Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. Hebrews 11:1
I have always loved this verse, it seems to give a clear and precise explanation of what faith is.
Confidence in what we hope for. – The word hope sometimes get used flippantly like “hope you don’t mind” or casually like “Hope you have a nice day”. There’s nothing wrong with this but in this description of faith, the author is talking about being confident in a hope. This hope isn’t something that might happen. With faith in God we have confidence that what we hope for will be heard. Our hopes are no longer just pipe dreams but our hopes are set down before God and we are confident in the work He will do in them. This Confidence is not in ourselves but in God.
Assurance about what we do not see. So what does this mean? Well think about it…in the middle of the day when we look up to the sky we don’t see the moon but we know it is still in its place or when we look in the sky and the clouds are so dense that we can’t see the sun, we are still sure that it is there. This is what Faith in God is about. We cannot see Him, we may not be able to see His work in our lives at any given moment but we are assured that He is there.
Faith is about being confident in what we hope for and assured of what we cannot see.
Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Moses, Israelites, Joshua, Rahab, Gidean, Barak, Samson, David, Samuel, Daniel…
The writer of Hebrews doesn’t leave us with a simple description of faith. He goes on to remind us of all those who have gone before – those people in the Old Testament that lived and were an example of this confident and assured Faith. Let’s look at some of them from the list that follows in Chapter 11 of Hebrews.
7 By faith, Noah built a ship in the middle of dry land. He was warned about something he couldn’t see, and acted on what he was told. The result? His family was saved. His act of faith drew a sharp line between the evil of the unbelieving world and the rightness of the believing world. As a result, Noah became intimate with God.
By an act of faith, Abraham said yes to God’s call to travel to an unknown place that would become his home. When he left he had no idea where he was going. By an act of faith he lived in the country promised him, lived as a stranger camping in tents. Isaac and Jacob did the same, living under the same promise. Abraham did it by keeping his eye on an unseen city with real, eternal foundations—the City designed and built by God.
13-16 Each one of these people of faith died not yet having in hand what was promised, but still believing. How did they do it? They saw it way off in the distance, waved their greeting, and accepted the fact that they were transients in this world. People who live this way make it plain that they are looking for their true home. If they were homesick for the old country, they could have gone back any time they wanted. But they were after a far better country than that—heaven country. You can see why God is so proud of them, and has a City waiting for them.
17-19 By faith, Abraham, at the time of testing, offered Isaac back to God. Acting in faith, he was as ready to return the promised son, his only son, as he had been to receive him—and this after he had already been told, “Your descendants shall come from Isaac.” Abraham figured that if God wanted to, he could raise the dead. In a sense, that’s what happened when he received Isaac back, alive from off the altar.
Moses whole life – even before he could decide for himself – was based on faith. His but in a basket and set him afloat with faith that God would keep him from being killed. He was saved and although raised by Pharaoh’s daughter chose to flee from Egypt and he met God in a burning bush. By Faith he stood against Pharoah and helped to free his people. His faith encouraged the faith of the Israelites as the passed through the Red see unscathed.
30 By faith, the Israelites marched around the walls of Jericho for seven days, and the walls fell flat.
31 By an act of faith, Rahab, the Jericho harlot, welcomed the spies and escaped the destruction that came on those who refused to trust God.
32 And what more should I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets—
33 Through faith they conquered kingdoms, brought about justice, realized promises, shut the mouths of lions, 34 put out raging fires, escaped from the edge of the sword, found strength in weakness, were mighty in war, and routed foreign armies. 35 Women received back their dead by resurrection. Others were tortured and refused to be released so they could gain a better resurrection.
These are people who endured so much yet had faith in God’s promises.
If someone were writing the story of us – the people of Rotterdam UMC in 2016, how would we be examples of faithful people?
Our Gospel reading speaks again of being prepared. The letter to the Hebrews was a letter written to people who were awaiting the return of Christ. They had seen persecution for years and yet Jesus had not yet come back to take control. Some of the people were losing their faith and were drifting away from the churches. The letter was meant to remind them of those who kept the faith throughout the years and never did see the coming of the Christ. The Hebrews and we are called to have faith, to not drift away just because we may not see the end times coming. We must be like the servants who are always watching with confidence and assurance that the Master will return.
If we give up our faith and live as though Christ is not coming again, we will be like the home owner whose house was broken into because he was not watchful. We do not know when BUT we must be confident that Jesus will return.
We must hold on to our faith as if we are holding on to an anchor in the storm. Our faith in Jesus Christ as our anchor that will keep us from drifting off to some other temptation or false teaching.
Church members rarely …sit down one day and decide that they don’t believe in God anymore. Christians … tend to drift away. Too often, this drifting away happens when they head off to college and no longer are urged to find a church family. Other things become more interesting and consume their attention.
People sometimes drift away slowly, one “Sunday off” turns into a second and third missed Sunday. Soon the need or habit of being fellowship isn’t even missed. Sometimes drifting away begins with a bad experience, a disagreement or having their feelings hurt.
It is hard to imagine that if we have faith we can ever drift away but it happens and so we must be ever watchful and diligent in keeping our faith. We must hold tight to the anchor of Jesus Christ and having the confidence that God is at work and the assurance that we will someday be with Him in paradise.
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