Even in the midst of great uncertainty,
as we've been thinking about today, you remain the same. And so I pray that as we open
this letter and we continue to look and see what others looked
at and what you purposed in them, what you caused to take place
inside their hearts and minds, that they rested in the promises
that you gave them rather than worrying about what they could
see, about what they could do, and about what they knew. And so we pray that for ourselves
tonight. We pray that for our brothers and sisters scattered.
We pray that for those who are at home, those who have suffered
loss, those who are ill, that you would be all things to them,
Lord, and that you would reveal Jesus in a new and fresh way
every day so that we might rejoice. And we pray these things in the
name of Him, He who saves, our Lord and King. Amen. All right,
let's turn to Hebrews chapter 10, the last few verses there
and let's make a way of for way of reminder let's Remember where we're headed,
because as I'll say and say and say, we are not to subdivide
the text of scripture by the titles and the numbers and the
chapters. We are to continue to read it
and the arguments are syntactical and grammatical. They're not
divided out that way. Thankful for them, but they're
not inspired. Verse 32 of chapter 10, let's
read. But recall the former days, when after you were enlightened,
you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, sometimes being publicly
exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners
with those so treated. For you had compassion on those
in prison. and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property,
since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an
abiding one. Therefore, do not throw away
your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of
endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may
receive what is promised. For yet a little while, and the
coming one will come and will not delay, but my righteous one
shall live by faith. And if he shrinks back, my soul
has no pleasure in him. But we are not of those who shrink
back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve
their souls." Now, faith is the assurance of things hoped for.
It is the conviction of things not seen. For by faith the people
of old received their commendation. By faith we understand that the
universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen
was not made out of the things that are visible. By faith Abel
offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through
which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting
his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.
By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death,
and he was not found because God had taken him. Now, before
he was taken, he was commended as having pleased God. And without
faith it is impossible to please Him, for whoever would draw near
to God must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who
seek Him. By faith, Noah, being warned by God concerning events
as yet unseen, in reverent fear, constructed an ark for the saving
of his household. By this he condemned the world
and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith. By faith,
Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place and that
he was to receive as an inheritance, and when he went out, not knowing
where he was going. By faith he went to live in the
land of promise as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac
and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was
looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer
and builder is God. By faith Sarah herself received
power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she
considered him faithful who had promised. Therefore, from one
man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants, as many
as the stars of heaven, and as many as the innumerable grains
of sand by the seashore. These all died in faith, not
having received the things promised, but having seen them, and greeted
them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and
exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make
it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they'd been thinking
of a land from which they had gone out, they would have had
the opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better
country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed
to be called their God, for He has prepared them for a city."
By faith, Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and
he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up
his only son, of whom it was said, through Isaac shall your
offspring be named. He considered that God was even
able to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking,
he did receive him back. By faith, Isaac invoked future
blessing on Jacob and Esau. By faith, Jacob, when dying,
blessed each of the sons of Joseph, bowing in worship over the head
of his staff. By faith, Joseph, at the end of his life, made
mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions
concerning his bones. By faith, Moses, when he was
born, was hidden for three months by his parents because they saw
the child was beautiful and they were not afraid of the king's
edict. By faith, Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be
called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated
with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures
of sin. He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than
the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward. By
faith he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king,
for he endured as seeing him who was invisible. By faith he
kept the Passover and sprinkled the blood, so that the destroyer
of the firstborn might not touch them. By faith the people crossed
the Red Sea as on dry land, but the Egyptians, when they attempted
to do the same, were drowned. By faith the walls of Jericho
fell down after they had been encircled for seven days. By
faith Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who were
disobedient because she had given a friendly welcome to the spies.
And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell
of Gideon, of Barak, of Samson, of Jephthah, of David, and Samuel,
the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced
justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched
the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, who were made
strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies
to flight. When women received back their
dead by resurrection, some were tortured, refusing to accept
release so that they might rise again to a better life. Others
suffered mocking and flogging and even chains and imprisonment.
They were stoned and they were cut in two. They were killed
with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep
and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated, of whom the world
was not worthy. Wandering about in deserts and
mountains and dens and caves of the earth. And all these,
though commended through their faith, did not receive what was
promised. since God had provided something
better for us that apart from us they should not be made perfect. Therefore." Service is over. That's enough. I had to read
it all because it is one thought. It is one thought and we will
read this over and over again and I pray that you would read
it as well. Come prepared to agree with what you hear. not
to learn something new. Come prepared to receive that
which God has already taught you and to share it with others
in the reception, in the rejoicing. There is a horrible, horrible
cultural misunderstanding of what faith actually is. And if you see how Paul slides
into this understanding, now faith is, he answers it very
clearly what faith is. And we're going to look at some
of these things. It's going to take us probably
as many weeks, it took us six to seven weeks to get through
chapter 10. It'll take us that many weeks to get through chapter
11 because I want to go back and study myself and refresh
my own mind over the details of these examples of faith so
that we can capture it as the original hearers would capture
it. So that we would remember these stories so that when this
line came out about Rahab or this statement about Abraham
offering Isaac that we know what is being said. When it comes
to faith, we need to recognize that faith in itself is not something
that we do. And in and of itself it is not
something that we have. It is something that God gives. And faith that is given by God
does something in the life of the believer. First and foremost,
faith, by definition, makes one a believer. For if there is no
belief, there is no faith. Faith has an object, and that
object is a belief. And that belief is a person,
and that person is Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ and His testimony
and the story of Christ, of the Christ, is what we've been studying
for the last 24 weeks in this letter alone. Jesus Christ who
is God, who is creator, who is greater than Moses. Jesus Christ
who is man, who is high priest, who is greater than Melchizedek.
Jesus Christ who is the builder of the true house of God, who
are the people who have been given to him by the Father for
which he died and saved them from their sin. Jesus Christ
and all that he is and all that he accomplished for all that
he did it for. This is the object of real faith. And faith is something that oftentimes
is so small that it's not noticeable. Faith is often, if I could say
it this way, invisible. And faith doesn't look at that
which is able to be seen, it looks at that which is impossible
to see. We see this similar thing Paul wrote to the Corinthians
in the second letter in chapter four when he says at the very
end of all of this light momentary affliction that he talks about
being crushed. I think I read it last week. If not, I read
it on, yeah, it was last week. And he says that we endure by
looking at that which is unseen. John, as we're in his first epistle,
would even give the command to love to the church as Jesus commanded
to love. We also love as Jesus love. We
are instructed to love. And so we love. because we have
been loved first. And we do that in a way where
we recognize that there is always a war inside of our hearts and
minds, the affections of our flesh and the affections of our
soul, the affections of the pressure of the world in which we live,
the community in which we are, and the state and the country
and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, the very conditions of
a pandemic force us to consider what we're willing to do for
what cause. And in the end of it all, we
need to pay close attention to know that this stuff is part
of the world and the world is passing away and everything in
it is going to be destroyed. America is part of God's glorious
judgment. Egypt is part of God's glorious
judgment. And when I say judgment, I mean
judgment unto wrath. God has created the nations of
this world to depict a small, tiny picture of what power and
rule is and what man does. And then in the end of it all,
he just goes, and it is no more. There are not ashes to be seen
of a remnant of what was. There will be nothing but Christ
and his kingdom, Christ and his people. And it will not be reminiscent
of any kingdom of the earth. It will be something completely
new, completely different. Sometimes, as we made mention
earlier of the Imago Dei, I believe people think that means America.
And that's foolishness. It's passing away. So when we
look to that which is passing away, we have one sure hope. Paul's argument in this letter
thus far has said that there was something that was passing
away, something that pointed to the righteousness of God,
something that pointed to salvation, something that showed the preview
of redemption, and that was the law. And that was the law in
every part from the decalogue down to the washing, down to
the ceremonies, down to the prayers, down to the sacrifices, down
to the distance that you could walk, to the spitting on the
floor, all of these things, all of this restriction was to show
the righteousness that is Jesus Christ, and it is fulfilled in
Him, in His person, in His being, in His ontological essence as
God, and as now the God-man in the incarnation, now the glorified
God-man, Jesus Christ the Lord. This is the righteousness of
God, and all of these shadows are now gone. They are over. They're done with. So to look
back at them and to look at things that are visible is to just put
our hope in a shadow. Think of it this way, as if someone
were drowning. And above, maybe on two or three
stories ahead, there were people there reaching down 30 feet to
try to reach them in the pool. It's not possible. But the person
drowning saw the shadow of the hand and they walk over and try
to grab the shadow and touch the shadow and be pulled out
by the shadow. All the while, the rescuers are sitting right
next to it. That person would perish, clawing
at a shadow. That's what it means to hope
in that which is not the true. Faith, more than having, more
than being something. Faith, as Paul explains it here,
produces something. Now we have to be careful to
hear what I'm saying and not hear what I'm not saying. Do
not put words in my mouth and don't put words in your own head.
I'm not saying that faith is doing. I'm saying faith produces
something. Some of that is tangible, some
of that is intangible. And God calls each and every
one of us, first and foremost, to believe, though we have, and
we have, because we are his children. And then throughout life, there
is an exercise where God establishes the expression of faith in different
circumstances for different reasons, and that's where Chapter 11 begins
to explain this. But ultimately, if I were like
Abraham to sacrifice my son, it wasn't the sacrificing of
my son that proved I believed God. It was the fact that I believed
God, that He would call me to sacrifice my son and cause me
to know. And if you know that story in
Genesis 22, when Isaac asked, Father, where is the sacrifice
for the offering? He says, Son, God will provide
for Himself the sacrifice. God will provide for himself. So Abraham's faith wasn't strong,
it was divine. It was something that God granted
him to do in the moment and in the place of that reality. Why? So that you and I could
read it today and be encouraged. Not that we want to be like Abraham.
Not that we want the faith of Abraham. See, this is a misapplication
of the biblical narrative. Oh, I want to be, I think even
Brother Trey talked about it a little bit on Sunday, preaching
out of Philemon. Everybody's like, I want to be
like Paul, or I don't want to be like Paul. You're going to be
how God's called you to be. And you're going to have what God's
called you to have. And you're going to suffer as God has ordained
for you to suffer. And you're going to cry out as God's ordained
you to cry out. And as His child, you are going
to be brought through it for His glory. So we don't need to
say, well, I want to be like Paul, or I want to be like John,
or I want to be like Jesus, or I want to be like Peter. That's
what's wrong with the evangelical world today, is everybody's trying
to replicate the acts of the apostles. Well, guess what? There
are no apostles. Quit trying to make-believe.
You're playing Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood, but Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood
has more sense than you do, because he actually has a good story
behind what he's done in make-believe. We try to become this, or become
that, or we want to be like Jeremiah. You don't want to be like Jeremiah.
Jeremiah didn't want to be like Jeremiah. God made Jeremiah,
Jeremiah, and caused him to suffer like Jeremiah. That's why he's
called the weeping prophet, because he never stopped crying. He had
a hard life. But you know, in all my years
in full-time ministry, whatever that looks like, what's part-time
ministry? I've never figured that out. And all my years in
ministry, which aren't long, over two decades, but it's not
long. I've got a long way to go, Lord willing. I've never
heard anybody say to me, you know, pastor, I want you to pray
for me. I just feel called to be like Jonah. I want to be like Jonah. I want
to run from God and make him make me do what he wants me to
do. You know, I want to be like Esau. Do you? That's not even a good comparison.
Do you get the point? Nobody does. Everybody wants
to be a hero. Friends, there are no heroes in the Christian
faith. I love church history. It irritates me to death. I used
to love to hear, and I still do, I love the accounts of the
martyrs. I love to read their words and
I love present day martyrs and I've read their words and I've
seen Pauline style vernacular in their writings. I've heard
the words of men who were incarcerated for no reason because of their
faith, whose families were destroyed, whose families were actually
killed. because of the gospel, and I've heard them out of their
mouths proclaim the glory of God and the glory of Christ in
it. But these people are not getting up every day saying,
I want to be like this, I want a ministry like this, I want
to do... They're doing as a nothing the nothingness of proclaiming
the One who is everything. And God is establishing them
upon the earth for His namesake. The church growth movement in
the early 90s was some of the most deplorable demonic expressions
of misappropriation of the biblical text that I've ever seen in the
context of pragmatism. And if you don't know what I
just said, people playing games using the Bible so they can get
rich and get big and popular. And it's very easy to get plugged
into some of these things and fall prey to some of these things.
And the point that I'm making, as you'll see in a moment when
my head comes back around to the text, is that We have called
faith everything but what it actually is, to the point that
we've even mistaken faith with faithfulness. When true faith
doesn't look at the faithfulness of oneself, or one's brothers
and sisters, or one's ministry, or one's standing in the world,
or one's financial ability, or one's health. But true faith
doesn't rest in any of those things, but true faith rests
even by a toenail hanging on to dear life by the edge of the
whiteness of your nails in the one who is and the only one who
is faithful. His name is Jesus. That's the point. And some people have strong faith,
they have a resolve that never quits. Oh my goodness, you're
missing both of your legs. Yeah, I was walking the dog last
night. Somebody came by, chopped them off. The dog still went
potty. We never quit, praise God. How'd
you do it? Guy walking by with a skateboard
said, dude, you need my skateboard. He wheeled on home, quarterized
him on the fire, did some barbecue for my children. I'll be fine.
I don't want to be that guy. But that's what we want to do.
Come to this place, he's not going to be shaking. There's
nothing but a flesh wound, they say. Oh, it's okay. You get the
reference. Thank you. That might have been
inappropriate. I don't know. Thank you. I appreciate you being so strong
in the faith, but that's not all of us. And then you got some
people over here, they get a hangnail. Not because they're hanging on
for dear life, but because they're trying to not do anything to move. And they chip their nail on the
car. They're like, ah, the world is coming to an end. The sky
is falling. Everything's on fire. Ah! No, the hair dryer's on too
hot. Oh, I'm sorry. I thought the world was on fire.
And you got that person, that guy, drying his hair, and this
guy over here, on a skateboard losing limbs for Jesus and no
problem. And you got all the rest of us
in the middle. And we all feel like we want to be this guy,
but we really don't want to lose our limbs. You know how this
person is established by the Lord to be able to suffer under
that is because that's what God has ordained for him. So he gives
him the grace to rest under that type of suffering. This person
over here, God's just trying to promote the discipline of
getting up in the morning and reading the Bible. So all they
can handle is a hangnail in the carpet. And they're not a worse
Christian or better Christian, worse Christian or better Christian.
The problem is we have gauged faith by that. And then we chastise the saints
when they don't have enough. Listen, I have never. No, that's
a stupid thing to say, I have rarely ever doubted the existence
of God. I can't remember ever doing that,
but I'm not going to say never, because I probably have. And
I have no recollection of ever doubting the fact that the Bible
is telling the truth about Jesus. I've never remember a time when
I've wondered if I were safe in the Lord Jesus Christ. But
I have wondered if I was in the Lord Jesus. You see the difference? If I am in Him, I'm safe, but
am I in Him? Was His death for me? Was it
effective? See, that's where a lot of the
questions I get throughout the week, throughout the year. I
get that question a lot. How can I know that I really
have faith? Well, Jesus expresses it this way, and I know I'm not
really into this yet because we got a lot of weeks ahead of us
to deal with this. I want to deal with it slowly, but I want
us to get us in the right mindset. What Paul has done is he said
this. He said, you have a living hope. You have a hope. Let us hold fast to the confession
of our hope. So there's some words that are
synonymous in Paul's language. Hope, confidence, rest. You see, Jesus uses this language,
eating. drinking, following. See, all
these verbs that come together and all of these descriptive
words that help establish what faith looks like, they all come
to one thing. It's that there is a confidence
that comes with the work of God in the life of His people when
they are taught and know the gospel. And the confidence is
then at war with what? The flesh. Because the Spirit
of God grants faith. The Spirit of God gifts faith. See, faith is not hearing a whole
line of things, a whole list of facts, a whole checklist of
propositions, and going, I believe that, I believe that, oh, no,
I don't believe that. It's like the federal forum before
you get a firearm. If you check yes on any of those
questions, you don't get your gun. Have you ever renounced
your United States citizenship? Nope. Have you ever been upset
with the government? Nope. Have you ever stuck your
tongue out at a police officer? Nope. I mean, you know, never,
never. Because you say, absolutely,
sorry, the sale's over. Lose your mind. We don't come
to the place where we think sometimes. We believe all the right stuff,
so we're safe. Because how far does that last
when you fall down the stairs? And I'm saying that in a euphemistic
sense. When you're falling down ten
flights of stairs, oh Lord Jesus help me, you're crying out for
help. Because that's what we do in our vernacular. Even unbelievers
call it out on the roller coaster, oh God help me. And we're falling
and we don't know what's going on. At that moment, the academic
sessions of our intellectual faith are not in view. Now, what
is the falling down the stairs? You just name it. What's going
on in your life that feel like you're about to fall down some
stairs? Is it overload at school? Is it overload at work? Is it
overload at home? Is it overload in your head? Is it overload
with your body? Is it overload in your pocketbook or lack of
overload? What is it? Is it your neighbor? Is it your
dog? Is it your psychology? Is it your mental health? I've
heard the word mental health five billion times in the last
48 hours. Mental health, mental health.
I mean, you know, hey, how about the new Cheetos? Check your mental
health. I mean, really? I mean, we're worried about mental
health in America for the first time ever. Why's that? Because people are
home thinking too much. It's like the holidays, you know,
in ministry, especially in the larger churches where there's
always something going on and there's five billion people singing
with the holidays and everybody coming to listen to it and all
this kind of stuff. And I always used to think it was strange
when during Christmas season, especially in New Year's, there
were always a lot, and when I say a lot, instead of one or two
a week, it was like seven to eight a week of marital calls,
marriage counseling, Relationship counseling. I'm not kidding.
One a day at best on a good week during the holidays. And I used
to think in my younger days, what is going on around me? These people, what is wrong?
Christmas is terrible. It's not the holiday. It's the
fact they're off work staying at home together. It's the nature
of humanity. When they're together, they hate
each other. That's it. People that you only
see once a year, a day is about all you need with them. Not a
month. Hey, I'm off school. I'm staying
for four weeks. No, you're not. You know, first
weekend, everything's good. Second weekend, I hate your guts.
And that's what happens. And I sort of came. I mean, it
took about my 12th, 13th year of ministry to figure that out.
This is a people problem. This isn't a culture problem.
This isn't a holiday issue. The devil's not working hard
at Christmas. They're just together. That's the point. They're just
together. And that's what happens. We get together. And our sin
comes and gets us. And we aren't together. We have
issues no matter what they are in any season of life, and it
never fails. It always seems like a lack of
faith. It always is pointed to like
a lack of faith. Whatever we're going through,
what is it always pointed to, well, you just don't believe
enough. Well, here's a quick end of sermon point that I'll
do right here in the middle. The way we approach these issues
in life, the way we're going to survive economic failure,
pandemics, relationship issues, death, is to know the gospel. and to know it well, and to remind
ourselves of it daily, and to encourage each other in it, and
to put ourselves in a place of busyness through that encouragement
and taking care of the needs of those around us because of
the gospel so that our minds don't have time to become selfish. You hearing me? Because that's
the root of a lack of faith. For the believer, that's what
happens. We get selfish. What was the
point of this letter? That these Christians who were
Jewish by birth were being tempted culturally by other Jews who
were practicing Judaism to come back into the fold of the shadow
and grab hold of the hand of the shadow on the wall. And Paul's saying, Jesus has
this has disfinished. Jesus has done this for you.
You need to rest not in the shadow, but in the true hand of God.
Now, what's the next question? How do I take hold of the hand
of God? And the answer is in this text.
God took hold of you. He put you on his son and he
nailed his son to the cross, destroying the hostility. and He raised him from the dead
and promised you the same life. You've seen it, you know it,
rest in it. That's the first grade lesson. You tell a child there's a monster
under the bed, they won't sleep for weeks. You tell me there's
a monster under the bed, I'm like, why are you bothering me?
I was asleep. We have childlike faith when
it comes to things when we're children. We have adult-like
faith, we have adult-like wisdom and reason when we grow up, but
we treat Jesus as something that we have to come to on our own
terms, including how we believe. And how we believe is the work
of God. How we believe is knowing what the scripture says concerning
Him. And we come to that realization because God the Father grants
us. He gifts us that faith. We know that we are justified,
that we are righteous, that we are perfect before the Father.
And there is no way the Father will ever, ever, ever condemn
us. He will never destroy us. He
will never punish us because Christ was punished in our place.
So in that We rest, but then what happens? The flesh comes
alive, just like with these Jews. They became selfish. Instead
of resting in Christ, they were worried about what they weren't
doing for the sake of themselves. Now, it's not downright selfishness
like what we would define it, but that's what it is. Selfishness
as an introspective, as in self-serving, something that I'm going to worry
about. Somebody come to me and said, I need to be circumcised.
Oh, no, I better get on it because I don't want to displease the
Lord. So I'm thinking about myself. What am I not doing? I'm not
loving the Lord at the moment. I'm also not serving you because
I'm more concerned about my spiritual well-being before the Father
than I am about the obedience to the command of loving you
from the Father. You see? It's not rocket science. It's very simple. I am not an
intelligent person. But the reading of this text
over and over again, it just simply states these things. And
when we put it in congruence with each other, when the synergy
of the New Testament begins to unfold, it's just one big metanarrative
that started with Genesis that's the same thing that God's been
revealing to His elect people since the foundation of creation.
And that is this. I got this. And I got you. And you can't screw it up. And
you can't make it. Relax. Just rest. Just rest. I remember when, I've even told
this story before, when Grace, at the peak of her traumatic
asthma, I mean, coughing up blood like a horror story. I've shared
that with some of you. And Robin and I were just so
prepared for that. Didn't freak us out, we just
did it. Gentleman was with us one night after the episode of
exorcism. We're wiping blood off the walls
and the floor and the carpet shampoos out. We're just sort
of chill. And there's this child, bloodied
clothes laying in the floor, wrapped up in a blanket. And
this guy goes, I'm about to die. How did y'all handle that? Y'all
stayed so calm. It's normal. It's normal. Doesn't mean that it wasn't exciting,
exhilarating, scary, frightening, horrifying. It's just what we
do. This is what we do, this is what
we have to do. It's what we do. We're at rest in the midst of
the circumstance because we know eventually, the first time it
happened, mm-mm. Second time it happened, okay.
Third time it happened, okay, we got this. See, Christ, once
and for all, died for us. God, once and for all, put forth
Christ to satisfy his own justice. He's promised us that. He's shown
us that. He's revealed that to us by faith,
through the Spirit, that when we hear the record of the text,
we go, yes, this is my hope. He is my hope. He is my hope.
So, we got to do it enough to where we are what? We are content. And when we misstep and when
we trip over our flesh trying to get to righteousness, We're
trying to work around the cross and we don't know that we're
doing that. Believers do that, beloved. Elect people who are
called of God and saved, people who are born of the Spirit, do
this. Otherwise we wouldn't have Hebrews,
we wouldn't have Galatians, we wouldn't have these texts correcting
the church, we wouldn't have the rebuke and the instruction. But what does the enemy say?
The enemy lies, and that's what he does. He's the father of lies.
He lies and tells us that our faith isn't sufficient. Well,
how does Jesus, this is where I was going with all this. How
does Jesus describe what faith is enough? He uses the greatest
illustration of that time. We would have to do something
different. We would have to say, all you need is the faith of
an electron. And you could stand over there
and you could talk to that universe and say, be gone. And it could
be gone. See, the mountain was the biggest
thing that the first century world could fathom physically
with their eyes. And a mustard seed was the smallest
thing that they could understand with the naked eye. We can see
inside the molecules of carbon. We can see the composition of
what creates an atom with our naked eye. Of course, we use
technology to do it, but we can look at it on a screen. and capture
that and look at it and peek into the individual essence of
that thing. And we know that if we take away
some of that, it kills the cell. We know what happens when we
split one of those suckers. It's a wonderful fire. And the largest thing that we
could think of would be like the universe. So we could think
about a section of the universe, like another galaxy, maybe. And
so the faith of an electron, the size of an electron, the
vastness of an electron can say to the vast universe or galaxy
over there, be gone, and it vanishes. This is the example. This is
an illustration. This is not a doctrinal teaching.
Just like Acts is not a standard of living for the church today
or for evangelism or for apostolic work. It's just a history of
it. Jesus speaking this way is saying,
when you have faith, it rests in something significantly greater
than everything else that you can see. Faith rests and faith
is always alone in its subject. I want you to hear that. We have
the solas on the wall over there, historical mantras. And solos Christus. in Christ
alone. Faith alone. Sola Fide. Faith alone in Christ alone,
no matter how small it is, is still only, listen to this, is
still only Jesus. It's still only, it's only Jesus. And if you have faith in only
Jesus, no matter how weak it may be, it's still faith alone
in Jesus. And what fights that is the flesh
that comes and rises up and aggravates and tries to usurp that God-granted
hope, that God-granted confidence. And when does confidence wane?
When we sin willfully, when we avoid the assembly, when we neglect
to be together as some are in the habit of doing, as Paul has
already said. When we listen to the voices of those well-meaning,
unconverted religious Christians who would say, well, you've got
to do this and you need to do that, and a real Christian would
vote this way. That's demonic, by the way. Not only is it demonic, it's
unloving. and it's divisive. It's up there with the heresy
that you'd warn once and then you'd warn again and you'd kick
them out of the church, that type of thing. Quit. You might say,
as a Christian, I feel convicted in this way, but you cannot say
a real Christian will. Let what belongs to Caesar go
to Caesar. Give him the vote. It's all in
the hand of sovereign God, right? Or sometimes it's a statute of
righteousness, or it's a statute of social pressure, or it's hatred,
or it's frustration. See, when I talk about frustration,
I've said this to some of you over the last few weeks, I'm
really saying anger. But when I say anger, people
think uncontrolled anger, or fits of rage, or things like
that, which would disqualify me until I got that under control.
That's not what I mean, but anger is the root of my sin. And sometimes even if it's biblically
derived anger, I see the word and I see this junk and that
makes me angry. But I don't have the right to
become angry to the point that it begins to mess with my hope,
my confidence. Because when I'm focusing on
that which needs to be fixed, I'm forgetting that God has established
that mess that He's not going to fix, but He has fixed something,
and He's affixed my eternal destiny through the finished work of
Jesus. And so in that alone, no matter how small, I mean,
if it's a little bit of a scraping under my fingernail of faith,
that's sufficient because it's all that I have. He is all that
I have. Peter expresses it this way,
and then I'll be done, and then we'll get back into Hebrews.
Blessed be the God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. According
to His great mercy, He has caused us to be born again. Now listen
to that. He has caused us to be born again
to a living hope. Through the resurrection of Jesus
Christ from the dead. To an inheritance that is imperishable,
undefiled, and unfading. that is kept in heaven for you,
you who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation
that is ready to be revealed in the last days. So as I start, as I finish this
message to start this little mini-series, probably seven,
eight weeks on faith, we know that faith produces something.
More than what it is, is who it looks to. And then that looking
produces something. And here's something that Peter
says. Through, let's see who we are. Kept in heaven you, who
by God's power are being guarded through faith for salvation,
ready to be revealed the last time. In this hope you rejoice. And this is where you usually
get pushed back when you're telling people you need to rejoice by faith in the finished
work of Jesus. You don't understand what I'm
going through. What the Jews of the dispersion did. Peter's
writing to his brothers and sisters here. Though now for a little while,
in this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary.
You have been grieved by various trials. Why? So that the genuineness
of the tested genuineness of your faith, which is more precious
than gold that perishes when tested by fire. You can burn
gold. That the tested genuineness of your faith may be found to
result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus
Christ. And what's the obvious question
there when we're going through the dumps? Well, that could be
forever. When's he coming now? I want
him tomorrow. You know, when you have a bad
day emotionally, a bad day physically, it, you know, the day of judgment
is something you'd really want. Peter answers him, though you
have not seen him. See, these Christians have never seen Jesus.
He ascended, and then they were preached to, and then God saved
His people. Though you have not seen Him,
you love Him. Keep that in your mind, because
Paul's already said, this is just congruent synergy with the
letter to the Hebrews, I promise you. Though you do not see Him,
you love Him. Though you have not seen Him. Though you do not now see Him,
You believe in Him. You have a faith in who He is. You have a faith in what He accomplished.
You have a faith and confidence with what He did for you. And
in Him you believe and you rejoice with a joy. And see, there's
the next thing. I don't have much joy. Peter
answers that too. This is so wise, y'all. A joy
that is often inexpressible. The face looks like this. The
heart looks like this. The body is being destroyed,
the soul is exalting, filled with glory, which obtains
the outcome of your faith, which is the salvation of your soul.
It's what we're looking for, not what we're looking at. It's
important. And you might think, well, how
do I love the Lord? Love His people. Tend to one
another, Peter's saying. You love the Lord, you're suffering,
go serve somebody. You're upset, go serve somebody.
You're broken, be somebody's service. That's it. The old adage, the idle hands
are the devil's workshop. Idle minds are his playground. Idle lives are his Blueprints. Faith, Hebrews 11 is the assurance
of things hoped for. The conviction of things not
seen. That's what we've talked about
tonight. The question is, what are you looking at? Look to Christ, the founder and
perfecter of our faith. Don't look to Sinai. Don't look
to the problems. Don't look to the practices.
Don't look to the flesh. Don't look at your motives. Of
course we guard these things and check these things and evaluate
these things. But we look to Christ. And now,
for thirty How many verses? Forty. Well, 39 verses now. Paul is going to give an example
after example after example of what this looks like. And you're
going to be very surprised that none of the true heroes of the
faith are here as we would know them. These weren't faithful people.
They rested in a faithful Savior. Thus, all that they did was by
faith. Let's pray. We thank you, Lord,
for the time to be in this word. Father, for giving me clarity
as much as I have, to be able to understand it and to explain
it, to see the narrative of this New Testament writings and how
they work lockstep with each other, how all this is true and
nothing is changed. Father, as your Word teaches,
you are the same today, yesterday, and forever. That Jesus Christ
and His work on the cross is sure and certain and true. Lord, give us the drive in the
midst of uncertain times, when we lack confidence, to rest. Help us to quit looking at ourselves
and what we need, and what we want, and what we deserve, and
how we should have more, or have it better, or have it differently,
and help us to begin to rejoice in the love that you've given
us through Jesus Christ, and in that, Lord, help us to serve
one another through the power of Christ. And that we would
take all of our thoughts and we would turn them to prayers,
and that we would talk to you and trust in you sufficiently
as our great Heavenly Father. who gives us all good things.
And Lord, that we would also not give up. And know that no
matter how hard we want to, that You have kept us and that You
are guarding us. And at the end of it all, a molecular-sized
faith carries us all the way home. It's not our works. that satisfy You, Father. Though
they please You, they do not satisfy You. Father, it is the works of Christ
on the cross. So in Him we rest, in Him we
find our being, in Him we remain. In His name we pray. Amen.