Hall of Faith - Faith for the Future

We're into week three of our series called hall of Faith. And I have to say up front that we are not the first people to coin Hebrews 11 as the hall of faith. In fact, some of you might have heard messages called hall of Faith before from Hebrews 11. It's a common name that's given to this passage, this chapter in Hebrews, chapter 11. Pastor James gave us a little bit of insight last week into the start of Hebrews and what's happening there.

But really, in brief, Hebrews is written to Jewish Christians as an encouragement to them, a challenge to them to persevere in their faith. It's written to them to encourage them to keep on going, keep on following Jesus. Whatever you face, put your hope and your trust in Jesus. And so by the time the author of Hebrews gets to chapter 11, they then recount all of these really significant figures of faith that have demonstrated putting their hope and their trust in God and seeing God do amazing things in their life. And so this morning, we're going to look at another four of them, another four stories, only briefly, of these great figures of faith.

Now, before we get there, I thought I'd let you know a little secret about me. I am an incredible inventor. I don't know if I've ever told you that. See some of you smirking and laughing, shaking your heads. I am an incredible inventor.

No joke. I come up with the most incredible inventions. In fact, just this week, you might know, our youngest has got a broken arm. And he's in a cast now for the next five or six weeks. And we have to wrap that up every.

Every time we want to give him a bath. And I was thinking, as I was, like, trying to sticky tape this plastic bag to his arm, I was thinking someone should invent, like, a bag with a seal that goes over a broken arm. And so I thought, this is great. This is a great invention. This would save so much time.

And I did what I do with all of my inventions. I went online and I started doing some research, and I discovered that, like, 500 people have invented that already. It's like all of my inventions, this is the issue I have with them, is that they're well invented. Like, there's so many options of this on the market already that you can get. And this bag is like $2 on Amazon.

I'm like, how is anyone making money off that? But all of my inventions go the same way. Because I'm not really particularly good at perceiving what is in the future. I'm not great at looking ahead and seeing not what do people need now, but what are people going to need in 10, 15, 20, 25 years. And what we see today in these four examples are people who could look ahead, people who could see ahead in faith and they lived that way.

Some of them got there early in life, some of them got there right at the end of their life. But these are four stories of people who could look ahead in faith. And so we're going to be in Hebrews 11, we're going to be in verse 17 today. And so if you'd like to turn in your Bibles, we're going to pray as we open God's word together. Our God, we thank you for your word.

We thank you for Hebrews 11, for this passage that just gives us example after example of people who put their hope and their trust in you. And so God, we just pray that you would remind us again today of the truth of your scripture, that it would be life giving Father, that it would transform our hearts and our minds. In Christ Jesus name we pray. Amen. And so Hebrews 11:17 words will come up on the screen says this.

It was by faith that Abraham offered Isaac as a sacrifice when God was testing him. Abraham, who had received God's promises was, was ready to sacrifice his only son Isaac, even though God had told him Isaac is the son through whom your descendants will be counted. Abraham reasoned that if Isaac died, God was able to bring him back to life again. And in a sense Abraham did receive his son back from the dead. Now this is the second time we've had Abraham mentioned to us in Hebrews 11.

If you remember, back in week one ads as he came and preached, he reminded us of the great promise that God had made to Abraham and to Sarah back in verses 8 to 12 of this passage. And we see here that even though they are old, they are really old, well past the years of bearing a child. God gives them a promise that they will have a son and through that son will come a great nation. And they kind of try to make that happen themselves. We know the story, but God comes through and God is faithful and God gives them a son, Isaac.

But here in verse 17, Hebrews reminds us that even after Isaac has come that God then asks Abraham to do something that on the surface seems completely at odds with, with the promise that he had made. The story that is referred to here actually comes to us from Genesis 22. And we're going to be doing some bouncing around, but keep your focus on Hebrews here and I'll just summarize these stories as we go. But we read in Genesis 22 that God says, Go to Mount Moriah and take your son Isaac and offer him there as a burnt offering. And we see Abraham's response to this.

He takes Isaac and he travels to Moriah. And Isaac carries the wood up the hill. And as they climb the mountain, Isaac says, father, we have the fire and we have the wood, but where is the lamb? Where's the thing that we're going to sacrifice? And Abraham says to him, God will provide for himself, the lamb.

Now, I think I know that story. I'm sure some of you know that story. We've heard it, we've read it. And I think we easily disconnect biblical stories as not being about kind of real people with real emotions. They kind of think and feel just like you and I do.

Because I think we forget that this is the son that Abraham was promised. This is the son that God had said will come to you. And through this son will come a great nation. Now, I can't imagine what was going through Abraham's mind as he walks to Moriah and as he climbs that mountain and as he gets closer and closer, and we read that he gets to the top and he's ready to go through with it. And God says, stop, I'll provide for you a lamb.

And there is a ram stuck in a bush. A sacrifice that takes Isaac's place. And that moment points to something even greater. This is the significance of it for you and for me. It points to something greater because years later on that same mountain range, because Mount Moriah is where modern day Jerusalem is, where Jerusalem was founded, there on that mountain range, years later, another son would carry the wood on his back.

But this time there'd be no ram, there'd be no lamb to substitute. This time there'd be no last minute rescue because this son, Jesus, the lamb would give his life as a once and for all sacrifice. This moment with Abraham. And Isaac points to this. And Abraham declares, I don't think he understood necessarily the significance of it, but he says, when he says to Isaac, God will provide the lamb, he's speaking not just about this moment, it's this prophetic declaration that's fulfilled in Christ.

But the author of Hebrews gives us some insight into Abraham's mind, into his thinking. Because there in verses 18 to 19, we read, even though God had told him, Isaac is the Son through whom your descendants will come. Abraham reasoned that if Isaac died, God was able to bring him back to life again.

I read this and I remember hearing this as a, as a child and thinking, what kind of father is Abraham? Like, who is willing to sacrifice their own son? What kind of, you know, crazy story is this? But then when you read it, you, and you read Hebrews, you see that the author of Hebrews gives us some insight because they say that Abraham had reasoned, you see, as he'd walked, Abraham had done some thinking, he'd kind of played it out in his mind and he'd come to a realization that even if, even if God's plan was that Isaac would die, that God couldn't break his promise, that God had declared that through Isaac a great nation would come, Abraham's descendants would come through Isaac. And so Abraham had reasoned that even if Isaac died, God could raise him again.

Now that's incredible faith because before this time in scripture we don't see anyone raised to life. Not a single person is recorded in the chapters before this having been raised to life. And so I think Abraham's like, I actually don't know how this even works. I don't know how God would do it. Like I don't know how this would play out.

But what I do know is that God is a promise keeping God is that God cannot lie. And so even if Isaac dies, God will raise him again because God will keep his promises to me. Now what an incredible faith that is. Like if we could just grab a little bit of that faith, absolute conviction that God will keep his promises. What an encouragement that is.

But Abraham could look ahead. He could look ahead and he could see that God is a covenant keeping, promise keeping God. And then we move on to the next story in Hebrews 11 here in verse 20, it's only a brief mention. It says it was by faith that Isaac promised blessings for the future to his sons Jacob and Esau.

It's kind of like easy to pass over that, isn't it? Because of all the stories that have come before, this doesn't seem particularly remarkable. We had like Abraham who was willing to sacrifice his son and God came through and did an amazing thing. And then we have Isaac who just kind of promises blessings to his sons. If I was Isaac and if I was going to be mentioned as like a great hero of faith, I wouldn't necessarily want this moment mentioned.

I wouldn't want this moment to stand for all of time as my great moment of faith. I'd prefer probably the bit where I like climb onto an altar and I'm willing to be sacrificed because that is what God said, like, I think I would prefer that that was there. But instead, we have this moment where Isaac gets another mention. And this is found over in Genesis 27. I encourage you to read it this week.

But in Genesis 27, Isaac's reached the end of his life, and he's old and he's frail and he's nearly blind. And the time comes for him to give a blessing to his sons. Now, this was a really significant moment. It was an important part of their culture. It was spiritual.

It was practical. There was all these different dimensions to it. It was a big deal. But this story in Genesis 27 actually shows us how out of step Isaac is with God's plan. Because what we see here is that just a couple of chapters before that, God had declared that Isaac's older son would serve his younger son.

Now, that kind of flipped the cultural norms on the head, because the older son was supposed to be the one, the significant one, the one that received the blessing and received the double portion. But instead, God says no. The promise that was made to Abraham, that's been passed to Isaac will now continue through Jacob.

Isaac either doesn't believe this or he doesn't accept it, or he doesn't want it to be the way, because he gets to the end of his life here in Genesis 27, and he plans to bless Esau, the older son. And the reason he plans to bless Esau is because that was his favorite child. Now, we're not supposed to have favorite children as parents, are we? And we don't. We don't have favorite children.

I mean, we have children that are more like us. They tend to not be our favorites because they, you know, rub us up the wrong way sometimes. But we read here that Isaac has a favorite son, and his favorite son is Esau. And he likes Esau because Esau brings him food. Like, how crazy is that?

That's literally in the text that he likes the wild game that Esau brings to him. And so that's why he prefers that son. His wife prefers their other son. She prefers Jacob. And so she says to Jacob, hey, Esau is going to get the blessing that you should be getting.

So I'm going to dress you up, I'm going to put you in like, a bear onesie, and you are going to try and convince your father that you are Esau. Esau was the strong, rugged, hairy son. Jacob was the mama's boy, I guess we would say. And so they go in, and Jacob convinces a nearly blind Isaac to give him the blessing because he thinks it's Esau, and so he gives him the blessing. He's tricked into blessing the younger son now.

What a mess. Like, if you think your family is dysfunctional, like, check out these guys. Like, they get into the Bible. It's a family. And it's not just this moment.

There's other examples of, like, manipulation and deception and rivalry and jealousy and one parent liking one child and the other parent liking the other child. And in the midst of it, no one stops to ask God, hey, God, what do you want in this? What is it that you want in this? In fact, Isaac, he either doesn't know what God has said to Rebecca, or he is actively working against what God had already made clear. It's kind of wild, isn't it?

Like, how is this in Hebrews 11? How is this there? Because there's this brief moment. It's just like a passing mention. There's this brief moment after Jacob receives the blessing.

And just as Jacob is about to leave, Esau walks in and says, hey, here's your meal. Where's my blessing? And Isaac goes, but. But I've already given you the blessing. And it says here that when he discovers that he's been deceived, he trembles violently.

And we get a really clear indication here that this is not a rage field. Trembling, like, he's not angry. Instead, he realizes how close he came to resisting the will of God. And in this moment, he submits. And he declares that even though I intended to bless Esau and I've blessed Jacob, the blessing must stand.

I'm not going to withdraw that blessing. I'm not going to take that blessing back. And so this is the turning point, because he realizes very late, just before he dies, that God's plan is bigger than his plan. He realizes that even though he tries to work against it, that God's plan still moves forward. And in a moment where he could have tried to keep pushing against God, he submits and he surrenders.

And he trusts that God knows what he is doing in amidst the mess of his family. And that's the moment that Hebrews is pointing to. It's pointing to even in the middle of mess, Isaac could still see here that God's plan was moving forward. And then Hebrews takes us to the next generation of this family. We read of Jacob in verse 21, and it says this.

It was by faith that Jacob, when he was old and dying, blessed each of Joseph's sons and bowed in worship as he leaned on his staff. So Hebrews jumps us forward to Genesis 48, a lot has happened, and we find Jacob near the end of his life. And so we move from Isaac to Jacob. Jacob's story is pretty dysfunctional. Like, it's kind of remarkable that he even makes it into Hebrews 11.

But here in this moment, Joseph comes and says, would you bless your grandsons? And brings two of the grandsons, Ephraim and Manasseh. And Joseph lines them up oldest to youngest. But instead, we read here in. In Genesis 48, that Jacob crosses his arms and he gives the blessing to the younger Ephraim.

And Joseph tries to correct him. I think he thinks his dad's gone a bit old and dotty and he's blind and he can't really see. But Jacob refuses because he knows what God is doing. It also tells us that he's leaning on a staff. And that staff is there because he couldn't really walk properly.

After we read of him wrestling with an angel of God. And he wrestles, and he comes to a point where he follows God's lead. And here he is an old man in this picture of submission to God at the end of his life. But he also declares something important because he said, Egypt is not our home. God's planning to take us back to the land that he's promised.

And so this Jacob, who has a pretty messy life here at the end, can look forward to in faith. And then Hebrews takes us to the next member of this family, to Joseph. In verse 22, we read, it was by faith that Joseph, when he was about to die, said confidently that the people of Israel would leave Egypt. He even commanded them to take his bones with them when they left. You know, we might have been kind of scraping the bottom of the barrel to try and get moments of faith from some of these other people's lives.

But not so for Joseph, because Joseph had an incredible story. And the writer of Hebrews could have picked out, like, lots of different examples. He could have picked out the fact that Joseph trusted the dreams and the visions that God had given him, could have picked out that Joseph had stayed faithful to God in the pit or in the prison. Could have picked out the fact that God had brought Joseph up and he'd risen to this position of power and influence in Egypt. There's so many things that could have been picked out about Joseph's life.

And yet we read of this seemingly insignificant moment here, right at the end of his life. And that comes to us from Genesis 50, because here in Genesis 50, Joseph is about to die. But he Declares in this moment, confidence in God's promises to his people. They'd been in Egypt for a very long time, and perhaps getting to the land that God had promised them seemed like it was a long way off. It seemed like a distant hope.

But even here, amidst the wealth and the privilege that Joseph had experienced in this foreign land, he says, God will come and. And help you. He's going to lead us out of this place. He's going to take us to the land that he has promised us. And when he does, take me with you.

Don't bury me here. Take my bones and bury me there in the land that God has given to us. You see, he's able to look ahead in faith. And that is the most remarkable moment. The writer of Hebrews picks that moment, the fact that even in that land that he hadn't got comfortable, but he looked ahead.

And so I want to give us two brief reminders this morning as we close, two brief reminders about this incredible passage. Firstly, it's that Hebrews 11 is not a list of spiritual superheroes. So if you've come in this morning feeling like you've only got a little bit of faith, or feeling like your faith is feeling pretty worn out, you're feeling like not a great Christian as you come in here, and you come in here expecting to be hearing about all these amazing figures of faith from the Old Testament that are going to make you feel guilty when we get into Hebrews 11 and it tells us about all these remarkable figures. So many of them had an incredible messy life. Like, so many of them made some really monumental errors.

We have read of Isaac, who was a terrible father. We've read of Jacob, we've read of Joseph. I mean, Joseph was pretty good, but he was kind of arrogant, wasn't he? Like, if you know his story, if you've seen the musical, perhaps he's kind of arrogant, isn't he? We read of these people.

I mean, Abraham, he had some pretty monumental errors in his life as well. Things that we would think would disqualify you from a great list of faith. And this is what I want you to see this morning, that this list of deeply flawed people, as we read their stories, as we see their pride and their sin and their imperfections. Hebrews 11 doesn't focus on that because Hebrews 11 isn't a list of great people. It's a list of ordinary people who put their faith in a Great God.

Hebrews 11 is a list of ordinary people just like you and me, who put their Faith in a great God. And so when we read of these heroes of the faith and then we consider our own lives, we mustn't think, I am no one compared to them. I'm too flawed, I struggle with too many things. How could God possibly use me? Hebrews 11 should remind us that God is looking for people who will put their faith and their hope in Him.

Secondly, we see that these four people had faith that looked to the future. They had faith that looked to the future. You see, some of them walked in that faith consistently. Others went their own way, made a mess of things, and then came back to it later in life. But they believed that God would do what he said he would do.

They believed that God would do what he said he would do. This was an absolute conviction in their life. And they believed it in faith, even if they didn't get to see it in their lifetime. This is what we read a few verses earlier. Back in verse 13, it says all these people died still believing what God had promised them.

They did not receive what was promised, but they saw it all from a distance and welcomed it. They agreed that they were foreigners and nomads here on earth. Obviously people who say such things are looking forward to a country that they can call their own. If they had longed for the country they came from, they could have gone back. But they were looking for a better place, a heavenly homeland.

That is why God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for for them.

So let me ask you this morning, as a challenge to you, could someone say that about your life?

Are you living in such a way that even if you can't see God's promises yet being fulfilled, that you trust in the one who has made them? We see that in these stories, don't we? We saw it in Joseph's life. Of all the amazing things he had done, it's that is most incredible of all that while living in a foreign land, Joseph had not forgotten his God and the promises that his God had made. Have you forgotten?

Because Scripture's clear. We are living in a foreign land. This is not our homeland. But we are living here. And we need to be looking ahead to the land that God has promised us, that we need to hold fast that the promise promises that God had made.

I imagine the challenge to Joseph throughout his life was significant because he was wealthy, he was powerful, he was comfortable. Those are all things that drag us away from God often rather than to God. But even in the midst of that land, Joseph had not forgotten his God and he had not forgotten God's promises. I was reflecting this week and I was thinking, you know, when I reach the end of my life, this is a great passage that I would love to live in such a way that someone would be able to say this about me. That someone could look at these words that are up on the screen if we can go back one slide and someone might say, you can insert your name here.

But Simon died still holding on to God's promise.

Steve or Robbie or John or Chris died still holding on to God's promise. He didn't see it all come to pass in his lifetime, at least not in its fullness. But he could see it from a distance and he welcomed it.

I would hope that someone could say Simon lived like someone who knew that this world wasn't his true home. That someone might say that people who live like that clearly are looking forward to something more, a place that they can truly call home. Simon could have gone back to where he had started. He could have. But he wasn't looking back.

He was looking ahead. He was waiting for something better. A heavenly home. And because of his faith, God wasn't ashamed to be his God, because God had prepared a city for him. You know, as I was reflecting on that this week, I was thinking I would love whenever my time comes, and God knows that whenever my time comes, that someone might say that about me.

That he knew where he belonged and he lived like, not he knew where he belonged, but he. He didn't really show that in his life. He knew where he belonged and he lived like. Let's pray.

Oh, God. We read these passages and they're heavy with challenge.

Lord, as we reflect on that this morning, God, would you help us to process it? Would you help it to settle in our spirits, that it might spark in us a faith that looks to the future, that it might spark in us lives that are ordered and lived in such a way that they demonstrate a complete confidence that you are a good God and you keep your promises.

God, would you help us as we do that? Holy Spirit, would you be working in our lives that we might seek you, that we might be led by you and that that would be on display, that people would see that and they would know that we put our faith in a great God, and so we ask you this in Jesus name, Amen.