By Faith

By Faith

Theologian J.C. Ryle, in his book Home at Last writes “The earth is not our rest; it cannot be; there breathes not man or women who ever found it so.  Go, build your happiness on earth if you are so disposed; choose everything this world offers to make this life enjoyable, Take money, house and lands, take education, health and beauty, take honor and fame, obedience, troops of friends; take everything your mind can picture to itself or your eye desires.  Take it all, and yet I dare to tell you that even then you would find no rest.  I know well that in a few short years your hearts confession would be-it is hollow, empty and unsatisfying; it is all weariness and disappointment; it is all vanity and vexation of spirit.  I know well that you would still feel within you a hungering and famine, a leanness and bareness of soul; and ready indeed would you be to bear your testimony to the mighty truth that this earth is not our (final) rest.”

This was also the conclusion of the men and women we read about in Hebrews Chapter 11.  Most of the men and women presented to us in Hebrews 11 were ordinary people of their day, with a couple of Kings and prophets thrown in.   They had similar needs, desires, longings and hopes for their lives that we have for ours.  They struggled with social, moral, political, economic, and medical problems similar to what we have today, but without the comforts, entertainments and technology of our age, all of which distracts us from seeing the world and ourselves as we really are – a sinful mess, under the just judgement of God (Romans 1:18).  They saw and experienced life in its rawest and most trying forms and thus understood how fragile and unsatisfying it would be no matter how long they lived in it (Ecclesiastes 1:1-8).

Hebrews 11:13, as well as 1 Peter 2:11 describe God’s people in this world as sojourners and pilgrims, strangers who will never really feel settled – never really feel like this world is where they belong.  There is a restlessness in our soul, a belief that we were created for a very different life than even the best this world has to offer, as well as a belief that the infinitely glorious God who created us will one day provide for us such a world (Hebrews 11:16). And it is this faith in both the glory of God and the goodness of God (Hebrews 11:6) that leads to such beliefs.

The men and women of Hebrews 11 believed, by faith that this world in its present sin corrupted and disordered condition, in which sin and evil run rampant, could not possibly be the glorious world God created back in Genesis 1:31 and called “very good”, nor could they, as both the perpetrators and the victims of that sin and evil, be the type of beings God created in the beginning to image the perfections of His infinite goodness, wisdom, beauty and power (Genesis 1:26-27).

By faith, they saw past the lies and deceptions of their satanically influenced world (1 John 5:19), a world in opposition to God that would ultimately spawn terrorist groups like ISIS and Hamas, murderous socialist nations like Communist Russia and Nazi Germany, and legalize and celebrate the killing of unborn children.  By faith they had come to understand that what the Apostle Paul referred to in Galatians 1:4 as “this present evil world”, is a world that offers us everything we think we want, but absolutely nothing we would ever need to satisfy the deepest needs and desires of our heart and fulfill the most noble longings of our  soul which, by faith, they accurately understood could only be satisfied by the God who created them and put those needs, desires and longings in their heart (James 1:17) (Psalm 37:4).

They were not buying what this world was selling and thus were unwilling to invest their hope and affections, their time, attention and energy futilely pursuing their ultimate joy, fulfillment and satisfaction, their significance and security in it.  They saw by faith something of infinitely greater value, something that would enrich and satisfy them far beyond anything this present world could offer (1 Peter 1:3-11). And that something was the Kingdom of Heaven (Matthew 13:44-46) and more importantly it’s infinitely glorious King, the Lord Jesus Christ (Hebrews 11:24-26) (John 18:33-37).

The people of Hebrews 11 believed, faithfully waited for the fulfillment of God’s promises (Titus 1:1-3) without seeing the fulfillment of neither the promised Messiah nor the restoration of all things to the perfection in which they were created.  However, they all now intimately know the Messiah, Jesus Christ, who has come and fulfilled all that was promised of His first coming (2 Corinthians 1:20).  They are now all in heaven, enjoying God in all of His glory, excitedly awaiting the fulfillment of the promise of Jesus’ second coming (Revelation 1:8), just as we should be, wherein He will finally come and make all things new as described in Revelation 21 and Revelation 22.  This includes our physical bodies which will be resurrected or changed at that time (1 Corinthians 15:51-53) to be perfectly conformed to the beauty and abilities of His glorified body (Philippians 3:20-21).

This, however, was and is not just the blessed hope of these believers of the Old Testament presented to us in Hebrews 11.  This was and is the great hope of the thief on the cross (Luke 23:39-43) who confessed Jesus as his Lord and humbly prayed that Jesus would include him in His Kingdom.  This was and is the glorious hope of the early Christians who testified that Jesus was their King and not Caesar and were thus imprisoned or martyred in the Roman Coliseum for the amusement/entertainment of those who loved the world and its profane entertainments.  This was the great hope of men and women in the 15th century whose protests against the errors and atrocities of the Pope and the Roman church brought the Bible and God’s true gospel to the common people, but in the process cost them their freedom, their families and for some their lives in this world, which most perceived as no great loss (Revelation 12:11). This is the great hope of Christians today in China, North Korea, Nigeria and other Muslim controlled nations, who risk their lives every time they gather together to study and worship the God of the Bible, as we in this country presently are free to do without interference.  And this is the great hope of all, from every nation, language, and ethnic group (Revelation 7:9) who have come and will come to believe that they were created for a life of infinitely greater beauty, infinitely greater pleasures, infinitely greater satisfaction and fulfillment than anything this world can conceive of or imagine, and that such a life is only available to them through faith in the person and work of our Lord Jesus Christ, who calls us to and enables us to live a life of obedience, holiness and trust in His love while in this world, and who will be for us in the world to come the object of our deepest love and the source of our ever increasing, never ending joy.

Grace and Peace ×