Author: Lamar Austin

One of the most difficult things for a child of God or a servant of Christ to do is to stand alone.  If you were told that a prerequisite for leadership required standing alone, would you still want that job?  If you know that constant criticism, frequent isolation and unjust accusations were headed your way, would you still want that position?  Standing alone requires courage, tenacity, perseverance and patience.  It involves having a strong sense of purpose and being unwilling to veer away from it.

Loneliness can make cowards of us all.  When we feel like we are standing alone against the crowd, when all the pressure is on us to cave in, we rarely find the strength.  In fact, we know we cannot do it alone.  Even Jesus, in the loneliness of the Garden of Gethsemane, knowing what was ahead, cried out, “My God, My God, why have you abandoned me?”

Paul, in 1 Timothy 1:15, says that “all who are in Asia turned away from me” and in chapter 4 he expresses his need for others, saying, “Do your best to come to me soon.  For Demas, in love with this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia.  Luke alone is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is very useful to me for ministry” (2 Timothy 4:9-11).

Charles Spurgeon, in talking about depression, wrote these words in Lectures to My Students, a book that many have recommended to pastors training for ministry:

A minister fully equipped for his work, will usually be a spirit by himself, above, beyond, and apart from others.  The most loving of his people cannot enter into his peculiar thoughts, cares, and temptations. In the ranks, men walk shoulder to shoulder, with many comrades, but as the officer rises in rank, men of his standing are fewer in number.  There are many soldiers, few captains, fewer colonels, but only one commander-in-chief.  So, in our churches, the man whom the Lord raises as a leader becomes, in the same degree in which he is a superior man, a solitary man.  The mountain-tops stand solemnly apart, and talk only with God as he visits their terrible solitudes.  Men of God who rise above their fellows into nearer communion with heavenly things, in their weaker moments feel the lack of human sympathy.  Like their Lord in Gethsemane, they look in vain for comfort to the disciples sleeping around them; they are shocked at the apathy of their little band of brethren, and return to their secret agony with all the heavier burden pressing upon them, because they have found their dearest companions slumbering.

No one knows, but he who has endured it, the solitude of a soul which has outstripped its fellows in zeal for the Lord of hosts: it dares not reveal itself, lest men count it mad; it cannot conceal itself, for a fire burns within its bones: only before the Lord does it find rest.  Our Lord’s sending out his disciples by two and two manifested that he knew what was in men; but for such a man as Paul, it seems to me that no helpmeet was found; Barnabas, or Silas, or Luke, were hills too low to hold high converse with such a Himalayan summit as the apostle of the Gentiles. This loneliness, which if I mistake not is felt by many of my brethren, is a fertile source of depression…

Every Christian minister has a target on their back.  I used to think that the initials P. T. stood for “pastor-teacher,” but know I realize it stands for “prime target.”  Every pastor and Christian worker has at times felt the intense loneliness of ministry, and when we feel all alone, it makes it hard for us to remain faithful to our calling.

Here is my question this morning:  What kind of faith is it that enables a person to stand alone as a representative for God amidst overwhelming opposition?  What kind of faith is that?

Hebrews 11 once again draws our attention to a well-known Old Testament figure by the name of Noah.  He is well recognized even by people outside the church.  We have songs, even movies about Noah.  But we may have missed the significance of this man and his story.  I fear that we have cut the guts out of the story and lost the most important lesson that we are to learn about God and this man.

By the way, the 2014 movie with Russell Crowe is probably the worst distortion of the biblical story that I have ever seen.  Don’t put any credence in that movie.

So, what is the nature of this faith, that Noah had and God is looking for in each one of us?  It is obedient faith, faith that believes God so strongly that it is willing to obey God even when the costs are astronomical.

Let’s note five things about this obedient faith which Noah possessed and which we, too, can possess.

First, let’s just remind ourselves of some general facts about Noah.

• Noah gets 4 chapters in Genesis (vs. Able and Enoch), but just one verse in Hebrews.  In other words, we know a lot more about Noah than these other guys, but more is said about them in Hebrews than is said about Noah.  He gets just one verse.
• The word “faith” does not appear in the Genesis account.  Of course, it really didn’t appear in the Genesis account about Enoch or Abel either.
• Six of Noah’s predecessors were alive at his birth (Enosh, Kenan, Mahalel, Jared, Methuselah and Lamech), but all died before the flood.
• “Noah” means rest.
• Noah “found grace,” the first time that that word is found in the Bible.
• Like Enoch, Noah “walked with God.”  (These are the only two men of whom this was said.)

So far, we have seen Abel worship and Enoch walk…now we will see Noah work.

Again, we will notice that although it is faith alone that saves, the faith that saves is never alone.  It also yields fruit, it always results in obedience.

Noah’s obedience begins with God’s Grace (Genesis 6:8)

Both Noah’s obedience and his faith are gifts of God’s grace upon Noah.  Noah’s salvation and continuing spiritual life were because God chose Noah, not because Noah went out looking and found God.  He didn’t go on a search.

This text does not mention faith, as if that preceded God’s choice of Noah.  God was sorry that He had made mankind.

“The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen. 6:5)  Boy, there’s a good description of total depravity.  While total depravity doesn’t mean that everything unsaved man does is evil, it means that it is infected by and shot through with evil. 

Can you imagine living in a time when it would be true that the years of everyone “was only evil continually”?  You won’t hear that from Norman Vincent Peale, will you?  You don’t see here, “I’m OK, you’re OK.”  There’s no “goodness of mankind” evident here.  Over the last few weeks I have re-watched Band of Brothers and Becky and I watched the two seasons of World on Fire on BBC, both of which speak of the atrocities committed by the Germans in World War II.  It was truly disgusting.  The whole world was like that in Noah’s day.

The poet W. H. Auden was a believer in the goodness of man, until he walked into a movie theater in New York City in Yorkville on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, near where he had lived when he first arrived.  It was still a largely German-speaking community and this was before the U. S. had entered the war.  The film was Sieg im Poland, a documentary of the Nazi invasion of Poland.  It was graphic.  Hitler’s SS Storm Troopers were bayoneting women and children, and members of the audience cried out in support of their fellow countrymen, “Kill the Poles! Kill them!”  He was horrified and his belief in the natural goodness of humankind was dashed.

Charles Hodge, an eminent theologian, wrote this about depravity:

Our guilt is great because our sins are exceedingly numerous.  It is not merely outward acts of unkindness and dishonesty with which we are chargeable; our habitual and characteristic state of mind is evil in the sight of God.

Our pride, vanity, and indifference to His will and to the welfare of others, our selfishness, our loving the creature more than the Creator, are continuous violations of His holy law.

We have never been or done what that law requires us to be and to do.  We have never had that delight in the divine perfection, that sense of dependence and obligation, and fixed purpose to do the will and promote the glory of God, which constitute the love which is our first and highest duty.

We are always sinners; we are at all times and under all circumstances in opposition to God, because we are never what His law requires us to be.

If we have never made it our purpose to do His will, if we have never made His glory the end of our actions, then our lives have been an unbroken series of transgressions.  Our sins are not to be numbered by the conscious violations of duty; they are as numerous as the moments of our existence.

Genesis 6:11 adds, “Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight, and the earth was filled with violence.”

“And the LORD was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart” (Gen. 6:6).   God’s heart was filled with pain and agony because the prize of His creation was rebelling against Him.

So God determined to judge sinful humanity at that time.  “So the LORD said, ‘I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them’” (Gen. 6:7).

And in the midst of all this darkness and depravity, when everything seemed lost, “But Noah found favor (grace) in the eyes of the LORD” (Gen. 6:8).  God chose one man out of all humanity, showed him grace and gave him a mission.

God had promised a seed, a redeemer, that would come from Eve to crush the serpent once and for all.  How could that take place if the entire human race is now corrupt and destined to be annihilated?  Genesis 6:1-5 indicates that the human race had become so degraded that it was hardly human anymore.

But the shaft of God’s grace and mercy pierced through the thick darkness.  “Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD” (Gen. 6:8).

• All men deserved God’s wrath; but one man was chosen to survive.
• All men were condemned, and justly so; but one man was justified.
• All men went astray from God; but one man was called.
• All men were lost; but one man was saved.
• All men were unbelievers; but to one man faith was given.  Noah found grace, not merit, but grace, in the eyes of the Lord.
• There is always a remnant according to the election of grace.

This doesn’t mean that Noah was a good man and God decided to reward him for his goodness.  No, God decided to set his pre-ordained affection on Noah and graced him.  His unmerited favor was on that man, and Noah, just like all of us a sinner, trusted God and began to walk with God.  To that man Noah God gives an unbelievable assignment.

Grace towards Noah brings forth his trust.  God’s faithfulness is what initiates Noah’s faith in God.

Noah’s Obedience Depends Upon God’s Word (Hebrews 11:7; Genesis 6:14-16)

The faith that stands alone is the kind of faith where everything in my life is dictated, shaped, molded, and directed by God’s revelation, His Word.

Can you imagine hearing these words?  “”I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold, I will destroy them with the earth.  Make yourself an ark of gopher wood”?

This is what is meant by the words of Hebrews 11:7, “being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen…”  God was warning Noah that he was about to destroy the earth.  He didn’t tell him how yet, but he told him to build an ark.

A what?  An ark.

The primary unseen thing he was warned about was, of course, that the earth’s population was about to be destroyed by a monstrous cataclysmic flood—judgment by water (cf. Genesis 6:17). Implicit in this was a second thing not seen and certainly never dreamed of—that God was going to deliver Noah and his family through a great ark that Noah himself was going to build.

Now imagine how this all came down on this pre-diluvian farmer.  The only floods he had ever seen, if indeed he had seen any, were the wadi washers that came from an occasional thunderstorm. 

And God asked him to build this huge structure, a boat as we know it.  It was huge, “the length of the ark 300 cubits, its breadth 50 cubits, and its height 30 cubits” (Gen. 6:15).

And the amazing thing is that even though Noah had never seen a flood, didn’t know what an ark was, he implicitly obeyed God, without question or complaint.

And it took him 120 years to build this ark.  Noah worked long and hard, exhibiting his faith in God through his obedience to His Word.  Noah would say that faith in God is not a “hunch.” Nor is it positive thinking or a leap in the dark.  Noah would tell us that his faith was based on the fact that God “warned” him.  God spoke to Noah and told him what He was about to do.  Noah believed God and got busy building a boat to ride out the storm.

Remember that faith is in “events as yet unseen,” future things that God tells us will happen, which reminds us of Hebrews 11:1, “faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

But Noah was seeing that flood as if it were already present.  He believed it would happen and he built an ark so that he and his family would be rescued.  Genuine faith always has a basis, a firm basis.  It is founded on what God says and for us what God says in His Word.  In fact, a faith that doesn’t rest upon God’s Word is not a faith worth having.  It is a false hope.  But true faith has a sure foundation.  It is not based upon our feelings or emotions.  It is not based on our traditions.  No, our source of authority, the basis of our faith, is the unchanging Word of God!

As we’ve been saying all along, faith must have a revelation (Romans 10:17).  Here was the revelation of judgment that would happen in 120 years as well as the means for the salvation of his family (Genesis 6:17-18).

18 But I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives with you. 19 And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ark to keep them alive with you. They shall be male and female.

Explicit instructions for this ark had been given to Noah in vv. 14-16.

14 Make yourself an ark of gopher wood. Make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and out with pitch. 15 This is how you are to make it: the length of the ark 300 cubits, its breadth 50 cubits, and its height 30 cubits. 16 Make a roof for the ark, and finish it to a cubit above, and set the door of the ark in its side. Make it with lower, second, and third decks.

This visual certitude was combined with a future certitude, for he had “the assurance of things hoped for”—namely, the promise of salvation for him and his family. 

So Noah built an ark.  Real faith will always act on God’s revelation.  It will always obey.  The book of James repeats this again and again.

It was in his building of the Ark that Noah’s faith was seen.  We know this not because the word “faith” is mentioned in the story of Noah.  It isn’t.  We know it because Noah’s obedience pleased God and the text tells us that you can’t please God without faith.

Warren Wiersbe says that “Noah’s faith involved the whole person: his mind was warned of God; his heart was moved with fear; and his will acted on what God told him” (The Wiersbe Bible Commentary: New Testament, p. 835).

Last week we began looking at the example of Enoch as a man of faith, who pleased God with his faith.  That faith was expressed by walking with God, a phrase we first find in Genesis 3, that God was “walking in the garden in the cool of the day” (Gen. 3:8).  Adam and Eve’s response was not to walk with God, but to hide from him.

But Enoch had learned to walk with God by faith.  How much a visible, tangible presence that was we don’t know.  But we noticed that for Enoch to walk with God, he had to be going to the same place, taking the same path and walking at the same pace.  That is true of us as well.  Another thing we noted is that Enoch didn’t take up this practice of walking with God until after Methusaleh was born.  “Enoch walked with God after he fathered Methuselah” (Genesis 5:22).  He was 65 years old at the time.  This tells us that what is important about walking with God is that we start, not when we start.  I would encourage you, if you’ve never walked with God, that you start today.

Enoch observed the culture around him, which Genesis 6:5 tells us was exceedingly wicked. “the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen. 6:5).  And Enoch walked with God as a prophet, speaking judgment against the wickedness surrounding him.

14 It was also about these that Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his holy ones, 15 to execute judgment on all and to convict all the ungodly of all their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him.” (Jude 14-15)

This was Enoch’s sermon for 300 years prior to the flood, “You are in God’s cross-hairs.  Judgment is coming.”  Needless to say, Enoch was never a much-sought-after conference speaker!  We have no indication that people listened to either him or Noah.  Yet, for 300 years Enoch acted in obedience to God because he believed God.  And God rewarded Enoch.

Walking with God was a great reward in and of itself.  He experienced the great joy of being in God’s presence on a daily, moment-by-moment basis (Psalm 16:11), “practicing the presence of God” as Brother Lawrence advised.  Despite all the difficulties and distractions, all the trials and hostilities, Enoch enjoyed an intimate fellowship with God.

And so God gave him an even greater reward.  He took Enoch so that Enoch could have uninterrupted eternal fellowship with God, no longer surrounded by the barriers of sin or this sinful world.  Enoch pleased God because that was his ultimate pleasure.  He lived out the first question of the Westminster Shorter Catechism: Question:  “What is the chief end of man?”  Answer: “The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.”

God has intended that we experience the ultimate joy of a fellowship with Him that would be uninterrupted and would involve fullest, unbroken joy.  God’s plan is to bring you to glory and to shower you with His presence forever.  THAT will bring you greatest joy.

Well, if God was pleased with Enoch, how can we imitate Enoch so that God is pleased with us and we experience this great joy?

Hebrews 11:6 answers that question strongly by casting it in the negative: “And without faith it is impossible to please God.”  This is the strongest way that our author could impress upon us the absolute necessity of faith.  We might have everything else, but if faith is missing, “it is impossible to please God.”  It isn’t “difficult” to please God, or “without faith you will have to work extra-hard to please God, but “impossible” to please God.  If we have not faith, we cannot please God at all.  There is only one thing that makes us pleasurable to God, approved by God, and that is faith.

This resonates with Paul’s insistence that God cannot and will not be pleased apart from the righteousness that comes from God through faith (cf. Romans 3:21, 22; Philippians 3:9).  Indeed, without this faith all are under the wrath of God (cf. Romans 1:17, 18; 2:5–8).  Christians understand that “by grace you have been saved through faith.  And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Ephesians 2:8, 9).

Paul is just as absolute as the writer of Hebrews when he says “whatever does not proceed from faith is sin” (Romans 14:23).  Paul and our author shut the door, slam the door shut against any possibility of winning God’s favor through anything other than faith.

The reality is you and I cannot possibly be good enough to please God.  Any sliver of sin in our lives, even if done only once, makes a holy God abhor us.  We can never be religious enough.  We can never make enough sacrifices or give away enough money to make God take a glance at us.  “Your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear” (Isaiah 59:2).  And even “all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment” (Isaiah 64:6) which God wants nothing to do with.

But what do we mean by a faith that pleases God?  After all, doesn’t James say that even the demons believe?  What kind of faith pleases God?

Respected theologian Louis Berkhof defines genuine faith as including an intellectual element (notitia was a term they used), which is…

“a positive recognition of the truth”; an emotional element (assensus), which involves “a deep conviction of the truth”; and a volitional element (fiducia), which involves “a personal trust in Christ as Savior and Lord, including a surrender…to Christ.” (Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1939).

When missionary John Paton was translating the Scriptures for the South Sea islanders, he was unable to find a word in their vocabulary for the concept of believing, trusting, or having faith.  He had no idea how he would convey the idea of faith to them.  One day, while he was in his hut translating, a native came running up the stairs into Paton’s study and flopped in a chair, exhausted.  He said to Paton, “It’s so good to rest my whole weight in this chair.”

John Paton had his word:  Faith is resting your whole weight on God.  Faith is resting your eternal destiny in the hands of God.  That word went into the translation of their New Testament and helped to bring that civilization of natives to Christ.  Believing is putting your whole weight, your complete trust, in Jesus Christ.

Our writer tells us two things about this faith, the kind of faith that pleases God and is rewarded by God.  First, it is faith placed in the right God, “for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists.”  Literally, “must believe that he is.”  Mere existence is not the issue, although there is plenty of evidence that the true God does exist.  But what pleases God is not simply that we recognize that there is a deity out there, but that we believe in the one true God.  The object of the Christian faith is more narrow and focused than just any god.  To believe that “he is” is a reference for the name of God by which He revealed Himself to Moses in Exodus.  Remember this?

13 Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.'” (Exodus 3:14-15)

Hear the overtones?  We must believe the “I am,” that “He is.”  We must put our faith in this covenant-making, covenant-keeping God, believe that He is Yahweh.  In John 8:58 Jesus aroused the wrath of the Pharisees by saying, “Before Abraham was born, ‘I AM.’”  Yahweh and Jesus are one—the self-existent eternal God.  God is not pleased when we believe in a created Jesus (Jehovah Witnesses) or a developed Jesus (Mormons).  It is never faith in the God we want but faith in the God who is that matters to God and pleases Him.

This “I AM” is the Creator of heaven and earth, the miracle-worker that brought Israel out of Egypt and through the Reed Sea.  He is the one who brought down the walls of Jericho and made the sun stand still.  And for us, He is the one who conquered the grave and rose again.

Second, God is pleased with a faith that pursues a rewarding God.  It is not merely faith in the right God that pleases God, but faith in a rewarding God.  It other words, faith that pleases God believes that God will deliver on His promises.  We believe that “he is and that he rewards those who seek him.”

Friends, God wants us to believe that the benefits of knowing Him infinitely outweighs anything that might seek to keep us from him.  He wants us to believe that knowing him will benefit us and make us happy.  He wants us to believe that we will find in Him our greatest delight and satisfaction, that it is a reward to seek Him.

God is a rewarder.  It is in His nature to give, because His nature is love.  He longs to reward us.  And it is through faith that we receive the reward.

C. S. Lewis, in one of my favorite quotes, said this:

If there lurks in most modern minds the notion that to desire our own good and earnestly hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I submit that this notion has crept in from Kant and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian faith.  Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak.  We are half-hearted creatures, fooling around with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in the slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea.  We are far too easily pleased. (C. S. Lewis, Weight of Glory).

How strong do you think the Lord finds your desires for Him and His good gifts?  Are you being too easily pleased by other things?  These Hebrews were in danger of valuing the benefits they would receive by returning to Judaism as higher than what they could experience by remaining with Jesus Christ.  They were not trusting that God would reward them, but feared that they might be losing out, so they were in danger of returning under the Law.

God is pleased with the kind of faith that sees Him for who He is (the Great I AM) and believes that in pursuing Him we receive the greatest possible reward.

The greatest reward we receive, which is also the object of our faith, is God Himself.  The prophet Jeremiah was told to tell the people that God could be sought and found.  In Jeremiah 29:12-14a we read, “Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you.  You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.  I will be found by you, declares the LORD…”

What is the reward of our seeking?  God.  Of course, God is the ultimate reward of our seeking.  Nothing else will ultimately and deeply satisfy us.  2 Chronicles 15:15 puts it this way: “And all Judah rejoiced over the oath, for they had sworn with all their heart and had sought him with their whole desire, and he was found by them, and the LORD gave them rest all around.”

Beautiful, isn’t it?  They sought for Him and He let them find Him.  That’s what He wants.  He wants to be found.  He is like the father playing Hide-n-Seek with his child, giving clues and hints to where he hides.  He wants to be found.  He wants his child to have the joy of finding him.

The question is:  Do you have a heart that says, “I want to know Christ.  I believe there is greater reward in seeking Him and finding Him than in anything else this world offers.”

That was Enoch.  He believed in the true God and He sought Him and when he found God he walked with God.  And he was taken up by God.  He pursued God all the way to heaven!

Do you remember the day God let you find Him?  What a glorious day!  Maybe you don’t remember it well.  Don’t stop seeking.  Keep pursuing Christ.

Paul experienced this same pursuit.  Here is how he explained his salvation in Philippians 3.  In his testimony in Acts we hardly get a glimpse of what was going on inside of Paul.  Those testimonies focus on what God did and how God had called him.  And maybe Philippians 3 is in retrospect, but they do explain Paul’s motivations and thinking.

If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; 6 as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. 7 But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 8 Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith– 10 that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

Does that express your heart’s desire?  Do you value Christ and want to know Him so much that you are willing to give up everything that made you who you were before?  Paul wanted to be “found in him,” because that is where true righteousness was found, righteousness that is a gift of God to all who believe.  And in coming by faith, it enabled Paul to experience knowing Christ in both sufferings and resurrection.

God is looking for those who have the faith to believe that He is worth the effort of chasing and losing everything else in order to find Him.

Here is the great and grand point: Enoch lived in dark, hostile days that were uncongenial to his faith.  Life was so inhospitable to righteousness that finally, in the time of Noah:

Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight, and the earth was filled with violence.  And God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.  And God said to Noah, “I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold, I will destroy them with the earth.” (Genesis 6:11–13)

However, Enoch resisted the sinful gravity of his culture and walked with God for over three hundred years!  He set his goal on the city of God—God’s place; so he walked the same path —striding in step with God’s pace.  Three hundred years of trusting pursuit!

Why was he able to do it?  First, because he believed that God is, that “he exists” in all his creative and personal power.  Second, because he believed that God “rewards” those who earnestly “seek him.”  Enoch was sure God would be equitable to him.  As a result, there was great pleasure in Heaven—and God took him.  Perhaps the stars echoed with God’s joyous laughter.

Seek this God while He may be found.  Today is the day of salvation.  We are guaranteed no other day.

And if you have found Him, walk with Him.  Far too many Christians only want enough of God to guarantee heaven.  But He saved you for so much more!  I hope as a son or daughter of God that you want to know Him and you will pursue knowing Him and enjoying Him in all of His grace and goodness.

The reality is, there is more reward to be found!  Keep on seeking and you will find Christ to be a never-ending treasure of goodness and grace.  Keep on seeking and you will discover that Christ is everything you ever thought you needed and more than  you ever dreamed of. 

His love has no limit, His grace has no measure,
His power no boundary known unto men,
For out of His infinite riches in Jesus,
He giveth and giveth and giveth again.

That’s what happened to Enoch.  He started walking with God at age 65 and didn’t stop walking with God.  And finally he reached home.  God opened the door and said, “Come on home.”

In Revelation 3 God provides an invitation to a church we don’t think much of, the church of Laodicea.  But it is an invitation to all of us.

Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me. (Rev. 3:20)

He is pursuing you. Seek Him by faith.  Believe that He is the great I AM and that finding Him will thrill your soul.

We may not have the same experience of Enoch in being translated to heaven without dying, but we do know that if we pursue God by faith that ultimately we will stand alive before God in heaven, and to our heart’s deepest desire, worship Him forever.

“The soul is measured by its flights, some low and some high.  The heart is known by its delights and pleasures never lie.” (Anonymous)

What pleases God?  Have you ever asked yourself that question?  Many people have and wonder if their life really measures up.  When we truly comprehend the holiness of God and realize how sinful we are, it could strike fear in our hearts that we cannot possibly measure up and please God.

With God, no one could ever be pleasing to Him based on performance. His standard is perfection, and no goodness on our part can ever compensate for our sins. We may please man with our actions, but “all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). It takes the precious blood of Jesus to do that.

The way we receive the forgiveness that’s available through Jesus’ blood is by faith (Rom. 10:9-17).  It is that faith, more than anything else, that pleases God.

5 By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death: “He could not be found, because God had taken him away.” For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. 6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.

A person whose actions are not right but who trusts the Lord is more pleasing to God than an individual who is doing the right things but has no faith in God.  Just think about it.  There are many things we can do that God could be pleased with—our love, our worship, our service, our obedience.  But it is faith that pleases God the most.  Why?  Because in all of these other things it is us doing something for God, while faith is asking God to do something for us.  It pleases and glorifies God the most because it is asking Him to show up and show off His might or wisdom or grace or goodness.  The spotlight is on Him when we are trusting Him to do something for us.

Someone has said, “The soul is measured by its flights, some low and some high.  The heart is known by its delights and pleasures never lie.”  I’m not aware of who the author is nor the occasion of its writing.  But the situation that the author refers to is poignant for us.  Listen again to the last two lines: “The heart is known by its delights and pleasures never lie.”

The author is pointing to a means for measuring something which is otherwise invisible.  The character of the human heart can be unmistakably known by that which brings it pleasure.

How about you this moment?  What is it, really, that brings you the most pleasure?

Henry Scougal, a Puritan pastor, said it much the same way when he said, “The worth and excellence of the soul can be measured by the object of its love.”  And John Piper has written, “To know a soul’s proportions, you need to know it’s passions.”

If this is true, then what do your passions and pleasures say about the state of your soul today?

And if that this is true, what does it say that what brings God’s heart the greatest delight is your faith.  Your faith is His pleasure, His delight.

Here is what we’re going to be looking at today in Hebrews 11:5-6, and that is that a Christian is a person who finds his or her ultimate pleasure in pleasing God.  For the Christian who has been awakened by grace our greatest pleasure lies in pleasing God, in bringing delight to His heart through our trust in Him.

This is authentic Christianity—a constraining desire to bring God pleasure, to delight His heart.  But the reality is, not every Christian has the ultimate pleasure of pleasing God.  Far too often our hearts are captured by other pleasures, other delights.  It will be a lifelong struggle to divest ourselves of these idols, to destroy them so that our ultimate joy can be found in God Himself and our greatest desire is to please Him.

If our greatest desire is to please God, how do we do that?  Fortunately we are not left to guess the answer to that question.  It appears quite clearly in Hebrews 11:6, “without faith it is impossible to please God.”  What brings pleasure to our God is the life of faith, a life that is governed, shaped, molded, fashioned by the promises of God.  A life in which decisions are made on the basis of the Word of God. 

To illustrate this kind of faith, we’re going to look at a little known man in the Bible by the name of Enoch.  If you were to ask for a list of the names of great men and women of faith, his name would likely be left off many lists.  One of the reasons is that the Bible says very little about him.

So, we know that Enoch lived over three and a half centuries on this earth. This means that if Enoch’s 365-year life span had ended in 2023, he would have been born in 1658, more than one hundred years before our nation declared its independence.

Not only that, his son Methusaleh, who lived 969 years, wouldn’t die until the year 2992.  So Enoch’s life was relatively short compared to others of that era.  But it was nonetheless an amazing stint of time—and those three-hundred-plus years were given to righteous living in the midst of a terribly evil antediluvian world that was destroyed precisely because of its depravity (cf. Genesis 6:11–13).

Not only that, but Enoch served as a prophet for over three centuries, preaching the unwelcome message of coming judgment. Jude 14, 15 records this, saying:

Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his holy ones, to execute judgment on all and to convict all the ungodly of all their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him.”

Enoch lived in the time before Noah’s flood.  Genesis 5:21–24 devotes only fifty-one words (in English) to describing Enoch:

When Enoch had lived 65 years, he fathered Methuselah. Enoch walked with God after he fathered Methuselah 300 years and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Enoch were 365 years. Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him.

Enoch is unique because “he was not, for God took him.”  Whereas Abel was murdered, Enoch never died, yet both demonstrated faith.  Throughout Genesis 5 you would be reading the repeated refrain, “and then he died…and then he died…and then he died.”  But this didn’t happen to Enoch.  He did not die.  Instead, God took Him.  He was an anomaly in the litany of deaths that were all due to the fact that Adam and Eve had rebelled against God. 

Hebrews interprets it for us like this.

By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death: “He could not be found, because God had taken him away.”  For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. (Hebrews 11:5)

The Scriptures do not say exactly how this happened.  Sometimes the idea of the word “found” (“He could not be found”) simply means to come up empty after doing an exhaustive and thoroughgoing search.

Remember that the same thing happened to Elijah and he was taken up in a chariot of fire.  And people searched for him for three days and couldn’t find him.  He, too, was not “found.”  Enoch lived in a very dark and wicked time, with evil rampant everywhere and Enoch was likely not well liked because of his righteous life and preaching judgment (like Noah).  So people were probably aware that he was not around anymore.  Maybe some looked for him, but couldn’t find him.

The word “taken” or “taken up” is used three times in Hebrews 11:5.

By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death: “He could not be found, because God had taken him away.”  For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. (Hebrews 11:5)

This is a compound Greek word that means “to alter the place” or “to take someone or something from one place and put it in another.”  It is a beautiful picture of what faith does in our lives—taking us from alienation from God to reconciliation with God.  Colossians 1:13 expresses this idea when Paul says “For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves,” and 1 Peter 2:9 says that God “called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.”  A change of location.

How did God do this with Enoch?  We don’t know.  Maybe he just said, “Come” and poof, Enoch was gone.  However it happened, it does serve as a prototype of what will happen for us someday, what is called the rapture, when we will be taken up, transferred bodily out of this world without dying.

Ultimately, it is a picture of our transition from earth to glory.  For some that will come through death, with an eventual transformation of the body.  1 Corinthians 15:51-53 speaks of this: “51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed—52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.  53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.”

Doesn’t that sound wonderful?  I know the older I get and the more this body breaks down, I get more excited about that change.

For those who are still alive this exhilarating event will take place, explained by Paul in 1 Thessalonians 4.

16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.

Like these believers who will be “caught up together,” Enoch was “taken up” so that he would not see death.

Why did God do that for Enoch, and why will he do that people who are alive when this great event takes place?  Hebrews 11:5 tells us, “For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God.”

What a eulogy!  This is the greatest eulogy that a person could ever receive.  Mainly because it comes from God.

How did Enoch please God?  Because he acted on the basis of faith.  We have already made some mention as to why Enoch was taken away—namely, the character of his life.  Helpfully, Hebrews 11:5 is very explicit in exploring this, giving us two specific reasons he was taken. First, because of his faith —“By faith Enoch was taken up” (v. 5a). And second, because he pleased God —“Now before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God” (v. 5b).

Faith and pleasing God are opposite sides of the same coin, and it is profitable to examine each side.

There are two important factors that mark the character of Enoch’s faith.  Like Abel’s and everyone else’s in Hebrews 11, it was an active faith, a faith that obeys.  First, he pleased God by turning away from the godlessness that was present in his society at the time.  In other words, he wasn’t concerned about pleasing others, bowing to peer pressure and following the crowd.  He was focused on pleasing God.  Second, he maintained a daily walk with God (like Adam did) which grew so intimate that God one day said to him, “Why don’t you just come on to my house today.”

The Genesis account (Genesis 5:21-24) suggests that for the first 65 years of his life, Enoch did not walk with God.  It’s quite possible that for a while he went along with the deteriorating morality of his times, which Genesis 6:5 describes.  As Genesis 5:25 suggests, the event which changed Enoch’s outlook was the birth of his son, whom he named Methusaleh.  Some scholars derive the meaning of Methuselah’s name from the Hebrew root muth, which means “death,” and translate the name “His death shall bring (it).”  The “it” was the “flood” that Noah was preaching about.  And, of course, that is exactly what would happen.  On the day Methusaleh’s died, the heavens opened up.

So, it was possibly the revelation of this coming judgment, bring on the fear of God, along with the animal sacrifices that many of those in the line of Seth were still offering, that his heart was stirred towards God.  At some point he began to live by faith and walk with God.

God was well-pleased enough with Enoch’s faith that he rewarded him and exempted him from the experience common to every son of Adam—death. 

Genesis 5 twice says “Enoch walked with God.”  It doesn’t say that Enoch “walked after” or “before” God, two common phrases that refer to a life of obedience or openness before God.  Adam had “walked with God” in the Garden, and since their lives overlapped Enoch could have questioned Adam about his experience and learned how to walk with God.  Adam had shared the glories of walking with God and that sparked a desire in Enoch’s heart.

“Walked with God” and “pleased God” mean the same thing.

R. Kent Hughes comments on this, bringing out these three ideas with regard to what it meant to “walk with God.”

But the metaphor of walking more exactly reveals how Enoch pleased God. Walking with another person suggests a mutual agreement of soul, as the prophet Amos understood when he asked, “Do two walk together, unless they have agreed to meet?” (Amos 3:3). It is impossible to walk together unless there are several mutual agreements.  To begin with, you must agree on the destination.  Husbands and wives know that the paths to Bloomingdale’s and Eddie Bauer are not the same!  You cannot walk together and go to separate destinations.  Enoch was heading in God’s direction.

Of course, it is quite possible to be headed to the same destination but by separate paths.  But again, two cannot walk together unless they have the same destination and follow the same path.  This Enoch did with God!

There is one other requirement in walking together.  Two must not only be traveling to the same place on the same path, but they must also go at the same pace. Enoch was in step with God.  We too must “keep in step with the Spirit” (Galatians 5:25).

Enoch’s great walk produced two wonderful things—fellowship and righteousness.  When two walk toward the same place on the same path at the same pace for three hundred years, they are in fellowship!  And this is the primary meaning of walk: fellowship, sacred communion.

Matching God stride for stride along the path of life while headed for the city of God also produced in Enoch a righteous walk.  Malachi 2:6 describes such a walk: “True instruction was in his [Levi’s] mouth, and unrighteousness was not found on his lips; he walked with Me in peace and uprightness, and he turned many back from iniquity” (NASB).  Enoch walked in profound fellowship with God and had a profound righteousness.  Thus, Enoch pleased God.

We can also refer to the words of the apostle John, that fellowship with God entails “walking in the light as He is in the light” (1 John 1:7).  That is how we maintain fellowship with God.  We lose that fellowship (not our relationship, but our fellowship) when we sin.  We regain that fellowship through confessing our sin.

Warren Wiersbe writes,

Enoch had been walking with God for so many years that his transfer to heaven was not even an interruption.  Enoch had been practicing Colossians [chapter] three centuries before Paul wrote the words: “. . . keep seeking the things above. . . . Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth” (vv. 1, 2).

It was little wonder that God took him!

Enoch was pleasing to God and set an example of walking by faith all his life that readers would do well to follow.  The Lord may return at any time to take modern Enochs into His presence, just as He took that great saint.

So Enoch pleased God by walking with God.  Next week we will look at Enoch’s faith.

Last week we began to look at this great Hall of Faith in Hebrews 11.  Our author starts with Abel and writes:

By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.

We noticed first of all that what God is looking for is obedient faith.  Faith in Him, yes, but faith in Him will always be put into action.  What that obedience looks like will depend upon the person and their situation (as we will see as we go through Hebrews 11), but faith is always obedient.

And we noted that genuine faith responds to God’s revelation.  That response is, again, first to believe His promises, but then to obey His commands.  In the case of Abel, God’s revelation was first to Adam and Eve when he replaced their fig leaves with animal skins.  It is likely, then, that from birth they had not only been exposed to the example of Adam and Eve offering animal sacrifices to cover their sins, but had taught their sons why they did so.

Did God directly instruct Cain and Abel in making appropriate sacrifices?  It is possible.  We see in the aftermath of Cain killing Abel that God speaks directly to Cain, asking, “If you do well, will you not be accepted?” (Gen. 4:7).  Cain must have known what “doing well” meant, since God doesn’t spell it out here.

So obedient faith responds to God’s revelation.  Second, obedient faith, therefore, receives God’s commendation.  In Hebrews 11:4 we read, “though which [his offering by faith] he was commended as righteous.”  This would be akin to what God says about Abraham having righteousness credited to his account in Genesis 15:6.

How was Abel commended?  “When God spoke well of his offering.”

Genesis 4:4b-5 says,

And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering, 5 but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell.

You know there is nothing at all in the text to indicate that Abel was any better than Cain.  They were both sinners.  The only thing that commended Abel as righteous was that he did what God had revealed to him, whereas Cain did not.  That’s the only difference.  Abel believed God’s Word and therefore did what God said.

And that’s the only difference.  That’s the only thing that changes any man or woman’s relationship with God.  It’s not how good you are, it’s not if you are better than someone else, it’s only that you came to God on God’s terms that God revealed.  That’s all He asks.

But God “commanded [Abel] as a righteous man.”  He credited righteousness to his account.

And this is so very foundational in the gospel because it is when we come to Christ who is our sacrifice, when we recognize that we are sinners and that Jesus paid in full the penalty for our sin and we embrace that by faith, we believe that and we act on that, and, as it were, we come to the altar and embrace the sacrifice of Christ as our own sacrifice, being offered to God.  And it is in that act and at that moment that God gives testimony that we have been declared righteous.  And that is exactly what happened with Abel.

God did not respect Abel for what was in Abel.  God did not respect Abel because there was something attractive or good about him.  God respected Abel because of his offering, because he believed God’s revelation that a blood sacrifice was necessary and therefore that is what he offered.  Abel was as much a sinner as Cain.  He was just as liable to eternal judgment as Cain.  But he believed God.  He trusted in God’s revelation and acted upon it and that obedient faith was counted to him for righteousness.

So here we have for the first time in Scripture a record of righteousness being credited to the account of a sinner who has trusted and obeyed.  This is such a momentous thing.  Righteousness is credited to the account of a sinner!  God gives testimony that this man, Abel, has attained righteousness.  His act, an act of faith, was an act which brought a very righteousness of God to cover his sin.  It is the stunning foundation, isn’t it, of understanding the doctrine of justification.

Abel honored God…brought him the right sacrifice.  God thus honored Abel…imputing righteousness to him.  Imagine having God give you that testimony that you are righteous in His eyes!  That is what God did for Abel.  That is what God does for everyone who puts his or her trust in Jesus Christ, the ultimate blood sacrifice.

Abel was not made righteous by his sacrifice (Heb. 10:1-4).  Neither was he made righteous by his faith.  He was made righteous in exactly the same way we are, by the righteousness of Christ, which was imputed him on the basis of grace.  Faith was the instrumental cause, but it was God’s grace that made it possible for Abel to be declared righteous on the basis of faith.

That God approved Abel’s sacrifice and did not approve of Cain’s was painfully obvious to Cain.  He knew that God had favored Abel’s sacrifice and not his own.

So Cain was very angry, and his face fell. (Gen. 4:5)

He was furious, I mean his blood was boiling, his face was beet red, smoke was pouring out his nostrils.  His pride was shattered.

It just reveals to us that what delights God (obedient faith) enrages the heart of ungodly people.

Notice the incredible act of condescension on God’s part—coming to Cain, pleading with Cain to repent.

6 The LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen?  7 If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door.  Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.” (Genesis 4:6-7)

He encourages Cain to “do well,” or “do what is right.”  He encouraged Cain to act in obedient faith as well, so that he, too, could be accepted.  God is saying, “Look, Cain, this isn’t the end.  You haven’t ultimately failed.  Sure, you messed up, but you can make it right.  You can turn around now and do the right thing.”  The offer was still valid; the altar was still open.

But Cain didn’t want to.  It’s not that Cain didn’t know what to do.  It’s not that Cain couldn’t see the benefits of obedient faith.  But Cain didn’t want to do it.  Ignorance is very rarely the problem; willfulness is.  Stubbornness is.

And look as God personifies sin as a kind of monster, like a lion or dragon, “crouching at the door” and “its desire is for you”…do you sense the danger Cain is in?  Do you feel the seriousness of the situation?

How was it that God showed his acceptance of Abel’s sacrifice?  Our text doesn’t say.  However, there are six other occasions in Scripture where God displays his approval through fire from heaven which devours the sacrifice (Lev. 9:24; Judges 6:21; 13:19, 20; 1 Chron. 21:26; 2 Chron. 3:1; 7:1; 1 Kings 18:24, 38).  So it is quite possible that fire fell from heaven and consumed Abel’s offering, while Cain’s just sat there.  Or, in another example of self-reliance, Cain built the fire himself.  In some way it was glaringly obvious whom God approved.

Psalm 19:11 tells us that when it comes to God’s commands, “in keeping them there is great reward.”

Cain, on the other hand, is the person who comes to God on his own terms.  This person might come whenever he wants, however he wants.  His worship is determined by himself.  He determines how much and what He will give.

He did not want to use a bloody, substitutionary victim.  Cain, is a progenitor of those who say, “We do not need the blood of Jesus Christ to attain to eternal life.  Our religion is just as good as the religion of the Bible.  All roads lead to heaven.  I could never believe in a God that would be so angry as to require that someone die for someone else’s sins.”  Cain, said, long before Frank Sintra crooned, “I did it my way.”

That’s the middle letter in the word SIN, I.  Isaiah 53:6 says, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned–every one–to his own way.”  “Just follow your heart” is not very good advice.  In fact, it is terrible advice, for Jeremiah 17:9 reminds us, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?”

Now as we shall see further Cain failed to acknowledge the fact of his sinfulness first of all and secondly he failed to obey God in that he failed to bring what God had prescribed to pay for his sins and believed that God, through his own merits and hard work, would respect his sacrifice.  But God rejected Cain’s sacrifice and confronted his self-reliant, self-righteous attitude. 

Then Cain went away from the presence of the LORD and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden. (Genesis 4:16)

And Cain continued to rebel.  He had some children, and he built a city.  It was the first city men had ever built, and you know what it was?  It was the birth of the system, it was the birth of the world’s system which fell into the control of Satan immediately.  He chose to go his own way; he walked out of the presence of God (v. 16).

Don’t feel sorry for Cain, that God didn’t choose his sacrifice.  The Bible reveals that he knew exactly what he was doing and intentionally turned away from God, first with his heart and then with his body.

We cannot come to God on our own terms.  We are the creature; He is the Creator.  We draw near to Him through the means HE has identified—through the blood of Jesus Christ alone.  The faith God commends here is not faith of our own making, but the father that responds to God’s revealed Word and trusts in the sacrificial substitute—Jesus Christ.

Have you come to God through the only means He has provided—His Son Jesus Christ?

He is the only one who can wash away your sins and bring you to God!

In Acts 4:12 Peter says, “And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”

It is a name that saves, not your own efforts.  And there is only one name through “by which we must be saved.”  It is not just any name; there is salvation “in no one else” but Jesus Christ.  Jesus Himself said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”  I’ve heard someone say (I cannot remember who) that even if there were many ways to God, there is only one way to the Father, and that is “through” Jesus Christ.

Now, notice how Cain responded (Genesis 4:8).  He responded the same way all unsaved mankind responds to righteousness.  He hated it.  He invited his brother out into the field.  (His invitation drips with deception.)  There he “rose up against his brother Abel and killed him.”

By the way, how did Cain know how to kill his brother?

Think about it.

The only precedent Cain had for killing was the animal sacrifices that he had seen killed for sin offerings!  Isn’t that ironic…and tragic?  What was tragic is that Cain was in league with Satan, for in John 8:44 we read that Satan was a murderer from the beginning and acted through Cain to kill Abel.

Now why is this so profound for these Hebrew Christians?  Why does the writer of Hebrews begin with this tragic story of the killing of Abel?  Because their allegiance to Jesus Christ was about to bring about intense persecution and possibly their own martyrdom.

We today may not face quite the same degree of danger, yet the point is still whether we will choose to remain faithfully obedient to the Word of God when it might cost us something very dear to us, even our own lives.

The fact is, Jesus told us the world would hate us.  In 1 John 3:12-13 the apostle John shows the comparison of this ancient story of Cain and Abel to their present persecution at the hands of the world they lived in.

12 We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous. 13 Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you.

Jesus did not teach his disciples that they would always have a life of ease, of health and wealth and their “best life now.”  Instead, he warned them: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.”  It is par for the course.  It is natural for the child of God to be hated by the world, because the world hates anything that reminds them that they are beholden to Someone outside themselves, namely God.

Paul told Timothy, “Indeed [in truth, in fact], all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted,”

At the very outset of the human race, sin violently reacted to snuff out righteousness.  It is no different today.

Getting back to Cain, maybe he thought that he was once and for all rid of this nagging display of righteousness and the voice of his own conscience.  But he was about to face a disturbing reality.  Dead men do tell tales.

Moffatt has said, “Death is never the last word in the life of a righteous man.”  And truly, the life and example of Abel still preaches.

It just reminds us that when a man leaves this world, be he righteous or unrighteous, he leaves something of himself in the world—the testimony of his example.  And that leads us to our third point.

Obedient faith possesses a perpetual influence.

For good or bad, you will leave your mark on people’s lives.  Positive or negative, our testimony outlives us.  Just think of Hitler, Nero and Stalin; or Adoniram Judson, Hudson Taylor, or my dad Calvin Austin. (It’s interesting, isn’t it, that you only have to give part of the name of the really infamous characters in history?)

Hebrews 11:4 ends by saying, “And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.”

Among William Blake’s most famous paintings is one depicting the murder of Abel.  In the background lies Abel’s muscular body, pale-grey in death.  In the foreground flees Cain.  His body is facing away as he flees but his torso is twisted back so that his face still views the body.  His eyes are wide in terror, his mouth wrenching in agony and his hands are stopping up his ears in an attempt to shut out the wailing of his brother’s blood screaming from the ground.

Genesis reminds us that Abel’s blood cries out for vengeance.  9 Then the LORD said to Cain, “Where is Abel your brother?” He said, “I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?” 10 And the LORD said, “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground.”

Every time Cain put his foot back down on terra firma, it shouted to him, “You killed your brother!”  This will be mentioned again in Hebrews 12 and the concept shows up once more in Revelation 6:9-10 where we read of the martyrs who were crying out to Jesus Christ to right the wrongs that had been committed against them.

9 When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the witness they had borne. 10 They cried out with a loud voice, “O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?”

However, the writer of Hebrews is not so much emphasizing Abel’s cry for vengeance as his cry to us to live an obedient and enduring faith in God’s Word even at personal expense.  Abel has been speaking to us two things: (1) no man comes to God through their own efforts, but through faith.  And (2) you cannot ignore and disobey God’s revelation, like Cain did.

Cain’s response to all this was merely to start pouting and whining (Genesis 4:13-14).  There’s no remorse in his heart, no penitence, no sorrow for his sin, no pleading for grace, there’s no “right God, I’ll give the right sacrifice now.  I’ve learned my lesson.”  No, it’s just “God, this is too tough, it’s not fair.”  He pitied himself.  And his guilt would bite at him for the rest of his life, for God wouldn’t allow anyone to exact vengeance against Cain (Genesis 4:15).  But, that fact also reveals God’s patience, and the ray of hope that somewhere, sometime, Cain would repent.

Here in Genesis 4 we have one of the most profound illustrations in all the Word of God about what it means to exercise biblical, enduring faith—a man who so took God at His Word that it cost him his life.

“The declaration that ‘Abel being dead still speaks’ means that he, who when he was actually alive could not teach his only brother by his faith and example, now that he is dead teaches the whole world” (Martin Luther)

What a lesson for these Hebrews in this congregation to reflect upon if they were indeed struggling with his faith.  This verse very powerfully tells us that our faith, and only by our faith, do we come into a right relationship with God.

And if you’re struggling with whether it is worth it to stay faithful to Jesus Christ, God shows us here that enduring faith, even if it results in our death, receives commendation from God that we are right with Him.

Abel anticipates the very Son of God, who always responded with obedient faith to His Father’s Word.  He says in John 4:34, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.”

His obedient faith, though His human will struggled with it in the Garden of Gethsemane, merited God’s commendation, for following this highest act of obedience, after three days in the tomb the Father shows His commendation by raising Him from the dead, “and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 1:4).

And His obedient faith to give up His life on the cross continues to possess a perpetual influence.  Of course, it provides a model for obedient living, but more than that it has the power to declare righteous those who trust in it.

We are to listen and learn from the message of Job’s faith, but we are to fix our eyes on Job’s Savior, Jesus Christ.  That is who Abel points to.

And this is what Christian faith is.  It is a reliance upon Jesus with the result that we will have enduring obedience to His will, even in the face of severest opposition.

The theme of Hebrews is the absolute supremacy and sufficiency of Jesus Christ and the New Covenant He inaugurated.  The audience of Hebrews were primarily Jews whose lives had been surrounded by the Levitical system of daily and yearly sacrifices.  They were largely unaware of the important role that faith played in their relationship with God.

They needed some examples from the past in Hebrews 11, but he will also point out in Hebrews 13:7 that there are current examples of faith as well.  “Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith” (Heb. 13:7).

Our author had introduced back in 10:38-39 that “the just shall live by faith” and now he is explaining and illustrating how that works in Hebrews 11.  To them our author writes:

By faith Abel brought God a better offering than Cain did. By faith he was commended as righteous, when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith Abel still speaks, even though he is dead. (Hebrews 11:4)

Abel “still speaks.”  But what is he saying?  What was he saying to these first century people exposed to the gospel and what is he saying to  21^st century believers today?

Admittedly, when you first read the story in Genesis 4, it is somewhat mysterious and enigmatic. 

Abel is the first model of what the writer of Hebrews is now calling these Jewish Christians to—an active, living, vibrant faith, produced by grace, only placed in Jesus Christ, which then expresses itself in faithful obedience.  And Abel is a profile of that trusting, obedient faith.

But why is Abel first in the list in Hebrews 11?  Well, it does seem to be a chronological list, but still, why start with Abel?

Actually, Adam and Eve, in the purest sense of the word, were not people of faith.  At least, at first they had walked by sight.  They had lived in Eden and had a sensory experience of walking with God.  There was little need for faith in pre-Fall Eden.

But Abel was born outside Eden.  He had never experienced God’s presence like Adam and Eve had.  Another reason Abel’s faith is so important in mentioning here is that (1) it had to do with his own salvation and (2) it cost him something.  Both of these factors applied to these first-century believers.

And there are three features of this trusting, obedient faith:

• It responds to God’s revelation, thus trusting in His Word.
• It receives God’s commendation.
• It possesses a perpetual influence on others.

So, first, trusting, obedient faith responds to God’s revelation.  What is obvious in this chapter is that Christian faith responds to the revelation of God.  You will see this throughout this chapter.

Notice verse 4, “By faith Abel offered a better sacrifice than Cain did.

But what does this mean…a “better” sacrifice?  Better in what way?

Well, we need to turn back to Genesis 4 for a little background.  In verse 4 we read Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD.”

So Cain is the firstborn.  Then we read in verse 2 “And again, she bore his brother Abel.”  So Cain and Abel were the second and third men on earth, after Adam.  By the way, the name “Cain” comes from the verb caneh, which means “to get.”  Eve had “gotten” a man-child.

Now, do you remember the promise, the first expression of good news in Genesis 3?  As part of the curse against the malevolent serpent, God says, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.”

Both the serpent and Eve would have offspring.  There would be constant enmity between these two and although the serpent’s seed would “bruise his heel,” the final, crushing blow would come from Eve’s offspring, who would “bruise your head.” 

So, there would be a future seed (child) of Eve who would overcome the evil one.  God was promising these two sinning parents that they would give birth to a deliverer.  So, like all of us, being a little impatient and not realizing that God’s plan often takes a good bit of time to unfold, when Cain was born Eve shouted, “I’ve got him!”  Roughly translated, “He’s here!  The deliverer God has promised is here!”

But she was wrong.  In fact, he would be the first taker of life, not the giver of life.

The second-born son was Abel.  His name (hevel) means “breath,” which speaks both of his weakness and the brevity of his life.  Was she being prophetic?  Job spoke of life, in Job 7:16, as a breath.  The Psalmist in Psalm 144:4 speaks of life as but a breath.

Significantly, Abel was “a keeper of sheep,” while Cain was “a worker of the ground.”

Why did Abel keep flocks?  They were not meat-eaters yet.  The only purpose of the flocks at that time was for sacrifices, and that, of course, is significant.

Cain “worked the soil” and brought God something from his labors.  As a “working of the ground” his offering came from his own labors.  Also, keep in mind that it came from the cursed ground (cf. Genesis 3:17).

So we read in Genesis 4:3-4, “In the course of time Cain brought to the LORD an offering of the fruit of the ground, and Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions.”

At some time of offering, Cain brought “an offering of the fruit of the ground” while Abel “brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portion.”

All seems good.  But then we read…” And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering he had no regard.” (Genesis 4:4b-5)

But why?  Why did God value the offering of Abel above what Cain had offered?

The writer of Hebrews interprets this passage and says, “By faith, Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain.”  It was not better because it was more costly, or more abundant or because it came from a better person, but because it was qualitatively different.  It was more pleasing to the Lord.

The same Greek word is used by Jesus in the following passages:

• “is not life more important [same word] than food?”
• “one greater than [same word] Solomon here…”

Abel’s offering was of greater value.  But why?  The answer is tightly connected to the prepositional phase that began Hebrews 11:4, “by faith.”  It is a dative of manner, speaking of the way he acted.

Sure, it was better (1) because it was a blood sacrifice, imitating the sacrificed animal to provide covering for Adam and Eve (cf. Gen. 3:21), which ultimately is a type of Jesus Christ and His sacrifice in our behalf; and (2) because he brought the “firstborn of his flock” which revealed his heart attitude in giving God the very best no matter what the cost.  And Abel was doing all this hundreds of years because Moses codified it in the laws of Israel!

In Abel’s sacrifice, the way of the cross was first prefigured.  The first sacrifice was Abel’s lamb—one lamb for one person.  Later came the Passover—with one lamb for one family.  Then came the Day of Atonement—with one lamb for one nation.  Finally came Good Friday—one Lamb for the whole world (The MacArthur New Testament Commentary, Hebrews [Moody Press], p. 301).

But ultimately the reason God accepted Abel’s sacrifice and not Cain’s is that Cain’s was not an exercise of faith.  It may represent the best of human reason and industry, but it does not express faith.

And as we learned last time, faith demands an object.  It is not faith in faith itself.  It is not positive thinking.  Biblical faith demands an object, and that object is God’s revealed promises, especially the promise of Jesus Christ as the ultimate deliverer.  Faith, therefore, presupposes revelation from God.  And faith is a right reflex in response to God’s Word, in other words, it trusts and obeys.

Evidently, God had given Cain and Abel instructions about this act of worship.  It may have come through Adam and Eve, but ultimately God had indicated how he wanted to be worshiped.  God does not leave something as important as worship up to us and our whims.

We see this from several facts in the text.

First, there seems to have been an established place for bringing sacrifices.  They both “brought” their sacrifices somewhere.  It think it’s quite possible that that “somewhere” was at the door of Eden where the cherubim now stood guard, prohibiting them from entering in, reminding them of their sin.  Also remember that the mercy seat in the tabernacle (and later the temple) were protected by cherubim.

Secondly, notice that there must have been some instruction about a certain time for bringing sacrifice.  Verse 3 begins “in the course of time.”  Usually in the book of Hebrews that phrase is used to express the idea of the end of days, literally, at the end of a certain prescribed time it was now time for sacrifice.  Maybe it was a precursor to what would later be called Yom Kippur, the day of atonement.

And this makes it quite likely, therefore, that there was also a prescribed manner for bringing the sacrifices.  I would imagine that this wasn’t the first time the family had brought sacrifices.  Maybe they had seen their father do it many times.  It has been estimated that Cain was 129 years old at this time!  It is likely, therefore, that they both knew not only where and when, but also how sacrifices were to be made.

They had likely watched their father Adam as they grew up, but it was also quite possible that God had spoken to them individually (just like he does to Cain after the offerings were made).

Paul affirms to us that “faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God” (Rom. 10:17).  You cannot put your faith in something you know nothing about, so God must have revealed something for Abel to offer his offerings “by faith.”

Whether or not God had spoken instructions, they had definitely learned about the proper way to offer sacrifices from Adam and Eve.  Surely they had heard the story many times about how God had covered Adam and Eve in the skin of a slain animal.  “Death for sin, death for sin.  The provision of a substitute, God has given” would be ringing in their ears.  The very fact that Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel were all clothed and not naked, was a signal to everyone of the reality of sin and the requirement of a substitute.

Four things are intimated by the fact that God made cloaks of animal skin for them, “(1) sinners need to be covered in order for a sinner to stand accepted before a holy God, (2) it couldn’t be of human manufacture, they had already made a covering of leaves, and God said, “No, I think I’ll design the covering.”  (3), God had to provide it himself, and (4) it was obtained only by death, an innocent animal had to die.

So even though more instruction will be given to Moses in Leviticus, even at this point in history they could clearly understand the importance of a blood sacrifice to take care of sins.

While it is true that the categories of ritual animal sacrifices were not established until Moses’ time, the earliest believers nevertheless met at the altar on the basis of blood sacrifice (Genesis 8:20–22; 15:1–11).

By the way, there is nothing wrong with grain and fruit sacrifices.  There was a place and purpose for them.

Leviticus 19:24 says, “And in the fourth year all its fruit shall be holy, an offering of praise to the LORD.”  And there are other places that recommend offerings that involved grain or fruit.  But, you were never supposed to bring fruit first.  The first offerings were the sin offerings and the sin offerings always had to involve blood, as Hebrews 9:22 reminded us, “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.”

When Abel did what God said, he revealed his trusting and obedient faith.  He acknowledged his own sinfulness through his sacrifice.  Cain, although offering a sacrifice, did not acknowledge his sinfulness.

The life of faith begins with the acknowledgement of personal sin and the need and desire for forgiveness from God.  It begins with the admission that you are a sinner in need of forgiveness and then it relies on Another for that forgiveness.

Cain didn’t believe in Another; he relied upon himself.  He neither realized his need for forgiveness, nor how that forgiveness could be obtained.

R. Kent Hughes notes:

He came his own way—“the way of Cain.”  By refusing to bring the prescribed offering, and instead presenting his garden produce, he was saying that one’s own good works and character is enough.  Cain may have reasoned, “What I am presenting is far more beautiful than a bloody animal.  I myself would prefer the lovely fruits of a harvest any day.  And I worked far harder than Abel to raise my offering.  It took real toil and sweat.  And it is even of greater market value!  Enough of this animal sacrifice business, God.  My way is far better!”  [Cain’s theme song was, “I did it my way.”}

Cain’s offering was a monument to pride and self-righteousness—“the way of Cain.”  Abel, on the other hand, believed and obeyed God: “By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain.”  He brought God what God wanted.  This was acceptable worship.

It is true that the smell of Cain’s sacrifices would have been more pleasant to the human olfactory senses than the smell of Abel’s burnt animals.  But it was not man’s estimation but God’s that mattered.

In addition to a blood sacrifice what made Abel’s sacrifice more worthy in God’s eyes was the fact that it represented the very best that could be offered.  What made Abel’s offering superior to Cain’s was evidently its being an offering of the firstborn, and its inclusion of the fat (Gen. 4:4).  Ancient Near Easterners commonly held that a deity deserved the first of whatever man, beast, or crop brought forth.  The fat, likewise, represented the best part of an animal offering. Along the same line, by offering a blood sacrifice, Abel offered the most precious thing that life supplies: life itself.

But again, ultimately the chief difference between the two sacrifices is the heart attitude of Abel.  He expressed faith in God’s revelation and the reality of a blood sacrifice being necessary to cover sins.

William Lane says, “”The general tenor of Scripture indicates that the superior quality of Abel’s offering derived from the integrity of his heart rather than from the nature of the offering itself.  This is the clear implication of Gen 4:7, where the Lord says to Cain, ‘If you do what is right, will you not be accepted?'” (William Lane, Hebrews 9-13, p. 334)

It is interesting throughout the rest of Scripture that Abel is referred to as a “righteous” person.  Remember, “the just shall live by faith.”  For example, in Matthew 23:35 it speaks of “the blood of righteous Abel” and 1 John 3:12 contrasts Abel’s actions with that of Cain and calls Abel’s behavior “righteous.”

It simply means that he was faithfully obedient to the Word of God that had been communicated to him.  He obeyed God because He believed God’s Word.  This is important because it is the single most distinctive feature of the Christian faith.

Real faith in a Christian’s life will always produce obedience.  The person who says they believe in Christ, but has a total absence of the transforming power of grace through faith, will fail to produce obedience in their lives.  But real Christian faith takes God at His Word and that Word then shapes his or her life.

There is no real barrier between faith and works.  Yes, they are distinctive and they are not interchangeable, but they cannot be separated.  Faith obeys; faith responds; faith perseveres!

There is, at the end of the day, a quantum difference between faith in God and believing God.  Many have faith in God—that there is a deity out there to be found.  To say you “believe in God” allows a distance to remain.  It only acknowledges His existence and does not demand a personal relationship with Him.

But to believe God, to trust His Word, involves you personally with God.  It means that you trust in and rely upon that God personally and immediately.

This is the characteristic of authentic Christian faith—not merely believing that God exists, but trusting God and His Word and allowing His word to shape you through obedience to it.

That is what made Abel’s faith exemplary.

St. Augustine understood it and penetrated to its very core in his famous City of God when he explained: “Cain was the first-born, and he belonged to the city of men; after him was born Abel, who belonged to the city of God” (t. Augustine, The City of God , Book 15, Chapter 1, in Philip Schaff, ed., The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, vol. 2, trans. Marcus Dods (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1973), p. 284).  Augustine correctly saw that each was representative of radically different approaches to religion and to God.  There was the way of Cain—a way of unbelief and of self-righteous, man-made religion.  Jude 11 warns, “Woe to them! For they walked in the way of Cain.”  In contrast was the way of Abel—a way of faith described in the present text: “By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks” (11:4).

We are in that great faith chapter, Hebrews 11, where the author of Hebrews is encouraging his readers to endure in their faith, waiting in hope of gaining their ultimate reward.  In this chapter he gives example after example of Old Testament saints who did just that, enduring in faith, waiting for a reward that this did not receive in their lifetime, but would ultimately receive.  The author has already exhorted the church to be “imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises” (6:12), and now he provides multiple OT examples of such faith.  Many of these OT figures also exhibited obvious failings, yet their more pious actions evidenced a strong belief in God’s ability to deliver on his promises.

1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 2 For by it the people of old received their commendation. 3 By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.

Having given us faith’s character in verse 1, the writer now calls to mind faith’s activism in verse 2: “For by it the people of old received their commendation.”  The “it” that caused them to receive commendation was their faith—because they trusted God’s promises, they receive commendation.

In OT times, he points out, there were many men and women who had nothing but the promises of God to rest upon, without any visible evidence that these promises would ever be fulfilled; yet so much did these promises mean to them that they regulated the whole course of their lives in their light.  The promises related to a state of affairs belonging to the future; but these people acted as if that state of affairs were already present, so convinced were they that God could and would fulfill what he had promised.  In other words, they were men and women of faith.  Their faith consisted simply in taking God at his word and directing their lives accordingly; things yet future as far as their experience went were thus present to faith, and things outwardly unseen were visible to the inward eye.  It is in these terms that our author now describes the faith of which he has been speaking.  (F. F. Bruce, The New International Commentary on the NT: Hebrews, 276)

Our author, however, does not only accumulate a series of examples; he sets them in historical sequence so as to provide an outline of the redemptive purpose of God, advancing through the age of promise until at last in Jesus, faith’s “pioneer and perfecter,” the age of fulfillment is inaugurated. (F. F. Bruce, The New International Commentary on the NT: Hebrews, 278)

All the ancients in Israel who received divine commendation received it because of the character of their faith—their faith’s future certitude as they were sure of what they hoped for—and their faith’s visual certitude as they were certain of the invisible.  Read down through these verses and you will see that God was pleased with their faith.  God was pleased with Noah and saved him and his family.  God was pleased with Abram’s faith and credited righteousness to his account.  Our faith pleases God (Heb. 11:6).

Why? Because faith looks away from self and to the Savior.  Faith is an act of self-renunciation and a declaration that our hope and confidence are in God.  Faith puts no trust in man but in God only.  It declares that he is enough; he is sufficient; he is able. 

The reason it’s important to take note of this statement that “without faith it is impossible to please God” is because in none of the three stories noted here is faith ever mentioned.  All that is said in the stories of Abel, Enoch, and Noah is that they “pleased” God.  But that is how we know they had great faith, because “without faith it is impossible to please God.”

We need to recognize that faith is not a meritorious work that we do to gain rewards from God.  That would conflict with the entire teaching of the New Testament, that faith is simply the channel through which God’s blessings flow.  Two seemingly paradoxical things are true of faith: On the one hand, it is our responsibility to believe the gospel, because God commands us to believe (Mark 1:15).  On the other hand, sinners are unable to believe because of spiritual blindness (2 Cor. 4:4), deafness (Luke 8:10), being bound by Satan (2 Tim. 2:26) and even spiritual death (Eph. 2:1). 

Saving faith comes as God’s gift, not as a human effort (Eph. 2:8-9).  Jesus is both the author and perfecter of faith (Heb. 12:2).

The people of old (Gk. presbyteroi, “elders”), especially those listed as examples of faith throughout the chapter, received commendation in the form of a good testimony from God.   It refers here to the believers of the Old Testament and more specifically to the forefathers, both physically as well as spiritually, of those to whom this is addressed.

The author does not focus on their failings (e.g., Gen. 9:20–27; 12:10–20; 17:17–21; 18:11–15), since his goal is to positively illustrate what faith looks like and to connect the current people of God with this “cloud of witnesses” (Heb. 12:1).  You would think that their sinful failings would disqualify them, but instead their faith secures God’s approval.  Faith reaches out to the promise.

The list includes a man who was a murderer, a woman who was a prostitute, people who were afraid, rebellious, and even those who committed adultery.  Yet they gained approval with God – not because of their actions, but because of their faith.

Faith is the instrumental cause of God’s approval.  Grace is the ultimate cause.  Grace is what causes God to offer us good gifts—like forgiveness, adoption and eternal life—freely and without cause (in us).

The verb “received commendation” is actually ἐμαρτυρήθησαν.  The idea here is that the actions of the Old Testament saints bore witness of their faith in God.  It was an active, productive faith.  Real faith is always active and productive.  Good works are a (super)natural by-product of faith.  They will occur because true faith is present.

Some attribute the statement “We are saved by faith alone, but the faith that saves is never alone” to Martin Luther.  Actually John Calvin said in his Antidote to the Council of Trent, the Roman Catholic denial of the tenets of the Reformation:

I wish the reader to understand that as often as we mention Faith alone in this question, we are not thinking of a dead faith, which worketh not by love, but holding faith to be the only cause of justification. (Galatians 5:6; Romans 3:22.) It is therefore faith alone which justifies, and yet the faith which justifies is not alone: just as it is the heat alone of the sun which warms the earth, and yet in the sun it is not alone, because it is constantly conjoined with light.

According to Roland Bainton’s biography of Luther, Here I Stand, Luther wrote at one time:

Faith is a living, restless thing. It cannot be inoperative. We are not saved by works; but if there be no works, there must be something amiss with faith.

And thus we see that all of the examples mentioned in Hebrews 11 had a faith that acted.

R. Kent Hughes reminds us…

Think of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego (alluded to in 11:34). They had nothing but God’s word to rest on. They had no visible evidence that they would be delivered in this life. But they knew they would ultimately be delivered—they knew it so well that it was a present reality.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. If this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.” (Daniel 3:16–18)

There is no evidence that any of them had ever seen the invisible world at work around them, but they did see it by faith and were certain of it. Graciously, God did let them see it with their physical eyes when he delivered them. Remember Nebuchadnezzar’s astonished words as he watched the trio in the flaming furnace:

Then King Nebuchadnezzar was astonished and rose up in haste. He declared to his counselors, “Did we not cast three men bound into the fire?” They answered and said to the king, “True, O king.” He answered and said, “But I see four men unbound, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods.” (Daniel 3:24, 25)

The faith of the trio consisted simply in taking God at his word and living their lives accordingly. Things yet future, as far as their experience went, were present to their faith. Things unseen were visible to their individual eyes of faith.

And so it goes for every example in the great Hall of Faith of Hebrews 11—from Abel to Samuel to the unnamed heroes of the faith. (R. Kent Hughes, Hebrews, Volume 2, pp. 63-64).

A couple of questions before we get into verse 3.

First, have you gained God’s approval by putting your trust in Christ alone as your only hope of heaven?  As we saw in chapter 10, Christ’s sacrifice on the cross is the only basis for forgiveness of sins.  Don’t put your trust in your own good works.  They avail nothing.  You get no credit at all.  In fact, you are deeply in the hole because of your own misbehaviors.  They are counted against you.  Only the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ has pleased the Father and only by trusting in Christ can that righteousness be credited to your account.

Second, are you still pleasing God by living by faith today?  Some people believe that they are saved by faith and sanctified by their own efforts.  That is not so.  That is another lie from Satan.  We are to continue to live by faith, trusting that the righteousness of Christ credited to my account and my union with Christ will mean that He will live His righteous life through me.  Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

Now, in verse 3 our author says: “By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.”

This is the first occurrence in a series of twenty-one uses of the phrase by faith.  (William Hendriksen & Simon J. Kistemaker, NT Commentary: Hebrews, 312)

So verse 3 is a specific illustration of the definition of faith in verse 1b.

Here’s the question: How do we know that God made the world out of nothing that is seen?  Not only were we not there when it happened, but, even if we had been there, we would not have been able to see the act of creation, because you can’t see the word of God.  So how can we know or “understand” that the worlds were made by the word of God?  How can we know that “what is seen was made out of things invisible” – namely the word of God?

Verse 3 answers, “by faith.”  “By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God.”  This may seem like a circular argument.

John Piper resolves this by saying:

So the crucial question is: How is faith “evidence” of things unseen, namely, that God created the world by his word?  I take my clue from the one other place in the New Testament where God’s invisible attributes are said to be “clearly seen” by man, namely, Romans 1:20. “Since the creation of the world [God’s] invisible attributes, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood by what has been made.”  The word “understood” here in Romans 1:20 is the same word as in Hebrews 11:3, “By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God.”

So there in Romans 1:20 it says, “we understand the invisible attributes of God by what has been made.”  And here in Hebrews 11:3 it says, we understand the invisible word of God behind creation by faith.  Romans 1:20 seems to say that the evidence that God made the world is the things made – they clearly point to a Maker.  Hebrews 11:3 seems to say that the evidence that God made the world is faith.  

Now think about this for a moment.  What shall we make of it?  Here’s what I make of it.  Faith – at least in part – is the spiritual seeing or perceiving of the fingerprints of God on the things he has made.  Now the fingerprints of God on the things he has made – the order, the beauty, the greatness, the “irreducible complexity” (as Michael Behe says, in Darwin’s Black Box) – are the evidence that God made the world.  But so is the seeing of these fingerprints a kind of evidence.  It’s just the other side of the coin.

If you ask me, “How do you know Focus on the Family has a headquarters in Colorado Springs,” I will say, “I saw it on Tuesday.”  My seeing is evidence that it is there.

I think that is the way faith is the evidence of things unseen.  We all look at the same fingerprints, but some see and some don’t. Those who see have the evidence – the testimony – in themselves. (https://www.desiringgod.org/messages/what-faith-knows-and-hopes-for)

Philosophically we are left in the air by creation.  Infinite categories await us on either side of the argument.  Either matter existed from all time (and that is an infinite idea) or it was made out of nothing (another infinite category).  Logically and philosophically we are stymied.  Only by faith can we hope to understand.  We of faith are not embarrassed to say, “God created the heavens and the earth.”  Not to say that is to cast ourselves on some unknown, impersonal force that cares little if at all for what happens to creatures of this world.  Our faith tells us that there is a father and Creator Who cares after He has thrown the magnificence of the universe into its balanced structure.  (Louis H. Evans, Jr., The Communicator’s Commentary: Hebrews, 198)

God’s creation of the universe was accomplished by his word (Gk. rhēma).  So that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible is consistent with the doctrine of creation ex nihilo (Latin, “from nothing”), but is not itself a full statement about this reality.  It does, however, seem to correct Greco-Roman notions about eternally existing matter.  The idea that God created the visible universe out of some other kind of invisible (“not … visible”) matter is not in the author’s mind; rather, he is saying that God did not make the universe out of any preexisting matter as humans know it, which is close to saying that he made it “out of nothing.” Further support for this idea is found in Gen. 1:1; Ps. 33:6, 9; 90:2; John 1:3; Acts 14:15; Rom. 4:17.

When we read Genesis, we see that it is the word out of the mouth of God that caused this creation to come into existence and then be formed and filled.

Genesis 1:1-3 says…

1 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.  3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.

Genesis 1 establishes a pattern that everything is created by what God said (vv. 1, 6, 9, 11, 14, 20, 24, 26) so that whatever God says establishes reality, something the Tempter denied to Eve.

Psalm 33:6, 9 emphasize the same.

6 By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host.

9 For he spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm.

If God can therefore bring something out of nothing as He did at creation, can we not trust Him now to reverse any negative circumstance?  He certainly is able!

Faith is what looks at that created order and has a firm and resolute confidence in the God to whom it bears witness, who, though unseen, has provided a foundation for such a confidence through his mighty acts.  (George H. Guthrie, The NIV Application Commentary: Hebrews, 375)

“Looking at the earth from this vantage point, looking at this kind of creation, and to not believe in God, to me, is impossible… to see [the earth] laid out like that only strengthens my beliefs.” (Astronaut John Glenn after viewing the world from outer space for a second time.)  (Quoted in Internet for Christians Newsletter, Nov. 9, 1998; Leadership, Spring 1999, 75)

Kent Hughes begins his sermon on the beginning of Hebrews 11 with this story:

AS THE STORY GOES, a man despairing of life had climbed the railing of the Brooklyn Bridge and was about to leap into the river when a policeman caught him by the collar and pulled him back.  The would-be suicide protested, “You don’t understand how miserable I am and how hopeless my life is.  Please let me jump.”

The kindhearted officer reasoned with him and said, “I’ll make this proposition to you.  Take five minutes and give your reasons why life is hopeless and not worth living, and then I’ll take five minutes and give my reasons why I think life is worth living, both for you and for me.  If at the end of ten minutes you still feel like jumping from the bridge, I won’t stop you.”

The man took his five minutes, and the officer took his five minutes.  Then they stood up, joined hands, and jumped off the bridge!

Gallows humor to be sure, but it is painfully parabolic of today’s culture, which has abandoned its Christian roots for a vacuous secularism.  Indeed, if one factors God out of life’s equation and adopts the view that we are little more than cosmic accidents, life, with its inevitable hardships and suffering, becomes hard to defend.  In fact, suicide has been considered more intellectually consistent, even stylish, by some existential intellectuals in the last few decades.

But for the Christian there is substantial reason for hope in this life and the life to come because of the promises of God’s Word.  In fact, 1 Peter 1:3 tells that we have been “born again to a living hope.”  Now, the degree of our experience of hope is proportionate to the degree of our faith.  The more solid and certain our faith, the more profound our hope.  A deeply intense faith spawns a deeply intense hope.

This was important to the writer of Hebrews because of the rising storm of persecution that was about to fall on the church.  He knew that the key to survival was a solid faith and a resultant hope.  That is why in 10:38 he quoted Habakkuk 2:4, “But my righteous one shall live by faith.”  There is a spiritual axiom implicit here: faith produces hope, and hope produces perseverance .  Without faith one will inevitably shrink back.

Having introduced faith and endurance in 10:39, the writer proceeded to develop these concepts further.  He celebrates the character of faith in chapter 11 and then summons the readers to endurance in 12:1-13.  The first of these sections is exposition, and the second is exhortation.

“The characteristic vocabulary of this section relates to the vital issue of enduring disciplinary sufferings.  Anticipating the subsequent development in 12:1-13, the writer underscored the community’s need for hypomone, ‘endurance,’ in 10:36.  That note is resumed in 12:1, when the commitment required of the Christian life is reviewed under the metaphor of an athletic contest, and the key to victory is found in ‘endurance.'” (William Lane, Hebrews 9—13, p. 313).

It may help to see what might be called the “bookends” of Hebrews 11. Just a few verses earlier in Hebrews 10:36 our author told them that they had “need of endurance” (Heb. 10:36).  They needed to persevere and endure and press into the promises of God. And then immediately following Hebrews 11, in Hebrews 12:1, he exhorts them to “run with endurance the race that is set before” them.  So here we find Hebrews 11, tucked in between this call for endurance in chapter ten and then again in chapter twelve.  My point is simply that the examples of faith that we find in Hebrews 11 are all designed to encourage these first-century professing Christians to hold on tightly to Christ, to persevere in their confidence in him, to endure by clinging to him and all the blessings that God has given us in his Son.

You need to recognize what a brilliant theological and spiritual strategy this is.  The men and women to whom Hebrews is written were contemplating going back to the religious ways of people like Abel and Enoch and Noah and Abraham and Moses and Joshua and Gideon and David (the very people of whom Hebrews 11 speaks).  So what does our author do?  He describes these Old Testament saints as people who lived in daily confidence and faith in the promise of God that something better was coming.  That is to say, these great men and women of old lived in confident faith and expectation of the coming of the Savior from whom these first-century believers were tempted to walk away! (These last two paragraphs are from Sam Storms).

With the important connection between faith and hope now understood, the preacher launches into an eloquent song of faith that occupies the whole of chapter 11, beginning with a brief description of faith in verses 1–3 that is followed by a lyrical catalog of grand examples in verses 4–40.  As we take up verses 1–3 and the theme of what “faith is,” we must keep in mind that this is not an exhaustive definition, but rather a description of a faith that perseveres. In fact, there is a better definition of faith in Romans 4:21, where Paul says, “fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.”  That is what genuine, biblical faith is, being fully convinced that God is able to do what He has promised us.

Hebrews 11 is a favorite chapter of many.  It has been called “The Saints’ Hall of Fame,” “The Heroes of Faith,” “The Honor Roll of the OT Saints,” “The Westminster Abbey of Scripture,” and “The Faith Chapter” (John MacArthur Jr., The MacArthur NT Commentary: Hebrews, 285)

Here in Hebrews 11 will consider faith under three headings: Faith’s Character , v. 1; Faith’s Activism , v. 2; and Faith’s Understanding , v. 3.

1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 2 For by it the people of old received their commendation. 3 By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.

George Guthrie notes: “Over the past two centuries those of us in the Western world have embraced a very non-biblical view of faith as ‘a leap in the dark.’  Largely this view comes from a philosophical orientation known as existentialism.  One version of that philosophy goes something like this: in the modern world we know that miracles don’t happen, so basic beliefs of Christianity—like a man rising from the dead—can’t be true.  So to continue to embrace Christianity, we must turn our backs on the facts and take a leap of faith.’”

This approach to faith has even been memorialized in movies like Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.  Remember near the end of the movie, when Indy had come to vast chasm.  He had to have “faith”—shut his eyes and step off into nothing.  Of course, he stepped onto an invisible bridge, and everything was OK!  That’s Hollywood’s version of faith.  A blind leap.  That is not biblical faith.  One place we can look for the biblical alternative is Hebrews 11” (https://georgehguthrie.com/new-blog/biblical-faith)

So, it is vitally important for us today, as well as these Hebrews, to understand the true nature of faith.  It is not a “leap in the dark,” regardless of the evidence.  It is not a faith in faith.  It is belief in God’s promises. 

Faith is not a feeling, like the line from Oklahoma:

O what a beautiful morning,

O what a beautiful day.

I’ve got a wonderful feeling,

Everything’s going my way!

It is not optimism or bootstrap positive thinking either.  It is not a hunch.    It is not sentimentality.  The cynical Ambrose Bierce wrongly described faith in his Devil’s Dictionary as “belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge of things without parallel.”

Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

True faith is neither brainless nor a sentimental feeling.  It is a solid conviction resting on God’s words that makes the future present and the invisible seen… The great Bishop Westcott says of verse 1, “The general scope of the statement is to indicate that the future and the unseen can be made real by faith.”

Faith is not irrational, rather it is supra-rational.  It is based on a supernatural power to fulfill promises which God asks us to trust.  These are rational because we can understand them and because God has been faithful in the past.

In the Greek text the verb “is” (estin) is the first word.  Faith is a present and continuing reality. . . . This meaning is that there are realities for which we have no material evidence though they are not the less real for that.  (Frank E. Gæbelein, Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Vol. 12, 113)

The Greek noun here is pistis, which can be translated as “faith,” “trust” or “belief” and sometimes “faithful,” depending upon the context.

Our author describes faith in two ways in verse 1.  First, “faith is the substance of things hoped for.”

“Faith is the substance” (hupostasis).  The Greek word here gives the sense of something foundational, basic, a concrete reality upon which other things are built.  Stasis, the root of the word, means the place, setting, a standing pillar, that upon which other stones are placed.  The prefix hupo means “under” or “below.”  Together the result signifies something solidly foundational, concrete in reality, something assured. 

Thus, faith as defined by our exhorter is not an imaginary product of the mind fabricated out of its own philosophical needs or rationalistic dreams, but that which is firm, solid, of real existence.  Faith is the solid certainty of that for which we hope, based upon reality and solid existence.  (Louis H. Evans, Jr., The Communicator’s Commentary: Hebrews, 196)

“To the writer to the Hebrews faith is a hope that is absolutely certain that what it believes is true, and that what it expects will come.  It is not the hope which looks forward with wistful longing; it is the hope which looks forward with utter certainty.  It is not the hope which takes refuge in a perhaps; it is the hope which is founded on a conviction” (William Barclay, pp. 144-45).

This is just another way of talking about the “already” and “not yet” dimensions of Christian experience.  There is much that is “not yet” ours.  We await it.  It will come when Christ returns.  But there is also a part of that future inheritance that is “already” ours, and faith is what makes it possible for us to experience and enjoy today what will come in fullness only when Christ returns.

There is a sense in which that future promise is already and substantially here when we trust God’s word.  Faith gives to our future inheritance a present reality and power, as if it is already possessed.  No one has expressed this with greater clarity than John Piper:

“In other words, faith grasps – lays hold of – God’s preciousness so firmly that in the faith itself there is the substance of the goodness and the sweetness promised.  Faith doesn’t create what we hope for – that would be a mere mind game.  Faith is a spiritual apprehending or perceiving or tasting or sensing of the beauty and sweetness and preciousness and goodness of what God promises – especially his own fellowship, and the enjoyment of his own presence.

Faith does not just feel confident that this is coming some day.  Faith has spiritually laid hold of and perceived and tasted that it is real.  And this means that faith has the substance or the nature of what is hoped for in it.  Faith’s enjoyment of the promise is a kind of substantial down payment of the reality coming” (sermon, What Faith Knows and Hopes For, June 1, 1997; www.desiringgod.org). 

Faith is so assured of the future (because of God’s promises) so that they already seem to have been fulfilled in the present.

Is this the kind of faith you have?

Faith grabs hold of what is hoped for, as something real and substantial.  It believes that God’s promises are sure.

If you have the substance (the thing you hoped for) or you could see it, you wouldn’t need faith.  It is because you cannot see it or you don’t have it yet that you need faith.  You have to trust that God has the power to be faithful to keep His promises to you.

As William Lane explains:

Faith celebrates now the reality of the future blessings which make up the objective content of Christian hope.  Faith gives to the objects of hope the force of present realities, and it enables the person of faith to enjoy the full certainty that in the future these realities will be experienced (William L. Lane, Hebrews: A Call to Commitment (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1988), p. 149).

The second half of verse 1 joins faith’s future certitude to the parallel visual certitude that comes through faith, because faith means having “the conviction of things not seen.”

Our faith is the organ by which we are enabled to see the invisible order—and to see it with certainty, just as our eyes behold the physical world around us.  What do we see?  As we have mentioned, we see the future because it is made present to us through faith. But we also see more—namely, the invisible spiritual kingdom around us.

Sometimes God opens our physical eyes to see these spiritual realities.

Genesis 28 records how Jacob, on that miserable night he fled from Esau into the wilderness, forlorn and alone, laid his weary head on a rock to sleep, and “he dreamed, and behold, there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven.  And behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it!” (Genesis 28:12).  In a flash he saw what had been around him all the time—angelic commerce between Heaven and earth on his behalf! The account records, “Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, ‘Surely the LORD is in this place, and I did not know it.’  And he was afraid and said, ‘How awesome is this place!  This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven’” (Genesis 28:16, 17).  Jacob saw the unseen spiritual order, and that is what we see by faith.

And in 2 Kings 6 the king of Syria sends his army against Israel.  He surrounded the city and Elisha’s servant asked, “Alas, my master, what shall we do?”  Elisha said, “”Do not be afraid, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them.”

He could see something that his servant could not yet see.  So Elisha prayed and said, “O LORD, please open his eyes that he may see.”  So the LORD opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw, and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha (2 Kings 6:14-17).

But most of the time we must “walk by faith” rather than by sight (2 Cor. 5:7).

Faith brings a dynamic dual certitude to everyday life. First, there is future certitude as that which is to come becomes present to us. Second, there is a visual certitude as we see the invisible.

In summary then faith is a kind of spiritual tasting of what God has promised so that we feel a deep, substantial assurance of things hoped for; and faith is a kind of spiritual seeing of the invisible fingerprints of God in the things he has made. By the one we know God’s power and wisdom to make us, and by the other we know his goodness and grace to save us.

So I say with Psalm 34:8, “O taste and see that the LORD is good; How blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him!”

Our author is encouraging the Hebrews and us to exercise a faith that makes the future a present reality and the invisible visible to our spiritual eyes.  This will result in an action-oriented, enduring faith, one that is strong and robust.

Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego had that kind of faith.  They will be referred to in verse 34 of this chapter.  They refused to bow down to Nebuchadnezzar’s idol, which caused the offended king to threaten to throw them into the blazing furnace.  Their response shows that by faith, they were making real in their present crisis the future promises of God regarding eternal life.  By faith they saw the unseen God as more real than the enraged king standing in front of them, threatening to roast them alive.  Listen to how faith oozes out of verses 16-18.  They say, “”O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter.  If this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king.  But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.”

And what happened?  Not only did they survive, but Christ appeared with them in the fiery furnace.  Their faith allowed them to enjoy that special experience of His presence with them.

The American Revolution was all but lost.  Powerful British force had crushed the American colonial force at New York City and put them to flight that summer.  The British and their Hessian allies had then occupied free colonies, effectively cutting the rebels in two, they had advanced within sight of Philadelphia, the rebel capital, from their perspective.   George Washington had lost 90% of his army, and had been driven-what was left of his army–driven across the Delaware River.  Many soldiers had been lost to death, to disease, to injury, and to capture.  Many more had deserted.  And as the year 1776 came to a close, Washington stood to lose even more soldiers legally at the end of that year, December 31st, when their enlistment would end, and they could just walk away.  The morale of his army was at an all-time low.  But on Christmas night of 1776, as the howling Nor’easter struck the region, George Washington crossed the Delaware River and attacked the exhausted Hessian garrison in Trenton, killing or capturing over 1000 men.  The Second Battle of Trenton followed within a few days, as the rejuvenated Americans held off a counter-attack by some of Lord Cornwallis’ best troops.

Almost trapped at that point, Washington slipped away under cover of darkness, stole behind the enemy and hit them a third time at Princeton and won another victory over British Brigade at Princeton.  The course of the entire war was changed with those events.  More than anything, General Washington had given his army what it could not fight without, and that is confidence in final victory.  Without that confidence, an army will quickly surrender in the face of the foe.  But having confidence, an army will overcome even appalling odds and when shocking victories come, it genuinely believes it can win, no matter what the odds.

Well, if confidence was important for General Washington’s Army, how much more for the army of Jesus Christ in this world?  We are faced with a foe so powerful that if we could see all of his power unleashed against us, we would quickly surrender.  As Martin Luther put it, “Did we in our own strength confide our striving would be losing,” we would quickly give up.  We must have absolute confidence, unshakable confidence in Christ’s final victory in order to fight well.   And without that confidence, we will easily, we will quickly crumble in the face of the battle that faces us.

Going through hardship isn’t easy.  We endure it for a while and then sometimes give in.  It is hard to endure when suffering goes on and on and on.  Suffering causes us to question our faith and we may turn away from God.  If something we believe is causing hurt and pain in our lives, we re-examine that belief and possibly reject it.

This is what was happening in the lives of these Hebrews, some of whom were genuine believers and others who had experienced some spiritual experiences and associated themselves with the faith for awhile.  However, persecution was causing them to question whether it was worth following Christ.

32 But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, 33 sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated.  34 For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one.  35 Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward.  36 For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised.  37 For, “Yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay; 38 but my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.”  39 But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls.

They had endured public ridicule, ministered to fellow believers in prison, and endured economic hardships.  The reason that they were able to do so, and joyfully do so, was because “you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one.”  They had run their race well so far.  The Holy Spirit now moves from the readers’ past persecutions and trials to their present duress.  Since they had been faithful in enduring trials, they had “need of endurance” still.

Now was not the time to throw away confidence in a better reward (cf. 3:6; 4:16; 10:19). They needed endurance to persevere, to “keep on keeping on,” as the saying goes.

The “therefore” here gives the inference or implication of how the readers endured past trials and how they should relate to their present sufferings.  The Holy Spirit here draws a conclusion from verses 32–34.  Given how they had successfully handled all their past sufferings, they should not throw away their confidence.

We have all heard of the famous high-wire aerialists the Flying Wallendas, and about the tragic death of their leader, the great Karl Wallenda, in 1978.  Shortly after the great Wallenda fell to his death (traversing a seventy-five-foot high-wire in downtown San Juan, Puerto Rico), his wife, also an aerialist, discussed that fateful San Juan walk.  She recalled: “All Karl thought about for three straight months prior to it was falling.  It was the first time he’d ever thought about that, and it seemed to me that he put all his energies into not falling rather than walking the tightrope.”  Mrs. Wallenda added that her husband even went so far as to personally supervise the installation of the tightrope, making certain the guy wires were secure, “something he had never even thought of doing before” (Warren Bennis and Burt Nanus, Leaders, the Strategies for Taking Charge (New York: Harper & Row, 1986), pp. 69, 70).  Wallenda’s loss of confidence portended and even contributed to his death, though his past performances gave him every reason to be confident.

Spiritually, no true Christian has to surrender to the “Wallenda factor” because our confidence rests not on our own powers but on God’s sure promises.

The writer’s charge to “not throw away your confidence” means not to cast away confident confession of Christ in the midst of opposition.  It’s a negative command. Do not throw it away this confidence. 

“Cast away” or throw away is the very opposite of holding fast (Heb. 3:6). The argument here is that this is no time to abandon the readers’ confidence since they previously carried a high level of confidence under persecution (Heb. 3:6; 4:16; 10:19). The implication is that, since they already had “confidence,” they should not abandon it (Heb. 3:14).

We saw it earlier in Hebrews 4:16, “Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with confidence,” because we have a great high priest who died on the cross, who shed His blood for sinners like you and me, since He was raised from the dead, since He has ascended and is now seated at the right hand of Almighty God, “let us approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”  Let’s have that confidence.

Adam Clarke protests: “Do not throw it away…neither men nor devils can take it from you, and God will never deprive you of it if you continue faithful.  There is a reference here to cowardly soldiers, who throw away their shields, and run away from the battle.  This is your shield, your faith in Christ, which gives you the knowledge of salvation; keep it, and it will keep you.”

Discouraged by the perils and hardships of the wilderness, the forefathers of those to whom our letter was sent were moved with a spirit of apostasy when they asked, “Would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt?” (Num. 14:3).   These Hebrew Christians of the first century were in danger of following this evil example (cf. 3:12) by “forsaking the God who made them” and “scoffing at the Rock of their salvation” (Dt 32:15).   To do this would be evidence that they had indeed “thrown away their confidence” and returned to the deceptive and impermanent material things of the present world which previously they had professed to “throw away.”  (Philip Edgcumbe Hughes, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews, 432)

These believers were not to go back to where they had been as unbelievers—that is, to not fully understanding and depending upon the finished work of Christ.  These Hebrews were not to throw off the confidence they had in Christ.  Rather, they were to boldly proclaim their faith in the finished work of Christ.  They were to build upon their past faith and faithfulness.

The positive corollary (to “throwing away” one’s confidence) is to proclaim confidence even in the midst of opposition—like Peter and John before the Sanhedrin (Acts 4:13) and Latimer before King Henry.

This exhortation to maintain their confidence in Christ will result in “great reward” (cf. v. 34 “a better possession and abiding one”).  As we said last week, that “great reward” ultimately is God himself.  There is no better reward than to know Him and have a deep and abiding relationship with Him.  That is our greatest joy (Psalm 16:11).

There is a great and rich reward in eternity for persevering in one’s faith during trials. This reward is not because we maintain our confidence; rather, it is the retaining of the confidence that allows us to receive God’s promises.  They must persevere in their faith to receive this reward.

Next, one’s confident response is to be followed by perseverance: “For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised” (v. 36).  The exhortation of v. 35 is so that they “may receive what is promised.”

Endurance is sticking to something even when it gets hard and painful.  I can remember running cross country at what was then called Ozark Boys Camp.  On two Sunday track meets I had won the race, on the third week I lost.  On the fourth and final week I was running neck and neck with the guy who had beat me the week before.  My side was hurting and it was too painful, so I tripped on purpose, allowing him too great a distance to catch up.  I didn’t endure.  I gave up close to the finish line, but I didn’t win because it was too hard to continue running fast.

The prophet Jeremiah complained to the Lord about how dark the times were that he lived in. The wicked get away with everything.  What’s the deal?

God replied, Jeremiah 12:5 “If you have run with footmen and they have tired you out, then how can you compete with horses?  If you fall down in a land of peace, how will you do in the thicket of the Jordan?”  If you think it’s tough now, just wait. It’s going to get worse.  You and I need endurance.

William Barclay writes: “Perseverance is one of the great unromantic virtues.  Most people can start well; almost everyone can be fine in spasms.  Most people have their good days.  Most men have their great moments.  To everyone it is sometimes given to mount up with wings as eagles; in the moment of the great effort everyone can run and not be weary; but the greatest gift of all is to walk and not to faint” (William Barclay, pp. 143-144).

The toughest and most discouraging trials are when we are called to obey God’s will when the fulfillment of His promise seems so far away.  This is why we need endurance.

These Hebrews must endure in keeping their full confidence in the finished work of Jesus Christ, rather than retreating back to the Jewish system of sacrifices and priests.  This is God’s will for them—to remain believing in Jesus Christ.  This is God’s great desire for you and me as well.  Just as you put your faith in Christ at some point in your life—keep believing!  No matter how hard that path gets, stick with it.  Don’t abandon your confidence in Jesus Christ!

The result of continued confidence in the finished work of Jesus Christ is that we will “receive what is promised” (v. 36c).  Receiving God’s promises is based on our faith, but it is also based upon our endurance in believing.

This exhortation is a good summary of the whole message of Hebrews.  It is what all the warning passages are about.

We understand that the grand key for perseverance is faith.  Knowing this, we are set up for the greatest exposition of the subject of faith found anywhere in Scripture–in chapter 11.  (R. Kent Hughes, Preaching the Word: Hebrews, vol. 2, 56)

The key to successful perseverance is faith.  It is significant that in verses 37–39, as the preacher emphasizes the need of faith in order to persevere, he quotes from Habakkuk 2:3, 4—“For, ‘Yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay; but my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.’  But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls.”

Every word in Habakkuk 2:4 is important, and the Lord quotes it three times in the New Testament just to bring out the fullness of the meaning.

• In Romans 1:17 Paul quotes this same passage from Habakkuk 2:4 with the emphasis on faith: “The just shall live by faith.”
• In Galatians 3:11 Paul quotes this passage from Habakkuk 2:4 with the emphasis on just: “The just shall live by faith.”
• Here in Hebrews 10:38 the emphasis is on live: “The just shall live by faith.”

Originally God gave this exhortation to the prophet Habakkuk as the prophet repeatedly complained about the advances of injustice and the suffering of the righteous, God’s bottom-line advice being that “the righteous shall live by his faith” (Habakkuk 2:4).  “Live by faith, Habakkuk!”  Later on in Habakkuk’s writing, when the prophet had allowed this truth to sink in, he rose above his depression and complaint and sang this great song of faith: “Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will take joy in the God of my salvation” (Habakkuk 3:17, 18).

Here in Hebrews, though the quotation from Habakkuk is taken from the Septuagint’s rearranged messianic rendering of the Hebrew text, the application is still the same— the righteous will live by faith.  The meaning here in Hebrews is this: (1) Jesus is returning soon—“The coming one will come and will not delay” (v. 37); (2) the saved will persevere by faith—“But my righteous one shall live by faith” (v. 38a); (3) the lost will shrink back—“And if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him” (v. 38b).

We can persevere because Jesus is returning soon “in a very little while” (cf. Rev. 22:20).  So we need to keep walking by faith.  If we abandon that purpose and shrink back, we will not please God.  When Jesus returns all of God’s promises will be fulfilled.  He will fulfill the covenants with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and David.  Jesus’ coming will fulfill everything that He promised for you.

Twice in verse 37 our author emphasizes the nearness of Christ’s return to fulfill His promises.  He says “yet a little while” and he “will not delay.”  That phrase is very expressive and emphatic. The author used a word which signifies “a little while”, and then for further emphasis added a particle meaning “very”, and this he still further intensified by repeating it; thus literally rendered, this clause reads: “For yet a very, very little while, and He that shall come will come.”

The righteous “shall live by faith.”  Faith is not only the instrumental cause of our salvation, but it is also the instrumental cause of our Christian life here and now.  Paul says in Galatians 2:20 “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.  And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

If we don’t live by faith and access the power of God for our daily life, when trials and persecution come we will likely “shrink back” from full confidence in Jesus Christ.  “Shrinking back” is just another name for “throwing away [our] confidence.”  Again, it refers to the apostasy explained in verse 29.

Leon Morris says, “Paul is concerned with the way a man comes to be accepted by God; the author [of this epistle] is concerned with the importance of holding fast to one’s faith in the face of temptations to abandon it.”

There are two dangers in turning away from Jesus back to the Mosaic system.  First, God “has no pleasure in him.”  God is not pleased by sin, and especially this most heinous of sins—turning one’s back upon His precious Son whom God has offered to die in our place.  When someone does that, to say that God “has no pleasure in him” is a vast understatement.  In fact, the opposite is true—one remains an enemy of God.

The other consequence of turning away from Jesus Christ as the one sacrifice for sins is found in verse 39, those who shrink back “are destroyed.”  The word could also be translated “ruin” or “waste.”

Some believe this refers to eternal destruction in the Lake of Fire.  Others believe it refers to temporal punishment.  And some believe that it refers to the waste of turning back to the old ways of life.  Obviously, some of these possibilities are more serious than others, but none of them work in our favor.

As in our other warning passages, our author once again distinguishes between those who apostatize and those who remain faithful.  Verse 39.

But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls (Heb. 10:39)

He is saying, let God’s promises of future reward keep you from shrinking back, and thus you will preserve your soul.  This is not a reference to conversion. It refers to the preservation of the faithful believer until he receives his full reward (cf. 1 Pet. 2:9).  The “preserving of the soul” is equivalent to saving the life in James 5:20.

Last week we began this section of the book of Hebrews which encourages the Hebrews to look back at their past faithfulness and look forward to their reward to encourage them to continue in faithfulness to Jesus Christ.

That passage is Hebrews 10:32-34.

32 But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, 33 sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. 34 For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. 35 Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. 36 For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. 37 For, “Yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay; 38 but my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.” 39 But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls.

Not only had these Jewish Christians been persecuted themselves, they had also unashamedly supported other believers who had undergone persecution in the same way; they became “partners with those so treated.”

Here their spiritual athleticism leaps forth, because they transcended the normal tendency to be passive and actively joined in suffering together.  What gallantry and honor!  “I stand with my brothers and sisters here.  If you insult them, you insult me!”  Side-by-side, with arms locked, they chose to face persecution together.

They stood by them.  They embraced them in solidarity.  They didn’t turn and run away in fear but said, “We are here for those you are abusing.  We stand with them.  They are our brothers and sisters in Christ.  We are not afraid to declare ourselves partners with them.” 

Can you think of someone who is being publicly attacked today who might need you to stand with them and support them?

This word here in v. 34, “partners,” is the word we find normally translated “fellowship,” koinonia.  We talk about Christian “fellowship” today but usually mean no more than that we shared a meal together or hang out in a small group or enjoyed sitting next to another Christian in a church service like this one.  But for these people it went much deeper.  Their unity and sense of community displayed itself in their open and willing identification with those who suffered worst of all.

Community is not just a place for the suffering to find comfort but for the comfortable to find suffering.  Together we join Christ in his suffering, and as a result, as 2 Corinthians 1:4 says, “we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in his great little book Life Together, pointed out: ““The Christian, however, must bear the burden of a brother.  He must suffer and endure the brother.  It is only when he is a burden that another person is really a brother and not merely an object to be manipulated.  The burden of men was so heavy for God Himself that He had to endure the Cross.  God verily bore the burden of men in the body of Jesus Christ.  But He bore them as a mother carries her child, as a shepherd enfolds the lost lamb that has been found.  God took men upon Himself and they weighted Him to the ground, but God remained with them and they with God.  In bearing with men God maintained fellowship with them” (Life Together).

What we see, and like to see, is cure and change.  But what we do not see and do not want to see is care: the participation in the pain, the solidarity in the suffering, the sharing in the experience of brokenness.  And still, cure without care is as dehumanizing as a gift given with a cold heart” (Henri J. M. Nouwen, Out of Solitude (Ave Maria Press, 2008), pp. 35-36).

Jerry Bridges, in his book Trusting God, writes: “There are many elements that go into the total concept of fellowship, as it is described in the New Testament, but the sharing together in suffering is one of the most profitable.  It probably unites our hearts together in Christ more than any other aspect of fellowship.”  Most of us aren’t out looking for suffering, but we can deeply appreciate the fellowship we enjoy when we share it with others.

We enjoy the deepest fellowship with Jesus Christ as we join him in the “fellowship of his sufferings” (Philippians 3:10).  We enjoy our deepest fellowship with one another as we go through suffering together.

Next, in verse 34, he says, “you had compassion on those in prison.”  That is, they literally had a “fellow-feeling” for or with those in prison. The same word is used in 4:15 of Christ’s sympathy for us as our high priest!  They lived out the later exhortation in Hebrews to “remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them” (13:3). 

Even more, this was not imagined sympathy—it was real, because they visited their comrades in prison.

In the world of the first century the lot of prisoners was difficult. Prisoners were to be punished, not pampered.  Little provision was made for them, and they were dependent on friends for their supplies [including food].  Without them, they would likely starve.  For Christians in the early church, visiting prisoners was a meritorious act (Matt 25:36).  But there was some risk, in fact it could be dangerous, for the visitors became identified with the visited.  However, the readers of the epistle had not shrunk from this.  It is not pleasant to endure ignominy, and it is not pleasant to be lumped with the ignominious.  They had endured both.

It’s entirely likely that those arrested had been severely beaten and were left untended and hurting.  In any case, the rest of the Christians had to make a decision: Do we keep our mouths shut and lock our doors and say and do nothing?  Or do we go to our Christian friends and provide the help they need and in doing so very likely expose ourselves to the same mistreatment they’ve suffered?  Let’s not forget, we’ve got families too.  What will become of our homes and possessions and our jobs and our reputation if we step out to help them?

Evidently, when the light of God’s grace shone in their hearts to give them the knowledge of Jesus Christ, among the many things that they experienced was a transformation from being selfish and self-protective to being compassionate!  They were so burdened by the burdens of their fellow believers that they simply couldn’t remain silent or keep still.  The compassion that Jesus himself displayed toward the sick and hurting and abused and the outcasts of his day came alive in their hearts as well. 

What some might consider reckless and irresponsible behavior on their part, the Bible calls compassion!

And they did it willingly—and in doing so some visited Christ who said, “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink . . . I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me” (Matthew 25:35, 36).

In all of this they had done well, but most amazingly to me is the next statement: “. . . and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one” (v. 34b).  Apparently their willingness to stand in solidarity with Christians who were being persecuted is that they experienced economic persecution as well.

Perhaps they burned their homes or broke out their windows and stole their furniture.  Or it might refer to official fines.  Whatever it was, showing sympathy with their suffering brothers and sisters cost them their possessions.

You can’t tell from the word whether it’s official confiscation of property, or whether it’s unofficial vandalism.  One way or the other, their property was ruined and taken.

They didn’t just grimly endure the loss of their property; they accepted it joyfully!  Many modern Christians would rage at such unfair treatment and file a lawsuit to recover what they lost, plus damages for emotional suffering!  But these new believers had such profound joy in knowing Christ that they sang the doxology as the mob hauled off their belongings and leveled their houses.

Now, imagine your small group.  Half of a small group went to jail, and the other half had a meeting and prayed, and they made decisions about costly love.  They went and identified with the prisoners, and while they were gone people wrote, “Christians get out!” all over their houses and took their furniture and burned it in the streets.  And you gather your small group in a circle and sing a song of joy that you had been counted worthy of such abuse for the sake of the Name (Acts 5:41).  The author of Hebrews says that is how they responded: “You joyfully accepted the seizure of your property knowing that you have for yourselves a better possession and an abiding one.”

Now, the human tendency is to hold on as hard as we can to what we have and we only let go of it kicking and screaming.

We may believe that the way to really enjoy the good things in life is to hold onto to them as hard as we could for as long as we can.

R. Kent Hughes relates this story:

I once came across an ad that appealed to the desire of many to keep their household pets, which unfortunately do not have a lengthy life expectancy.  The advertisement was for freeze-drying!  According to the ad, most people who have their pets freeze-dried do so because they want to “keep their pets around a little longer.”  The process takes several months, and the pet will remain natural-looking for up to twenty years after being freeze-dried.  The price for this service ranges from $400 for a small pet up to $1,400 for a pet the size of a golden retriever (“Freeze-dried Pets Article Legitimate,” The Bloomington Indiana Herald-Telephone (December 26, 1985).  So, if your wish is to hang on to everything—even your dead dog—here’s your chance!

But there is a better way, a way that will lead to greater joy, and that is to ‘joyfully accept[ed] the plundering of your property.”

They had also been willing to suffer material loss because they looked forward to a better inheritance in the future (cf. Luke 21:19).  Moreover, they had done this joyfully, not grudgingly.

You accepted it “with joy” (joyfully), the writer says.  The preposition “with” denotes the attendant circumstances of something that is taking place.  Here that loss of possessions is “with” the feeling of excitement, filled with “joy” (chara).  The word “accepted” has the idea of welcoming something, of treating it like a welcome guest, or eagerly receiving someone.  It expresses the idea of expectant waiting where a person is ready and willing to receive all that is hoped for.

“Thankfully, joy is an all-season response to life. Even in the dark times, sorrow enlarges the capacity of the heart for joy. Like a diamond against black velvet, true spiritual joy shines brightest against the darkness of trials, tragedies and testing” (1 and 2 Thessalonians, Christian Focus Publications, 1999, p. 54).

“The eternal inheritance laid up for them was so real in their eyes that they could lightheartedly bid farewell to material possessions which were short-lived in any case.  This attitude of mind is precisely that ‘faith’ of which our author goes on to speak” (F. F. Bruce, The Epistle to the Hebrews, p. 270).

Though losing their possessions they found themselves exhilarated by the loss!  Why?  Because they knew they “had a better possession and an abiding one.”  They believed Jesus’ words, “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven . . .” (Matthew 6:19, 20). They were “seek[ing] the city that is to come” (13:14)—“the heavenly Jerusalem” (12:22).

They made it through the time of persecution by keeping a heavenly perspective, an eternal perspective.  The writer to the Hebrews’ point is clear: you can make it through this present time of discouragement also.

There are a number of passages in Scripture that command us to have joy in the face of trials and troubles and persecution, and in every case it is based upon something that we know.  There is always a good reason.  All of these passages have to do with the trials or persecution we go through and all of them command us to rejoice and all of them give us a great reason to rejoice.

Look at these passages.  First is James 1:2-4.

2 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, 3 for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. 4 And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

We are to count it “all joy,” or “pure joy” whenever we meet trials and verse 3 gives us the reason we can rejoice in our trials, and that is “because you know” something, you know “that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness” and when we continue to be steadfast, it produces spiritual maturity.

Paul, in Romans 5 says something very similar.  In the midst of five great benefits of being justified by faith, Paul says…

3 More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,

We not only rejoice in our “hope of glory” in the future, being transformed into Christlikeness, but now “we rejoice in our sufferings,” and why?  Because we know “that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope.”  Again, we rejoice in our sufferings because through them God brings about Christlike character.

Peter chimes in as well.  In 1 Peter 1 he looks back upon his own experiences with trials, likely reflecting back upon the time that he denied his Lord three times after claiming that he would stand up for Christ.  He says…

6 In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, 7 so that the tested genuineness of your faith–more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire–may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 1:6-7)

He doesn’t use the word “know,” but he does reveal that the purpose of trials is “so that the tested genuineness of your faith….may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”  In other words, when we go through the testing of our faith through trials, the end result is reward in the presence of Christ.

That is what Jesus focused upon when he told His disciples in Matthew 5:10-12.

10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”

The word “blessed” means to be in a state of utmost happiness and this can be experienced even in persecution.  Thus, Jesus tells them to “rejoice and be glad” (and that word “be glad” has the idea of jumping for joy).  And why?  Because “your reward is great in heaven.”

Like Peter, Jesus focused on the future benefits of suffering now—it results in greater rewards in heaven.

Paul also addresses this in Romans 8 and 2 Corinthians 4 when he says “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:18).  As we look at our current sufferings, no matter how painful and prolonged they may seem, they are “not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.”  Do the math, Paul says.  Whatever you lose now we result in far greater gain in glory.

In 2 Corinthians 4 Paul says it like this.  “For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,” (2 Cor. 4:17).

Christ also would endured the shame and pain of the cross “for the joy that was set before him” (Heb. 12:2).  He endured the present pain by looking forward to future reward.  In Hebrews 11, Moses will do the same.  I love these verses.

25 choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. 26 He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward.

And now look back at Hebrews 10:34.

When you know that you have a better and a lasting possession, you are not paralyzed by loss.  Now that’s not nearly strong enough is it?  When you know that you have a better possession and one that lasts forever, you’re not paralyzed by anger when you lose something.  That’s not nearly strong enough either, because it’s not just that they weren’t paralyzed, (and I didn’t write it, Christian hedonist that I am, God wrote it) it says they rejoiced.  Evidently, there must be a possession which is so much better and long lasting that if you have it, and you lose something in the name of it, that’s okay.

The key to indomitable joy that produces love and good works that share the loss of property others have experienced is “knowing that you have for yourself a better possession and an abiding one.”  When you know that you have a better and a lasting possession, you are not paralyzed by loss.  If that better possession is great enough, you will even be able to rejoice in loss.

So what is this possession?  Well, it’s everything the book of Hebrews is about.  This book is written to help believers love their treasure, their reward, so deeply that this lifestyle emerges.  From the end of Chapter 10, everything left in this letter is about living by faith by falling in love with this possession.

What is it? Well, it’s the triumph over death (2:15).  It’s the final resting for the saints (4:9).  It’s the subduing of all of our enemies that Christ accomplished (10:13).  It’s the perfection we enjoy by the one sacrifice, Jesus Christ, and it’s the ultimate goal of drawing near to God and having him be our God forever.  That’s the new covenant.  “I will be among them.  They will be my people.  I will be their God forever.”  That’s our treasure, our possession.  God, our God, our portion, our Savior, our Refuge, our hope, our King.  

A better possession and an abiding one is not a thing.  Don’t ever try to get your hope from a thing in heaven, or from a gift instead of the giver.  Our true possession is fellowship with God.  It’s being accepted by God and being loved by God and being embraced by the Father.  And, it’s better.  Don’t miss those two words.  Don’t fly over words when you read the Bible.  Stop and meditate. T he two words I’m pointing you to are “better” and “abiding.”  We have a better possession, verse 34, a better possession and an abiding one.

I love to link that up with Psalm 16:11.  At the end of the Psalm it says, “Thou wilt show me the path of life; in thy presence is fullness of joy.”  Mark the word fullness.  “At thy right hand are pleasures forever.”  That’s lasting.  If you take those two words, fullness and forever, and compare them with verse 34, you see how they correspond: We have a better possession and an abiding one.  Better corresponds to fullness and abiding corresponds to forever.  What’s the reward?  It’s God.  “In thy presence is fullness of joy.  At thy right hand are pleasures forevermore.” (https://www.desiringgod.org/messages/the-present-power-of-a-future-possession)

For a Jew to confess the faith of Christ Crucified brought on him the loathing and disgrace of his compatriots, the ruination of his business, and even expulsion from the family circle. This would particularly be the case in the Jewish homeland, and it goes a long way toward explaining the extreme poverty of the Christian community in Jerusalem, which caused Paul to give such prominence to the collection of relief funds among the Gentile churches.  (Philip Edgcumbe Hughes, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews, 427)

So our author is encouraging his readers to stay faithful, to endure sufferings.  They had done it until know, they have need of continued endurance.

We may have begun well and now want to end well. If so, part of the secret is to remember well.

We have been looking at the rather severe warning passage in Hebrews 10:26-31 over the last few weeks.  We’ve seen that apostasy is quite possible among those who have been attached to the church and have felt some spiritual experiences and adopted some Christian practices, yet they have ultimately “spurned the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace” (Heb. 10:29) and therefore they will experience God’s just punishment.

The writer concluded this warning by reminding his readers of their former faithfulness, when they were being tempted, in order to encourage them to endure their present and future tests (cf. 4:12-16; 6:9-20).  Here is what he wrote:

32 But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, 33 sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. 34 For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. 35 Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. 36 For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. 37 For, “Yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay; 38 but my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.” 39 But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls.

“The juxtaposition of 10:26-31 and 32-35 suggests that it may have been the experience of suffering, abuse, and loss in the world that motivated the desertion of the community acknowledged in v. 25 and a general tendency to avoid contact with outsiders observed elsewhere in Hebrews (see … 5:11-14)” (William Lane, Hebrews 9—13, p. 297).

So in this passage the writer of Hebrews first calls them to remember past faithfulness (vv. 32-34) and then he encourages them “do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward.”  He encourages them to endure.

Hughes notes with reference to this passage, “We may have begun well and now want to end well. If so, part of the secret is to remember well” (R. Kent Hughes, Hebrews: An Anchor for the Soul, 2 vols. (Wheaton: Crossway, 1993), 2:54).

We might identify the big idea of this passage like this: To have faith that endures trials, recall how God worked for you in the past, focus on doing His will in the present, and remember to trust His promises in the future.  Or, to put it another way: By pointing the community to the past as well as to the future, the writer seeks to strengthen their Christian resolve for the present.

This passage may seem somewhat foreign to us and irrelevant to our situation.  After all, we are probably not experiencing persecution like that expressed in this passage.  And then, of course, there is the prosperity gospel teaching that we can claim health and freedom and a good life now so that we don’t have to experience such bad things.

But we do need this encouragement.  Life can be tough.  There are many things that can discourage us from continuing on with Jesus Christ.  Our country does not look with favor upon Christians practicing their faith as it had in the past.  Sometimes our families are against our commitment to live for Jesus Christ.  Our culture paints Christianity as an antiquated, dogmatic, homophobic, anti-science propaganda that we are better living without.  So we have need of endurance.  We need to remember that there will be “a great reward” for us in the future if we hold on and don’t shrink back.

Our writer takes his readers back to the “former days…after you were enlightened.”  This word “enlightened” is the same word used back in Hebrews 6:4.  We said there that this experience of being enlightened is a part of the pre-Christian experience when the Holy Spirit begins to open one’s eyes to spiritual truth.  However, we noted there that although this is the experience of every Christian—we must have our eyes opened (cf. 2 Corinthians 4:4-6)—it does not necessarily result in salvation, for those who experienced this back in Hebrews 6:4 ended up turning away from Christ and could no longer experience repentance.

2 Corinthians 4:6 says

“God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” 

Before God opened our eyes, we did not even see our need for the Savior.  We mistakenly thought that we were good enough to get into heaven by our own righteousness.  We had no idea of how terrible our sins were or of how holy God is.  We did not appreciate the fact that the Son of God gave Himself on the cross to pay our debt of sin.  But then, while we were yet in such darkness, God graciously opened our eyes.  With the converted slave trader, John Newton, we could sing, “I once was blind, but now I see!”

This had happened to the recipients of this epistle—their eyes had been opened and they saw the sufficiency and supremacy and sweetness of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ and believed.

So the first thing that happened is that God’s loving light invaded their darkened hearts and minds and gave them sight to see the beauty and majesty of the glory of God revealed in Jesus. When God’s grace takes hold of us, the lights go on!

John Piper points out that…

But then the New Testament talks about how becoming a Christian means we also shine like lights in the midst of a crooked and perverse world (Philippians 2:15).  We don’t just see the light of God’s glory more clearly, we begin to reflect it.  God shines into us and we shine out to the world.

So I take Hebrews 10:32 to point to these two things.  These Christians had come to see the light of the gospel of the glory of God as true and infinitely valuable; and they had then begun to shine in the world as a witness to this truth and value. The first experience set them free from the world and the second made them stand out from the world.

Before we work through the text, one other word of introduction may be helpful. Jesus’ parable of the sower (Matt. 13:3-23; Mark 4:3-20; Luke 8:5-15) serves as a useful backdrop to our text.  Jesus described the seed of the Word as sown on four types of soil.  Some fell beside the road, where the birds ate it, so that it never took root and sprouted.  This represents unbelievers who hear the gospel, but do not understand or believe it.  Other seed fell on the rocky ground, where there was no depth of soil. It quickly sprang up, but it had no roots, and so it withered.  This represents those who hear the Word and immediately receive it with joy.  But when affliction or persecution arises, they quickly fall away.

The third soil is infested with thorns.  The seed sprouts, but the thorns, representing worries, riches, and pleasures of this life (Luke 8:14), choke out the word so that it does not bring forth any fruit.  The fourth type is good soil, representing those who hear, understand, and accept the Word, and bear fruit with perseverance (Luke 8:15).

In my understanding, only the fourth type of soil represents true believers who “have faith to the preserving of the soul” (Heb. 10:39).  The rocky soil and the thorny soil both make a profession of faith for a while but eventually, they “shrink back to destruction.”  In other words, genuine saving faith endures trials and bears fruit.  The amount of fruit will vary (“some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty,” Matt. 13:23), but there will be observable evidence of a transformed heart.  True believers may fail under pressure, as Peter did when he denied Jesus.  Every believer struggles daily against sin, not always victoriously.  But if God has changed the heart and if His saving life is “in the vine,” the person will repent, endure in faith, and bear fruit unto eternal life. (https://bible.org/seriespage/lesson-31-enduring-faith-hebrews-1032-39)

The apostates had also been enlightened, but their lack of endurance revealed that their hearts had not been changed.  They did not ever truly put their trust in Jesus Christ, turning their backs on their own efforts and fully relying upon His work in their behalf.

So our author is drawing their minds back to the days just after they had been enlightened and he reminds them that they had “endured a hard struggle with sufferings.”  Every part of that sentence hurts.  Their conversion had resulted in hard times.  This is what makes the “joy” of verse 34 so amazing.

Phillips notes, “the author does not ‘recall’ his readers’ attention to the ‘good old days’ where faith seemed easy.  It is not the times when things go well that really define our Christian lives. The really significant times, the periods that make up the highlights of our own histories, are those of trial and difficulty and danger” (Richard D. Phillips, Hebrews: Reformed Expository Commentary (Phillipsburg: Presbyterian and Reformed, 2006), 380).

In the former days, after the Hebrew Christians started to see the glory of Christ and to shine with the glory of Christ, they also started to suffer for Christ.  That is the paradox of the Christian life—the more faithful we are to Jesus Christ, the more we will suffer hardship.

This was a challenge to recall how they had marvelously stood unmoved some fifteen years earlier during the persecution under the Roman Emperor Claudius in A.D. 49.  A famous quotation from the historian Suetonius indicates the character of the Claudian persecution: “There were riots in the Jewish quarter at the instigation of Chrestus.  As a result, Claudius expelled the Jews from Rome” (Life of the Deified Claudius, 25.4).  Historians believe “Chrestus” is a reference to Christ and that the riots and expulsion occurred when Jewish Christians were banished from the synagogue by the Jewish establishment.  No one had been killed (cf. 12:4), but it was nevertheless a wrenching time of humiliation and abuse.

They had endured a “hard struggle.”  Our word “athletic” comes from the Greek word translated “struggle.”  It was like a hard-fought athletic contest, with Satan vying for their souls.  They were not passive, but engaged in this suffering, seeing it as a contest for God’s glory.

The persecution was like a hard-fought athletic contest viewed by a partisan crowd.  There was nothing passive in their display.  In fact, they showed superb spiritual athleticism as they stood their ground!  (R. Kent Hughes, Preaching the Word: Hebrews, vol. 2, 52)

The word translated “endured” is a reference to war and means “to stand one’s ground” or “to remain on the battlefield” instead of running away in cowardice.  In an athletic contest, it involved remaining in the fight or the race, even though every fiber of your body is screaming, “give up.”

Such athleticism is a beautiful thing in the eyes of God and the church—as it was, for example, in the life of Hugh Latimer, the great English Reformer.  On one notable occasion Latimer preached before Henry VIII and offended Henry with his boldness.  So, Latimer was commanded to preach the following weekend and make an apology.  On that following Sunday, after reading the text, he addressed himself as he began to preach:

Hugh Latimer, dost thou know before whom thou art this day to speak?  To the high and mighty monarch, the king’s most excellent majesty, who can take away thy life if thou offendest; therefore, take heed that thou speakest not a word that may displease; but then consider well, Hugh, dost thou not know from whence thou comest; upon whose message thou art sent?  Even by the great and mighty God! who is all-present, and who beholdeth all thy ways, and who is able to cast thy soul into hell!  Therefore, take care that thou deliverest thy message faithfully.

He then gave Henry the same sermon he had preached the week before—only with more energy!  Latimer was superb!  And his memory is a great treasure of the Church.

Here our writer is calling for a similar remembrance of those storied days when the little church had been magnificent—“But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings.”

It is encouraging to note the intensity and repetition of the conflict. It is of great intensity.  The word is polus meaning “much, great, strong, severe, hard, deep, profound.”  They were enduring an intense profound struggle with sufferings (pathema).

That “suffering” was a struggle that came many different ways.  They had been “publicly exposed to reproach and affliction.”  They were “partners with those so treated” – including the writer to the Hebrews himself (“you had compassion those in prison”).  They also had faced economic persecution (the “plundering of your property”).  But the point is that they had faced these things, and had endured them.  They could take a look at their past endurance, and be encouraged to keep standing strong in the future.

The story line in the book of Acts demonstrates the early Christians were exposed to open shame, persecution and derision (Acts 4:15-18; 5:17-18, 40-41; 8:1; 9:1-2; 12:1-5; 13:50; 14:19; 16:19-24, 37-39; 17:5-8, 13; 18:2; 19:9, 23ff; 21:27-39; 28:16-17, 30).  Stephen’s martyrdom in Acts 8 is an excellent example of this kind of persecution.  James the brother of John was murdered by King Herod (Acts 12:1-2).

When he says that they were sometimes “publicly exposed to reproach and affliction,” he uses the theatorizo, from which we get “theater.”  This uses the same ancient Greek word as in 1 Corinthians 4:9 “God has exhibited us apostles as last of all, like men sentenced to death, because we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels, and to men.”  The idea is to be made theater for a watching world.  They were ridiculed and taunted as a theatre of the absurd.

This may be the primary way we face persecution in the U. S. today—public ridicule.  This happens through Hollywood and social media quite often.

The word “reproach” pertains to one’s character.  They slandered you.  They dragged your name through the mud.  They accused you of horrific sins that you have not committed. They ridiculed you for your faith.  This is the same word he will use in 13:13 to describe the “reproach” that Jesus himself endured.  It’s our author’s way of saying that these believers had so identified with Jesus that they endured the same sort of public humiliation to which he was exposed. 

Along with that, the “affliction” they endured was of the nature of being squeezed and pressured.  The word “affliction” pertains more to maltreatment of one’s body.  They beat you, they deprived you of shelter and food, and then they threw you into prison without justifiable cause.  Persecution was one thing, but sardonic, smiling, rung-dropping insults made it even more devastating.

Sam Storms notes:

Evidently the non-Christian world surrounding them saw this light in their lives and hated it and did everything they could to snuff it out.  Jesus told us to expect this to happen.  In the Sermon on the Mount, and virtually in the same breath, Jesus said, “let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 5:16), but he also declared, “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.  Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you” (Matt. 5:11).  So not everyone gives glory to the Father when they see Christians shining. 

We don’t know what provoked this persecution.  It may be that these Christians simply stopped engaging in the sinful activities that formerly characterized their lives.  They stood out in a crowd and said No, and this offended those with whom they used to run wild.  Or perhaps their vocal testimony to the glory of God as revealed in Jesus and his atoning sacrifice was deemed “politically incorrect” and the civil authorities took action to silence them.

This was just part of the suffering they were facing.