Hebrews 11:1-3 (NKJV)
"BY FAITH WE UNDERSTAND"
November 3, 2024
ILLS: A man is lost on a hike through a rocky terrain with a few canteens of water in his pack. He conserves his water carefully until it is all gone and then he begins to get thirsty. That thirst gets deeper and deeper until he sees an old water pump and runs to it hoping to find a well. He lifts the handle and pulls it down but all he hears is the sound of metal on metal. He starts to panic. Then he sees a tin can at the bottom of the pump and inside is a message. “Dear traveler, do not despair. There is water in this well, please follow these instructions in order to prime the pump. Under the pump in front of you there is buried a bottle of water. Dig up the bottle with your hands, pour the water into the cylinder and start priming the pump. The water seal will make it work, and water will come freely out. Drink all of the water you can; fill all the containers you have but do not forget to fill up the priming bottle again and leave it for the next thirsty traveler. Warning: you will be tempted to drink this one bottle of water, but if you do, you will soon be thirsty again and have nothing to prime the pump. Have faith to pour it into the pump as instructed. If you would only have faith, you will have all the water you want and enough to refill this bottle.” The moral of the illustration, like pouring out the only water you have with a hope that new water is on the way, “faith is the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen!” The Hebrew writer first explains the nature of true faith, giving not so much a definition as a description. Faith is trust in the unseen. It is not trust in the unknown, for we may know by faith what we cannot see with the eye. The Scripture says, “By Faith We Understand.” We understand the evidence, the elders and the eternal.
The Evidence v1 - Notice that faith makes "things that are hoped for" as real as the things that are and it provides the unshakable "evidence" of those things that are a result of our trust in Jesus. Two words summarize what true biblical faith is: substance and evidence. The beginning point of faith is believing in God's character: He is who He says. The end point is believing in God's promises: He will do what He says. When we believe that God will fulfill His promises even though we don't see those promises yet, we demonstrate biblical faith (Jesus said to Thomas, “because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed”). By faith we are sure of eternal things that they ARE; by hope we are confident that WE SHALL HAVE them. Biblical Hope relies on Biblical Faith. Romans 8:24 says “For we were saved in this hope, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance.” Faith and hope go together because the same things that are the object of our hope are the object of our faith. Bishop Augustine said, “Faith believes what it cannot see; for if you can see it, there is no faith, the Lord has gone away so as not to be seen: He is hidden from the eyes, that He may be believed; the yearning desire by faith after Him who is unseen is the preparation of a heavenly mansion for us; when He shall be seen, it shall be given to us as the reward of faith... By faith we venture our eternal interests on the bare Word of God!” True Biblical faith operates quite simply. God speaks and we hear His Word. We trust His Word and act on it no matter what the circumstances are or what the consequences may be. The circumstances may be impossible, and the consequences unknown but we obey His Word just the same and believe Him to do what is best for us. The word translated “substance” means literally “to stand under, to support.” Faith is to a Christian what a foundation is to a house: it gives confidence and assurance that he will stand. So, “Faith is the confidence of things hoped for.” The word translated “evidence” simply means “conviction.” This is the inward conviction from God that what He has promised, He will perform. The presence of God-given faith is conviction that He will keep His Word. Faith is simply the deep settled assurance that God will do exactly what He has promised.
The Elders v2 - One certain character of biblical faith is that you will always find a witness. People may have laughed at these Elders of a Good Testimony, these great men and women when they stepped out by faith, but God was for them and with them. Missionary Oswald Sanders put it perfectly: “Faith enables the believing soul to treat the future as present and the invisible as seen.” The best way to grow in faith is to walk with the faithful. This chapter provides a summary of the lives and labors of great men and women of faith in the Old Testament. In each instance, you will find the same elements of faith: (1) God spoke to them; (2) they obeyed God; (3) He bore witness about them. By faith the elders obtained a good report — They were an honour to their faith, and their faith was an honour to them. By faith Abel offered a more pleasing sacrifice because of the promise of God. By faith Enoch walked with God and did not see death because he had pleased God. By faith Noah built the Ark and survived the flood because of the promise of the Lord. By faith Abraham left home and country, sojourned in a foreign land, offered his son as a sacrifice to God and looked for an eternal city. His faith was based on the unshakeable foundation of the Word of God. By faith Isaac, Jacob and Joseph all died looking to the fulfillment of the promises of the Lord. By faith Moses forsook Egypt, led Israel, did the will of the Lord, all in response to the promises of God. By faith Israel conquered Jericho because of the promise from God. By faith Rahab was saved because of the Lord’s promises. By faith thousands down through the ages have responded to God’s promises with hope and every single time He did what He said!
The Eternal v3 - A basic character of faith is that we who have it, “understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God.” It shows that in its earliest and most general expression, belief that the visible universe was created by God, is a conviction of something not perceivable by the senses. Colossians 1:16 states, "For by [Jesus] all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities – all things were created through Him and for Him". The word “understand” means “to perceive with the reflective intelligence.” The facts about creation must be a subject of faith, “so that we understand that things which are seen in creation were not made of things which do appear.” Why is understanding creation tied to faith? Because the “worlds were framed by the word of God.” Our faith in the personal Word of God [Logos] is directly linked to our understanding of the spoken word of God [rhema]. We can put our trust in Jesus as the Logos of God because by faith we understand the Rhema of God. We believe that Jesus is the Word [Logos] because God spoke it with His words [Rhema]. Hebrews 1 says, “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power [rhema], when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.” John 1 says, “In the beginning was the Word [Logos], and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.” When By Faith We Understand that all creation was framed by the very words of God, then we also UNDERSTAND that Greater is He that is in us than he that is in this old world! And if we UNDERSTAND our God is greater, “What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?”
