The Power of Faith

Introduction

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Throughout the history of the church teachers have tried to explain what faith is.

Rick Warren, a more modern preacher, compares faith to following a GPS—trusting God’s directions turn by turn without seeing the full route.

C.S. Lewis compared faith to a passenger trusting a pilot to fly a plane. You don’t have to understand every detail of the plane or the science behind flight in order to trust the skill and experience of the pilot.

Soren Kierkegaard, a Christian philosopher in the 19th century described faith as a leap into the unknown—trusting God despite the uncertainty and risk. This was a helpful concept in an age of skepticism and fantastic scientific discoveries.

The illustrations get more fun the farther back you go.

Mystics in the 13th and 14th centuries, like Julian of Norwich, described faith as trust in the unseen pattern of a tapestry, with God as the weaver. You might only see the messy underside, but faith trusts that there is a beautiful design that will be revealed when we get to look at the other side.

In the 12th century preachers often compared faith to a knights unwavering loyalty. This resonated with a feudal society—trusting God’s sovereignty even to death.

John Climacus from around the 7th century taught that faith is like the first rung in a ladder leading to God. It’s the initial step of trust that requires humility and commitment to ascend the ladder to heaven.

Origen, the African theologian of the 3rd century, compared faith to an athlete’s disciplined training, with an emphasis on the athlete’s effort and perseverance—a metaphor inspired by the sports culture in Rome.

Tertullian from the 2nd century likened faith to a ship enduring a storm, with God as the pilot. This image portrayed faith as steadfast trust in God to guide through persecution or trials.

Just after the disciples, in the 1st century, Clement of Rome talked about faith in the resurrection being like the mythical pheonix, a bird that rises from its ashes. We should trust in God’s power to resurrect and renew despite facing death.

I’m sure you’ve heard more than a few faith illustrations throughout your life as a Christian.

Summary

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In Hebrews 11 Paul doesn’t give these metaphors and illustrations, instead, he gives concrete examples.

Turn with me to hebrews chapter 11.

The first three verses begin with a definition of faith.

The middle section is filled with concrete examples of faith.

And the last 8 verses point to the outcomes and future hope of faith.

Definition of Faith

Let’s start with Paul’s definition of faith.

Think back to the first few chapters of Hebrews. Hebrews is a sermon written to the Jewish christians in Jerusalem who were caught in the middle between the Jews who had rejected Jesus as the Messiah and the Romans who thought the Christians were just like the rebellious Jews. The author, Paul, called to these Christians to not drift away from the truth, but to listen very carefully and review the core elements of their faith. Included are the reality of Jesus’ divinity, His humility in becoming a human, His conquering of death through the resurrection, His ministry as the true High Priest in the heavenly sanctuary, and the fact that He has adopted us so that we can enter into the throne room of God and call Him, our Heavenly Father.

These realities are the context of this faith chapter. Let’s read the first three verses together:

Hebrews 11:1–3 ESV

1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 2 For by it the people of old received their commendation. 3 By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.

Faith is not a complicate idea for Paul, it’s the confidence that what God has promised, He will do. Because of God’s promise, we hope in the resurrection. We have assurance that all of God’s people, including those we have loved, will rise from the dead at Jesus’ return.

God promised it. We believe it and live by it. That’s faith.

Like Abraham who, in Genesis 15:6, was called righteous because he believed, we too receive God’s righteousness because of our faith. We are commended by God, not because of our good deeds but because we believe in His promise.

But tell, how can you believe that God will fulfill his promises if you don’t believe that God made everything from nothing?

Let’s do a quick thought experiment.

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If you believe that everything started with a big bang and then evolved through various chemical and biological processes over millions of year, then you either don’t believe in God, or you believe that He is a product of evolution—another element, like Helium. At best, God would only be one of the more creative beings in the universe, like Leonardo da Vinci, Isaac Newton or Marie Curie playing with chemistry, engineer and physics.

If that’s true than God is not really God and whatever He promises is no more trustworthy than when a politician makes a promise.

But if God is who He says He is, then He created the universe by speaking a few words. From nothing but the sheer power of His imagination He made everything that is visible and invisible.

This is the fundamental nature of faith—believing in a God who created everything who promises to adopt us, rescue us, resurrect us, and take us to live with Him in heaven.

Examples of Faith

In the next section Paul mentions several examples of faith including Abel, Enoch and Noah, but jump forward with me to verse 8 where Paul introduces Abraham and Sarah.

Hebrews 11:8–12 ESV

8 By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. 9 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. 10 For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. 11 By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised. 12 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.

God promised Abraham would be the father of a great multitude from one son, Isaac, and he believed. That’s faith.

And God also promised Abraham a new inheritance—a promised land. Everyone talks about Israel being the promised land, but Paul, talking to the Jewish Christians, stomped that idea right into the dusty roads of Jerusalem. Keep reading:

Hebrews 11:13 ESV

13 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.

Hebrews 11:15–16 ESV

15 If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 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 for them a city.

It was not Canaan, or Israel or Jerusalem that Abraham was hoping for. It wasn’t even a place to call home here on earth. God promised and provided that, but Abraham was really looking for a heavenly Canaan and a New Jerusalem built by God and not man.

Consider the confidence of Abraham’s faith in verse 17

Hebrews 11:17–19 ESV

17 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, 18 of whom it was said, “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.” 19 He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back.

“If God promised that Isaac would be the one through whom nations would come, then its going to be pretty cool seeing God bring him back from the dead.”

That’s the kind of assurance that allows people to face persecution and trial, torture and death without compromising or drifting away.

Paul goes on to talk about Moses and the red sea and the walls of Jericho and Rahab’s faith as additional examples of what faith loos like. And then he shifts to the results of faith.

Faith Outcomes

Look at verse 32 through the first part of verse 35

Hebrews 11:32–35 ESV

32 And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets— 33 who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, 34 quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. 35 Women received back their dead by resurrection.

What a beautiful and powerful testimony of faith. With faith, anything is possible. Notice how Jesus put it in Matthew 17

Matthew 17:20 NLT

20 “You don’t have enough faith,” Jesus told them. “I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.”

Or Mark 9 when they brought a boy to Jesus who was being thrown around by demons and would foam at the mouth and hurt himself and others. They said, “have mercy on us and help us, if you can.”

Mark 9:23 NLT

23 “What do you mean, ‘If I can’?” Jesus asked. “Anything is possible if a person believes.”

Why is anything possible? Because faith believes in the promises of the God who made everything from nothing. He can make life from a simple word. Nothing is too hard for God, and therefore anything is possible for those who believe His promises.

But faith doesn’t always result in winning battles against our enemies, accumulating wealth and enjoying an easy life. In fact, faith is more distinct when things don’t turn out in a miraculous way. Let’s keep reading from the middle of verse 35:

Hebrews 11:35–38 ESV

…Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. 36 Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. 37 They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated— 38 of whom the world was not worthy—wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.

It is from these lives of poverty and mistreatment and persecution that we recognize the need for determination in faith. If you only believed when things were easy, that wouldn’t be faith, that would be convenience. But when you believe regardless of what you can see in front of you, that’s faith.

Abraham believed he would live in a city built by God’s own hands all while he was camping in a tent in a foreign land. Faith holds on to hope even when things look dire.

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Dustin, from the youtube channel, Smarter Every Day, recently posted a video of a four year process of trying to make a grill scraper from all-American parts. In his journey he had to learn new skills like CNC tool building, injection moulding, and working with new materials with different tooling requirements.

I was especially intrigued by the challenge he had finding people who could make the dies and tools that he needed to manufacture here in America. Apparently, over the last 30 years we have closed many of our tool and die makers, making it hard to make the tools that make the parts of the scraper.

What does this have to do with faith? Well, Dustin had a vision for making something completely in the United States. The hope that his vision could be a reality drove him to take the difficult journey to learn and design and discover the resources necessary to accomplish his vision.

That’s a function of faith. Faith sees a reality that is not yet real. It plants its feet confidently in a future that has not yet happened.

The vision that we have by faith in God’s promises will cause us to do similar things as Dustin. We don’t have to find tool manufacturers, but we might have to go far to find truth. We don’t have to learn CNC tool manufacturing or engineering, but we do need to be a student of the Bible. Living out God’s promise might require difficult sacrifices or enduring persecution, but when you have faith in something, difficulties don’t turn you away—they galvanize your focus.

Conclusion

The final two verses of Hebrews 11 are a fitting conclusion to this conversation about faith:

Hebrews 11:39–40 ESV

39 And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, 40 since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.

Even though they were approved and commended by God through their faith, they never saw the city made by God. They died and were laid to rest in the grave waiting for the promises of God to be fulfilled. That may seem dissapointing, but remember that faith is based on the reality of a God who created from nothing and who is overflowing with self-sacrificing love.

If God is in it, then it’s going to be good in the end. If it isn’t good yet, then it isn’t the end yet.

Paul says, “God had provided something better for us…”

He doesn’t explain why its better but he says that we will all be “made perfect” together. Not one by one, or age by age, but all at once. What is Paul talking about? He’s talking about the resurrection at Jesus second coming when at the command from his mouth the dead in Christ will rise and then we will all receive heavenly bodies at the same time.

We began with a list of metaphors and illustrations that the church has used throughout the centuries to describe faith. Let me end with one more from the last century. This one is from Charles Spurgeon, a world renowned preacher who wrote an exposition on the book of Hebrews.

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Hebrews Exposition

The stupendous falls of Niagara have been spoken of in every part of the world. But while they are marvelous to hear of, and wonderful as a spectacle, they have been very destructive to human life when by accident any have been carried down the cataract. Some years ago, two men, a bargeman and a collier, were in a boat, and found themselves unable to manage it. They were being carried so swiftly down the current that they must both inevitably be borne down and dashed to pieces. Persons on the shore saw them, but were unable to do much for their rescue. At last, however, one man was saved by a rope floated to him, which he grasped. The same instant that the rope came into his hand, a log floated by the other man. The thoughtless and confused bargeman, instead of seizing the rope, laid hold of the log. It was a fatal mistake; they were both in imminent peril, but the one was drawn to shore because he had a connection with the people on the land. The other, clinging to the log, was borne irresistibly along, and never heard of afterwards.

Do you not see that here is a practical illustration? Faith is a connection with Christ. Christ is on the shore, so to speak, holding the rope of faith. If we lay hold of it with the hand of our confidence, He pulls us to shore. But our good works, having no connection with Christ, are drifted along down the gulf of fell despair. Hold on to them as tightly as we may, even with hooks of steel, they cannot benefit us in the least degree.

Faith demands determination. It motivates our actions. It propels us towards a vision and a hope. But it is not faith in our skill or whit or money or generosity or circumstance in life that will accomplish the least bit of eternal good for us. Faith clings solely to the claims and promises of the Creator God who is powerful and loving and able to accomplish all He has promised.

So cling confidently to the rope of God’s good grace. Base your life on God’s promises—they will come true.