), This was an exercise of his faith. (2.) For without faith it is impossible to please God. Euripides said: "Envy is the greatest of all diseases among men." (4.) You, as a Christian, ought to have the calm settled consciousness that God, looking on you, discerns not one spot or stain, but only the blood of Jesus Christ His Son that cleanses from all sin. Here observe, 1. For assuredly if Jewish children honoured their father and mother on legal grounds, much more ought Christian children on grounds of grace. Isaac was willingly submissive to the father's will.For three days they journeyed from Hebron, and in the mind of Abraham, for those three days his son Isaac was dead, because he knew that God had required that he offer him as a sacrifice in the place that He would show him. As far as the soul is concerned, Christ would not go up to heaven until sin was abrogated before God. He gave his promise to never leave us. 3. Smegma Oriental. The sacrifices that they made were all made in faith as they looked forward to the sacrifice that God would one day make when He would send His only begotten Son. (iii) There came the day when Moses, because of his intervention on behalf of his people, had to withdraw from Egypt to Midian ( Exodus 2:14-22). It begins with Abel, one of the first saints, and the first martyr for religion, of all the sons of Adam, one who lived by faith, and died for it, and therefore a fit pattern for the Hebrews to imitate. All that are effectually called resign up their own will and wisdom to the will and wisdom of God, and it is their wisdom to do so; though they know not always their way, yet they know their guide, and this satisfies them. The other descendants of Abraham honoured the house of Aaron as Levitical priests; but Abraham himself, and so Levi himself, and of course Aaron, in his loins honoured Melchisedec. How great a temptation Moses was under. Here he is in the midst of a great revival. James ( James 2:25) quotes her as a great example of the good works which demonstrate faith. It is possible for a person to be victorious over the enemy, to wax valiant in battle, to subdue the aliens, but it is also possible for the man of faith to be tortured for his faith. But then comes far more definite instruction, and, beginning with Abraham, the details of faith. Here consider. His goodness consisted in the fact that he took God at his word. Bishop Newbigin tells of the negotiations which led to the formation of the United Church of South India. It is the assembly composed of certain individuals that make it up, regarded either as brethren, as in the second chapter ("In the midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee"), or as the church of the first-born ones, as in Hebrews 12:1-29, persons who drew their title from Christ the first-born Heir. A true believer is desirous, not only to be in covenant with God, but in communion with the people of God, and is willing to cast in his lot with them, and to fare as they fare. [2.] It is the most beautiful adventure in life." Thus the only time when he comes into notice he is acting in the double capacity here spoken of: King of righteousness as to his name, King of Salem as to his place, blessing Abraham on his return from the victory over the kings of the Gentiles in the name of the Most High God, and blessing the Most High God the possessor of heaven earth in the name of Abraham. You remember, though, that Sarah's faith wasn't always so perfect. Here we have the faith of a leader and of a people who were prepared to attempt the impossible at the command of God, realizing that the greatest barrier in the world is no barrier if God be there to help us overpass it. Another story tells that, after he had been forewarned by God, Noah made a bell of plane wood, about five feet high, and that he sounded it every day, morning, noon and evening. Take care of that first and then come and offer your gift unto the Lord." God said to first deal with the sin. 1. The writer to the Hebrews uses three vivid Greek words about them. At that moment Moses might have gone on but his people were not ready. III. Sometimes a man may have to sacrifice personal relationships. The actings of their faith during this imperfect state of things. Sometimes, not always, the countenance is the index of the mind. (Compare Acts 15:22.) (6.) This was an effectual call, by which he was converted from the idolatry of his father's house, ; Genesis 12:1. The second brother they bound to the catapults. His birth was long beyond any natural possibility for birth, and so he was in a sense received from the dead, a miracle child to begin with. He sacked the Temple. He is the same unchangingly and evermore, as He has ever been. They know that they cannot explain the existence of the world solely by reasoning from the things that can be seen (11:1-3). Seeing Abraham afar off, and Lazarus there being comforted in Abraham's bosom, said, 'Father Abraham, send Lazarus to me, that he might take his finger and dip it in water, and touch my tongue; for I am tormented in this heat.' By faith the walls of Jericho fell down, after they were compassed about for seven days ( Hebrews 11:30 ). Let us hold fast the profession of our hope [for so it should be] without wavering (for he is faithful that promised); and let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works: not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching." The third point is how to walk with God, and this again is by faith. But this shows the main object of the Spirit of God in directing us for the type that applies to the believer now to an unsettled pilgrim-condition, not to Israel established in the land of promise. He was sold into Egypt. (2.) At any time it is an unhappy thing to be a stranger in a strange land, but in ancient days to this natural unhappiness there was added the bitterness of humiliation. (3.) Instead of pining after that which is about to be destroyed, or repining at the call to go out to the place of Christ's shame on earth, Christianity, which replaces Judaism now, may well cause us to offer "the sacrifice of praise to God continually." This is life itself, and to the Hebrews blood always stood for life. in the other scale the best of the world, and in his judgment, directed by faith, the worst of religion weighed down the best of the world. These are the positive sides to faith: the subduing of kingdoms, obtaining the promises, stopping the mouths of lions, quenching the violence of fire, made strong out of their weakness, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens and women receiving their dead to life again.But the man of faith can also know defeat and discouragement. Would he give up the one that was the type of the true Seed, the progenitor, and the channel of the promised blessing, yea, of the Blesser? One man meets a friend. like pilgrims who need a word of encouragement; Hebrews encourages us to listen to the Word of God revealed in the Son of God, Jesus. Their own Psalm, in its grand prophetic sweep, and looking back on the law, pointed to the place in which Christ is now seated above; and where it is of necessity He should be, in order to give Christianity its heavenly character. And so I believe in the magnetic powers or the magnetic force, but I have never seen it. The story of their action is told in Exodus 2:1-10. None but a heavenly Priest would suffice for the counsels He has in hand. When he dwelt in Mesopotamia, he had a promise to bring him into Canaan; and when he got there, he had a promise of what was higher to lead his heart above. God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect ( Hebrews 11:40 ). Thus another and a higher priesthood was incontestably acknowledged by the father of the faithful. Do you not discern in this striking combination the distinctive features of Christianity? (a) In Hebrews 11:13 he calls them xenoi ( G3581) . And to be absent from this body is to be present with the Lord.Shall we pray.Thank you, Father, for all that You have done for us. Do I have the faith, the quality of faith that endures? Lord, we pray that You will continue the work of Your Spirit within our hearts as we yield ourselves to You, to walk in fellowship with You through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, to live in that hope of eternal life in and through Him. Again he insists upon the honour and purity of the marriage tie, and the abhorrence that God has for those that despise and corrupt it, and the sure judgment which will come upon them. He demonstrates its vicarious nature and value from the sacrifices so familiar to all then, and to the Jew particularly, in connection with the covenant that required them Now his rapid mind seizes, under the Spirit's guidance, the other well-known sense of the word, namely, as a testamentary disposition, and shows the necessity of Christ's death to bring it into force. She dressed in all her finery, persuaded her people to let her out of the town and went straight to the camp of the Assyrians. 2. (iii) Some have seen in death sheer extinction. 1. i Apud Hottinger. The actings of Abraham's faith in so great a trial: he obeyed; he offered up Isaac; he intentionally gave him up by his submissive soul to God, and was ready to have done it actually, according to the command of God; he went as far in it as to the very critical moment, and would have gone through with it if God had not prevented him. In the best of us there is a certain timorousness. How Abraham lived in Canaan, not as heir and proprietor, but as a sojourner only. The story of Samson is in Judges 13:1-25; Judges 14:1-20; Judges 15:1-20; Judges 16:1-31. But here he was seeking communion with God when sin was in his heart. . (Hebrews 9:15). "This corruption must put on incorruption, this mortal must put on immortality" ( 1 Corinthians 15:53 ). (3.) in forgetting, and in despising. If faith can see every step of the way, it is not really faith. Thus, writes William Lincoln, while surrounded by Egypts pomp and splendor, his heart was not there at all, but with his people in their future glory and blessing. BBC, And gave commandment concerning his bones - Genesis 50:25. Scripture Hebrews 11 Sort Bible Verse Sermon The Danger of Dull Hearing Apr 10, 1988 Scripture: Hebrews John Piper Sermon What Faith Knows and Hopes For Jun 1, 1997 Scripture: Hebrews 11:1-3 John Piper Sermon Without Faith It Is Impossible to Please God Jun 8, 1997 Scripture: Hebrews 11:4-6 John Piper Conference Message h T. Bab. In the Letter of Aristeas the writer says: "It is a fine thing to live and to die in one's native land; a foreign land brings contempt to poor men and shame to rich men, for there is the lurking suspicion that they have been exiled for the evil they have done." Given after Isaac had said: "Behold. Two Horizons Commentary Sale. There is nothing here below so difficult for the natural mind; and for the simple reason that man can never rise above that which is caused. The Jews would not have Him living. Who ever walked in faith as He? FAITH AND ITS SECRET ( Hebrews 11:23-29 ). Shakespeare in one of his sonnets cried: "Tir'd with all these, for restful death I cry.". Sin is now put away; the sacrifice is complete. For everyone at some time there comes something for which there seems to be no reason and which defies explanation. 3. God's message might look foolishness at the moment; but Noah believed it and staked everything on it. (5.) because God had some better plan for us, that they, without us, should not find all his purposes fulfilled. Isaac has to have children, because God has to keep His word. Then comes forth the wondrous counsel that was settled before either the sin of man, or the promises to the fathers, or the law which subsequently put man to the test. He leaves an influence of good or ill; every one when he dies still speaks. By faith we may see this invisible God. Stevenson tells of an old byreman who spent all his days amidst the muck of the byre. For indeed He was a man as really as any other, though infinitely above man. It was a figure and earnest of the glorious resurrection of all true believers, whose life is not lost, but hid with Christ in God. And a lot has been made over that. With only three hundred men Gideon won a victory over the Ammonites in days when they had terrorized Israel, a victory which went ringing down the centuries. The trial and exercise of Abraham's faith; he was tried indeed. Joseph, when he died , When he was dying, gave commandment concerning his bones. He prophesied that they should be blessed; but, as Isaac did before, so now Jacob prefers the younger, Ephraim; and though Joseph had placed them so, that the right hand of his father should be laid on Manasseh, the elder, Jacob wittingly laid it on Ephraim, and this by divine direction, for he could not see, to show that the Gentile church, the younger, should have a more abundant blessing than the Jewish church, the elder. And declaring, basically, that if it were offered properly it would have been accepted; if his heart was right.There has been a lot made over the fact that one was a blood sacrifice and the other was not a blood sacrifice, but an offering of the fruit of the ground. (2.) ( 1 Corinthians 15:55 ) Jesus has removed the sting of death by taking away our sin. And after the second veil, the tabernacle which is called holy of holies; which had the golden censer, and the ark of the covenant overlaid round about with gold." So as Jesus said to Martha grieving over her brother Lazarus, "If you live and believe in Me, you will never die." What, then, is man's actual estate? Their faith was a faith of consent. But having done this, He points us to the place of Christ without the camp. "Ya." Popilius and Antiochus met on the boundaries of Egypt. He presses a conversation without covetousness, and a spirit of content, founded on our confidence in the Lord's care. Upon his mind; it impressed his soul with a fear of God's judgment: he was. The writer to the Hebrews reads into the simple statement of the Old Testament passage the idea that Enoch did not die at all but that in some mystic way God took him to himself. The supports of Abraham's faith (; Hebrews 11:10): He looked for a city that hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. But now they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city ( Hebrews 11:16 ). His finger was burnt; he put the burnt finger in his mouth and burnt his mouth; that, they say, was why he was not a good speaker ( Exodus 4:10) but stammered all his life. (1. He knew that in Isaac his seed was to be called. If in these two verses we bear in mind that it really means "testament," growing out of the previous mention of the "inheritance," I am persuaded that you will have better understanding of the argument. And you feel the wind. Or it is held that the point of the story is that it was in this way that Abraham learned that God did not desire human sacrifice. They had looked for advance and triumph and peace and prosperity everywhere; on the contrary, they had come into reproach and shame, partly in their own persons, partly as becoming the companions of others who so suffered. Offer it on the altar." It was by faith that Joseph, as he came to the end, had his mind the days when the children of Israel would leave Egypt, and gave instructions concerning his bones. The method prescribed seemed very improbable to answer such an end, and would doubtless expose them to the daily contempt of their enemies; the ark of God would seem to be in danger. It is the setting aside of God, and the setting up of man; it is the precursor of the apostasy that is coming, which again will issue in man taking the place of God, and becoming the object of worship, instead of the true Creator. Like Abraham he has to go out not knowing where he is going. They were stoned; they were sawn asunder; they underwent every kind of trial; they died by the murder of the sword. When it says that Abraham looked for the city, it means a blessed and ordered scene of glory on high, which eclipsed the Holy Land before his eyes. By this 29 th verse, his recounting has already lifted up Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham and his family, and Moses. God cannot give us the vision unless we permit him; but if we wait upon him, even in earth's desert places be will send us the vision and with it the toil and trouble of the way become all worth while. So little was it a question, that our Lord could appeal to its acknowledged meaning, and press the difficulty His person created for unbelief. [5.] Our failure and our fear are so often due to the fact that we try to do things alone. "If therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood, (for under it the people received the law,) what further need was there that another priest should rise after the order of Melchisedec, and not be called after the order of Aaron?" If it be not the truth, it would be the height of presumption indeed. (7.) He even commanded them to take his bones with them when they left. The allusion in the last clause to the eternal inheritance (for everything is eternal in the Hebrews, standing in decided contrast with Jewish things which were but for a season) leads the Holy Spirit to take up the other meaning of the same word, which was and is rightly enough translated covenant. He may feel called by God to a task in a sphere which is difficult and in a place that is unattractive and it may be that the girl he is to marry will not face it with him. There is something of permanent greatness here. To such death is the adventure of supreme discovery. Paul, in writing to the Corinthians, said, "The gospel that I declared unto you, how that Christ died according to the scriptures, and was buried according to the scriptures, and rose again the third day according to the scriptures" ( 1 Corinthians 15:1-4 ). (2.) He had some success; there were those who were willing to accept Greek culture, Greek drama, Greek athletics. He has so absolutely swept it away for those who believe on Him, that when He comes again, them will be no question of judgment, as far as they are concerned, but only of salvation, in the sense of their being cleared from the last relic or result of sin, even for the body. You see the evidence of it, and thus, we believe in the wind, though we don't actually see the wind itself.Magnetic force--I believe in it, but I've never seen it. "For this he did once, when he offered up himself. For, [1.] Well, she was eavesdropping over in the tent, listening to what the Lord was saying to Abraham. Here were two persons, brethren, both of whom went in to worship God, and yet there was a vast difference. It is that which infinitely exceeds the deliverance out of Egypt, or any ceremonial atonement ever wrought by a high priest for Israel. All the effort of Christendom is first to deny the one, and then to escape from the other. (2.) The Jews themselves found the story puzzling and elaborated it in order to find a reason for God's rejection of Cain and for Cain's murder of Abel. So he knelt down and adored the moon. We can understand, therefore, both the delicacy that thus entreated them, and the meaning of the added words, "for also in few words I have written to you." He may live as if that message is of no importance or as if it is the most important thing in the world. There are those who seek to be righteous by their faith in the Lord and those who seek to be righteous by their works. The actings of Noah's faith, and the influence it had both upon his mind and practice. Jacob had the precedency and the principal blessing, which shows that it is grace and the new birth that exalt persons above their fellows and qualify them for the best blessings, and that it is owing to the sovereign free grace of God that in the same family one is taken and another left, one loved and the other hated, since all the race of Adam are by nature hateful to Godthat if one has his portion in this world, and the other in the better world, it is God who makes the difference; for even the comforts of this life are more and better than any of the children of men deserve. In the most admirable manner he proves that this was what God was all along waiting for. Therefore is it that men so naturally slip into, or rest on, second causes. He promised and He'll send His Son. Alas! The sting is gone. The Christians gained Him in a far more excellent way after the pattern of resurrection, as Abraham at the close received Isaac as it were from the dead. There are types that suit the mystery when it is revealed, but of themselves they never could make it known, though illustrating particular parts when it is. The meal offering it was called. The walls of Jericho fell before them. And he sprinkled likewise with blood both the tabernacle, and all the vessels of the ministry. Isaiah refused and was condemned to be sawn asunder with a wooden saw. It is interesting how that a person living for their own pleasure is constantly pursuing pleasure, constantly trying to find something new, something different, some new sensation. The scripture says, "So Joshua let the people depart, every man unto his inheritance" (Joshua 24:28). For there is seen not only the proof that the Messiah is the One whom God pronounced by an oath "a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec," but the glorious seat He has taken at the right-hand of God is now worked into this magnificent pleading. (vii) Some have seen death as an adventure. To every task he came out from God's presence. To us Christ is all. He now supports this statement with illustrations from the Old Testament. He had a divine revelation, whether by voice or vision does not appear; but it was such as carried in it its own evidence; he wasforewarned of things not seen as yet, that is, of a great and severe judgment, such as the world had never yet seen, and of which, in the course of second causes, there was not yet the least sign. It became us to have a Priest, "holy, harmless, undefiled, made higher than the heavens.". Observe the due regard that Abraham had to this heavenly city: he looked for it; he believed there was such a state; he waited for it, and in the mean time he conversed in it by faith; he had exalted and rejoicing hopes, that in God's time and way he should be brought safely to it. Cain said: "I have not the sense of this bird. He lived in tents. This is the meaning of the phrase, not that He will sit there throughout all eternity. He refused in anger. Above all, let them take care that they be not a shame and reproach to their God, and so provoke him to be ashamed of them; but let them act so as to be to him for a name, and for a praise, and for a glory. But not the patriarchs. But the apostle lets them know that if they understood their true blessing, this was the very part of it that was inseparably bound up with their present nearness to God, as set forth typically by the central and most important rite of the Jewish system. Jephthah was an illegitimate son; he was driven into a kind of exile and into the life of an outlaw; but when the Ammonites were putting Israel into fear, the forgotten outlaw was called back and won a tremendous victory, although his vow to God cost him the life of his daughter. Here, it is plain, we have the chief lineaments of revealed truth. Now, I don't know how God's going to do it. Her story is recounted in Joshua 2 and 6. [4.] [2.] The legends go on to tell that Terah not only worshipped twelve idols, one for each of the months, but was also a manufacturer of idols. The actings of her faith. When he was asked why, he answered: "To warn you that God will send a deluge to destroy you all." So, Philip went. Many Samaritans are believing, being baptized, being filled with the Holy Spirit. What he did by his faith: He made mention of the departing of the children of Israel, and gave commandment concerning his bones. The best way to enjoy our comforts with comfort is to resign them up to God; he will then return them, if not in kind, yet in kindness. "Inasmuch as not without an oath he was made priest: (for those priests were made without an oath" no oath ushers in the sons of Aaron "but he with an oath by him that said as to him, The Lord sware and will not repent, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec:) by so much was Jesus made a surety of a better covenant.". Now He came to set the prisoner free and to open the doors to those were captive, so that when Jesus rose, Matthew's gospel tells us in the twenty-seventh chapter, the graves of many of the saints were opened and were seen walking around the streets of Jerusalem after His resurrection.Paul tells us that when He ascended He led the captives from their captivity.
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