Giants of faith: Hebrews 11

What is faith

We often need reminding of what faith is

Here’s a vox pop of what some people in London think about faith

https://youtu.be/TG3nXdcDGgI

What does it mean to have faith, what is Christian faith?

The writer of Hebrews shares clearly that Christian faith has two sides.

Firstly, it’s confidence in what we hope for. Think of the squirrel. She doesn’t worry about whether or not she’s going to reach the branch. She’s got experience in making the leap of faith, she fixes her eyes on the branch and then she leaps.

We do this all the time. I have faith that the sun will rise tomorrow and that I’ll be able to see the world I’m working in. I have faith that the the electricity will be pumping through the power sockets in my house to power my devices. I have faith that my car won’t explode when I get in it to drive. I can see all of the fruit of all of these things, I have experience in them and I can almost always rely on them. I do love a good disaster movie, and the premise of any disaster movie is removing one or more of the everyday things we put our faith in. Because we can’t imagine a world without these simple everyday things we put our faith in daily.

This includes for every Christian, the faith in the resurrection of Jesus, that he has gone ahead of us, and will give us eternal life from the moment we meet him. That when we die, all who believe in him will have a new resurrected life in the recreated heaven and earth. It’s the faith that Jesus is with us now, that we are never alone. That whether we feel abandoned or neglected by God, the reality is that he is with us, particularly when we can’t feel him with us. Our hope is in the God of creation being for us, with us, guiding and strengthening us. Showing us the right way ahead. Our faith is in the God who stepped down from heaven to earth in Jesus Christ because he loves us to much to leave us in the brokenness of the world we have messed up. That he made a way for us to be free forever with him.

So Christian faith is having confidence in what we hope for.

Secondly, Christian faith is assurance about what we do not see.

I love a good Spielberg, particularly when George Lucas is involved. Remember this scene from one of my favourite movies. It’s an oldie so hopefully most of you will recognise it.

After many months of searching Indiana finds his Father who has spent his life searching for the lost Grail, and Indy has completed the first two of the three faith related puzzles to find the Holy Grail and this is what he sees.

https://youtu.be/b8_FODdi5-c

Now, Christian faith is even more than stepping off hoping that you’ll be caught by some invisible unknown thing. Because we do know the one who saves us. As Christians, we get to know Jesus through encountering him, through living life seeing him rescue and guide us. We get to know him better particularly when we pray and read the Bible, which is why we encourage you to find at least 15 minutes a day to dip into the Bible and speak to him.

Our faith is not blind in that way because we know who is calling us to do what feel impossible and we know that he is faithful and he will catch us.

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Notes

Hebrews, A 12-Week Study The Big Picture

The Big Picture

Hebrews 10:19–11:40 shows the sufficiency of Jesus’ work in making a way to God, and calls the reader to imitate the persevering faith of the Old Testament saints as they await final consummation in Christ.