Sermon 88
Sermon by
Keith Bateson in 2007 at Wonersh
Hebrews
Series
Faith
for Today
Reading BibleGateway.com
- Hebrews 11
Opening Prayer
Lord, open your word to our hearts, and
our hearts to your word, in your Spirit’s power. Amen.
Introduction
This morning we continue to immerse
ourselves in thought aimed at Jewish Christians, as we consider the letter to
Hebrews, chapter 11. Before Christmas we
looked at chapter 9. We have not looked
at chapter 10, yet chapter 11 is sandwiched between chapters 10 and 12, and the
chapter boundaries aren’t part of the original.
So we shouldn’t be too rigid in cutting up the text by chapters. Chapter 11 is all about faith. The background, the context, for chapter 11,
is in chapter 10, with the strong theme of ‘Don’t give up!’ Don’t, whatever trials you face, give up on
following Jesus.
So, after verse 1, ‘Now faith is
being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see’—we are
reminded of the faith and actions of a whole string of Old Testament saints,
from Abel through Moses to Samuel, and all the prophets lumped together. The chapter is too long to read all of it in
a communion service. You may want to
read right through it later, as there are all sorts of hidden gems in the part
we did not read.
The Old Testament saints are not
commended for some airy-fairy faith in their heads. They are commended because they had faith
that produced results, and the writer to the Hebrews mentions the results in
every case. Abel offered a better
sacrifice. Enoch pleased God. Moses—interesting words here—‘regarded
disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of
The whole purpose of the writer to the
Hebrews is to show how superior Christ is, how much better than all that went
before, in the Old Testament—even though that was good. So we would expect New Testament faith
to have even better results than the tremendous things he quotes from the Old
Testament. And in the last verse of the
chapter he gives us the result: ‘God had
planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made
perfect.’ Wow! Us, me even, made perfect. Yet to come, of course!
In our gospel reading from the Sermon
on the Mount, Jesus talks about not worrying.
He calls his disciples ‘you of little faith’, and encourages them
to trust in God’s provision for their basic needs. He does not, of course, encourage them to lie
down with their mouths open and wait for God to put food in them. Christ commissions them to go, and both live
and preach the gospel—and promises that as they do so, they will not go
short of food and clothes.
Just an aside—I have already quoted the
words ‘Moses regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than
the treasures of Egypt’, and it’s striking that in this long chapter, in a book
that focuses so heavily on Christ, this is the only reference to him—applied to
a time 1000 years before his birth! Time
has no hold on Christ.
Even though there is only one reference
to Christ in this chapter, the writer has made clear already that a remade relationship
with God is only possible through Christ, the death (blood) of Jesus in chapter
10 verse 19, for example, which brings us into the very presence of God.
The chapter is all about faith. But what faith is this? Well, as you would expect by now, it’s all
about Jesus, ‘the author and perfecter of our faith’, as chapter 12 verse 2
reminds us. The faith we are encouraged
in is faith in Jesus, ‘Jesus’ meaning ‘the LORD our saviour’. This is the essential faith, as much today
for us, as when this letter was written for the early Jewish Christians in the
In Ephesians 2, verses 8 and 9, we are
told ‘it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from
yourselves, it is the gift of God (we think of gifts at Christmas)—not
by works, so that no one can boast.’
Faith in Christ, which makes us by an amazing miracle, right with God,
is not for us to feel proud of. It is
pure gift, utterly undeserved. We are so
easily tempted to feel ourselves better than more obvious sinners—but this is
not true, not in the slightest. God’s
love for them is the same as his love for us, even if they are ignorant of his
Lordship, or refuse to accept it.
I stress the fact that faith is in
Christ, not just any faith. In the
discussion about ‘faith schools’ I have heard people, on the radio for example,
talk about ‘no faith’. As if to be an
agnostic or secularist is to be in a different category from Christians, for
which no faith is required. This, of
course, is nonsense. No one can live
without faith, because that’s the human condition. Aggressive secularists have astonishing
faith—in the validity of their own thoughts, for example. If they were right in their claim that we are
all just peculiar bunches of organised atoms—organised only temporarily
too—what possible value could there be in human thought? No one can live without faith. Faith with results—consider the faith of
Lenin, that all would come right if only everyone were forced to be
communist. That anyone who disagreed
should be treated with the utmost cruelty or killed—or both. What vicious results came from that, and how
pathetic it now seems.
No one lives without faith—there is
only good faith—based on real facts—and bad faith, based on falsehood.
All the examples of Old Testament faith
in God involved testing. Risk-taking and
hard labour. With definite results. This is our example to follow, our role
model.
Sometimes the results were pleasant,
good in this world. Enoch knew a close
relationship with God and avoided dying.
Daniel was not eaten by the lions.
Rahab’s life was saved.
Sometimes the results were extremely
uncomfortable. People, people like you
and me, were chained and put in prison.
They were stoned; they were sawn in two; they were put to death by the
sword. They went about in sheepskins and
goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated.
The writer to the Hebrews knows that
many of his readers are facing similar suffering. He wants them never to give up following
Christ, even if this is the result. That
was then. Is this relevant today? Well, it is!
Some of you will know the story of Corrie ten Boom, who was imprisoned in
Ravensbruck concentration camp during the second world war, with all its
terrible conditions. Not for faith in
her head, but for the results of that faith—helping Jews to hide from the
Nazis. Even that was 60 years ago. Today?
You can get a prayer e-mail from an
organisation called ‘Voice of the Martyrs’.
Put ‘voice of martyrs’ into Google.
Or ‘open doors’, another good organisation. It gives details of persecution of Christians
now. In the last two months there
have been stories from 14 different countries.
From Eritrea, for example: “On October 17, security police tortured two
Christians to death, two days after arresting them for holding a religious
service in a private home south of Asmara.
Immanuel, 23, and Kibrom, 30, died from torture wounds and severe
dehydration in a military camp outside the town of
The deaths came after officials
detained a
And “
Also, the government of
Moving to
Notice the distinction between ordinary
suffering—illness or accident for example—and suffering for Christ. These people are killed or mistreated simply
because they are known to be Christians.
Towards the end of chapter 10, Hebrews
says, ‘Remember those earlier days after you had received the light, when you
stood your ground in a great contest in the face of suffering.
‘Sometimes you were publicly exposed to
insult and persecution; at other times you stood side by side with those who
were so treated. You sympathized with
those in prison.’ Do we sympathize and
pray for persecuted Christians, or do we take our freedom for granted?
Now we get closer to home, to
Wonersh. ‘You joyfully accepted the
confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better
and lasting possessions.’ ‘You joyfully
accepted the confiscation of your property…’
Highly uncomfortable, isn’t it?
Coming to church is good—very good—but
I have to ask myself, is faith just a gloss on my materially comfortable
and successful life?
If not, what difference am I making?
Closing Prayer
Father, there is so much in your Word,
and it is such a challenge as well as a blessing. Thank you that we, even we, can have
fellowship with you through faith in your Son, and all the joy of
knowing that you love us so much, without our having to deserve it! Help us to live riskily for you, in the power
of Christ. Amen