By Faith These Al

The Burial of Sarah by Gustave Doré

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. supposedly once said, “Some people are so heavenly minded that they are of no earthly good.” I’ve learned to be skeptical of unsourced online quote attributions, so I’m not absolutely certain he said it, but I have no reason to think he didn’t. What I am sure of is that a paraphrase of this saying shows up in the Johnny Cash song No Earthly Good. “But you’re so heavenly minded,” Johnny sings, “you’re no earthly good.”

Another thing I’m sure of is that, unlike Johnny Cash or Oliver Wendell Holmes, the author of Hebrews considered heavenly-mindedness to be an entirely praiseworthy quality. He commended Abraham and Sarah, who we discussed in the previous piece on the people of Hebrews 11, for a lifetime focus on their future home in heaven. Their longing for heaven, he wrote, is the reason, “God is not ashamed to be called their God” (Hebrews 11:16 NIV).

“These all,” he said, referring to Abraham, Sarah, their son Isaac, and grandson Jacob, who were all mentioned in the preceding paragraph of this chapter—

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. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. 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. (Hebrews 11:13-16 ESV).

The last piece in this series highlighted God’s fulfillment of a promise to Abraham and Sarah. He promised, if you remember, to give them a son, and though they waited many years, in the end, he gave them Isaac (Hebrews 11:11). 

But as the author points out in the paragraph from Hebrews quoted above, there were other promises to Abraham and Sarah—and to Isaac and Jacob, too—that remained unfulfilled. For instance, while God promised to give Abraham a countless number of descendants (Genesis 15:5), when he died, only his son Isaac and his grandson Jacob counted as his promised heirs (Hebrews 11:9, 18). When Abraham’s grandson Jacob died, he had 70 descendants (Genesis 45:27). They were a large family by then, but not a nation, and certainly not the many nations God said would descend from Abraham (Genesis 17:5). 

God also promised to give Abraham’s descendants the land of Canaan (Genesis 12:5-7), which was the land Abraham lived in after God called him out of Haran. But he and his family never had permanent homes there. After Sarah died, Abraham purchased a small piece of land for a family burial plot, and this is the only soil in the promised land that he  ever owned (Genesis 23:17-20). He was always “a sojourner and foreigner ” in Canaan (Genesis 23:4). And his grandson Jacob thought of both his own life and  his fathers’ lives as sojourns (Genesis 47:9). These men lived their entire lives as pilgrims in the land God promised to their descendants. 

You might think Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, and Jacob were disappointed with how their lives turned out, but they weren’t. They demonstrated a key principle of faith as explained in the first verse of Hebrews 11: With eyes of faith, they saw the as-yet-unseen fulfillments of God’s promises “from afar.” They were confident that what God promised them—the things they hoped for—would still become reality. They died anticipating what he would do in the future and rejoicing in what was to come.

But what they ultimately hoped for, what they anticipated most, was not the earthly fulfillments of God’s promises. Yes, they wanted a country of their own—that they referred to themselves as “foreigners and strangers” is evidence of this—but if what they had in mind was a bit of land to settle down on, they could have gone back to Haran, the land Abraham came from. But they didn’t go back. In fact, Abraham made his servant promise to never take Isaac there (Genesis 24:6-9). And although Jacob lived in Haran while he worked for his father-in-law Laban, he didn’t stay, but eventually brought all his family and everything he owned back to Canaan (Genesis 31:17). He preferred sojourning in the promised land to settling down in Haran. Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, and Jacob demonstrated by their words and actions that they were looking for something better than a homeland here on earth.

So if what they longed for most was not an earthly country, what did they want?  What was their ultimate hope? They wanted something greater than Haran, or even the land of Canaan. What they truly desired was a home in the heavenly country the earthly land of Canaan only foreshadowed.

They were, more than anything else, heavenly-minded people, which doesn’t mean, by the way, that they were “of no earthly good.”  After all, Abraham went to battle to rescue his nephew Lot from the bandit kings who carried him off (Genesis 14:6-18). And Jacob was a skilled herdsman and excellent provider for his large family. But even as these men worked to provide safety and security for themselves and those around them, they had their hearts set on one day being with God in the city he built for them.

And because what they hoped for most was to be with him, God “is not ashamed to be called their God” —which, if you think about it, must be the highest honour God can give a human being. These Old Testament believers desired God himself above anything else (another key principle of faith, according to Hebrews 11:6), and that’s exactly what he will give them when they inherit a home with him in his heavenly country. 

The author of Hebrews hoped those he wrote to would see parallels between their own lives and the lives of Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, and Jacob, and that they would be encouraged by their faithfulness. These first century Christians were once again facing possible persecution, imprisonment, and the confiscation of their property because of their faith (Hebrews 10:32-34; 13:3). God had promised to always be with them (Hebrews 13:5), but it may have seemed as if he was not keeping this promise. Perhaps a few of were thinking of giving up on Christianity and going back to Judaism, which was a legal religion, in order to avoid more suffering.

The lives of these four Old Testament believers reminded faltering early Christians that while God always fulfills his promises, sometimes it takes a long time, and sometimes it doesn’t happen in this life at all. But the way of faith is always forward to the heavenly country, not back to comfort and security in this life. Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, and Jacob knew that being in God’s presence for eternity—a treasure more precious than anything in this world—is the ultimate fulfillment of all God’s promises. If the first readers persevered in the faith, if they refused to give up and go back, if they kept on trusting God even when trials came and they were tempted to think God had forsaken them, God had a place in his country for them, too. Like Abraham and the others, if they endured they would one day see the glorious future God prepared for them. 

These four Old Testament believers are examples for us too. Does your life parallel the lives of Abraham and the others? Are you someone who knows, deep down, that you don’t really belong anywhere in this world? Do you feel like a stranger and exile? 

Or perhaps you identify more with the Hebrew believers because you are facing difficult trials that tempt you to doubt God’s care. Maybe you wonder why you should keep on believing if believing doesn’t make your life easier, and sometimes makes it more difficult. 

But it may be that your life so far has been comfortable and safe. You may live in what you hope is your forever home, or at least in a place you hope is a step on the way to your forever home. You are invested in life, and all your hard work seems to be paying off.

The key to enduring faith is the same for all of us, regardless of our circumstances. We must play the long game, like Abraham and the others did. We must claim our true identity as pilgrims on earth, and keep our focus on the heavenly country that is to come. It’s the only place any of us truly belong, whether we feel it or not. As Jesus said, we are all only sojourners here—in this world, but not of it (John 17:14). If you don’t feel like a stranger yet, when trouble comes (and it will), you will know that’s what you are. Thankfully, our glorious heavenly inheritance is the “joy set before us” (Hebrews 12:2) to give us strength to endure when difficult circumstances come. It’s the prize that keeps us believing and keeps us doing earthly good when it would be easier to give up.

Or to put it another way, lifelong faithfulness comes from heavenly-mindedness. And if, more than anything else, we long to be with God in the country he has prepared for those who love him, he will give us what we long for, and it will be worth the wait.

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Previous posts in this series:

• By Faith the Ancients
• By Faith Abel
• By Faith Enoch
• By Faith Noah
• By Faith Abraham and Sarah

By Faith Abraham and Sarah

Abraham Journeying into the Land of Canaan by Gustave Doré

When I was five, my family moved from Idaho to Illinois in the dead of winter. We towed all our belongings behind us in a small utility trailer as we climbed over snowy mountain passes on the way to the home my parents arranged for us. It was a fun adventure for me, but I know it was harder for my parents, who left family and a steady income so my father could finish his schooling. Later, when I was a young mother, my husband and I packed up the back of an old pickup truck, strapped the baby in a car seat between us, and headed from Minnesota to Whitehorse, up the Alaska highway to a new job and new apartment. These were both big moves, but at least we knew where we were going and we had a place to live when we got there.

When God told Abraham, the fourth person listed in the Hebrews hall of faith, to leave his relatives and his home in Harran and set out for a place God would show him, Abraham didn’t know his destination (Hebrew 11:8). The Lord promised to bless him and make him into a great nation, and commanded him to go, so Abraham packed up his wife Sarah, his nephew Lot, his herdsmen and servants, and off they went in obedience to the Lord (Genesis 12:1-5). 

Their move from Haran was much riskier and more difficult than any of the moves I’ve experienced. Not only did they not know where they were headed, but Abraham lived in a patriarchal society, and people relied on their extended family for everything. All their social ties were within a kindred group, which had its own distinct culture, traditions, and religion. What’s more, large extended families defended each other from the pirate kings who roamed around the land, plundering and enslaving those weaker than they were. (Remember when Abraham rescued Lot from a ransacking alliance of kings in Genesis 14?  As Lot’s relative, he was fulfilling his duty to protect him.) So when Abraham and his family left Harran, they left everything familiar and headed into a dangerous unknown without the safety and security their relatives had provided for them. 

The author of Hebrew calls Abraham’s obedience to God’s command an act of faith. Abraham believed God had something better for him, so he left everything he knew and all his earthly protection because God commanded him to go (Hebrews 11:8-10). He took God at his word, so he obeyed him.

And it was by faith that Abraham’s wife Sarah eventually gave birth to a son (Hebrews 11:11). Sarah had been barren her whole life, and she was already sixty-five years old when God promised to give offspring to Abraham (Genesis 15:5). Biologically speaking, what God promised was impossible from the start, and then twenty-five years passed before God fulfilled this promise.  As each year went by, the promise must have seemed more and more impossible to believe. 

But God had promised the couple a son, and according to the author of Hebrews, Sarah trusted him to fulfill his promise. When Sarah was 90 years old and Abraham was 100, God kept word, and Sarah had her son Isaac. Eventually, through the almighty power of the God “who gives life to the dead and calls into being things that were not” (Romans 4:17), descendants “as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore” came from one “as good as dead” husband and his old barren wife (Hebrews 11:12). 

The Old Testament accounts of the lives of Able, Enoch, and Noah, the first three people in the Hebrews hall of faith, give us little reason to doubt the quality of their faith. But we know more about the lives of Abraham and Sarah, and we can see from their actions that they sometimes forgot or doubted God’s promise to bless them. Where was Abraham’s trust in God’s promises when he twice endangered Sarah in a foolish scheme to keep himself safe by telling everyone she was just his sister (Genesis 12:10-20; Genesis 20:1-18)?  God intervened both times to save Sarah and Abraham from harm despite Abraham’s weak faith. God was faithful when Abraham wasn’t.

And at one point, rather than trusting God to give her a family, Sarah blamed him for her lack children, and came up with her own twisted plan to build herself a family with Abraham—a plan that only brought her sorrow (Genesis 16). Later, when the Lord told Abraham that Sarah would indeed have a son in about a year, she scoffed at the idea. She laughed, and then lied to the Lord about laughing (Genesis 18:10-15). Despite the Lord’s sure promise, she struggled over the years to believe she could ever become pregnant.

Yet here they are, both Abraham and Sarah, listed as examples of faith in Hebrews. They remind us that a life of true faith may contain periods of strong faith and also periods of doubt, and that the Lord remains faithful throughout. He rescued them when Abraham’s lack of faith got them into trouble, and when Sarah’s doubt caused her to lose hope, he reassured them by reminding them that nothing is too hard for him (Genesis 18:14). In the end, even scoffing Sarah “considered him faithful who had made the promise” (Hebrews 11:11). By her imperfect faith she received her son Isaac, because the power of faith is not in its strength or perfection, but in its object—our faithful God who can do the impossible.  

Despite their doubts, Abraham and Sarah ultimately trusted God to do what he said he would do, so they were included in the hall of faith to encourage the original audience of the letter to the Hebrews. Their faith was imperfect, too. Some of them were struggling to keep on believing as life got harder. The stories of Abraham and Sarah reminded them that the fulfillment of God’s promises is certain, but it may come only after a long wait—or even, as we shall see later in Hebrews 11, not in this life at all. The Christian life required patience. Eventually, even if their trust sometimes wavered, they would receive all God’s promised blessings through the perfect saving work of Jesus. 

And the stories of Abraham and Sarah should encourage us, too. All God’s promises are “yes” in Jesus, and by faith in him, we will eventually inherit all the eternal blessings of salvation. Not because our faith is strong, but because it looks to Jesus, who is faithful and mighty to save. 

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Previous posts in this series:

• By Faith the Ancients
• By Faith Abel
• By Faith Enoch
• By Faith Noah

By Faith Noah

The Dove Sent Forth from the Ark by Gustave Doré

The story of Noah and the ark is one of the most familiar stories in the Old Testament, maybe even the whole Bible. Everyone knows something about Noah. I searched “Noah’s ark” on Amazon and found Noah’s ark puzzles, books, stickers, stuffed animal collections, and play sets. There are t-shirts for children, onesies and fleece blankets for babies, all featuring images of a wooden boat and a few irresistible animal couples. It’s the pairs of animals, I think, that make pictures of the Noah and his ark so popular despite some frightening details in the biblical story. 

When the author of Hebrews summed up Noah’s story in the Hebrews 11 hall of faith, he didn’t mention the animals at all. He was focused on the man Noah. Here’s what he wrote:

By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark to save his family. By his faith he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness that is in keeping with faith. (Hebrews 11:7)

The introduction to the hall of faith describes faith as “assurance about what we do not see” (Hebrews 11:1). Noah is a perfect example of this kind of faith. 

When God told Noah he was going bring floodwaters to destroy life on earth (Genesis 6:17), he was warning him of something “not yet seen,” and also something never seen before. Neither Noah, his neighbors, nor his ancestors had ever experienced anything like it. The God who created a good world and filled it with good creatures saw how corrupt and violent humanity had become (Genesis 6:11-12) and decided to wipe them out in one mighty act of de-creation. It was unprecedented, and from a human perspective, unimaginable. 

But Noah revered God and was convinced God would do as he said. He believed there was only one way—God’s way—to escape the coming destruction, so he “did everything just as God commanded him” (Genesis 6:22 NIV). He followed God’s instructions and built a big boat in the middle of dry land. 

It must have taken decades to build such a large boat, even with the help of his sons. They couldn’t jump in a truck and drive to the lumber yard to buy supplies. There were no power tools. From start to finish, they did it all, and they did it all by hand. Still, as the years passed, Noah’s faith held firm. He continued to carry out God’s instructions without any tangible evidence that the judgment God warned of would ever come. He kept on believing that God’s word would come true, and he kept on preparing for the sure reality of something that did not yet exist. His unhesitating and unwavering obedience was evidence of his trust in God and God’s rescue plan.

What I think is the hardest phrase to understand in this verse about Noah is found in the second sentence. By faith, the author wrote, Noah “condemned the world.” Of course, it was God, not Noah, who wiped out the people of the world in the flood. What did the author mean, then, when he said Noah condemned the world?

Here’s what I’ve concluded. This phrase means that Noah’s trust in God’s word, his obedience to God’s command, and his rescue from God’s judgment, showed how wrong the rest of humanity was when they spoiled God’s creation and ignored his warning of judgment. Noah’s faith highlighted their unbelief, and maybe even helped harden them in their defiance against God. By his faith, Noah showed how wrong they all were, and it’s in this sense that he condemned them. 

And by his faith, Noah became “an heir of the righteousness that is in keeping with faith.” That Noah is described as an heir of righteousness tells us that his righteous standing before God was God’s gift to him—a gift he received by faith. In other words, when God said to Noah, “I have found you righteous in this generation” (Genesis 7: 1), it was based on Noah’s trust in God’s promises to him. His radical obedience flowed from his faith and was evidence of it, but it was not the fundamental reason God approved of him. Noah was an heir of righteousness because he believed what God said and trusted him to preserve him and his family.

Some of the original recipients of the letter of Hebrews were in danger of falling away from the faith, and one of the objectives of the author was to encourage them to keep on believing. He included the hall of faith, for instance, to show examples of faithful Old Testament saints for them to imitate. He also built a logical case for the superiority of Jesus and his finished work. Jesus, he argued, was better than the Old Testament system they were tempted to return to, so they should continue trusting him.

And he used a carrot and stick approach to help keep them faithful, too. He reminded them that those who remained faithful could expect future rewards. God, he wrote, promised an eternal inheritance (9:15), a Sabbath rest (4:9), and a place in the heavenly city (11:16) for those who kept on believing. He also warned them of the consequences of falling away. In the warning passages of Hebrews (2:1-4; 3:7-4:13; 5:11-6:12; 10:19-39; 12:14-29), the author urged his readers to avoid the final judgment by continuing in the faith. No matter how we understand all of the debated details in the warning passages, their purpose seems clear. They were meant to help preserve the readers’ faith.

Perhaps the author included Noah in the hall of faith because he was someone who believed both God’s warning of judgment and his promises of deliverance. As Noah built the ark, working daily, year after year, he was spurred on in his obedience by keeping in mind God’s faithfulness to his promises, and also his impending destruction of the world. Because Noah saw the reality of both these “unseen things,” he remained faithful. 

As a man of faith, Noah was an example to the first audience of the letter to the Hebrews and he’s an example for us as believers too. Our continued faithfulness depends on our conviction that God’s word will come true, and that things not yet seen are sure to happen. We can keep on trusting for the long haul by focusing on the certain joy to come as God fulfills his promises to us, and also by considering the sure reality of the judgment he is saving us from. Both God’s promises and his warnings work for our good.

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Previous posts in this series:

• By Faith the Ancients
• By Faith Abel
• By Faith Enoch