10-19-2024, 03:31 PM
Because the Cross freed us from the prison of the flesh, we can walk by faith. That word "faith" has seen vast abuse; it is not simply beliefs, ideas or ideology. It refers to your personal submission to Christ as Lord. It is equivalent to the word "commitment".
People read this chapter in English as if it were soaring rhetoric that moves the emotions. That misses the whole point. The first thing our author tells us that your commitment provides all the certainty you need to embrace His covenant promises. It's the assurance and substance of things your flesh cannot see. It trumps your intellect, your senses and reason. It answers the questions you don't even know to ask.
It has been around since the beginning. The saints of old found peace with God that way, and He testified of His approval of them. We can grasp how the physical world was completed as a poor shadow of the preceding spiritual realm. By faith Abel's offering was accepted by God; Cain had no faith and was rejected. Abel's life is long gone, but his faith still testifies. God's approval of Enoch was readily apparent, and his faith kept him from seeing death
Without faith it is not possible to even approach God, much less be at peace with Him. Noah was moved by faith to build that ark and save his family from something no one had ever seen, nor could have imagined.
Through this kind of radical commitment, Abraham left his ancient homeland and acted on a promise of land and inheritance that was never visible to his eyes. A nomad his whole life on the land he was promised, he was certain of his home in Heaven. When both he and his wife were almost a century old, they conceived a son based on this promise of descendants like the stars in the night sky. It was some centuries later that Abraham's descendants claimed the land, but several generations of patriarchs who never lived to see that result kept their commitments by faith in the promise.
Faith like theirs makes you an alien to this world itself. It was this kind of faith that led Abraham to offer his son of the promise, prepared to see him raised from the dead, since he was so sure God would fulfill His commitments. It was this faith by which Isaac foretold the lives of his sons. And in a later generation, Joseph prophesied that his nation would someday claim that homeland and ordered that his bones be kept ready for the move so he could be buried there.
This commitment caused Moses' parents to hide him, and later led Moses to renounce his royal privileges as having been raised in Pharaoh's courts. He vastly preferred to embrace the fate of his nation based on just the promises of God that their future was richer than his past. The nation kept the Feast of Sparing and were spared. Moses didn't fear to face the risk of escaping Egyptian slavery with Pharaoh's troops on his heels. Instead, the nation marched across the dry seabed, but those troops were drowned.
Through faith in a silly ritual march, the city of Jericho was destroyed. Meanwhile, Rahab escaped because of her commitment. And there were countless others whose very lives were miracles of faith. Some saw lives of power and others faced death by the same power -- some of those deaths quite grisly. They endured because they were committed to God's glory in this world.
How many times did it appear that God didn't keep His promises for this life? His promises are eternal in nature. This life is supposed to be horrible; it's only for His glory that we don't receive all the sorrows that our fleshly natures deserve. All the good things we reap in this life from His Covenant are mere shadows of His promises in Heaven.
People read this chapter in English as if it were soaring rhetoric that moves the emotions. That misses the whole point. The first thing our author tells us that your commitment provides all the certainty you need to embrace His covenant promises. It's the assurance and substance of things your flesh cannot see. It trumps your intellect, your senses and reason. It answers the questions you don't even know to ask.
It has been around since the beginning. The saints of old found peace with God that way, and He testified of His approval of them. We can grasp how the physical world was completed as a poor shadow of the preceding spiritual realm. By faith Abel's offering was accepted by God; Cain had no faith and was rejected. Abel's life is long gone, but his faith still testifies. God's approval of Enoch was readily apparent, and his faith kept him from seeing death
Without faith it is not possible to even approach God, much less be at peace with Him. Noah was moved by faith to build that ark and save his family from something no one had ever seen, nor could have imagined.
Through this kind of radical commitment, Abraham left his ancient homeland and acted on a promise of land and inheritance that was never visible to his eyes. A nomad his whole life on the land he was promised, he was certain of his home in Heaven. When both he and his wife were almost a century old, they conceived a son based on this promise of descendants like the stars in the night sky. It was some centuries later that Abraham's descendants claimed the land, but several generations of patriarchs who never lived to see that result kept their commitments by faith in the promise.
Faith like theirs makes you an alien to this world itself. It was this kind of faith that led Abraham to offer his son of the promise, prepared to see him raised from the dead, since he was so sure God would fulfill His commitments. It was this faith by which Isaac foretold the lives of his sons. And in a later generation, Joseph prophesied that his nation would someday claim that homeland and ordered that his bones be kept ready for the move so he could be buried there.
This commitment caused Moses' parents to hide him, and later led Moses to renounce his royal privileges as having been raised in Pharaoh's courts. He vastly preferred to embrace the fate of his nation based on just the promises of God that their future was richer than his past. The nation kept the Feast of Sparing and were spared. Moses didn't fear to face the risk of escaping Egyptian slavery with Pharaoh's troops on his heels. Instead, the nation marched across the dry seabed, but those troops were drowned.
Through faith in a silly ritual march, the city of Jericho was destroyed. Meanwhile, Rahab escaped because of her commitment. And there were countless others whose very lives were miracles of faith. Some saw lives of power and others faced death by the same power -- some of those deaths quite grisly. They endured because they were committed to God's glory in this world.
How many times did it appear that God didn't keep His promises for this life? His promises are eternal in nature. This life is supposed to be horrible; it's only for His glory that we don't receive all the sorrows that our fleshly natures deserve. All the good things we reap in this life from His Covenant are mere shadows of His promises in Heaven.