The True Discipleship Broadcast-1983-13 True Discipleship — William MacDonald

Faith, Creation, and the Word of God

Now, the writer for the Hebrew, he wants to talk about the life of faith, and he says, where shall we begin? And he says, well, let's begin at creation. Verse three, by faith we understand. What do we understand?

The worlds were framed by the word of God. What does that mean? It means God spoke, and the worlds came into being. Is that scientific? I don't care whether it's scientific or not, but it's true, and it just happens to be scientific.

It's scientific, too, because some years ago, Einstein came out with his famous formula, and his formula says E equals mv squared. You can live a normal life without knowing that, but basically what it says is energy equals matter times the square of life, or just let me simplify it.

What it really says is energy equals matter, so this says energy, speaking as energy, so I see nothing unscientific in this at all, although don't tell them at the University of California they might not like it.

By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible. How true! How true! How many years has it been since we knew about the atom, and the neutron, and the proton, and a lot of other invisible things that go to make up matter?

The things that are seen are not made of things that do appear. Absolutely true. So, to me, this verse is very, very satisfying, and I don't think it can be improved on. So then it goes over to Cain and Abel.

Cain, Abel, and the Need for Atonement

Now, it doesn't say this in the Bible, but sometime in their lives, those fellows learned that the Holy God can only be approached by sinful men on the basis of an atoning sacrifice. I don't know where they learned that, or how they learned it, probably through their parents telling them about the coats of skin, but I know they knew.

I know they knew that the proper way to approach God was through a sacrificial animal to God, of an animal, where the blood had been shed. Cain said, well, I never did care about that, and he came with his basket of fruit and vegetables, and Abel probably said, well, I don't understand all the theological intricacies of atonement by blood, but God said it, and I'm going to do it.

And as a result of that, if you read by faith, Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, through which he obtained witness that he was righteous. God testifying of his gifts, and through it, he is dead, you'll see.

How did Abel manifest faith? By believing the revelation that God had given to them. Although the verse doesn't say it, it presupposes a definite revelation. God didn't hold Cain responsible for something he didn't know about, did he?

Cain knew he was acting in disobedience to God. He was the beginning of the whole world of salvation by work. He's the one who started it all. He was the original modernist, the original liberal. That is that the life of faith enables you to go on talking long after your body has returned to dust in the grave.

Isn't that a wonderful thing? Abel still talks to us today. What does he say? The right life is the life of faith. Believe God, and you won't make any mistakes. The next man is Enoch. What's the story with Enoch?

Enoch and Faith in God's Promise

Well, once again, the Bible doesn't say it in so many words, but it presupposes that sometimes, in Enoch's life, God came to him and said, Enoch, you're never going to die. I'm going to take you to heaven without dying.

Well, really, that was a blockbuster, because up till that time in the history of the world, everybody had died or was in the process of dying. Enoch had gone down to the local encyclopedias. He never could have found a record of anybody being translated to heaven without dying.

There was no instance of it in human history, but God said it, and Enoch believed it. One day, he was out walking, and God took him home to heaven without dying. That's what this verse says. By faith, Enoch was translated so that he did not see death, and was not found because God had translated him.

They went looking for him, and they couldn't find him. There was no trace of his body. And he had this testimony that he pleased God. How did he please God? By a life of devoted service? No. By taking God at his word.

What word? The word that he'd never die. Translating. You and I believe. Lord, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump, the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

God said it. But it's not of much credit to you and I to believe it, as it was to Enoch. Because we can say, well, it's happened at least twice in the history of the world before. It's happened twice, it can happen.

Enoch and Elijah went to heaven without dying. We know that. We can go to the Bible and see a historical precedent for it. So, no big deal for us to believe it. Enoch didn't have that. So, he pleased God.

Without faith, it's impossible to please him. I don't blame God for that. I tell you something, and you say to me, I don't believe it. What are you saying? When God says something, and man says, I don't believe it, what do they think?

They think God is a liar. I'm telling you, it's not, as John says in his first epistle, a serious thing. Without faith, it's impossible to please him. He who comes to God must believe he is. You must believe in the existence of God, but that isn't enough.

You must believe that he's a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. That means you must not only believe that God exists, but you must believe that he'll do what he says he'll do. In other words, he says, he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life.

You must believe that when he says that, and you do it, that he is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him. Go back on his word. Possibility for God. But then it goes on to Noah. This is remarkable, too.

Noah's Faith and the Condemnation of the World

God appears to Noah. We know this because it's stated. God says to Noah, Noah, I'm going to destroy the earth with a flood. And Noah could have said, because up until that time in the history of the world, as far as we know, not only has there been no flood, we don't even think it had rained up until that time.

The ground had been watered by a mistletoe. And now God says to Noah, Noah, I want you to build an ark. I'm going to destroy the world with a flood, but I want you to build an ark for the salvation of yourself and your household.

And here Noah lands to the people of his generation. He's called a preacher of righteousness and no water. I don't doubt that Noah was really ridiculed, and I'd like to tell you that there is that about the life of faith that might make them look ridiculous to others.

I say Noah being divinely warned of things that are not yet seen could have two meanings. It could mean that there never had been a flood, or it could mean that the flood had been going on for 120 years.

Moved with fear. Moved with godly fear, that's it. Well, you have to admire these men because, you know, they didn't have a Bible. They didn't have a concordance. They didn't have commentary. God just spoke to them.

That's all I need. Plant my feet on the word of God, believe it, and leave the consequences with him. He prepared an ark for the which he condemned the world, and really the life of faith does condemn the world.

It really does. The world doesn't like it, doesn't understand it, doesn't understand it, and doesn't like it either. But there is that about faith which condemns the world, and he became heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.

In other words, he was justified. He was reckoned. I should pause here to say faith is not meritorious. I think you've probably been over that. Maybe we've been over it before. But this is a good place to start, faith.

Faith, Justification, and the Exclusion of Boasting

Faith is not a meritorious work, and I say that because, you know, we say to the unsaved, you don't have to do anything to be saved. All you have to do is believe, and they look at you as if you've lost your marbles because you've just stated a contradiction to them.

You don't have to do anything to be saved. All you have to do is believe. What we mean by the second portion of that paradox is that believing is not a meritorious work. You don't earn or deserve your salvation.

You simply believe the Lord, and you can't pat yourself on the back because you believe the Lord. You'd be a fool not to. It says in Romans 3 that faith excludes boasting. Nobody will boast and say, well, nice going, McDonald's.

You got here by your faith. I am crazy not to put my faith in the Lord. Anybody else is crazy not to because his word is absolutely sure. He became heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.

Abraham's Obedience and the Pilgrim Life

Then it says, by faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to the place which he would afterward receive as an inheritance, and he went out not knowing where he went. Here is Abraham. You might call him a pagan, a heathen, you know, living in darkest Mesopotamia, Ur of the Chaldeans.

And God appears to him and says, Abraham, I'm calling you. I want you to leave your country, leave your kindred. I'm not going to tell you where I'm going to take you, but I'm going to lead you. I'm just positive that God has spoken and I'll trust his eyesight rather than my own.

I'd rather walk in the dark with God than walk alone in the light. And he went out not knowing where he was going. That was pretty good. Pretty good. He had the word of God. If you have the word of God, you don't have to worry.

God has the map. You don't have to have it. And I think there are times in life when God leads us this way too. This was a crucial verse in my life. And I had to do that. I had to step out not knowing what lay ahead.

And when I did, God showed me the way he wanted me to go. There's no risk of leaving God in obeying. By faith, he sojourned in the land of promises in a foreign country. This is Canaan. You know, it's wonderful.

This verse is beautiful to me because God brought it into Canaan and said, look, it's Abraham came into that country and he really never settled. He never settled. He lived in tents all the time. He lived as a pilgrim in a land that belonged to him.

Always going through his mind, God is something better. God is something better than this. I mean, I'll just be content to live in a tent. You know, I think that is a voice for us, a sense in which all this world belongs to us.

Did you know that? Did you know when you go down through the San Joaquin Valley, that it all belongs to you? They're keeping it for you. Someday, you're going to come into possession of it. When the Lord says all things are yours, and ye are Christ and Christ is God.

And there's a sense in which the United Airlines operates for the children of God, in which the garbage collection takes place for the children of God. A lot of other people benefit by it, but the wheel turns.

Thank you very much, Lord. I'll just be content to live in a pilgrim here. But that's what this is. Dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob. The heirs of hymns of the same prompt. I'll tell you that faith.

That faith. You know, we used to sing a lot of hymns about pilgrimage, and they're largely gone from our hymn books. They've been dropped. They've been purposely dropped, my dear. You don't listen to them.

All from above and heavenly men by. Once were but the citizens of earth. We would not seek a home on earth which gave him but a grave. Thy cross why, I've nothing to choose or to gain. I've no thought by, Darby wrote.

This is the treasure I found in his love that has made me a pilgrim below. And that was what Abraham was saying. I think that's wonderful. It all belonged to him. And yet it says by faith he sojourned in the land of promises as in a foreign country.

An alien country. Dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob. The heirs of hymns of the same promise. Everywhere he went, he lived in a tent himself that built an altar for God. Like some of us live in pretty fancy tents.

Abraham's Heavenly City and God's Design

It says he looked for the city. If it doesn't say that in your Bible, it should. In the King James, in the old King James, it says he looked for a city. But it really should say he looked for the city.

Why? Because there's only one city that runs it. Why? He looked for the city which has foundations. You give for the foundations of San Francisco today. Frankly, I wouldn't give a nickel. Pride of God.

I wouldn't give very much for the foundations of Chicago or New York today. Or Washington, D .C. There is a city. The city which has foundations. That's the only city worth. I like that. The city which has foundations.

Then it says whose builder and maker is God. That's a bit confusing. Builder and maker say the same thing to us in English. It really is whose architect. He's the architect of creation. Creation existed in the mind of God before it ever existed in fact.

True of any of our modern buildings, isn't it? You know, the architect sees it before it ever exists. And he designs it. And then it comes into being. This is true of God. He's the architect. I think that's what it means in Colossians 1 when it says all things were created.

There are three different prepositions there. I might have gone over this before. It says in him were all things created. They were created through him. And they were created for him. And I think when it says that in him, in the Lord Jesus, all things were created.

That means they were created through him or by him. He was the active agent. And they were created for him. He was the object. He waited for the city which has foundations. Then it says by faith Sarah herself also received strength to conceive seed.

Sarah's Faith in God's Impossible Promise

And she bore a child when she was past the age because she judged him faithful to his promise. Now when you come to Sarah, we've got to admit, and it's true with every one of us, faith has its people.

People weren't perfect any more than we're perfect. Abraham and Sarah must have really created in that village when dear Sarah went out. And people saw her. She was obviously was 90 year old. I said before faith deals in the realm of the impossible.

If God says it, that makes it possible. Doesn't it? She received strength to conceive seed. She bore a child when she was past the age. Of course he was a child of miracle birth. That's all. I think that's why he's called Abraham's only son.

Child when she was past the age because she judged him faithful to her promise. Therefore from one man and him as good as dead were born as many as the stars of the sky in multitude innumerable as the sand which is by the sea shore.

Sarah believed God gave him child. These all died in faith. This is beautiful. They all died believing not having received the promises. When it says not having received the promises, it means not having received the fulfillment of the promise.

They received the promises. But what it really means is they didn't see the promises fulfilled. You have to supply that. Of course they received the promises. But they didn't see the fulfillment of all the promises.

For instance, God made a promise to Abraham of the land stretching from the Mediterranean to the Euphrates. But Abraham didn't see that. He died in faith. To him it was just as sure as if he had already seen it.

That's what it means. He died in faith. Not having received the promises, but having seen them afar were assured of them, embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on earth. And in some versions, this is very beautiful, it makes me think of people standing on a pier and a great ocean liner is coming in, you know, and they're peering to see their relatives on the deck and they're waving to them.

And it seems to me that these people who died in faith, they didn't see the fulfillment of the promises, but they waved at them. They were so real to them that they embraced them. They greeted them from afar.

You know, it's especially good at the time of death, because sometimes at the time of death, you know, your physical and mental abilities wane, but their faith didn't. Sure to them, they embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.

That's really beautiful. Things declared plainly that they seek a homeland. In other words, the Old Testament saints did have a heavenly hope. There's no question about it. The main promises of the Old Testament were earthly promises, material blessings in earthly places.

The main promises, but they did have a heavenly hope. And this brings it out very clearly. They declare plainly that they seek a home. They could have gone back to the country they came from. Nothing to stop them.

Now they desire a better. God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he's prepared for the city. Mark it down. God is not ashamed to be called the God of people who take him at his word. He's quite to be ashamed of.

He's praised by people who take him at his word, who believe it. And again, I say there's no risk. It's nothing. Believe it. Launch out on full surrender. This is absolutely basic in the life of discipleship.

You can hardly go on and grow as a disciple of the Lord Jesus without having a faith that's growing too. Claiming new character.