The Gift of Rest | Ep 14

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Hey, friend. Welcome to a new creation podcast where we're pointing women towards victory in Jesus story at a time. My name is Jemese LaChel. I'm so glad that you're here. Let's dive right in to today's episode.

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Well, welcome back, friends. This is Jemese. Before we begin, I want to hop right into prayer like I like to do. You know, we like to pray here before we get started, so let's pray.

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Gracious Father, we just love you. I thank you for this time. I pray for the listener today that you would just bless this listener, this one, this daughter. Bless them, Lord, with your sweet presence Bless them with your kindness, bless them with your grace, bless them with your love and give them ears to hear what the spirit of the Lord is saying. Or make our heart soft before you remove anything that would stand in the way of us hearing you, anything that would stand in the way of our relationship with you, anything that has exalted itself above the knowledge of you.

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Lord, we pray that you would tear those things down in the name of Jesus as we just fix our hearts and our eyes on you. In Jesus name. We love you, Lord. Amen.

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Come to me. The word of God says, Come to me. Jesus says, come. Come to me, all of you who are weary and heavy lated, and I will give you rest.

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There is such a beautiful gift that the Lord Jesus Himself would speak those words that we have in our Bible today that we can read, we can drop that word, we can hide it in our hearts. He says, come to me. All of you are weary and heavy lated, and I will give you rest. Rest is such a necessary gift. And it's a command.

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Yeah, command. So people get sometimes defensive or a little agitated sometimes. We can know that if that's the case, that is not coming from God. It doesn't mean that you're under attack or whatever. It doesn't mean anything negative per se.

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But our flesh must come under subjugation, be crucified in Christ Jesus, and only then can we know and operate and love all of these beautiful commands. The flesh will balk against the word of God. Our flesh will have us working and pushing and striving and trying to do all of the things. As I'm recording this podcast episode, it's in holiday season time. There's so much that we can busy ourselves with doing.

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There's so much that we can tell ourselves that we got to do this thing and that thing and get this meal plan together. We have to organize that and not to mention all the different varying relationship pieces. And at the end of the day, it can make you feel so worn out, tired, exhausted, and that's just preparing for a good thing, like a quote unquote good scenario where it's fun to spend time with holiday or spend time with family, it's fun to do. These are good things, right? If we come from a background or epistemology where it's a blessing, where it's a great thing to gather for holidays, right?

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I say that because I know that holiday season isn't always fun or nice for everyone and I do acknowledge that and I honor you if you're in that place. But here's the gift, there's a message for you because God is reminding you today that there is a gift of rest. And there's a reason why he would speak that into His Word, why he would even say it as a command, why we wouldn't even know through the scriptures that Jesus is our Sabbath rest. We never have to work for striving to please God ever again. We never have to work for pleasing Him.

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Because once we accept Jesus, once we allow ourselves to rest in Him, once we allow ourselves he'll take Him at His Word when he says, come to me all of you who are weary and Hebulated and I will give you rest. Once we say, I believe you Jesus. Once we allow ourselves to say, I'm not self, I'm not going to deny myself this gift. See, a lot of times people will not allow themselves to take a good gift because they feel like there's some kind of issue of oh I don't need it, I'm fine, I got it. I'm talking in the natural.

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Have you ever gone through that experience where somebody wants to do something kind for you? Even like open the door and you're like, oh I got it, I'm kind, I'm fine. What you don't always see is under the surface of that is oftentimes pride operating. It's pride. Pride will keep you from taking the good gift that God has put out before you.

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Pride will keep you from stepping into the fullness of the Lord. That's the reason why he hates pride. God hates pride. He hates a proud heart. We don't talk about our Lord this way very often.

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You really don't hear people a lot of times speaking about this nature, this aspect, this characteristic of our God. Yes, he is love, oh yes, he is so full of compassion and kindness and mercy. But our God hates pride. He hates it because a proud heart will exalt itself against the knowledge of God. A proud heart will say, I don't need you.

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A proud heart will say I don't need God. A proud heart will deny Jesus.

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That's why the scriptures tell us to humble ourselves before Him. And it really is an act of humility to rest, don't you think? I mean even think about it in the natural, taking rest, laying down our bed at night, it's a humility. Like we are not made to push forever. You may be able to run and run and run for a period of time but eventually you're going to pass out, right?

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Like rest, even in the natural. It's a humble state. But there's an invitation here for someone listening. Maybe you've got this podcast screaming into your earbuds right now. You've got me here, ministering, this word to you.

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There was an invitation that the Lord wants to bring you nearer, draw you near to Him and give you the rest that you need. So I say it like this. You even have the permission to rest in God. I keep saying the same sort of theme every time God sets me down and puts me in front of this microphone to produce these episodes. Every time I pray, asking God, what do you want me to share?

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I don't take it lightly that on the other side of this audio, on the other side of this microphone that I'm speaking in, there is a child of God.

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And you know what he keeps telling me? He keeps bringing up this theme of rest, rest, rest, rest, rest. So my question for you is, where are you pushing? Where are you striving?

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The invitation to rest in Jesus brings us a freedom from performance. It brings us a freedom from condemnation. It brings us a freedom to act in peace. And on the other side of that are so many beautiful gifts of the Holy Spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, selfcontrol.

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There's so many beautiful fruits of the Spirit of God available to us. But often times when we are so hurried in our day, when we are so doing everything in our own strength, we may struggle to pause and actually take a place of rest and just allow the fullness of those gifts to be evident in our lives. Who doesn't need patience, especially right now in this season? Who doesn't need gentleness and kindness? You may struggle with being a patient person or being a kind person.

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You may have these secret struggles or even secret sin operating in your life. I'm here to point you to the person of Jesus Christ who has given you this invitation to rest in Him. There's a beautiful song called Rest on US. And as you listen to that song yeah, it's such a beautiful, worship song. But as I was preparing for this episode, I just kept hearing that song in my spirit, and I hope that I would get in trouble for singing it a little bit, but it goes like, as the spirit was moving over the water, spirit, come move over us.

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And it was like the Holy Spirit was asking me to listen to that song a little bit differently for once and to imagine that it was God himself saying, come rest on us. Come rest on God the Father. Come rest on God the son Come rest on God the Holy Spirit. How would your life look different if you accepted the invitation from Holy God to just rest on Him? What are you carrying right now that you need to be laying down this is a brief podcast.

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I'm not going to take up too much time, but I want to minister this word to you. There's a reason why God keeps having me come back to the similar theme. I know that the women who's connected to this podcast are connected for a reason. Allow the word of the Lord to speak to you. Come to me, all of you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest as a promise.

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If you need a prayer, if you need deliverance, if you want to speak about inner healing or mentorship, reach out to me.

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As always, I leave room at the end of every episode to invite the listener who doesn't yet know Jesus to come to him. You just heard a word about coming to Jesus and Him giving you rest. If that's you, and you know that you need Jesus, or if maybe you've allowed your relationship with God to grow cold or grow stagnant or you've moved away and you've heard something today, I want you to hear that you don't have to wait until you find a church home. You don't have to wait one moment longer. You can accept Jesus right now and repair that relationship right now, and it's actually Him reaching out towards you.

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You open your mouth and say yes to Jesus, but he is so willing and ready to reach out and run towards and grab hold of you and scoop you up and just restore you, redeem you. The Bible tells us that every one of us who calls in the name of the Lord shall be saved. So fix your eyes and your heart on Jesus. And if you're ready to bridge that gap between you and the Lord today, let's pray. Father, we thank you.

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We acknowledge that you are the Lord and that we meet Jesus and we need grace or we confess our sin. We confess our sinfulness. We confess our sinful nature. Lord God, we need you, Jesus, as a savior. We thank you, Lord, that you would teach us what we need to know by the power of the Holy Spirit, by the power of your presence.

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Lord, I ask for a fresh fire to be ignited in the life of the listener. I ask for fresh oil to be poured into the life of the listener. Fresh presence of God. A fresh window, lord, blow through this daughter's life in a way that she has never seen or known before, Lord. In a way that is so holy and pure.

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In a way that she will know that it was only you who could have done this thing. Draw her near, my God, in the name of Jesus that she could call herself a child of God, firmly planted and rooted and grounded in love. I pray for her to know you better. I pray for deeper intimacy between you, Lord God, and this listener on the other side, this listener who maybe has this prayer going into her earbuds right now. Lord, you see this child of God right now?

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What did I pray for? Your blessing to be upon them and that you would draw them near and heal any hurting places. Allow your restfulness to just bless her, come upon her, and allow her to learn and soak up anything that is that she needs to know. In Jesus name we pray. And if you just set that prayer for the first time.

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Welcome to the family.

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As always, I want to thank you for tuning in and allowing me to hang out with you and your earbuds. That is such an honor. I'd like to ask before you go, would you mind leaving a review wherever it is that you're listening to this podcast? So maybe Apple podcast or Spotify? Such a gift and a blessing to me personally and to this podcast.

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Thank you in advance for doing that. In the meantime, I want to just say thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Bless you bless.

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You bless. And I ask that the Lord God himself would bless you and reach into your life, touch you where you need to be touched, in your heart and your soul and your spirit, until we meet again.