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Faith's Unending Legacy (Hebrews 11:32) | Worship Service
That Jesus saves, this ends my fear and doubt A sinful soul,
I come to Him, He'll never cast me out My heart is leaning on the
Word, the written Word of God Salvation by my
Savior's name, salvation through His blood I need no other argument,
I need no other plea Is He not that Jesus died, and that He died for me?
My great Physician heals the sick, the lost He came to save For me
His precious blood He shed, for me His life He gave
I need no other argument, I need no other plea
Is He not that Jesus died, and that He died for me?
What is our hope in life and death? Christ alone,
Christ alone What is our only confidence?
That our souls to Him belong Who holds our days within His hand?
What comes apart from His command? And what will keep us to the end?
The love of Christ in which we stand Oh, sing hallelujah!
Our hope springs eternal Oh, sing hallelujah!
Now and ever we confess Christ, our hope in life and death
What truth can calm the troubled soul? God is good,
God is good Where is His grace and goodness known?
In our great Redeemer's blood Who holds our faith when fears arise?
Who stands above the stormy trial? Who sends the waves that bring us nigh?
Unto the shore the rocket fries
Oh, sing hallelujah! Our hope springs eternal
Oh, sing hallelujah! Now and ever we confess
Christ, our hope in life and death Unto the grave what will we sing?
Christ, He lives, Christ, He lives And what reward will heaven bring?
Everlasting life with Him There we will rise to meet the
Lord There sin and death will be destroyed And we will feast with endless joy
When Christ is ours forevermore
Christ, our hope in life and death Oh, sing hallelujah!
Was placed upon the perfect line
The wisdom of the sovereign God Whose greatness will be shown
When those who crucify Your Son Rejoice around Your throne
And bow the glory of the cross
That You had sent Your Son for us
I gladly count my life as lost
That I might come to know The glory of, the glory of the cross
What righteousness was there revealed That sets the guilty free?
That justifies ungodly men And calls the filthy clean?
Oh, righteousness that proved to all Your justice has been met
And holy wrath is satisfied through unatoning death
What mercy now has been proclaimed For those who wouldn't believe
A love incomprehensible Our minds could not conceive
A mercy that forgives my sin And makes me like Your Son And now
I'm loved forevermore Because of what You've done
I gladly count my life as lost That I might come to know
The glory of, the glory of the cross
That You had sent Your Son for us I gladly count my life as lost That I might come to know
The glory of, the glory of the cross That You had sent Your Son for us
I gladly count my life as lost That I might come to know The glory of, the glory of the cross God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.
Therefore, we will not fear, though the earth should change, and though the mountains slip into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains quake at its swelling pride.
There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the dwelling places of the
Most High. God is in the midst of her, she will not be moved. God will help her when morning dawns.
The nations made an uproar, the kingdoms tottered. He raised His voice, the earth melted.
The Lord of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our stronghold. Come, behold the works of the
Lord, who has wrought desolations in the earth. He makes wars to cease, to the end of the earth. He breaks the bow and cuts the spear in two.
He burns the chariots with fire. Cease striving and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations.
I will be exalted in the earth. The Lord of hosts is with us. The God of Jacob is our stronghold.
Let's pray together. Our Father, You are our stronghold and our refuge, our strong tower.
And while the nations rage around us and while the peoples plot a vain thing, while there is so much turmoil and so much unrest, we can simply trust
You and wait upon Your good and sovereign purposes. We know that You will be exalted in this earth and You will be glorified amongst the nations.
And we know that even now, during this day of grace, You are calling out to Your elect from every tribe and tongue and kindred on the face of this earth.
You are doing so for the good of Your people and for the eternal glory of Your great name. So we pray that You would continue to do so, that You would give grace and strength to those who serve in the foreign mission fields, to serve
You with earnestness and grace, to do so with theological clarity and accuracy, to be bold and courageous and fearless in proclaiming and defending
Your word. We pray that You would be honored and glorified by calling people to Yourself all over this world even today.
As You have drawn us together here today to worship You and to praise Your great name, we pray that You would do a work of grace in our hearts and in our lives, that You would draw us together and unite our hearts in faith and love and unity in fellowship one with another around what
Christ has done and what He has accomplished through His death on the cross on behalf of all those whom
You have called to Yourself. We pray that You would fill our hearts with love and affection for Christ our
Lord, that we may see in Him the glory of our triune God manifested in the flesh, that we may worship and adore
You, and that You would send Your Spirit to be our comforter and our encourager and our strength today, that You would be honored and glorified through our worship.
We pray that You would do this for the greatness of Your own name and the glory of Your name and for the advance of Your eternal kingdom, we pray in the name of Christ our
Lord. Amen. Hear sinners stray their filthy rags
For His righteousness applied Mercy cleansing every stain
Now rushing o 'er us like a flood There the wretched and vilest ones
Stand adopted through His blood Home out of grace, to Thee we plead
From the law has set us free Once and for all our calories yield
In love and justice shall agree Praise the
Lord, the price is paid The curse defeated by the
Lamb We who once were slaves by birth
Sons and daughters, now we stand
O well of joy, it's thine to drink
For my Lord has conquered death Victorious forevermore
The ancient foe is laid to rest Hallelujah, Christ is
King Alive and reigning on the throne
Our tongues employed with hymns of praise Glory be to God of old
Hallelujah, Christ is King Alive and reigning on the throne
In Lamentations, our reading comes from today, chapter 3, verses 22 and 24.
The loving kindness of Yahweh indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning.
Great is Your faithfulness. Yahweh is my portion, says my soul, therefore I will wait for Him.
We're going to end our music service this morning by singing God Moves in a Mysterious Way. God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform He plants
His footsteps in the sea And rides upon the storm
Deep in unfathomable minds
Of never failing still
He treasures up His bright designs
And works His sovereign will
God of mercy, God of grace
Give us eyes to see
Eyes to see Your smiling face
Within the mystery The fearful saint's fresh courage take
The clouds He so much spread
Our big with mercy hand shall break
In blessings on Your head
Trust not the Lord by feeble sense
But trust Him for His grace
Behind the frowning providence
He hides a smiling face
Within the mystery His purposes will ripen fast
Unfolding every hour
The blood may have a bitter taste
But sweet will be the flower
Why not believe His sure -to -wear
And scan His work in vain
God is His own interpreter
And He will make it plain
Give us eyes to see Eyes to see
Your smiling face Within the mystery
Within the mystery You may be seated.
Will you join me in prayer now? Our Father, we have asked that You would give us eyes to see
Your smiling face in the mystery of providence. We have asked that You would be glorified here through our service.
And now we are asking that You would be honored and glorified through the study and meditation upon Your Word.
We pray also that You would give us ears to hear and hearts to obey and feet that are quick to move and to do
Your will. And we ask Your blessing on these things and to this end that Christ may be glorified in and through us and that You would conform us to the image of Your Son.
So we pray that You would sanctify us by Your truth and the power of Your Holy Spirit through Your Word.
We ask in Christ's name. Amen. Will you please turn to Hebrews chapter 11. We are going to read together from verse 32 through 38 though we are not going to be going through all of those verses this morning.
Verses 32 through 38 of Hebrews chapter 11. Verse 32.
And what more shall I say? For time will fail me if I tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets who by faith conquered kingdoms, performed acts of righteousness, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight.
Women received back their dead by resurrection and others were tortured, not accepting their release, so that they might obtain a better resurrection.
And others experienced mockings and scourgings, yes, also chains and imprisonment.
They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were tempted, they were put to death with the sword. They went about in sheepskins, in goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, ill -treated, men of whom the world was not worthy, wandering in deserts and mountains and caves and holes in the ground.
We have seen that the author of Hebrews was a man very familiar with his Old Testament. He was well read and studied in almost every section, what we would say in every section of the
Old Testament, because he quotes prolifically from the Psalms and the prophets and from the law. The author of Hebrews traffics in the nuances of Leviticus and Exodus, nuances in which you and I would get lost.
He ties together some obscure passages from the Old Testament and shows their connection to the redemptive purposes of God over time.
He grasps the theological significance of various Old Testament characters and his grasp of them and their significance is quite amazing, even men like Melchizedek, of whom scant mention is made in the
Old Testament, and yet the author in chapters 6, 7, and 8 is able to mine from Melchizedek this wealth of theological and technical insight from his life, knowing the mind of the
Spirit of God, even in recording Melchizedek's name. The author is able to flip back and forth from Old Testament texts, connecting dots and drawing parallels and exegeting those passages, and he is so fluent in the
Old Testament that as we read through Hebrews 11, this list of characters that we've been looking at over the last several months, we quickly get the feeling that the author could go on almost endlessly quoting examples of faith, right?
We get the feeling that he's so fluent in his Old Testament that these characters just come to his mind and the examples of faith come to his mind so quickly that he could just continue to go on and on and exhaust paper and pen and exhaust the patience of his audience and exhaust us with examples of faith from the
Old Testament. In fact, he does say as much in verse 32, What more shall I say, for time will fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, and Samuel, and the prophets.
So he just lists these men. This is a favorite rhetorical trick of preachers, by the way. They always say, well,
I'm running out of time, and I have a lot more to say, and it's usually an indication that they've run out of things to say right about the right time.
And the author does this. What should I say? I mean, time's going to fail me. I'm at a loss for words.
I could just go on listing people. But in his case, it's genuinely true. He is aware at this point that he could exhaust his readers and continue on almost indefinitely.
He could go on forever and ever, and if he had 2 ,000 years of church history to choose from, he could probably go on and cite a whole bunch more, right?
Time would fail me to tell of Spurgeon and of Calvin and of Whitefield and of Luther and of Edwards and of Knox and of Owens and of Athanasius.
Just beginning with Athanasius, you could do a series of messages. But we run out of examples, or sorry, we would never run out of examples, but we would run out of patience and time, and that's the condition that the author is in.
What we have seen about faith to this point is more than enough for him to make his case. He has been seeking to show that the faith that distinguishes the apostate from the true believer is that the true believer has a faith that endures and perseveres to the salvation of the soul.
The apostate has a profession of faith, but not a true and genuine faith. He's made that case in chapter 10.
In fact, he's made that case in all of the warning passages all the way up through the end of chapter 10. And now he is listing out for us examples of this faith.
There are those who have faith who do not shrink back to destruction, but instead they have faith to the preserving of the soul.
That's chapter 10, verse 39. Then he gives us this list of men and women who have had such a faith. A robust list.
Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses' parents,
Joshua, Moses, Rahab. And then you get in verse 32 just this list of other names.
Up to this point, he has called out 12 witnesses to stand and testify to the reality of genuine saving faith.
And each example has shown us faith from a bit of a different perspective. Each of the people in the list have certain similarities one with another, and all of these examples have a number of things that they do not share in common.
But what they have all shown us is that faith has always been the way that men relate to God and are justified before God.
Faith has always been the way and the basis of justification and salvation. Faith is that which pleases
God. And faith has always been reproached by the world, but it is always rewarded by God.
Remember, those who bear the reproach of faith receive the reward of faith. That has been our theme all the way through chapter 11.
But verse 32 marks a change in pattern, and what follows is not a selective list chronologically given of more characters from the
Old Testament. In fact, you're going to see that he breaks his chronological pattern here. But instead, in verse 32, we just get this list of names, six of them specifically, and then a group of people whom he just calls the prophets.
In verse 33 -34, we have an example of great feats of triumph that have been effected by faith.
Effected, not affected, but effected by faith. And then in verses 35 -38, a list of great tribulations and trials that are endured by faith.
So a list of men in verse 32, verses 33 -35, is a list of triumphs affected by faith, or caused by faith, we might say, done by faith.
And then in verses 35 -38, a list of trials and tribulations that are endured by faith.
And if we were going to do all of this in one Sunday, which we're not, that would be my three -point outline. But we don't have a three -point outline today.
Instead, I have two points, which I'll give you here in just a moment, because we're going to be looking at verse 32. Now, arriving at verse 32 presents me with something of a challenge that I've been kind of wrestling with for a number of weeks, and thankfully, early in the week, this week,
I figured out how I want to approach this. How do you tackle verse 32? Up to this point, every character has received from us a commensurate,
I should say, to their mention in Hebrews, a commensurate amount of focus and attention as we've gone back into the
Old Testament to look at their story and kind of connect it to the points that the author is making in Hebrews.
So if somebody's mentioned just one time in one verse, we might go back into the Old Testament, spend one Sunday there, connect it to Hebrews chapter 11 in the next
Sunday, and then characters that are mentioned in multiple verses, we've taken more time to go back and to study them.
So we've dove, dove -dived? We've gone as deep with each of those characters as is necessary to kind of find out what the author of Hebrews is meaning by his mention of them and his treatment of them.
But now we get to these seven, six people and one group of people, and the question remains, what do we do?
How do I tackle these? Because you know that I could give a biographical series on a couple of these guys,
David and Samuel. You could spend one Sunday on, two Sundays actually on Gideon and a
Sunday on Barak, three or four Sundays on Samson, a Sunday on Jephthah, eight, ten
Sundays on David, five, six Sundays on Samuel. And right now
I recognize that there are two groups of people forming in this congregation. There are those who in your mind are thinking, oh please, please, please go that deeply into the
Old Testament and take that number of Sundays on each of these characters. And I'm not going to ask you, the five of you who are thinking that, to raise your hand because then nobody is going to want to have fellowship dinner with you.
They're going to think you should be in your own group sitting off in a corner doing something special. And then there is everybody else who is here who is thinking, oh please, please, don't do that.
Just give us the amount of detail that is commensurate with the mention in Hebrews. And you will be relieved to find out that I'm not going to do a biographical series on these.
And instead we are going to, since the author just gives us the list, and since he gives us this list in sort of a rapid fire way, we're going to cover this in a rapid fire way.
At least rapid fire compared to other things that we do. So verse 32 is going to occupy us for today.
Now, here are the two questions that we want to answer. First, what can we learn about faith from this list as a whole?
So we're going to tackle the list as a whole and say what does this collection of people tell us about faith?
Because the author, obviously, he is not connecting them to individual accomplishments and things in their lives.
He's just simply giving us the names. Now, he's going to move on and give us a list of things that people did in faith.
Some of them are connected to folks in this list. Some of them are not, as you'll see in a moment. So his goal is not to get us to focus on the people with a specific example, but simply to give us this list of men who have done great things by faith.
So the first question we have to answer is what do we learn about faith from the list as it is? The second thing we have to answer is what do we learn about faith from each one of these examples?
And we obviously have to tackle it in a very rapid fashion. So let's tackle the first question.
What can we learn about faith from the list? I want you to just notice a couple of general observations from verse 32.
First, notice that the author breaks his chronological pattern. These are not in a strict chronological order.
Now, I've argued that up to this point, up through verse 31, all of the examples of faith have been in a chronological order.
But the author breaks that now. There is a pattern here, but it's not chronological. In fact, if we were to take this chronologically, then
Barak would be before Gideon. Look at verse 32. Barak would be before Gideon. Jephthah would be before Samson.
And Samuel would be before David. That would be the chronological pattern. But you'll notice that though it is not chronological, that there is a pattern there.
Gideon is mentioned before Barak, Samson before Jephthah, and David before Samuel. And these kind of pair up in that fashion in that he sort of skips one and then goes to one who came before it, and then skips one and then goes to one who came before him, then skips one and goes back to one who came before him.
So there is a pattern there. And there is also a chronological pattern if we categorize them in the offices by the offices which they held.
So for instance, he does address judges first, men who served as judges or underjudges, Gideon, Barak, Samson and Jephthah were all judges.
David is a king and Samuel was a prophet, and then he moves on to the prophets. So there is a flow in Old Testament Israel's history where they were ruled and delivered by judges and then by kings, and then the office of prophet kind of comes after the kings and is attached to that and really flourishes through the rest of the kingdom age of Old Testament Israel.
So that is chronological. But you'll notice that the notable ones in this list are listed first.
So Gideon is more notable than Barak. He's more well -known than Barak. Very few of you,
I would bet, unless you took Miss Diane's class in judges in the recent, very few of you would be able to tell me all the significant details from Barak's life.
Likewise, Samson is more notable than Jephthah. David is more notable than Samuel or more well -known.
So there is a pattern here in that he sprinkles these lesser -known figures in with greater -known figures.
In this list, in verse 32, here's another observation, the author blazes through 400 years of history.
From Rahab to David or Samuel slash David is 400 years of history.
He's picking a group of people here that cover a long portion of Israel's history. Some of these are well -known.
Others are more obscure. We might even argue that Samuel is one of the lesser -known figures, at least in terms of probably us.
We're more familiar with David than we are with Samuel. One thing to observe of all of them, a couple of things.
Number one, that all of them were leaders. Do you notice that? All of these men were leaders. But that's not what's mentioned here.
Do you also notice that? What's mentioned here is not that they were judges. In fact, the author does not say, oh, there were notable judges.
These men were great because of the office that they held. Like Samson who was a judge or David who was a king or Samuel who was a prophet.
It's not the offices that they held that is notable or noteworthy with these men. They were all significant.
Kings, prophets, judges, national leaders. In their day, each one of these men's names would have been a household name.
Everybody knew who Samson was. Everybody knew who David was. Everybody in Israel knew who Samuel was. Many of them could probably identify these men just from their face, just recognize them publicly.
These were all well -known men. But they're not commended here for their office. They're not commended for their leadership ability, for their calling, their greatness before men, but for their faith.
Take note of that. For their faith. What sets David apart is not the fact that he was a king.
Thousands of people have been kings. Hundreds of people in David's time were kings of other nations.
That's not what sets David apart. What sets David apart is his faith. There were lots of leaders of all kinds of tribes in and around Israel in the time of the judges, but what sets
Gideon and Barak and Samson and Jephthah apart is not that they were judges, but that they were men of faith.
What the world values is the office. What the world values is the position, the calling, the reputation, the status that these men are elevated above other men.
This is what the world values. God doesn't value that. God sees faith, and that is what is the difference maker for Him.
He sees the faith that He grants. He sees the faith that is at work in the life of that individual. He sees the act of obedience and trust and doing what
He has commanded, and that is what pleases God. That is what is acceptable to God. That is what He delights in, is the faith and not the office.
You can be the greatest of men and have not faith, and you are nothing, and you will perish everlastingly, but if you are the least of men and you have faith, you will be greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
That's God's economy. So these men are not elevated or not marked because they were leaders, but because they were men and women of faith.
God Himself is no respecter of persons. Finally, and we are going to return to this at the end, all of these men, notice it, are deeply flawed men.
You notice that? I mean, just you read through the list and you kind of, oh, how did he make the list?
I mean, Samson? Of all the people to fill in there from the Old Testament, you could have put
Elijah there. You could have put Elisha there. There are a lot of competitors for Samson's slot on the list.
And you choose a man who is renowned for his flaws.
Let's just put it that way. He is renowned for his flaws. So all of these are deeply flawed men.
So now let's look at what we can learn about faith from the lives individually of these who are listed.
You'll notice that there is a list of accomplishments, verses 33 to 35. You'll notice that there is a list of tribulations and trials, verses 35 through 38.
This list is kind of connected to the list of men in verse 32. Kind of. It's not entirely connected to the list in verse 32 because there's not a specific one -to -one correspondence between the people on the list and the things, the triumphs that are mentioned on the list in verse 33.
Some of these descriptions in verses 33 through 38 fit more than one person on the list.
For instance, in verse 33, by faith they conquered kingdoms. Who could that refer to? Look up at verse 32.
It could refer to Gideon and Barak and Samson really as the leader of Israel and Jephthah and David and all of those guys.
It could refer to all of them. Likewise with performed acts of righteousness. Escaped the edge of the sword.
Did David escape the edge of the sword? Multiple times. He escaped the point of his spear a couple of times, didn't he?
How about escaping, sorry, from weakness were made strong. You think, well, that specifically refers to Samson, but David was weak.
David was just a wee little guy when Samuel anointed him as king.
He was weak, the smallest, the youngest, and seemingly the most insignificant in his father's household, and yet he was made strong.
Became mighty in war. Would apply to many of those men. Put foreign armies to flight. Would apply to many of those men.
And some of the descriptions, some of the people on the list actually would fulfill more than one of these triumphs in verses 33 through 35.
Some of the descriptions fit people not mentioned. Look at the end of verse 33. Shut the mouths of lions.
Who does that refer to? Daniel. You were thinking of Daniel.
Well, you'd be right, I think, but Daniel's not on the list, is he? So he's referring here to some triumph that was done in faith, and yet the person that we immediately think of,
Daniel, is not on the list. There's a sense in which Samson shut the mouth of a lion too, right? And David shut the mouth of a lion?
Well, how about quench the power of fire? Who does that refer to? Who does the author have in mind there?
Probably Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego if we're sticking with the Old Testament. And if he means Daniel by shutting the mouth of lions and quenching fire, probably refers to Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the very same book.
You take a survey of the men listed, and you'll see that not one by one is there a correspondence for verses 33 through 35, and certainly not for verses 35 through 38.
So we have a list of men and a list of accomplishments, and let me tell you, this is not what I'm going to do, is to try and draw the lines between those two columns of people.
Instead, we want to look at the list as a whole. Now let's look at the list individually. Let's look at these men, survey of them.
First up, Gideon. Judges 6 through 8 tells the story of Gideon. Gideon delivered
Israel from the oppressive Midianites. He followed God's command, and by following God's command of choosing 300 men out of 32 ,000 men,
Gideon ensured that God would get the glory for throwing the enemy into confusion. You remember the story of Gideon, that he selected those 300 men on the basis of how they drank water.
Not exactly something that they do at West Point today in terms of culling out all of the bad seeds in an army to get your elite fighting force, but the point in Gideon's life was not choosing an elite fighting force, but rather demonstrating that in obedience to God, when we walk with Him and obey
Him, that God brings the victory, that God accomplishes great things. So Gideon, with a bunch of torches and pitchers, ended up throwing the enemy into confusion and routing an army of 135 ,000 men.
So we could say that Gideon was, from weakness made strong, that he conquered kingdoms and that he put a foreign army to flight.
But is Gideon a man who was without any flaw? Any moral flaw? No, he was not.
Gideon's father had an altar to Baal. Now we're not going to criticize Gideon for his father's idol worship, but Gideon was commanded by the
Lord to tear down that altar and to destroy that altar, and Gideon did it, but he did it at night because he was afraid of men.
He didn't want to be seen doing it. He didn't want it to get out that he was the one who did it. He wanted to obey God, but he feared man in his obedience to God.
Not exactly the courageous man of faith that you might at first think, right? Gideon asked for a sign of the fleece.
Do you remember that? Let the fleece be wet and the ground around it be dry, and let the ground be dry, or the fleece be dry and the ground around it be wet, whatever order that happened in.
That, by the way, is not a method for determining God's will. You don't put out fleeces. You've heard that used. I don't even need to go into that with you.
There's a good book on that if you want to read up more on it. He asked for the sign of the fleece, but listen, in connection with Gideon, Gideon already knew full well what the will of God was because God had said to him, you're to do this and to do this and to do this, and Gideon, in fear, said, well, if it's really to be that way, then how about you give me a supernatural sign, and God graciously, instead of consuming
Gideon with fire, gave him the sign, and then Gideon said again, okay, let's switch this around.
I want to confirm this. Give me another supernatural sign, and God graciously gave him the sign rather than consuming
Gideon with fire. That is not exactly faith. After his conquering of the
Midianites, Gideon made a golden ephod, which was a religious relic that became an idol in Israel and was obviously the cause of sin and the downfall and probably the damnation of many souls because Israel worshipped that golden ephod.
And then Gideon had many wives and violated God's purpose for marriage. So a man of faith, in terms of what he did in obedience to the
Lord and God used it, we might even say that for Gideon, his example of faith is just surrounded by other very moral, very problematic morals connected with Gideon and the rest of his life.
Next up is Beric. Beric was a military leader at the time when Deborah was a judge in Israel.
By faith, God commanded, sorry, by faith, Beric obeyed God's command to fight against a
Canaanite army that was led by a man named Sisera and he did so in obedience to that command and God granted him a victory and granted the nation of Israel deliverance from the oppression of that nation through Beric.
He conquered a kingdom and he became mighty in war. Those would be the things that we could say of Beric, but his failure was this.
I think this was his failure at least. He refused to go into battle unless Deborah came with him. Now some people think that that is actually an expression of his faith, that Beric realized
Deborah was God's spokesperson at that time, that she was the leader of the nation and that he didn't want to go into battle without having
God's person there with him. But I don't think so because when he says to her, I will do this, but only if you go with me, she says, alright, but you're not going to get any glory from this, rather somebody else is going to get it.
A woman is going to receive glory from this. This was Beric because of his lack of faith and lack of obedience in that regard was robbed of the blessing of receiving the glory for the battle that he would wage.
So that I think was an expression of his weakness. He was God's leader for that war and he refused to go into it without that woman by his side.
He was God's man to command that army and to go, and yet I think we see in Beric an example of cowardice and an unwillingness to lead as a man.
In fact, I think that that is his fatal flaw, Beric's flaw, is that he was unwilling to lead as a man and probably indicative of all the other men in Israel, which is why
Israel had Deborah for a judge. When a church or a people have women for rulers, okay, a few weeks ago
I thought I was going to get in trouble for or clean out the church by saying something about baptism. Here we go. When a church or a nation or a group of people have women in leadership, it is always an indication that there are cowardly men who will not lead and they have abdicated that leadership and given it up to those who should not be leading in those environments.
That I think was indicative of Beric's problem. Third up, Samson. Samson is one of the most quirky of all the
Old Testament characters. Every time I read of Samson, I stand in awe of the grace of God and of the foolishness of men, all at the very same time.
By faith, Samson fought against the Philistines and used his supernatural strength for his military victories.
He was a one -man war against the Philistines. In fact, one thing that is notable about all the other judges in Israel is that they led armies, they led rebellions, they led people in conquering other armies.
Samson was just one man who led a one -man assault upon an entire nation, the Philistines.
He used his supernatural strength to do that. He didn't lead an army in the sense that the other people led armies.
But he would just go out and do these impulsive things that end up being judgments upon the Philistines. At the end of his life, he is noted for his trust in God when after being stripped of his strength, he prayed to God one last time to give him strength that he might slay the
Philistines as he was between the two pillars of that temple of Dagon. And God gave him the strength. And by faith, he from weakness was made strong, and he pushed the pillars apart and brought down that entire edifice and killed more
Philistines in his death than he did in his life. And yet, Samson's moral failures were notorious.
His craven desire for foreign women. He was a man driven by his appetites.
He cared little for God's gifts to him. He thought little of God's call upon his life. He thought little of the gifts that God had given to him.
He basically squandered them. He seemed to enjoy the battle and the war and the revenge and the fight and not necessarily the pursuit of holiness and faith which should mark a leader of the nation of Israel.
He relished the conflict and gave little regard to walking in righteousness and holiness. And his leadership for Samson was just a means to the gratification of his personal ends.
He was a man driven by his lusts. And so his power and his notoriety were used to that end to satisfy his craven desire for women.
Samson was a moral shipwreck and yet he was marked by these episodes of extraordinary resolute trust and faith.
And yet he was a moral shipwreck. His moral failings and impulsive acts were notorious. It was hot and cold with Samson.
One day as an Israelite, you would wake up and say, Yes, Samson. That's our man. That's our hero. He's fighting our battles, doing our thing, going against the
Philistines. And the next morning as an Israelite, you wake up and you say, Samson, why did you tweet that?
Can you just stop tweeting for a weekend? And it's hot and cold and it's back and forth and at times you think this is our man, he's our deliverer and at other times you think this man is the judgment of God upon our nation.
Then there's Jephthah, Judges 11 and 12. We probably remember his failure more than his faith.
Jephthah delivered Israel from Ammonite oppression. He was the son of a harlot and therefore he was an outcast in his father's house.
Notably, verse 31 mentions the faith of a harlot who was included in the Hall of Faith. Jephthah is the son of a harlot.
His father hired a harlot and fathered a son by that woman. And so that was
Jephthah and he was an outcast even amongst his own people, amongst his own brothers and sisters.
He ended up leading his own people in a battle against the Ammonites and he faced down an enemy and trusted God for victory and led the nation.
He became mighty then in war and put foreign armies to flight. But here is his failure, his foolish vow.
Remember coming home, he said, I will offer up as a burnt offering the first thing that comes out of my house to greet me. Even if he had cats and dogs, that's a foolish vow.
Don't you like your cats and dogs? What do you think is going to come out first to greet you? A rat, a rodent, an armadillo?
What do you think is going to come out to greet you and be excited? But instead, Jephthah's daughter is the first thing out and Judges says that he did as he had vowed to the
Lord. What a foolish vow. David, 1
Samuel. His faith, and we could give many examples of David's faith and here is where we could go on a biographical series of David's life that would last us the rest of this month.
He patiently waited for God to give him the kingdom. He was anointed as king at a young age and yet he had to wait years for that promise to be fulfilled.
And even when he had opportunity to kill his predecessor and take the throne, he didn't do it.
Instead, he trusted in God to give him the kingdom in fulfillment of his word at just the right time. That was an act of faith.
He served faithfully in Saul's court and led Saul's army. He killed Goliath by faith.
He was a man of warfare by faith. He conquered Jerusalem and made it his home and his city and the seat of his throne by faith.
He conquered all Israel's enemies and expanded the borders of Israel beyond anything that had been known prior to that.
And by faith, he united those 12 tribes under really one leader and became a nation of nations and a rising nation and the most powerful nation in the area so that by the time that David died,
Israel was for the first time in its history in that land living and dwelling in peace unafraid of their enemies.
And that's what he handed over to Solomon, by the way, whom he also appointed as king in accordance with the word of God as an act of faith.
He made provisions for the construction of the temple by faith knowing that his son
Solomon would build that temple but that David would die before he even saw the foundations for that temple laid.
That was all done by faith. And yet his failures are almost as notorious as Samson's failures.
David took multiple wives. He took a wife whom he had taken after he killed her husband and had her husband killed and after he had committed adultery with her while her husband was alive and that was
Bathsheba. He murdered Uriah to cover that up and covered up his own sin until Nathan confronted him with it.
He mishandled, David mishandled the affairs of his household so severely that his own son rebelled against him and drove him out of Jerusalem and David ran about as a vagabond for a period of time until his son died and he was never reconciled to that son.
And yet, he's called a man after God's own heart. And lastly, Samuel. By faith,
Samuel served the Lord in the tabernacle. He transitioned the nation from the time of the judges to the times of the kings.
He taught the people the word of God at a time when the spiritual apathy of the nation was at an all -time high and the spiritual temperature of the nation was at an all -time low.
He functioned as a priest, a prophet, a leader. He was a religious leader of a nation that really didn't want to follow any kind of leadership at all.
He anointed David as king while Saul was still alive. By the way, that would have been an act of faith because that he did at risk to his own life.
To anoint Saul's successor while Saul was still alive was an act of faith by Samuel which he did in obedience to the word of God.
And he did this while Saul was alive knowing that David was not a descendant of Saul and there were descendants of Saul living who could have been anointed as king and yet Samuel anointed
David outside of the line of Saul as Saul's successor. And he did this at a time when
Saul could have threatened his life. And he did this in obedience to God. And yet,
Samuel had a failure too as well. It's more difficult to identify Samuel's moral failings, his deep flaw, than it is with some of the other characters on the list.
But, Samuel ended up raising a couple of immoral sons and he appointed them to leadership.
They perverted justice and sinned against God grievously. And that actually led to the nation's demand for a king.
Because the nation came to Samuel and said, you're about to die and your sons ain't all that.
We want a king. We're looking at your sons and they're not going to rule us and lead us like you've been ruling and leading us, so give us a king.
That was Samuel's failure. And then the prophets in verse 7 would refer to, obviously, a whole class of people beginning probably most predominantly with the era of the prophets
Elijah and Elisha, but it would include Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, Jonah and others whose books and whose writings, whose preaching is not preserved for us in scriptures.
And truly, as the author would say, time would fail us to give adequate attention to all these men, wouldn't it?
It would. So what are we to conclude from this? There are a couple of things I think that should be an encouragement to us.
Number one, faith marked these men. They're not marked here for their sins.
Do you notice that? But for their simple trust, for their obedience to the Lord, to the revealed will of God. The key was not in their office that they were judges or kings or prophets.
That's not what made them great in the eyes of God. That's not what should make them great in our eyes. It might be what makes them great in the eyes of the world.
But in our eyes, what makes them great is their faith. They're not noted here because of their natural abilities or their talents or their perfections.
These were deeply flawed men, but God uses deeply flawed men. That should be an encouragement to us.
Yes, they're deeply flawed, but God uses deeply flawed people. Now, to tie into that first encouragement is the second one that is necessary.
This is not an excuse for us to be deeply flawed. So you can't approach this list and say, well,
I'm no Samson, and God used Samson, and I'm not as bad as he is. I'm certainly not as bad as David.
I haven't killed the husband of somebody that I had an affair with, and so I haven't sunk that deep, and therefore
I can give an excuse to my flaws and my moral peccadillos and my failures and my apathy and my spiritual indolence.
This list is not an excuse for that. We can't use this list to reject correction and to not pursue holiness and righteousness and to not mortify sin.
The lesson is not that our sin doesn't matter, and the lesson is not that God just winks at our sin or doesn't care about our sin.
That is not the point of Hebrews 11. But the point of Hebrews 11 is that yes, God can draw straight lines with crooked sticks, but you and I should not be content with being crooked sticks.
Instead, we should mortify sin and recognize that every person listed in this list, listen, sacrificed great blessings by their sin.
Imagine how much greater Samson could have been if he had been a holy man who cared as much about pursuing
God as he did about pursuing women. Imagine how great Jephthah could have been in the eyes of God and in the eyes of the world if instead of making foolish decisions, that he had instead vowed things before God that were in accordance with God's Word.
Imagine how great a man David could have been if he could have restrained his lusts and disciplined himself and his household and ruled his kingdom even better than he did.
So the point of this chapter in Hebrews and the point of this list is not that you and I can simply flippantly excuse our sin and our failings and say, well, yeah,
God uses deeply flawed people and I'm a deeply flawed person, therefore God loves me just as I am. No.
If somebody confronts you about your anger, your hostility, your sinfulness, your lust, the use of your time, the use of your spiritual gifts, a godly man will accept that.
You see, the reason that David was called a man after God's own heart is not because he sinned in all of those ways, but because David grieved over his sins.
He deeply grieved his moral flaws. He deeply grieved the sin that was in his heart and prayed that God would purge him and cleanse him from that sin.
It's not that David never sinned and he's called a man after God's own heart because he saw his sin for what it was and he hated it and he hated that part of him that was sinful and he wanted to be free from it.
That is why David is called a man after God's own heart. Don't think that you can be a man or a woman after God's own heart if you simply excuse your sin and certainly if you use this list as an excuse to do so.
Third, I want you to notice that each of these people was God's person for that time. Each of these people was
God's person for that time. As we've gone through the list, we've gone through the history from creation all the way up almost to the end of the prophetic and kingly era in the nation of Israel and we could go on.
By including prophets, you come all the way up to Malachi. That's the end of the Old Testament era. God appoints each person to live in the era and in the area that he desires.
So David was for then and not for now and you are for now and not for then. Catch that.
So you are God's person of faith for this day. God himself ordains our days and our times and our seasons.
He ordains our place not only chronologically but also geographically in his kingdom and in human history.
He sees that each man is fit for the time in which he lives and it is not of wisdom that we say oh that I wish that I lived amongst the time of David or oh that I wish
I lived in former days. In fact, Scripture says when you say why were the former days better than these days it is not from wisdom that you say this,
Solomon says. For you neglect to realize that the former days were just like these days except you've forgotten the pain and suffering of the former days.
And sure, all you know is the pain and suffering and the affliction and the uncertainty of these times but all times in human history have been uncertain.
And David was a man appointed by God in faith to be used by God in faith in his day and you and your children are appointed for this day and for this hour to be
God's men and women for these times in which we live. And you can say we live in some very uncertain times some very turbulent times.
I really wish I didn't live now. It's not from wisdom that you say such a thing. God has appointed you to live right now.
This is the age in which he wants you and I to be men and women of faith. And then we, when we live in faith and obey him become the enduring legacy of faith.
It is God's to ordain, it is ours to obey. And by grace, our sins and our deep flaws are not counted against us.
Blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute his iniquities but instead imputes righteousness.
And by faith, we will live and we will triumph and we will suffer and we will endure and we will persevere to the saving of the soul just as the men and women listed in Hebrews chapter 11.
Let's pray. Our Father, it is all by your grace that we are able to be here to endure to worship, to fellowship.
It is by your grace that you have called us out of darkness and into light. It is by your grace that you have appointed us to live at this time and in this day.
And it is by your grace that you have granted us the gift of faith. We thank you that you do not count us worthy on the basis of our status or our office or our reputation.
We thank you that we are not worthy of anything and therefore it is all by grace that you must choose and draw and bring us to faith in Jesus Christ.
We love you and thank you for your work of grace and we love you and thank you for the work of faith in our lives.
And as we respond in obedience, we pray that you would be honored and glorified through the lives that we live.
Give us grace, we pray, to mortify sin, to put that to death, to hate the sin that is in us and to repent and to return and to grieve over those flaws that are within us, the sins that lay hold of our hearts and our minds and our affections.
Father, we pray that you would grant us grace to identify them, to mortify them and to pursue holiness and righteousness.
We do not long to be great in the eyes of the world, but we want to be great in faith and men and women great in holiness in pursuit of righteousness, loving you, serving one another and pursuing holiness without which no one will see the
Lord. Thank you for these things and we pray that you would impress these things upon our hearts and help us to rejoice in your good gifts to us as we rejoice in those things which have brought us together and united us in Christ, in whose name we pray.
Will the ushers please come forward and help me as we serve communion. It is by faith that we are made partakers of the
Lord's death. And so last Sunday we had the opportunity to observe one of the ordinance that the
Lord has given to his church, the ordinance of baptism. It is one that the Lord has given to us to observe until he comes, until the end of the age and we do likewise with communion.
As we participate in communion, we are proclaiming the Lord's death until he comes. Acknowledging that which the
Lord suffered and how he died for our sake, for the sins of his elect, his people, whom
God has placed upon Christ and then given us his righteousness. We're acknowledging that and our part in that.
And it is by faith and only by faith, not by human merit, not by works, that we are made participants of that great sacrifice.
So let's take a moment to pray and confess our own sin before we partake and then I'll lead us in prayer.
Our Lord, we confess you our iniquity. We know that there is sin that dwells in us that longs to do everything that we do not want to do as new creatures in Christ.
We see that sin, we hate it, we long to turn from it and pray that you would give us grace to do so.
We thank you for the mercy that you give to your people. We thank you that another has borne our sin in its entirety and that he has taken away from us all our reproach and all of our blame and all of our guilt and removed our sins from us as far as the east is from the west.
He has borne our sin in his own body on the cross and fully paid the debt for all who would believe.
That sacrifice is sufficient for our salvation, sufficient for our day -to -day sanctification and it is sufficient for our security and to bring us to everlasting glory.
And as we do this until you come, we pray that our proclamation of your death may be a means of grace to us and that you would strengthen us and encourage our hearts together as we reflect upon that great sacrifice that has made us yours.
Thank you in the name of Christ for the forgiveness of sins and for his righteousness. It is in his name that we pray, amen.
On the night in which our Lord was betrayed, he took the bread and when he had broke it, he said, take, eat. This is my body which is broken for you.
Do this in remembrance of me. In the same manner, also after supper, he took the cup and said, this is the new covenant in my blood.
Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. Let's pray.
Thank you so much, Lord, for the celebration that we can take part in to remember that you died and your body was broken and your blood was shed.
We just praise your name, Lord, that we can do this and that we won't forget, but we will remember what you've done for us.
We just stand in awe of that fact. Thank you so much. In Jesus' name, amen.
Please stand and let's sing, There is a Redeemer. There is a
Redeemer, Jesus, God's own
Son, Precious Lamb of God, Messiah, Holy One.
Jesus, my Redeemer, Name above all names,
Precious Lamb of God, Messiah, Hope for sinners slain.
Thank you, O my Father, For giving us your
Son And leaving your Spirit Till the work on earth is done.
When I stand in glory, I will see
His face. There I'll serve my
King forever In that holy place.
Son And leaving your
Spirit Till the work on earth is done.
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers. Amen. Have a great week.