Hebrews chapter 11. My text will be found in verse
33. The Scripture says, "...who through
faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises,
stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire,
escaped the edge of the sword. Out of weakness were made strong,
wax valiant in fight. Turn to flight the armies of
the aliens." Now looking at this chapter 11 of Hebrews, this portion
of this text is no longer looking at certain individuals. We were
looking at the individuals, the saints of old and their faith,
and how the character of their faith is a picture, a representation,
of all true faith. All true faith is represented
in Scripture by the faith of those that went before us. But
now the Apostle is turning us not specifically to certain individuals,
But for time's sake, the fact that he didn't have enough parchment
to write it all out. He's lumping so many of them
together by these feats of faith. These feats of faith. What feats
are these? These feats of faith are subduing
kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, and stopped
the mouths of lions. These saints of old were commanded
of God to do impossible things. Impossible things. I know we've
heard these histories, these stories so many times that they
become so familiar that we don't recognize the great feat that
these things, that these were to accomplish, that God commanded
them to do. And what was the theme through
all of it? What is it that gave them such
ability to overcome these massive obstacles? It was faith in God. It was faith in God, not looking
at the circumstance, not looking at the object of the difficulty,
but rather looking at God's promises, looking at what God said He would
do. These suffered afflictions, they
suffered persecutions, and pains, and torments, and poverty, sickness,
and death. Yet how were these men able to,
in one word, faith? God who commanded such great
feats to promise victory, yet required this one thing of those
saints, faith. And so it is with us, believer.
We have great enemies. We have great difficulties. These
physical things, these physical things that they were given to
overcome were only types of spiritual things, which are greater enemies. I tell you, those enemies of
old were mighty enemies, but is there anyone more mighty than
spiritual enemies? The flesh. Is there anything
more powerful than the flesh of your own? Is there anything
more powerful than the world? Can you overcome these by yourself
in your own strength? No, they're impossible feats.
How then does the saints of God overcome such obstacles? One word, faith in Christ. Faith. trusting the promises
of God alone, in the power of God alone, and not in the strength
of our flesh, or the abilities we have, the gifts or talents.
We don't trust in any of this. Paul said, I have no confidence
in the flesh. No confidence. Now, flesh doesn't
have any ability to do these things. Just like Israel had
no ability to do any of those things God required of them,
yet God gave it to them, and this was the same theme running
through it all. Faith. They all had faith. They
looked not to the accusations of man, they looked not to the
wisdom of man. As we see, the faith of these
saints overcoming their physical foes is a type, a type of our
spiritual enemies. And be sure of this, all who
believe in Jesus Christ, all who believe in Him, listen, you
will overcome your enemies. You will. How can I be confident? Because I'm confident not in
your power, in His power. And if you're confident in His
power, you'll overcome them. You'll overcome them, just like
these men of old did. Listen, we've dealt with the
first two last week in our text. Subduing kingdoms. subduing kingdoms. I'll just give you a little reminder
of that. What is this? Well, the Israel of old, they
subdued physical kingdoms, but what are those kingdoms that
true faith subdues? Remember that word subdue. It
doesn't mean to pacify or to... what is the word... escapes my mind. I'm asking you
what the word is. That's not going to happen, is
it? To compromise. There it is. It's
not to compromise. A lot of people like to subdue
by compromising. They like to tame by compromising,
settling something. But this word is totally different.
It means to fight, to engage in a warfare, to battle. These men subdued kingdoms. How?
By battling, by struggling. struggling. And listen, our foes
are not going to be, should not be pacified. Our foes are the
kingdoms that we fight against, are the kingdoms of self and
the kingdom of the world. This, not the physical, but the
spiritual world. This spiritual entity. Our foes are the world and the
flesh. And we subdue these kingdoms
only by fighting. Remember, the flesh lusteth against
the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. These two are contrary
one to another. You're never going to find them
together, ever. And if you do, listen, you've
compromised. You've compromised, listen, not
with the spirit, you've compromised with the flesh. The flesh will
never compromise with the spirit. You'll always end up compromising
the other way, won't you? Is that not your experience?
In your failures, is that not our experience? We've always
compromised with the flesh. No! He is to be killed. He is
to be subdued. And it's a constant warfare that
will never cease until the grave. And so continually subdue him.
And the second one was the world. Friends, the world is not going
to love you. If you're seeking the praise, or the applause,
or the love of this world, you're not a friend of God. James tells
us that. A friend of the world is an enmity
against God. And this especially is true concerning
the religion of the world, friends. We are at warfare. We're not
physically going to fight. This is a spiritual thing. Our
weapons are not carnal. How many fools have taken up
swords in the history in the name of Christ trying to conquer
some kingdom? Fools, all of them. Our weapons are spiritual. Faith, love, joy, peace, meekness,
temperance. These are the weapons that overcome
the world. And the second one was wrought
righteousness, which means that when they conquered these kingdoms,
they didn't make them righteous. That's not what it was talking
about. It established the law of God in those kingdoms. The
worship of God was established in those kingdoms. And so it
is true of true faith. Isn't that what happens when
God comes in? He conquers us and establishes
His law in our hearts. He establishes His rule in our
hearts. He creates in us a righteous
nature. Isn't that wonderful aspect of
faith? That God, through faith, through faith, we received these
great and precious gifts. He wrought righteousness in us. Isn't that impossible? That was
impossible for us to wrought. That was impossible for us to
do. But how then have we obtained and established the righteousness
of God in our hearts? Through faith in Christ alone. Wonderful things, wonderful things. Now then, we're going to deal
with these other two things here mentioned. Obtained promises. Obtained promises. Now, the promises
of God were given to his saints of old, surely were opposed by human
wisdom. The promises of God given to
these saints of old were opposed to any human wisdom. Surely all the promises of God
could not be performed by the means that God had prescribed. Think of the means. I'm going
to use this illustration. There are many of them. You can
go and find any one of them. And God always prescribes something
totally opposed to human wisdom, doesn't he? Why? He makes foolish
the wisdom of the world. That's what he's doing. Consider
the conquest that God of Canaan... God said this to Israel in Numbers
33. I'll read it to you. Numbers
33, 51, 53. Speaking to the children of Israel, saying to them, listen,
when you passed over Jordan and to the land of Canaan, not if, When we say, when we give a determinant,
when you say you're going to do something and you're determined
to do it, you may say, when I do this? But you really don't know.
You mean if. Because you have no way of knowing
you'll ever do it. God doesn't speak like that.
He said when. When. This is not a matter of if. When
you come into the land of Canaan. This is what's going to happen.
Then you shall drive out the inhabitants of that land before
you and destroy all their pictures. destroy all their molten images,
and quite pluck down all their high places. And you shall dispose
the inhabitants of the land, and dwell therein." Listen, here's
the assurance. For I have given you, given you
the land to possess it. Friends, you're not looking at
a mighty army of people. You're looking at a band of slaves.
These men weren't trained for warfare. These men grew up as
farmers and slaves and brick. They made brick. Their fathers were bricklayers. That's all. They didn't have
any training in warfare. How then should they drive out
this nation? That's like saying, you know,
tomorrow Haiti is going to come in and wipe out the United States. That's how it's really, that's
how it was, impossible! Yet God said not possible, and
it's going to happen. It's going to happen. How could a band of slaves do
this? And listen, the means God chose
was also against human logic. The first conquest, wasn't it?
March around Jericho, one time a day, and seven on the seventh
day. and blow trumpets. Any military
genius come up with that. Anybody, any historian ever come
up with that kind of strategy? No. It seemed opposed to human
logic. How shall walls fall by marching
and blowing trumpets? It seemed opposed to all human
wisdom. What gave this power? Because
listen, we can go march around any city today and nothing's
going to happen. What gave it power? Listen, God
gave it power. God gave it power. God said to
do it. Now if God didn't say to do it,
you'd be a fool to do it. But because God said to do it,
they did it By faith. And what did they get? When they
did it by faith, what did they receive? They received exactly
what God said they would. They received exactly what God
promised. They obtained the promise that
God said that they would. Therefore, believer, you who
are given the promises of God, Do they not seem opposed to human
wisdom and logic? Human wisdom and logic is this.
Earn God's favor. You need to do something to earn
God's favor. That's human logic. Human wisdom. Isn't that how we treat everybody
else? Wayne's got a barbershop. He works hard. He works hard
for his money. He earns it so that he can buy things that he
desires, that his family needs. This is how it all works in the
earthly realm. But in the spiritual realm, it's
not that way. Salvation is not by works, but
rather by free grace. Free grace. Listen, you have such great and
precious promises of God, believers, such as righteousness, peace
with God, eternal life, and I like this one, continual and perpetual
forgiveness. These are not... If I were to
tell you these things and have no promise of God, they would
be foolish. You should not expect them. Had
they marched around Jericho on their own and blown the trumpets
without the Word of God, they should expect nothing to fall.
But I should tell you this, you should expect righteousness.
You should expect peace with God. You should expect eternal
life. Because of this, God promised
it to you. God said you should have it. And how should you have it? By
what means did God say you should receive it? By faith. By faith. Believing on the Lord
Jesus Christ. And so then look at the promise
of salvation. Go to John chapter 3. John chapter
3, verse 15. Verse 13, let's go back up to
13. Jesus said this, no man hath
ascended up to heaven. You know what this means? No salvation by works. Isn't
that it? No man hath ascended up to heaven.
Not by His works, not by His merit, not by His own obedience,
but He that came down from heaven. Now here's salvation by grace. We needed someone to come down
from heaven to save us. Since we could not ascend to
heaven, the Son of Man came down from heaven. He came down from
heaven. Even the Son of Man which is
in heaven. Now, if you want to deal with that, you deal with
that on your own. I'm telling you what, that just blows my
mind. He was standing right there,
yet He's in heaven. I'll pass on. And as Moses lifted up the
serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted
up. This is His work. Salvation is He that came down
from heaven, and this is His work. That He should be lifted
up on the cross. He should be lifted up. That
He should suffer for sins. that God should be satisfied
and that he should justify his people and this is his promise
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal
life the promise is given Now you
can either despise it, you can hate it, you can not believe
it. That doesn't negate the promise. It's there. It's there in plain
words. Whosoever believeth. Now look, I know this. I know
this for a fact. Only the elect will believe.
I just don't know who they are. Therefore, whosoever. Anyone? See, I believe the elect are
going to believe. They're the whosoever. I believe
Christ died for whosoever will. I just don't believe he died
for whosoever won't. Simple. Plain Word of God. This is the
promise. Faith in Christ then is opposed
to human wisdom, human religion. and even the experience of our
life in this world. Yet, to us who believe, the Word
of God is powerful. It is the truth. How do you know
it's the truth? Because that's my experience
of it. I've believed. I've trusted. And I do trust. He that believeth. I like this. Present perfect
tense. He that has believed, he that
does believe, is believing, and he that shall believe. I believe on Christ and I have
this promise. I believe God's promise. I'm
resting my soul on God's promise. But preacher, my body is sick.
My flesh is weak. My sin overwhelms me. Satan's
darts pierce my soul with conviction. My circumstances seem in every
way to cry out, God's angry. God's forsaken me. I don't feel
His presence. How then are you to receive this
promise? Stop looking at how you feel and cling to the promise of God.
Stop looking at the circumstance. Stop listening to the other voices
and hear the voice of God. Whosoever believeth in Me. in the Son shall not perish. But I feel I'm not perishing. You won't perish. What's the authority to receive
such a promise? It's God's Word. What other authority
do you need? What other authority are you
looking for? There is no other authority. There's no higher
authority. It's God's Word. God's people
believe it. And these doubts and fears are
only overcome by looking to Jesus. Brother Todd wrote this. I thought
it was good I give it to you. He said, when I look for evidence
of my salvation in my attitude and conduct, I fear that I'm
not saved. When I look to Christ only, I
have full assurance. But as soon as I think I have
assurance, it leaves. The Lord will not allow us to
trust in anything but Him. Christ alone. Nothing more, nothing
less, and nothing else. Christ alone. If you want full
assurance, don't look at your assurance. The minute you do,
it's gone. You want assurance, look to Christ.
And keep your eye on Christ, and you'll have assurance. You'll
have assurance. You'll obtain the promise. You'll
receive the promise. You'll have the peace of the
promise. In Christ alone are all the promises of God said
to be what? In Him, yea. Yes. And in Him, amen. To the man who comes to God in
his own righteousness, the promise is this, no. That's a promise, isn't it? You
come to God in your own righteousness, the promise is no. No righteousness. No acceptance. No love. No peace. No joy. Oh, but listen. To those who are in Christ, the
promise is always yes. You like that word? When you
ask for something, don't you like yes? Yes is a good word
to us, isn't it? What do we want? Believer, what
do you want? You want righteousness? Yes. You want peace? Yes. You want joy? Yes. You want comfort? Yes! In Christ, yes, is the answer
of God to all of these promises. Now I know your flesh wants promises
that God hadn't promised, isn't that right? But listen, all of those in Christ
are yes. He didn't say He's going to give
you everything your flesh wants. But what your spirit, the inner
man desires, those are yes. And listen, Amen! That means
it's sure. It's sure. The covenant promises
of God are sure. They're immutable. They're unchangeable
as God Himself. By faith we receive these promises,
not of men, not of flesh and blood whose promises can fail,
which promises those sincere have no power or ability to give. Go over to Jeremiah chapter 17. Jeremiah chapter 17 in verse
5. The promises of men are really,
even sincerely, at best, iffy. Isn't that right? Because we
have no power to fulfill such promises. Jeremiah chapter 17
and verse 5. Thus saith the Lord, Cursed be
the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm. and
whose heart departeth from the Lord." See the connection there? Anybody trust in flesh, they're
departing from the Lord. And you're cursed. For he shall
be like the heath in the desert, and shall not see when good cometh,
but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness in a
salt land, and not inhabited. Blessed is the man that trusteth
in the Lord, whose hope the Lord is. For he shall be as a tree
planted by waters, and that spreadeth outer roots by the river, and
shall not see when the heat cometh, but her leaf shall be green,
and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall
it cease from yielding her fruit." Trusting in the promises of God. Men who trust in the promises
of man's religion, to these the Word of God is foolishness. These
trusting, they trust in what they feel and they cast the word
of God behind them. This word, this little plant
here, a heath, it's a shrub that grows out in the desert. It's
barren. It has no leaves. It has no fruit. It's useless. It's useless. That's what a man who trusts
in man is. He is useless. And listen, when
the rains come on him, It doesn't matter. You can pour all the
water on that plant you want. It won't grow anything. It won't
produce anything. It doesn't know when good comes.
This morning, if you're trusting in yourself, the Word of God
is raining grace, pouring out grace, telling you to trust in
Christ. And yet to you, no effect. No effect. Why? You're a heath.
You're nothing but a shrub in the desert, and you don't have
any life. But to one who has faith in Christ
alone, who trusts in Christ alone, we are blessed. And when the
rain comes of His Word, we are like the trees planted by the
rivers of water. You know, you put us under the
same sun as the heath, the afflictions and troubles of the world, and
yet we still thrive. Why? because of the waters. We're a tree planted by the rivers
of water. Our leaves never fail because
our righteousness in Christ never fails. Our salvation in Christ
never fails. We're planted of God, rooted
in Christ, never anxious. Isn't that what he just said?
He said, they shall not be careful in the year of drought. They're
not going to be anxious in the year of drought. Why? They've
always got water. They've always... And what happens
to a believer when drought comes? When you have afflictions, what
happens? Your roots dig deeper into Christ. Paul says being rooted and built
up. In what? The faith. Built up
in Christ. When troubles come, what do you
do? Believer, you cling more to Christ But a man who's trusting
in man, he withers away. He doesn't have anything to hold
on to. And how is it that you dig deeper?
How is it that you obtain these promises? That you get these
promises? That you're sure of these promises? By faith. By believing and trusting the
Word of God. And opposing all who reject it. All that seems against it. See
the saint that he's in pain, that he suffers, and even at
the brink of death, he's in poverty, he's in trouble. And what is his response to all
those who oppose him? Paul said, for this cause I suffer
these things, nevertheless I am not ashamed. For I know whom
I have believed." When you suffer, how is it that you are not ashamed?
When they say, where is your God? How can you not be ashamed? Listen, I know whom I have believed. And listen, my trust is in that
He is able. He is able. Not that I'm able. He is able to keep that which
I've committed to Him against that day. Hold fast the form
of sound words which thou hast heard of Me. What? In faith and
love which is in Christ Jesus. Is this your faith? Are these your promises? I don't know. If you don't know,
I tell you today, believe on Christ and they will be. Believe
on Christ and they are! They're yours! You obtain them
in the same way, by faith. Why don't believe that? It's impossible. Well, of course
you won't. Not until God gives you faith. And when He does,
you'll receive it. And listen, this is how believers
live every single day. This is our experience every
day. We need those promises. I need those promises more today
than I did yesterday. How do I have them? Simply believing
on Christ. My hope is built on nothing less
than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest
frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. His oath is covenant, His
blood. Support me in the whelming flood.
When all around my soul gives way, He then is all my hope and
stay. On Christ the solid rock I stand. All other ground is what? sinking
sand. Look around you. Look at the
world around you. They're sinking, aren't they?
They don't know what's happening. They're confused, troubled. You do not have to be troubled. You know you are a believer,
but you don't have to be. By faith we subdue kingdoms. By faith righteousness is wrought.
And listen, by faith the promises of God are yea and amen in Christ
and we have them, they're ours. Every one of them. Find one.
Find one daily. Say, that's mine. That's mine.
And you're not being, you're not being arrogant. I know the
flesh comes in and says, well man, that's arrogant for you
to claim that. Well, you're nothing more than those name it, claim
it people. No. No. They claim stuff that's not
promised. I claim stuff that's promised.
I don't claim anything that's not promised. But you can claim what's promised. Obtain it. How? By faith. By faith.