WWUTT 1856 Faith is the Assurance of Things Hoped For (Hebrews 11:1-2)

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By faith, the Old Testament faithful believed God and it was credited to them as righteousness.

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And they received the eternal reward in the end. We must follow their example when we understand the text.

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Many of the Bible stories and verses we think we know, we don't. When we understand the text is committed to teaching sound doctrine and rebuking those who contradict it.

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Visit our website at www .utt .com. Here once again is Pastor Gabe.

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Thank you, Becky. We come back to our study of the book of Hebrews. This week we are in chapter 11.

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And it's going to take us a little more than this week to get through this chapter. I won't go through this as quickly as we've gone through some of the other chapters.

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Surely you know that Hebrews 11 is recognized for containing the hall of faith, or as we sometimes refer to them, the heroes of the faith.

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Those men and women from the Old Testament who believed by faith and gained their approval, as said in verse 2, or were considered righteous, as said of Abel in verse 4.

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As we've heard elsewhere in the New Testament, said of Abraham, which is quoted from Genesis, he believed

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God and it was credited to him as righteousness. So that could be said of any of these faithful that are mentioned here in Hebrews 11.

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Now remember the theme of this letter. The preacher is calling his Hebrew audience to hold fast to the gospel and not lose it, to finish strong.

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And these are their examples, those men and women that they know from the scriptures who believed to the end.

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And they received, at the end of their lives, the eternal reward. Even the Old Testament faithful, they were promised eternity, just as we are.

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So we might follow their examples and likewise finish strong and enter into glory with our

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Lord and Savior. So let's take our time as we consider these examples going through Hebrews 11 together.

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I'm going to start today by reading the whole chapter. I won't do this every time we study from Hebrews 11, but I figured to start things off, it's good to keep it together in context.

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So this is all 40 verses of Hebrews 11 out of the Legacy Standard Bible. Hear the word of the

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Lord. Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

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For by it the men of old gained approval. By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible.

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By faith Abel offered to God a better sacrifice than Cain, through which he was approved as being righteous,

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God approving his gifts. And through faith, though he is dead, he still speaks.

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By faith Enoch was taken up, so that he would not see death, and he was not found because God took him up, for prior to being taken up he was approved as being pleasing to God.

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And without faith it is impossible to please him, for he who draws near to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of those who seek him.

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By faith Noah, being warned about things not yet seen, in reverence prepared an ark for the salvation of his household, by which he condemned the world, and became an heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.

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By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed by going out to a place which he was to receive for an inheritance, and he went out not knowing where he was going.

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By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, fellow heirs of the same promise, for he was looking for the city which has foundations, whose architect and builder is

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God. By faith even Sarah herself received ability to conceive, even beyond the proper time of life, since she regarded him faithful who had promised.

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Therefore, there were born even of one man, and him as good as dead at that, as many as the stars of heaven in number, and innumerable as the sand which is by the seashore.

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All these died in faith, without receiving the promises, but having seen them, and having welcomed them from a distance, and having confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth.

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For those who say such things make it clear that they are seeking a country of their own, and indeed if they had been remembering that country from which they went out, they would have had opportunity to return.

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But now they aspire to a better country, that is, a heavenly one.

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Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he prepared a city for them.

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By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was offering up his only son, to whom it was said,

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In Isaac your seed shall be called. He considered that God is able to raise people even from the dead, from which figuratively speaking he also received him back.

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By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau, even regarding things to come. By faith

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Jacob, when he was dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph and worshipped leaning on the top of his staff.

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By faith Joseph, when he was dying, made mention of the exodus of the sons of Israel and gave commands concerning his bones.

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By faith Moses, when he was born, was hidden for three months by his parents because they saw he was a beautiful child and they were not afraid of the king's edict.

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By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin.

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Regarding the reproach of Christ, greater riches than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward.

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By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the rage of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is unseen.

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By faith he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of the blood, so that he who destroyed the firstborn would not touch them.

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By faith they passed through the Red Sea, as though they were passing through dry land, and the

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Egyptians, when they attempted it, were drowned. By faith the walls of Jericho fell down after they had been encircled for seven days.

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By faith Rahab the harlot did not perish along with those who were disobedient, after welcoming the spies in peace.

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And what more shall I say? For time will fail me if I recount Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, as well as David and Samuel and the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, performed righteousness, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong from weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight.

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Women received back their dead by resurrection, and others were tortured not accepting their release so that they might obtain a better resurrection.

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And others experienced mockings and floggings, yes, also chains and imprisonment.

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They were stoned. They were sawn in two. They were tempted. They were put to death with the sword.

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They went about in sheepskins, in goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, mistreated, of whom the word was not worthy, wandering in desolate places and mountains and caves and holes in the ground.

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And all these, having gained approval through their faith, did not receive what was promised because God had promised something better for us, so that apart from us, they would not be made perfect.

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There you go. You've read a whole chapter of the Bible today, Hebrews chapter 11.

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And we may just get as far as the first three verses here before talking about some of these figures, which we'll get to tomorrow.

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The first, of course, being Abel, then Enoch, and then Noah. So we'll see how far we get.

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Starting in verse 1, now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

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If you don't have that verse memorized, you should memorize it. But before explaining it and understanding its parts, let's consider the context.

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How did we finish chapter 10? Remember that the argument was made that we are in a new covenant.

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We are not in keeping with the old, and praise God for that. Because under the old covenant, the blood of bulls and goats was not enough to forgive us of our sins anyway.

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A better lamb had to be sacrificed. All those other animals that were sacrificed in the

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Old Testament, the millions of animals that were sacrificed, millions upon millions, they were but types and shadows of a greater one that was to come.

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One drop of Jesus' blood, not to say that there was mystical properties about his blood, but simply the giving of his life.

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The giving of the life of Christ had more power in it than the whole multitude of those animals that had been sacrificed under the old covenant.

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The old covenant was never sufficient anyway. We needed a greater sacrifice, and that is the

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Son of God who entered into flesh, who became our high priest for us, a priest in the order of Melchizedek, who fulfilled and completed all the requirements of the law.

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And he who died, who shed his blood for us, who rose again from the dead, conquering death for us, rose into heaven and is seated at the exalted place, at the right hand of God.

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He who has done and accomplished all of this intercedes for us before the Father. We have a great high priest through whom we are able to enter into that holy place,

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Christ having made us holy by the giving of himself and clothing us in his righteousness.

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Now all of this is the gift of God. So even as we read here in chapter 11 about those of faith, those who had faith, those who were declared righteous, remember this righteousness that they have is not of themselves.

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It is of God. Yes, there is a call that we must respond to, a call to believe, to live by faith, to live righteously, but we're only able to respond to that call because God has acted on our behalf first.

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So at the end of chapter 10, as we finished up this argument regarding the passing away of the old covenant and now this new covenant that we live in, consider verses 37 to 39.

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As it was said in the Old Testament, for yet in a very little while, he who is coming will come and will not delay, but my righteous one shall live by faith.

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That's us. And if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him. So there's the warning as well that came even from Jeremiah.

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The warning is that we would continue in faith, not lose this faith, lest we show ourselves to be unapproved and never having been saved to begin with.

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You notice that word approval that came up the number of times it did at the beginning of chapter 11 concerning these heroes of the faith.

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They believed and they gained their approval. And if we do not believe, if we do not persevere in this faith, then we demonstrate that we were unapproved and not approved by God.

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So my righteous one shall live by faith. We are to live by faith, verse 39, still in chapter 10, but we are not of those who shrink back to destruction.

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We are not of them. The preacher talking about himself, the writer who is writing

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Hebrews, the audience who is hearing this, we are not of those who shrink back to destruction.

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We are of those who have faith to the preserving of the soul. And now having said that at the conclusion of chapter 10, we have these examples of the

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Old Testament faithful in chapter 11, as though to say, we are numbered among them.

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Persevere in this faith and you will receive the award as they received their reward.

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Consider also the end of chapter 11 that we had read, verses 39 and 40, all these having gained approval through their faith did not receive what was promised because God had provided something better for us.

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So that apart from us, they would not be made perfect. Now consider that.

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That's wild. And we'll talk about that further when we get toward the end of chapter 11.

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But even our sanctification now, as we are growing in this faith and preparing ourselves for glory to be in glory forever with God and those who have gone before us, those who are with God around the throne now are even being perfected in the sense that we're being perfected and the glorified body that we will be with God in glory will be all the more glorious even by our sanctification.

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So they're receiving greater glory by our sanctification. Anyway, I don't want to dwell on that too far because I'm eating up a lot of time, but that's what we're going to get to when we get to the end of chapter 11.

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Even those who are in heaven with God have not yet reached their final state because that final state involves all of the church together at the final consummation with Christ.

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So we come back to the very beginning here of chapter 11 with this mention of faith.

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We gain our approval by faith. We are like those heroes of the faith of the

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Old Testament. So what is faith? And the preacher says this is how he defines faith at the beginning of Hebrews 11.

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Now, faith is assurance. It is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

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Notice something there that faith is being talked about as something sure this is not a guessing game.

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You will hear it a lot in evangelicalism today that doubt is good. Doubt is only good in the sense that you recognize the faultiness in your faith and you desire to have those questions answered so that you may know

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God better. That's the only sense in which we might consider doubt a good thing. But that's doubt that doesn't remain doubt.

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Doubt should never be cherished as something virtuous. But there are so many preachers out there that that tout it that way.

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They will say that doubt is synonymous with faith, that we have to have doubt.

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And if you have assurance, they'll even outright say that if you're certain that you don't really have faith, that's absurd.

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That contradicts the message of scripture. In James chapter one, we are told that if any lacks wisdom,

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James one five, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him.

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But he must ask in faith, doubting nothing. So right there,

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James one six, go to it and underline it sometime. If you don't have it underlined. Faith and doubt are set opposed to one another there.

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They're opposites. They are not the same. Don't ever listen to any preacher who tells you that faith and doubt are the same.

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We must ask God in faith, knowing that he answers us and he gives to those who earnestly seek him.

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That's said here in Hebrews 11 six. So James one six, he must ask in faith, doubting nothing for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea driven and tossed by the wind for that man ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the

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Lord. Because remember, having faith in the Lord means we know we will receive. But James calls him

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James one eight, a double minded man, unstable in all of his ways, the one who doubts.

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And so we cannot have doubts. A true definition of faith is assurance. My friends,

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I am absolutely sure I am absolutely positive of everything that I read in this book, which we call the

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Bible. There is not one part of it. I doubt I believe all of it.

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Genesis one to Revelation 22, the very first word of the Bible to the very last.

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There's not a part of it that I don't believe. I am sure and I am confident in all of this.

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Now, if there's ever a part that I don't understand and don't think that I can't be stumped, I can be my

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Sunday school class stumps me all the time. Ask me questions I didn't even consider during the week when

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I was doing my study in that particular book. So if I ever come upon a part that I don't understand,

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I'm going to respond to it in one of two ways. Either I'm going to study until I do understand it, or if it's something well, you know, come to as much understanding as I can, there may be deeper things there that I have to continue studying for a long time, coming to a deeper and deeper understanding.

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I'm never going to come to the end of the Bible. Its truth is so deep. I can study it my lifelong and there would still be more to study even the day that I die.

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So anyway, I'm going to study it to come to understand it. That's going to be my first response. Or if I if I can't understand it,

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I'm still going to trust God that he knows. And I'm just going to I'm just going to recognize the answer will be shown to me when

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I get to glory, even if I don't find the answer now or I don't see it fully now, I will see it fully when

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I'm with Christ forever in heaven, because as we're told, first John 3, 2, we will be made to be like him because we will see him as he is.

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So let faith be assurance. You are confident in all of these things that God promises, according to the word.

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And if there be anything you doubt, ask God. Ask God that he would give you wisdom that you may know, you may see and you may live according to his word.

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Faith is the assurance of things hoped for. These promises that we have in scripture, this is what we hope for, the eternity that is promised us, the dwelling place forever with God.

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We hope for that. Jesus said in Matthew six, seek first his kingdom and his righteousness.

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Those are the things we seek after first. And then when things happen in this life that we don't understand or things that hurt us and they create in us conflict questions, we we feel stress and anxiety when those kinds of things happen.

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Let that not turn into fear and doubt. But we continue to trust

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God even in the midst of the suffering that we have to endure because we know the promises given that this suffering that we endure in this life is temporary.

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It's only for a little while. The promise of the eternal kingdom that is to come.

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Is where all of this suffering that we go through now ends, we won't endure it anymore, as promised in Revelation, he will try he will dry every tear from our eyes and death will be no more.

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Hold on to that, no matter what struggle you go through now, be reminded that it's only temporary.

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And the and the glory that awaits us, not even worth comparing to those things that we go through now, as Paul talks about in the book of Romans, it's also in Romans 824, where he says, for in hope we were saved, but hope that is seen is not hope for who hopes for what he already sees.

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Hence, the other part of this definition, faith is the assurance of things hoped for the conviction of things not seen.

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And I love that that word conviction is used here because we are so confident in these things that we are told that we are convicted to obey.

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We know God has promised us this if we continue in faith and finish in faith.

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And so we are convicted to persevere. To the end that we may receive the reward.

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Verse two, for by it, by faith, the men of old gained approval.

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Another way of understanding this by it, the men of old were blessed when we read in the

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Beatitudes, blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are the pure in heart.

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Blessed are the peacemakers. On and on it goes. That statement of blessing there is synonymous with saying approved.

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Approved are you who is poor in spirit. Approved are you who mourn for you will be comforted.

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That's that's the reference of blessing that we have there. So by faith, as we continue in obedience to God.

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We have gained our approval, he already approves of us, and the approval is gained in this sense also that we will receive the reward.

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Now, that is the preface, what might you consider this, the the introduction anyway, of Hebrews chapter 11, these two verses that we have read.

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Then we get to chapter three, we're going to jump right back to the creation story at chapter three, verse three, we're going to jump back to Genesis one.

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By faith, we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible.

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Understand this when we read Genesis one and two, no one was there to witness any of that.

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We have to take that entirely by faith, that all things were created by God who spoke them into existence.

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He just said, let there be and there was. And the same word that brought all things into existence is that same word by which we have faith today.

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Someone spoke to us the word of God from the gospel and we believed and are saved.

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Let's finish there, we'll come back to our study of Hebrews 11 tomorrow. Heavenly Father, thank you for these good things.

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Thank you for these reminders of faith. And may we persevere in all that you have instructed us, looking to Jesus, the author and the perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of God.

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Come quickly, Lord Jesus, that our faith might be sight. Until that day, we continue in your name.