Hebrews 4:11

Let us therefore give diligence to enter into that rest, that no man fall after the same example of disobedience.

Do people actually enter that rest during the present life? The answer appears to be affirmative, but only in a sense of receiving earnest of it, or in the sense of receiving it as an inheritance to be possessed now but actually entered only in the eternal world. Bruce outlined a similar opinion thus: "It is evidently an experience they do not enjoy in their present mortal state, although it belongs to them as a heritage, and by faith they may live in the good of it here and now."[6] Disobedience, as in Hebrews 3:18 (which see), is the great enemy of that final possession of the rest of God; and the ever-present possibility of disobedience and temptations that woo people to disobedience are factors that contravene the complete enjoyment of that rest in this life.

That no man fall prompted this comment by Clark:

(It means) lest he fall off from the grace of God, from the gospel and its blessings, and perish everlastingly. This is the meaning of the apostle, who never supposed that a man might not make final shipwreck of faith and of good conscience, as long as he was in a state of probation.[7]

Note the injunction to "give diligence" as in the English Revised Version (1885), or to "labor" as in the KJV, which stresses the work to be done by the believer. Without in any sense attributing to one's own efforts any eternal merit, and without supposing such labors to place God under any obligation whatsoever, it is nevertheless one of the conditions of salvation that men labor, work, and strive to enter the narrow way. Many New Testament passages support this thought, such as Luke 13:34; Acts 2:40; Philippians 2:12; Revelation 20:12, etc.

[6] J. Barmby, The Pulpit Commentary (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1962), Vol. 21, Hebrews, p. 109.

[7] F. F. Bruce, op. cit., p. 78.