you to propel you onward independent of yourself.  That's what we need -- to live in the Spirit.

I've been seeing that there are degrees in this life in the Spirit.  God wants to overpower you, He wants to overshadow you, He wants to overtake you and overwhelm you.  I think this is what the prophets were talking about when they said, "the hand of Yahweh was heavily upon me".  

God wants to expose you to the weight of His glory and compel you into Himself.  He wants to consume you until there is no self-effort of self-thought left.  He wants to possess you: mind, body, and spirit.  Isn't that interesting?  It's the truth.

The point at which life becomes easy for us, when faith becomes restful, when pain turns blissful, when natural conditions burst out into the supernatural, will occur when God within us has full control.  It's not as hard as it sounds.  The only effort involved in us is the race towards believing.  If we've believed, we've entered into God's way, and if we stay in His Way, we'll have it easiest.