HEBREWS 11

To understand Hebrews 11, we need to look back to all we've been shown in the previous chapters of Hebrews:

• the supremacy of Christ as the exact representation of the Person and Nature of God
•  the humanity of Jesus, who, as God, allowed Himself to be tempted in all things just like us, but without sin, and tasted death for us
• the battle we fight by faith against our tendency towards slavery to rules and law to please God
• the rest that awaits His children - that goes right up against and overcomes the fear of death
• the work of Jesus the supreme high priest in making a way for us to enter the throne room of God and the very Holy of Holies to commune with God the Father
• the overwhelmingly amazing New Covenant that translates the truth from being something outside of us that we conform to, to being something God writes on our heart through His Holy Spirit.

Against all of that backdrop, we are strongly encouraged, at the end of chapter 10, to press on, to not shrink back, but to have faith. It's a kind of faith that does something life-changing and preserving to our souls. The encouragement of verse 10:39 is that our nature is changed from fearful to faithful. That takes the work of God!

As we open chapter 11, I am reminded of all the great quest stories that we love to read and to watch - where hapless souls are pitted against seemingly overwhelming odds and, because they believe in something more valuable than the toil and the dangers and the snares and arrows of the enemies of their souls, they persevere to receive a reward, or, if they die in the battle, their faithful struggle causes the tide to turn in favor of the cause they lived and died for. We love competition because we love to see something Greater prove itself in the sweaty, bloody battlefield of life. This is the rhythm of Hebrews 11. It describes a real and magnificent quest and its heroes who have already joined the battle and struggled and bled and died for that ultimate cause. The repeated implication is that they trusted in a Faithful God even when what was happening to them seemed unjust, wrong, unfair, upside down, and that they receive a reward that is totally worth the fight - a Rest that is deep and rich and refreshing.

Jesus, how can I possibly follow them? They are men and women who stand way above their peers ("of whom the world was not worthy") and have given their lives for the faith. How can I possibly become more than an observer and become in any way like one of them and the One they followed? Verse 6 gives us the way - "And without faith, it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him." This verse gives us both the gospel and the pattern for living it out. If you or I would come to God, we must believe first that God is.

Recall His name Yahweh - "I AM". We must believe in THAT God. We must believe in the God who revealed Himself to us (not the convenient God we would conjure up ourselves). We must believe in the transcendent God who revealed Himself in the lives of men, in the Word of Truth and in person, in the God/Man Jesus. We must respond to His persistent calling and knocking and seeking us, the lost, and respond in simple trust and belief. We must say, "Yes, I believe that You are who You say You are."

Secondly, we must believe (and this is amazing) that He rewards those who seek Him. More than that, that rewarding is in His nature - He is a rewarder. God asks us to believe that He is Good and that He has willed that Good for us. Further, He has connected our good to His Glory. That is, the thing that is best for Him - to receive the Glory that He is due - yields for us the thing that is best for us. God is at once the Rewarder and the Reward. Please read and re-read the stories of the men and women who put their whole faith and trust in those 2 truths. They suffered danger, harm and death, but proved the Promise true - that God is Good and a Rewarder.

Verses 39 and 40 tell us that, in Jesus, they gained approval through their faith, and though they did not see the Glory of God in their lifetimes, and were not always even rescued from death, but they laid claim to the coming Promise of eternal rest. The same promise of being with Jesus forever in His new kingdom (II Peter 3:13 - "But according to His promise, we are looking for a new heavens and a new earth, in which Righteousness dwells"). Just as Jesus went to His death by faith in His Father (He "kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously" - I Peter 2:23), we are called to live our lives by faith in the things God says are true. What would life look like if we fully took hold of all the amazing things we are reading in Hebrews about who Jesus is and how we are to please Him?

Prayer and Application

Lord, help us to live our lives on a level that more closely matches the commitment we read about in this "Hall of Fame" of faithful men and women. Unlike them, we have the Holy Spirit living in us, we have the testimony of the risen Savior, and we have the whole of the New Testament that reveals over and over your faithfulness and your goodness. Thank you for those who have gone before us and for the Promise of living with you in a depth and wonder of life we can't begin to imagine. Help us to not leave all of our faith "on the field" of battle and not hold back. Be glorified in our faith; grow it, so that is more and more pleasing to You and so that we live the lives we are called to live and become who we were meant to be.

 TOM ALBERS | Elder Chairman

Tom committed his life to Christ as a junior in high school in 1975. After moving to Austin in 1995, Tom and Cindy attended Hill Country Bible Church in Cedar Park before becoming part of the HCBC Pflugerville and Hutto Bible church plants. Tom serves as a Small Group Leader and in Youth ministry and in other ministry oversight roles. Tom and Cindy were married in 1986 and are parents to Will, Emily, Clare, Hannah and Nathan and grandparents to Owen.