Question: My question may be odd. Is worshipping a way to find Rest from the ongoing we have against the enemy? Jesus says, come to be all who are weary and I will give you rest. Is this rest referring to all weariness? Physical, emotional and spiritual? I made the statement that worship is a type of rest from the war with enemy. I was told that the rest Jesus is referring to is rest from our war with God. That we are now in a permanent state of rest now that Jesus paid our debt. What do those verses in Matthew 11:28-30 refer to?

Answered by: Steve Webb, who has been a volunteer with us since November, 2009.

Answer: Greetings in Christ and thank you for your question. Obviously, the word ‘rest’ can take on different meanings depending on how it is used in context. We know for sure that when Jesus promised us rest that he was not talking about physical rest. For example, Colossians 3:23 tells us, “Whatever your hands find to do, do it with all your strength, as if working for God rather than a human master.” In 2 Thessalonians 3:10 we read, “if any man will not work, neither let him eat.” Our lot in life is to work so as to support ourselves, our family, and any others dependent upon us.

From this, it is clear that Jesus is talking about a state of rest that transcends our everyday work activities; it is a spiritual rest that has to do with having peace with God. An analogy, albeit an imperfect one, is being in a situation where one of our children’s lives hangs in the balance due to an accident or disease, but finding out that we have turned the corner, and the child is going to live and make a full recovery. While there may still be a lot of hard emotionally draining work ahead during the healing process, there is suddenly a sense of quiet rest in knowing that the battle has been won. That is where we believers stand with God. All of us have a tough road ahead with challenges that meet us every day, but we have an inner peace and rest in knowing that life ultimately makes sense and that God is going to take care of us – we are going to live and make a full recovery from the hardships here. It is in that knowledge that we can find rest.

As far as some of the details of your question, yes, we certainly can, and do, find rest during worship. It is an important time of spiritual rest. But it is just one facet of the rest we find in God. With respect to the question of whether we are now in a “permanent state of rest,” yes, we are, in the sense that we can trust Jesus to take care of us, but we are not yet in the ultimate state of rest, which we will find in God’s coming kingdom. In this sense, the promise of rest has been partially fulfilled and is awaiting its complete fulfillment.

I hope this helps and you further questions are welcome.

Blessings and my prayers go with you,

Question: How is it true that animals don’t have souls if they are emotional beings? When a dog whines after getting disciplined and put in a cage, are they not upset?

Answered by: Chris Plumberg, who has been a volunteer with us since October, 2009.

Answer: Thanks for your interesting question. Before I try to answer it, l want to try to put your question in the form of an argument (i.e., with premises and a conclusion). This will help me to make my response a little clearer, and will also help you to check that I’ve actually understood your question. The argument (or syllogism) that I would use to re-word your question might go like this:

1. Anything which is an emotional being has a soul.

2. When a dog whines, it shows that it is an emotional being.

3. Dogs whine.

4. Therefore, dogs are emotional beings.

5. Therefore, dogs have souls.

As I understand your question, you are interested in knowing whether Premise (2) and Conclusion (5) are true.

Let’s go through these premises and conclusions, one at a time. It is hard to know whether we should agree with the first premise at all, since it so clearly hinges on the definitions of ’emotional being’ and ‘soul.’ For instance, if we define ‘soul’ to be ‘the immaterial part of man,’ then clearly a dog cannot have a soul, since a dog is not a man. Moreover, Scripture certainly does not tell us in so many words whether a dog has a soul, so we seem to be left with only speculation. If we limit ourselves to the Scriptural usage of the term ‘soul,’ which applies exclusively to human beings, but define an emotional being to be one which is capable of experiencing certain feelings (e.g., sadness, happiness, anger) in response to external stimuli, then we can simply say that dogs do not have souls, but are still capable of experiencing emotions.

In short, from a Biblical standpoint, ‘soul’ generally refers to people, not dogs. However, Scripture never tells us to think that an animal cannot experience emotions simply because it does not have a (human) soul. Thus, there is no difficulty in asserting that a dog does not have a soul, but that it is nevertheless an emotional being, capable of expressing emotions like anger and sadness. A whining dog may very well be upset, but I see no reason to think that this means that a dog has a soul (in the sense that Scripture says man has a soul).