Rest:

Number 7 is the scriptural symbol for rest.  – Stopping point

Also significant is 7x7 plus 1 is 50  = grace,  grace follows patience and rest = the crucifixion

7^th day of 7^th month plus 3 days is day of atonement - equates to the resurrection

Sabbath to Sabbath is 8 days, significant of 7 days plus God’s intervention is the 8^th day, or a new beginning. 

Scheduling life from rest to rest forms a new mindset for new beginnings.

Rest, restore, restoration

God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day. Gen 1:5

Genesis 8:4 Then the ark rested in the seventh month, the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat.

Another word for anxiety is restlessness.

Genesis 40:13 Now within three days Pharaoh will lift up your head and restore you to your place,

Six days you shall do your work, and on the seventh day you shall rest, that your ox and your donkey may rest, and the son of your female servant and the stranger may be refreshed. Exodus 23:12

How does not resting affect others?

Exodus 33:14 And He said, “My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.”

If you pull up the laws and read about all those rest scriptures and the days and numbers of days…you will discover that hidden among the numbers and words are a picture of Christ’s death and resurrection. “A solemn rest and a Holy Convocation, afflict your souls…

Also on the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when you have gathered in the fruit of the land, you shall keep the feast of the Lord for seven days; on the first day there shall be a sabbath-rest, and on the eighth day a sabbath-rest. Leviticus 23:39   Why we worship on the 8^th day.

Numbers 10:33 So they departed from the mountain of the Lord on a journey of three days; and the ark of the covenant of the Lord went before them for the three days’ journey, to search out a resting place for them. Leviticus 23:27

“Also the tenth day of this seventh month shall be the Day of Atonement. It shall be a holy convocation for you; you shall afflict your souls, and offer an offering made by fire to the Lord. Leviticus 23: 27

We all know that God rested on the seventh day, not because he needs rest in the physical sense, but because setting boundaries for our world was important to him, and because he took time ot reflect before he moved on.  Rest is a very large part of the human existance because our whole being needs it. Think about the words that are derived from the word rest: rest, restore, restoration, restraint. Stopping within a boundary to be revived.  And this one - restlessness, another word for anxiety.  It goes without saying that rest is about more than just sleep, but do we really think, when we are unrested, about what the lack of it is doing to our lives and those around us? Rest is about boundaries, having the mental strength to reflect on where we have been, deciding when to stop, bringing things back to normal,  and taking a stand for our own well being.

Scriptures define the boundaries for our rest with the number 7. It is the number for completion, being finish, and for rest. On the cross, Jesus said:
“It is finished!” And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit. John 19:30
Therefore, because it was the Preparation Day, that the bodies should not remain on the cross on the Sabbath (for that Sabbath was a high day), the Jews asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away...John 19:31

It was because it was the time for the Sabbath, the same 7th day that God established after his work week was finished, that Jesus called for his suffering to end. He made the decision for himself before the Jews went to Pilate. The same 7th day about which so many old testament laws revolve. The same one that is repeated over and over throughout centuries when referencing times frames for the feasts. He decided that an end had come to his work, and it was time to honor God's seventh day, to rest. (excerpt was also used on My Wings Are Made of Faith blog.)

The feasts were often on a 7 day time frame as well and intended to set aside a time for the people to rest, and find joy.  Many of the feasts were meant to be celebrations. So rest is also meant to be a time to restore your joy.

It used to bother me that the time frame and the numbers didn't fit with our 24 hour daily routine, which included 8 hours of rest. That is until I discovered the correlation between the number 7 being the Stop time and 8 being the Beginning time.  This establishes the number 8 as the Bible symbol for new beginnings. Now lest there be someone who thinks the numerics are hocus pocus, they were very important to God.  When reading the Old Testament, you often run into time frames that are laid out around groups of 7 plus 1. 8 hours of rest, according to Old Testament thinking, began a new day. Where we see it as an end, God wanted us to see it as a beginning. But when the number 7 is used, the rest follows work and is also the predecessor for a new week beginning. In this concept 7 plus 1 is the begining of a new week.  

5 which is the number of Grace, and 10 which is the number of Atonement when multiplied make 50. 50 is also a set of *7 sevens plus 1. The symbolism is that there should be a definite time frame when, although life's difficulties overwhelm week after week, we decide to say, "Enough! I am finished for the moment. I am finding rest for myself!" Then that time is followed by a new beginning, and in doing so I am honoring God's command to do so. In other words, you have the God given right, in fact the God given command to give yourself the break. You see, the number for God the creator, most high, and author of our destiny is 1. In times of hardship, he expects us to seek him to intervene for rest from our circumstances. Or when we have finished a segment of time in life when something has come full circle. As you get older, you begin to see these life patterns. Allow me to build a scriptural case: 

Here's the law: (as in the law of night and day, the law of gravity, and of forward motion...all the things God put in place to make life possible and functioning.) 

Six days you shall do your work, and on the seventh day you shall rest, that your ox and your donkey may rest, and the son of your female servant and the stranger may be refreshed. Exodus 23:12

Within this law is a reference to how rest will affect every one around you, including employees, your animals and people you don't even know. Even your employees' children. Your rest or lack of it will effect everything around you. When you don't rest, your family, friends, employees, neighbors, and the customer who walks into your business, whom you never met, will notice and be affected by it.

 Now consider this:

Then the ark rested in the seventh month, the seventeenth day of the month, on the mountains of Ararat.Genesis 8:4 

The ark is the place of safety when everything else was destroyed. The symbolism in the story of the ark is about the earth being cleansed of sinfulness and God making atonement, and when that process was complete - finished, he allowed that there would be a new beginning. In Noah's story are strong references to Christ as our savoir. And throughout the story are numerical references. (The number7 being how many pairs of animals were brought into the ark, and 2 for pairs, meaning blessing, reproduction, and  restoration.) You can almost go crazy with the number connotations but to be short -  

1.  The ark rested in the 7th month - the flood was finished.
2.  It was the seventeenth day - 10 the number of atonement + 7 the number of completion,  the atonement was finished.
3. 17 is a 1 and a 7 - which when added is 8, meaning it was time for a new beginning.
4. The final meaning - God's (1) completed work of atonement, when finished is a point of new beginning, blessing, restoration, and a fresh clean start.

Can you see Jesus's death and ressurection in the timing of the ark's numerics? Jesus underwent more than a human could  bare on the cross, and even in his misery, he called a time for rest, completion, a stopping point. And he did it in accordance to God his father's command to rest on the Sabbath, the seventh day. But once the atonement was complete in his 3 days of rest, he brought forth new life in his resurrection.  

 In God's language of creating the universe, it said... 

 God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day. Genesis 1:5   

The old bilbical day began in the early evening. Jesus knew that the day of rest was at hand.  He said it is finished, just as his father had, because he was God, and it was very much a part of God to conclude his work and follow it with a day of rest. Now if you haven't already noticed, Atonement is 7 days plus 3 or 10.  The number is 1 plus a zero - God plus nothing else. Or with out God there is no atonement. Once Jesus came to his resting place in order to fulfill the numerical order for atonement, there must be 3 days before his new beginning.  So Jesus waited until the 3rd day in his place of rest, before he came forth from the grave, to establish a new beginning for all of mankind.