Let's turn tonight to Hebrews
chapter 11. I want to begin reading in verse
32 through the end of this chapter. Hebrews chapter 11. We left off last week with verse
31, thinking of how faith enables men to overcome the fear of man. The example we have here of Rahab,
how that she received the spies, even though she was wanted by
the king for receiving them into her house. But tonight, beginning
with verse 32, and what shall I more say? For the time would
fail me to tell of Gideon and Barak and of Samson and of Jephthah,
of David also and Samuel, and of the prophets, 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,
waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens,
women received their dead raised to life again, And others were
tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better
resurrection. And others had trial of cruel
mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover, of bonds and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn
asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered
about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented,
of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and
in mountains and in dens and caves of the earth. And these
all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the
promise, God having provided some better thing for us, that
they without us should not be made perfect." This chapter began
with the definition of faith. Faith is the substance of things
hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. And then the writer
says that through faith, the elders obtained a good report. And he began by naming various
elders who believed God And as we have gone through this part
of the Bible, we have seen how the faith of the ones that are
mentioned here has revealed to us various aspects of faith. We began, of course, with Abel.
And what we see with Abel, his faith, is righteousness. Righteousness. We receive Christ as our Lord
and Savior, and his righteousness is imputed unto all who believe. To the point, to this point of
our text, verse 32, he has mentioned some, he calls elders, some through
the sixth book of the Old Testament, that is through the book of Joshua. Remember, there are 25 more books
to go, 25 more books in the Old Testament besides those six To
go on in this fashion, he says, the time would fail me. The time would fail me. However,
he named several more to show what faith has enabled believers
to achieve. He was writing to those who were
familiar with the Old Testament scriptures. That's obvious as
we read the verses I just read. So he could briefly go through
these scriptures. I've preached to people that
they wouldn't have a clue as to who he has reference to in
these verses we've just read, because they're not familiar
with the Old Testament part of the scriptures. But the ones
to whom the apostle, the writer, was writing this epistle, he
knew they were familiar with the Old Testament. And so he
could briefly just skim through that part of the Word of God,
naming these various individuals, knowing that they were familiar
with them. They were familiar with the Old
Testament. But here's the problem. While being familiar with the
Old Testament, They did not understand the purpose of the Old Testament. They did not see that the Old
Testament serves as our tutor, our schoolmaster, pedagogue,
to bring us, to lead us to Christ, that we might be justified by
faith. You know, over the years, I've
seen different people, heard different ones, different things
come up, you know. They use the scriptures for various
things, things for which the scriptures were never given.
I remember back several years ago, there was a diet. If you
wanted to lose weight, they'd come up with a diet out of the
Old Testament. Now, does anyone really believe
that that's the reason the scripture was given? to give men and women
a diet in order to lose weight. And that's just one example of
the many things that people look for in the Old Testament. Rather
than see that the Old Testament, as I said, is our tutor to bring
us to Christ, to picture Christ. One of the most important lessons
I know that I have ever learned is when the Lord showed me and
taught me that the key to the Scriptures, the Old Testament
as well as the New, the key to the Scriptures is the Lord Jesus
Christ. And until a person knows that,
until that's revealed to a person, they may study the Word of God
and know much about it. the history of it, the facts
of it, the origins of men and women, the universe and all of
that. But if the word of God does not
lead us and point us to Christ, to know him, it has not served
its purpose as far as we are concerned, not for our good. It is that we might know Christ. Remember, he said this, the Lord
Jesus Christ to those that he spoke to when he was here in
the flesh, Jews, religious Jews who knew the scriptures. When I say they knew the scriptures,
I mean they, many of them knew, they could have told you how
many letters were in the Old Testament. They counted the letters
and the words. They could have told you what
was the middle verse, maybe, in every book. They studied the
scriptures for the mechanics of the word of God, we might
say. Remember what? Five years ago
when these people came out and said there was a secret to the
scriptures, you know, and you look at every fifth letter and
then jumped five more letters, I forget what the schedule was,
but foolishness, foolishness, that's all it is, a deception
of Satan. When you study the scriptures,
when you read the scriptures, look for Christ. It may be in
type, may be in shadow, but look for Christ. He said to those
people of his day, search the scriptures, for they are they
which testify of me. And that's all they had, the
Old Testament. And then that day when he was
on the road to Emmaus with those two disciples, the day of his
resurrection, You remember the scripture there tells us that
he showed them, he opened unto them all the scriptures, the
things concerning himself, concerning himself, concerning Christ. Now as we look at this passage
tonight, I want to bring a text to us from Daniel chapter 11,
verse 32, which says, the people that do know their God, shall
be strong and do exploits. Let me give that to us again.
Daniel chapter 11, verse 32. The people that do know their
God shall be strong and do exploits. I see that this is true of all
of these who are mentioned in the verses we are looking at
tonight. They were all strong strong in
faith, and they did exploits. But listen, not all in the same
way. They all were strong and did
exploits, but they did not all do exploits in the same way. And I believe there's a division. If you look at the passage we
read, verse 32, when you come down to about the middle of verse
35, it says, and others. I believe that here's a division,
a division in this passage of scripture. And so what we have
the first division, verses 33 through the first part of 35,
we see exploits of one kind. And then we'll take up there
the second division and we will see exploits of a different kind. Now the writer, he doesn't list
these Old Testament characters in chronological order. He just
lists them. He begins with Gideon. Now, what
do you think of when you hear of Gideon? Well, I believe all
of us, if we stop and think for a few minutes, we would think
about the fact that he ended up with a very small army. God whittled his army down to
300 men to fight against a large, large host of people, and yet
God gave the victory. And God told Gideon, at first
he had too many, too many soldiers. Why? Because if God gave them
the victory, and it would still be through him, they would believe
that it was their power their ability, their strength that
had won the victory. God will not share his glory
with another. And as he said, it's not by might,
it's not by power, but it is rather by my spirit. So the first one mentioned is
Gideon. The second one is Barak. who
we know God used to deliver Israel from the army of Sisera. Now,
remember Deborah, the woman judge there in the book of Judges.
She's the one who directed Barak. And he was afraid. He was afraid
to go fight without her going with him. And so Deborah told
him, A woman will get the glory. A woman will get the honor. And
you know how that turned out, how that leader, that commander
of that army they were fighting against that had Israel enslaved,
she turned into that tent, or he turned into that tent of that
woman, rather, asking for refreshment and went to sleep. And when he
did, she took the peg of the tent and drove it through his
temple. Cemented him to the ground. She
got the glory. But that was Barak. That's the
second one that he mentioned. And then Samson. Now, Samson,
when we think of him, yes, we think about his problems. But
really, we remember that in his death, And it was by faith. Remember, there he was being
made sport of by the Philistines. His eyes were put out, but his
hair began to grow again. And remember, he prayed to God.
And that man put one arm around one pillar of the temple, or
the place where they were having a big sin dig, making fun of
God and God's man. And Samson prayed unto the Lord
and God gave him his strength and he killed more of God's enemies
in his death than he had in his life. Next one is mentioned as
Jephthah, who also in the book of Judges ascribed the victory
of Israel over the Ammonites to the Lord. Then David. David is the next one mentioned
when we or introduced to him, we find that he goes out to fight
the giant, Goliath. And he went out to him with these
words to the giant. Thou comest to me with a sword
and with a spear and with a shield, but I come to thee in the name
of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom
thou hast defied. And then Samuel is mentioned,
who judged Israel faithfully for many years. And last of all,
the prophets. He brings in the prophets, those
from Samuel to John the Baptist. John the Baptist was the last
of the Old Testament prophets, but from Samuel all the way through,
all of these prophets he includes. In thinking of all these that
are mentioned, Going through this list, it would be easy.
It would be easy to point out the faults, I should say, of
every one of them. But the writer doesn't do that.
He doesn't do that. And that's typical, isn't it?
These men who are mentioned and women who are mentioned, even
though, yes, they had their faults. But by faith, they did, as the
scripture said, exploits. They achieved things. And he
mentions the things which they achieved. First of all, they
subdued kingdoms. Those that he mentioned in that
list I just went through, they subdued kingdoms. David, when
we think of subduing kingdoms, I think of David. Listen to how
many countries he conquered. He and his army. He conquered
Syria, Moab, Ammon, Amalek, Edom, and the Philistines. They conquered
subdued kingdoms, rather. Then they, number two, they brought
righteousness. True faith is always attended
with works of righteousness. Faith, true faith, is an operative
grace. And the Apostle Paul tells us
in Galatians, it is faith that worketh by love. Faith is not
dormant, is it? It's an active grace. It works,
and it works by love. And third, they obtained promises. Some of the promises which they
obtained, they obtained the land of promise, the land of Canaan.
God had promised them, and they entered in and possessed it.
He also promised the Messiah, and he promised eternal life,
and through faith they obtained the promises. And fourth, they
stopped the mouths of lions. All of these things are things
that were achieved by these men and women of faith. When I read,
stop the mouths of lions, I thought about the fact that Samson, he
was mentioned just a few minutes ago, we know he killed a lion.
David, he killed a lion. But this has to refer to Daniel. I believe it has to refer to
Daniel because of what's mentioned next. Daniel stopped the mouths
of lions. You remember it was the king,
the king who had him thrown into the lion's den, who confessed
the truth about God, that his God was able to deliver, and
did deliver, did deliver, Daniel. And then fifth, they quenched
the violence of fire. And this, of course, refers to
those three, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Last time I mentioned
those three men in a message, someone said, you had Ahab in
that list. Well, that was wrong. It wasn't
Ahab. It was Shadrach, Meshach, and
Abednego. They were thrown in to the furnace. And that furnace was heated seven
times hotter, wasn't it? And Nebuchadnezzar, he was so,
so mad, so mad. And he wanted to give them an
opportunity to recant and to bow down and worship his image. I like their answer. One of them
said, if it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us
from the burning fiery furnace. He's able. That's settled. There's no question about that.
There's nothing impossible with God. Nothing. When the angel
told Mary that she was going to have a son, of course she
was perplexed and asked, how is that possible? And of course,
it wasn't possible for anyone other than for God, by whom all
things are possible, because God is all powerful. But they answered Nebuchadnezzar,
if it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from
the burning fiery furnace, and he will. He will deliver us out
of your hand, O king. Even if the fire consumes us,
our God will deliver us out of your hand. That's all man can
do, isn't it? Our Lord said, don't fear those
who can kill the body. After that, they have no more
power, but fear him who has power after the body has died to punish
the soul in hell. And then the six women received
their dead raised to life again. I know this refers to those two
widow women. The one that was at Sarepta that
Elijah lodged with for some time. You remember after he was there,
God took her son and God raised him from the dead. And then that
woman that Elijah, I always liked that story about her because
Elisha and his servant passed by, evidently, where she and
her husband had a farm or whatever lived, and she told her husband,
that man is a man of God. We've got to do something for
him. And so they began to minister to him, finally built him a little
shed and had a table in there and a candle, remember? Every
time he passed by that way, he had spent the night. And process
of time, her son died. And the thing I think about her
faith, he died, he was with his father in the field working and
he and he had a head, he said my head and his father sent him
to his mother back at the house and, and he died. And so what
does she do? She puts him on the bed, closes
the door, Goes out to her husband, says, I need to go see the man
of God. Well, it's not time, it's not
the time. You usually see the man of God. She said, it shall
be well. And so she goes, and you remember
Gehasi was Elisha's servant, and Elisha sent him first. But no, she was not content until
Elisha himself came. And Elisha came and lay upon
the boy. And God, of course, raised him
from the dead. So that's the first division
in this passage of scripture. But as I said in verse 35, with the word and others and
others, and now those we've just gone through those names we've
just looked at and those Those deeds, those exploits were of
one kind. One kind. But now the ones he's
going to deal with, in my mind, are exploits of a different kind. Those that were listed first
that we've just gone through, we might consider them to be
more positive, more exciting. And men naturally look at them
as greater things. The exploits now have to do with
victories that were won through suffering rather than deliverance from
suffering. Look in verse 34. These here of this first division,
it says that they escaped the edge of the sword. God delivered
them from the sword. When men would have killed them,
God delivered them. But now, look down to verse 37. They were stoned, they were sawn
asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword. What a difference,
right? Some, They did exploits, and
God delivered them from the edge of the sword, but others did
exploits as well, and they felt the edge of the sword. One writer said, in terms of
faith, there's no change, but the human experience is a different
matter. And I think of this as many times
people think those that are in the limelight, so to speak. And we think about missionaries
we've all read about and heard about and, and how God used them
so greatly and they have the fame. But there may have been
people, and I know there were people who we've never heard
of. Maybe who were on a bed, never
able to even come off their beds because of sickness. And yet
they were praying for the missionary. They were giving that the missionary
might go. They did exploits as well as
the one we've heard about and know about, but they are of a
different kind. But before God, it makes no difference. God gets all the glory for both.
Now, rather than point to Old Testament examples of these verses,
let's consider these three principles. First of all, faith suffers. That's what we see about these
and this group. They had faith. They obtained
a good report. And they suffered, they suffered. Our Lord said this, in the world
you shall have tribulation. Now that's what he told his disciples.
The apostle Paul said, yea, and all that will live godly in Christ
Jesus shall suffer persecution. We know in the book of Acts when
Paul and Barnabas revisited the early churches, they did so,
the scripture says, confirming the souls of the disciples and
exhorting them to continue in the faith and that we must, through
much tribulation, enter into the kingdom of God. Look at this
verse with me, keep your places here, we'll come back in just
a moment, but look with me back to Philippians chapter 1. Philippians chapter 1 and verse
29. We all know that faith is a gift,
don't we? For by grace are you saved through
faith, and that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God. We all know
that faith is a gift. It's a grace. It's listed in
the fruit of the spirit in Galatians chapter five. Faith cometh by
hearing. All men have not faith. God gives
faith and faith latches hold or lays hold upon Christ. The important thing about faith
is the object of faith, isn't it? Faith doesn't save, Christ
saves, but yet believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt
be saved. But here in Philippians 1 in
verse 29, the apostle said, for unto you, writing to these believers
in the church at Philippi, unto you it is given in the behalf
of Christ, not only Yes, absolutely. It's given unto you to believe. Faith is a gift, but not only
to believe on him, but it's also given unto you in behalf of Christ
to suffer for his sake, to suffer for his sake. Now to suffer in
the name and character in a state or person, not as an evildoer. The Apostle Peter makes that
clear. We shouldn't suffer as if evildoers. We shouldn't bring, because of
our evil, bring suffering upon ourselves. But if a man or woman,
a boy or girl, a child of God suffers their name, their character
is maligned, their state or their person, they suffer as a Christian,
it is a gift of God. A gift of God just as faith in
Christ is a gift. All the sufferings of the saints
of God, all the sufferings of the saints of God are appointed
by God. Isn't that a blessing to know
that when you're going through trials and tribulations and suffering
for Christ's sake, that the cup that the Lord has given you to
drink, it's measured. There's not a drop in it more
than what God would have you to experience. Not a drop. Believers are called to suffer
shame for the sake of Christ. That's in high honor. It's a high honor conferred upon
God's people. All the grace and strength by
which they are supported under sufferings is from Christ. It's all given to them. And all
the glory consequent upon their sufferings, it belongs to Christ. It's not merited by them. It's the free gift of God. The apostle said, it's not only
given unto you on behalf of Christ to believe on his name, but to
suffer. So faith suffers. And number
two, look back with me here in Hebrews 11. Faith obtains a better
resurrection. Notice that in verse 35. Women receive their dead raised
to death raised to life again and others, now here we go with
the second division, others were tortured not accepting deliverance
that they might obtain a better resurrection. Now, what does
that mean a better resurrection? Well, it's better than the resurrection
of those two young men that I mentioned just a few minutes ago. That
young man that was raised during the ministry of Elijah, the one
that was raised during the ministry of Elisha, they were raised,
they were restored to their mothers. That was a blessing, no doubt.
They rejoiced, but eventually they died. They died. But the resurrection that is
a better resurrection is a resurrection that is a resurrection to immortality. Those two resurrections were
to mortality. They were still mortal. But oh,
the resurrection that you and I are going to experience if
we die before the Lord comes again is a resurrection unto
immortality. The Apostle Paul writes about
that in 1 Corinthians 15. And third, faith puts the world
to shame. That's what it says, of whom
the world was not worthy. Notice that in verse 39. Faith puts the world to shame.
The world that mocked and ridiculed those who had faith was not worthy
of them. Here they were, many of them,
it says, they were wandering about in sheepskins and goatskins,
destitute, afflicted, tormented, of whom the world was not worthy. Jesus comforted his disciples
with these words, Rejoice, and be exceedingly glad, for great
is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets
who were before you. Now all of these that we see
in these verses, they all received a good report through faith.
Notice that in verse 39, and these all These all have obtained
a good report through faith. Receive not the promise, God
having provided some better thing for us, that they without us
should not be made perfect. The better thing is not a better
eternity. It's not a better heaven. or anything like that. The better
thing here is they lived when the promise was future, the promise
of the seed of the woman coming, the promise of eternal redemption. We live after the incarnation,
the coming of the Son of God, his death upon the cross, his
resurrection, his ascension. That's the better thing that
we have received. We've seen these promises fulfilled. We live after the coming of the
Lord Jesus Christ. The Old Testament elders, along
with us, those of us who believe, who trust in Christ, are made
perfect through the perfect Savior. The same way is perfect work
of redemption. Remember reading in Exodus when
God said it must be perfect to be accepted. Must be perfect. That means you, that means me.
If we're going to be accepted with God, we must be perfect. Where does that perfection come?
How does it come? It comes in Christ, being accepted
in Him. These Old Testament elders, they
all obtained a good report through faith and the same is true of
all of us who trust in Christ as our Lord, as our Savior tonight. Let us sing a verse of a hymn
and then we'll be dismissed.