To be here to read and to understand your word and to worship your your name and to give you glory and honor Lord, I I ask that you would give us much grace and forgiveness as we cannot come to you on our own Lord We trust in you through the work of your son Jesus and we stand in his grace alone and I pray that even as we look at this passage that it would just be the beginning of a deeper and more robust understanding of what it means to be a Christian and what it means to live like a Christian. And I pray that You would provoke our hearts, that You would convict us, that we would leave changed in some way. Father, my prayer, as always, from my own heart and everyone in this room, is that You would give us eyes of faith to see Your Son and His work, the Lord Jesus. And it is in His glorious name we pray, Amen. As I said, we're talking about faith. Now, Pastor Jeff has often shared some illustrations about faith, about the chair and other things. I have to give a confession to you. This is a quirky thing of mine, and pastors, we are quirky, weird people too. And so you know that we all have our little idiosyncrasies or whatever it is. So whenever I go to the post office, You need to deliver something. I don't even sometimes trust the Frisco mailman. So I don't leave it in my box. I have to go over there and put it in and make sure it goes down and I check it again. That's kind of how I am. But there are times in my childhood, and I'm going to tell you why I am this way. I grew up. kind of nervous about letting it go, letting the mail go in there, because I really was thinking, this is a check. I don't know if it's gonna get to the person I want it to get to, and I, let me think about this again. If there's another way to do this, and that's kind of how I grew up, that's how I am at the postal service, even though I've grown to trust them more, but let me give you the background. So I am the child of two Indian parents. And they often mailed stuff overseas to Great Britain, to India, to other places. And this is what they would do. When there was something important to send, they would never send it through the mail. You know why? Because most often it wouldn't get there. It would get intercepted by somebody. Somebody would say, huh, this looks like an interesting box. Let's open it up and see what goodies are inside. That has happened to us. And so what my dad and mom often used to do, and it's gotten better over the years, is that they would always wait for someone who was traveling that they knew and say, would you take this? And when you get there, put it in the mailbox there. I'll give you the postage. Or if it happens to be somebody that we know in person, would you deliver this for us? You know, it takes faith, doesn't it? It takes faith to let the letter go and say, all right, I've got to do my part, which is get it to the post office, put it in there, I've got to let it go, and then I have to trust the postal service to do the rest, which is get my mail to the person that it needs to get to. And I want to tell you, you know, in many ways, that is what our Christian life is like. You can either hold on to your problems completely because you don't trust anyone else but you, or you can go and say, Lord, I have no other way. I cannot travel to India today. I've no other way. I need this to happen. I need you to take care of it. And I'm going to do my part by coming humbly to you. And I need you, I trust you to do the rest. And our God, and what it means for us to be a Christian, is that we can take Him at His word that it will be as good as done. That is what it means to be a believer. That we trust God at His Word. And even, you know, you guys put me on the spot for my 50th birthday, right? Well, 50 years, I have grown up within a Christian home. And I know God is faithful. I've seen God work. But more than just my experiences, God's Word tells me that He cannot fail. That He is sure. that He is trustworthy, and that you can let go, and that He will do His part, that it will be as good as done. So we're talking about faith. today, and man, I don't know if I'm going to get through this, but we'll just continue on next week. Next week, just to whet your appetite, we're talking about Abraham and Sarah, but really the life of Abraham. So please come if you're able, listen on if you can, to understand what it means for us to be Christians and to understand that faith is necessary. True saving faith is necessary to be a true Christian. You cannot just say, yes, I am a person of faith. I dress this way. I talk this way. I do these things. I go to church. You must have saving faith to be a believer. And that is what this chapter is all about. Remember the writer is writing to a congregation of people who are about to turn back? about to go back to Judaism, which in their eyes are a solid religion. Now, I want you to think about this for a minute. This is where I told you I'm not sure if I'm going to get through this, because there's so much good stuff here to talk about in this chapter. But I'll do my best. Listen, they are a religion, Judaism is a religion, with so much sights and sounds and smells, isn't it, brother? I have Jewish friends, I grew up with Jewish friends. My best friends in high school were Jewish friends. Imagine going to the temple as a worshiper, and seeing gold, and the candles, and the smell of the incense. It's almost robust imagery, right? To say, I can see this, I can feel it, I can smell it. All those images for Judaism, it's like they almost... Forgive me for saying it like this. There is a danger of worshiping what you see and trusting in what you see rather than the stuff that you cannot see because it was all around them. Temple worship was all about that. The smells. I bet there are places where you can smell the blood. I bet that there's so much there that would inundate your souls physically with your senses that they probably wondered, well, what kind of imagery and senses does Christianity have to offer? Well, you know what? There really isn't a whole lot. Christianity doesn't have so much of that to give you to say, well, here's all the counterparts if you want to be a Christian instead of be a Hebrew or a Jew. Largely what we believe is unseen. It's eternal. It is of a spiritual reality, which you cannot necessarily see or touch all the time. So, you know, even when we talk about Jesus, it's dangerous for us to try to come up with a lot of imagery within our faith. Because our trust should never be in images or a smell or a place it is about something that we cannot touch we cannot fully comprehend we cannot see our God is beyond us and Christianity is about trusting him Because he has given us something precious in his word that tells us of the reality that all those things are So you see where the temptation could have been for them to say? Judaism really is a little bit more manageable for me, a little bit more digestible for me. And the writer is saying, don't go back. Don't go back. The unseen, although unseen, is so much better than anything you have seen or tasted or smelled or anything like that before. So I'm gonna give you a couple of ideas as a basic outline for the next few minutes. And hopefully it'll get us into chapter two, I mean, section two next week. But the basic outline is faith described and explained. What is faith? Like young people sitting here, you know that you're following mom and dad. Maybe you're asked to come to church or made to come to church or to be worshiping as a family. But you have to know what faith is. You got to understand what faith looks like, what faith behaves like, what faith is lived out like by your parents and others who also say that they are Christians. So the first part is faith described and explained. The second part is faith illustrated. Man, aren't you glad that the Bible gives us real life examples? That it isn't just pie in the sky, that there's real life and flesh and blood people who have lived this before us, who have known God to be true and have trusted Him, and through their lives they've experienced God to be faithful and loving and trustworthy? And that's what he does from verses 4 to verse 16. He gives us almost little case studies or character profiles of different people, particularly from the Old Covenant, the Old Testament, who trusted God at His word, even of the things not seen, and stayed the course throughout their lives, trusting in the reality of God in the promise that would be in Jesus Christ in the future. So those two points are the ones I was going to say. Let me mention this as we talk about faith for a second. As I said, there's physical reality and there's spiritual reality, right? Physical reality we can kind of take in by all our senses the spiritual reality you cannot you need the eyes and ears of faith to be able to understand things of the spiritual world or things of the spiritual reality and there's two aspects to the Unseen things that's what we're talking about the things that are unseen what God is offering to us in the new covenant so two things the things that haven't happened yet and They're not seen yet. There are things that are going to happen to us as believers. And we probably will see it and experience it. But it hasn't happened yet. It hasn't come yet. It's in the future. Like when God says, when you die, Jacob, you are going to be in the presence of Jesus. You're going to experience his glory that is yet to come. And one day I will see it and experience it. But it's in the future. The second is, you know, what just cannot be seen because it's not touchable. It's just you're not going to be able to see it. It's something that is not physical. It is wholly spiritual. And faith is what's needed to give us eyes to see both with joy. I want to kind of get into this by talking about this subject, this idea of understanding what faith is. You know, for the most part, the Old Testament people of God, they didn't have that kind of faith. And that's why the book of Hebrews, the writer says, you know, don't die as those who died in the desert, in the wilderness, who died without faith because they didn't trust God. They fell away. They rebelled, right? And in chapter 3 of Hebrews, which we've covered months ago, here's what it says, For who were those who heard and yet rebelled? Was it not all those who left Egypt, led by Moses? And with whom was he provoked for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest? but to those who were disobedient. So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief. They would rather have slavery in Egypt because it's something they could feel and touch and experience rather than what God was offering which they could not see yet by just trusting God and believing in Him. And that is why The author is writing to that congregation of his day and writing to us today to understand the difference. For the most part, I think many people don't understand what biblical faith is. They've kind of heard lots of definitions about faith, but all of that in many ways comes up short. Faith doesn't originate with us. Faith is part of the gift that comes with salvation in the Lord. Saving faith is given by God alone as a gift to us. And it's not positive thinking or all those other things. It's not something that's created within our heart. Faith comes by God alone. And so let me give you a few verses to help you begin to understand what we mean when we describe faith or when we talk about faith. Ephesians 2, 8-10. Many of you know these verses, but please, memorize these, young people. Or older people, these are foundational verses in understanding faith. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God. Not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Romans 12.3, For by the grace given to me, I say to everyone among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. Philippians 1.29, For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ, you should not only believe in him, but also suffer for his sake. You see that it's a gift of God. God works faith within his people's hearts that results in their salvation. And we are going to kind of recognize that we are a people with great need We are a people who really should be called desperate because we cannot do anything on our own. And then we come to God in rock-solid trust in what He promises to do for us that we cannot do for ourselves. So let me come... to the verses that are primary in this chapter, which is right from verse 1. The visible faith. By faith, the invisible is made visible. Listen to what it says. Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen, for by it the people of old received their commendation. Faith is what? gives us or transfers the certainty of God's promises to us and we live based on the unseen promises that are going to be given to us as we trust him and So let me read a few additional verses for you 2nd Corinthians 418 as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen for the things that are seen or transient but the things that are unseen are eternal and The assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 1 Corinthians 2, verse 14. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. Listen, do you have spiritual discernment? to be able to see the things that aren't visible, to be able to understand the realities of God and what is awaiting for you. This is what it says speaking of Moses in Hebrews 11.27, a little later on in the chapter. By faith he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured at seeing Him who is invisible. You know who Moses saw? The Messiah. In faith, He worried not about the anger of the king, but of one who is greater, that is Christ. Moses saw Christ not with his physical eyes, but with the eyes of faith. And faith isn't just simply knowledge. You can know a lot about the things of the Bible or about Jesus and still not have saving faith. That's what I worry about my own kiddos. They grew up in Sunday school and hearing the Bible stories during family worship and other things. But you know, having a lot of knowledge about the Bible or Jesus is not the same as Really trusting him and believing him that he's gonna take care of you in hard times. Listen to this This is a powerful verse from James chapter 2 verse 19. You believe that God is one you do well Even the demons believe and shudder Do you know that the demons believe the same things that we believe I But it causes them to tremble and to fear. But for those of us who are true Christians, the knowledge of God isn't just knowledge. It transfers to substance for us and produces joy. And when we hear these things, we're not fearful when we believe. 1 Peter 1.8, Though you have not seen Him, you love Him. Though you do not now see Him, you believe in Him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory. The second idea in this point of understanding faith is that by faith, even the visible things point to the invisible. And what's he talking about? Well, this is what it says in verse 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. You know, if you've traveled this summer, or you've been to the Grand Canyon, or you've been to other beautiful places, sometimes you'll stand back and look at those things, and something will speak to you, right? It's the Spirit of God that says, this world is made by God, and everything in creation points to the Creator, to someone much, much bigger, and you're taken aback by that. And many of you have experienced that. You know, the creation itself points to the reality that is even yet to come. All of the things that we have here speak, the natural speaks to the grandeur of God and enables us to trust Him even deeper in faith. Listen the spiritual sight that I talk about that I was speaking about the eyes to see in faith Beyond just the physical world here is given to us by the Holy Spirit And I'm gonna read John 3 3 for you to hear Jesus answered him truly truly I say to you unless one is born again He cannot see the kingdom of God Unless you're born again, unless conversion happens, unless God gives you faith, you cannot see the Kingdom of God. That spiritual world, that spiritual reality will not be discernible to the unbeliever. So the Lord gives us so many things to be able to grow in our faith. I heard this quote by Jonathan Edwards, which kind of caught my interest because I happen to just love creation and nature and all those things too, even the work of the animals. You know, have you ever looked at a spider's web and just caught yourself just standing and looking at the beauty of maybe a really beautifully made spider's web and you kind of think, how in the world does he do that? How in the world does He go from one tree to another tree and then make this beautiful design? Listen to this quote. Pardon me if I thought it might at least give you occasion to make better observations on these wondrous animals that should be worthy of communicating to the learned world from whose glistening webs so much of the wisdom of the Creator shining. That's Jonathan Edwards as he was gazing. He actually wrote a little paper on it, on the beauty from creation that grows our faith in realizing that there's a great God out there. Whether it's the Grand Canyon or a little spider's web, God has given us so much for us to realize that there's a grand reality in the spiritual realm and that we can possess. as those who trust and believe in Jesus, the Messiah, the Savior. For sake of time, I want to go into these case studies of these people just for a few minutes as we get ready for next week as we talk about Abraham. But let me go into these characters for a second. Many of you know these characters. that the Bible talks about in chapter 11, but I wonder if you've dwelled deeply enough to understand why it's highlighted here. Remember, well, for those of you who may have looked at the bulletin online or whatever, the title that I gave this sermon was Staying the Course. It's not just enough to make a profession of faith at some point and then think yourself a Christian. The true Christian is one who does not turn his back on Christ and His Word, who does not give up on the Word of God and the promises of God, who continues, who even though you may fall and have some detours, you never give up or turn your back on your faith. You endure till the end because of what God gives us. and that is saving faith. And these characters are people who have stayed the course, who have endured because of the faith that God gave them, which is saving faith, right? Not just knowledge, but saving faith. And so, I want to go through a few of these just in our remaining minutes as we look ahead to Abraham. The first one in verse 4 is Abel. Who was Abel? Abel is a son of Adam. He was the second of the first two brothers. Who was the first brother? Cain. Cain and Abel are sons of Adam and Eve. And we are given in this chapter, verse 4, by faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous. God commending him by accepting his gifts, and through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. I'm not going to use my notes on this. I'm just going to share this with you so that we can kind of get through these first few characters. Abel is commended, my friends, not just because of an act, but because the motivation for that act was faith. It was an attitude of faith. The reason Abel brought the sacrifice to God, the way that he did was because of faith. And I'm just going to quickly mention some things. In many ways, this is what's happening. Cain and Abel are coming before God, okay? They're coming before God. God has invited them. There's a lot we don't know in this chapter, but that's not given to us even from Genesis. But they're coming before God. And there's only one way to come before God. And that's in worship. And so God prescribed a way in which they should come to be able to worship. And what it says is, that by faith, offer to God a more acceptable sacrifice, which was needed, because he's a sinner, born in sin because the fall had already happened, right? And there's only one way to come, with a sacrifice. And the picture is of this. Like you may have often wondered, why did God accept Abel's sacrifice but not Cain's? Now, for all intents and purposes, we may understand that Cain also knew God. Cain is probably also a worshiper. But God had prescribed a way for sinners to come before Him, to stand before Him in worship, and Cain decided Even though he came with beautiful offerings of the ground that he worked on, he probably set it up in a beautiful way, put it in nice bowls or whichever way he would offer it to God. But the truth is, God had already given him through divine revelation how he should come. How they should come before God in worship. And Cain decides, I'm going to do it my way. I'm going to do it the way that I want to do it. And very likely, because he minimized his sin, because he probably thought, my sin is not that bad, and I am okay enough for me to offer God my best, the way I want to offer it. And you know what it says about Cain's offering? It was displeasing to the Lord. It was not satisfactory. And God told Cain that, and his face fell. You know what happens later on, right? Out of jealousy, he rose up against his brother Abel, and he killed him. Now what's the difference with Abel? Well, here's Abel, son of Adam and Eve. whom God had provided for even after the fall. He covered Adam and Eve. Do you remember that? The Scripture says, He covered them in garments of skin. Garments of skin. Not the feeble loincloth and fig leaves that they themselves made to cover their nakedness, which were worthless, which probably didn't last a day, which were probably insufficient. God killed and sacrificed with blood whatever animal He had chosen as a sin offering, a blood offering, and covered Adam and Eve so that they could come before God again. Abel knew this. Abel knew that blood was needed. Abel knew that a sacrifice was needed to be able to stand before God as sinners. And he comes before God, offering fat offerings of his best lambs, because he was a shepherd, right? And God says, I am well pleased with your sacrifice. You see, God had given him divine revelation first, so that he can come before Him in obedience. Abel chose to obey. Cain chose to disobey. Cain chose to come on his own merits, and on his own works, and how he thought he would be justified. Abel knew there's only one way to be justified, and that's the way God told me to do it. That's the way God prescribed. That's the way He had promised to my parents a way to stand before God in worship. And so Abel comes as an illustration of faith to us. My brothers and sisters, the point here for us is that in faith, when we come to the Lord in faith, True faith, true saving faith, means trusting His divine revelation, what God is giving you in His Word, and not just doing what you think is enough. And lest you think that your sin's not that great, just look at what happened to Cain. Just look at the judgment on Cain. There is only one way for sinners to come before God, and that is through God's provision for us, not our own thinking or our own provision for ourselves. Our faith as true believers in Jesus is always on the work and person of Christ alone, as it's described in God's Word. It is never what I cleverly think, well, my church does it this way. Or, well, you know what, I'm really not as bad as those guys over there, so I think this is enough for me to have favor with God. Absolutely not. There is one way, you know my favorite verse, right? Acts 4.12, for there is no other name under heaven given amongst men by which we must be saved except the name of Jesus Christ. There is only one way. You can come on his work alone or on your own works. And that's why Abel is counted as a hero of our faith here. Let me mention Enoch and Noah very quickly. Enoch comes, and this is what it said, After he had lived 65 years and gave birth to Methuselah. He lived another 300 years and he walked with God And he kept walking and walking and walking and walking and just kept walking all the way to heaven. He never died God had taken him up is what it says three times in the verse taken up. God had taken him up He was not found. God had taken him up and as he lived a consistent life of faith for 300 years. Just to boil it down, let me say it this way. You know what God loves? People who are continually faithful and consistent. That's not to say we're going to not make mistakes or going to have some bumps in the road. But look at Enoch's life. It is a life of consistent walking with God, trusting in God, putting faith in God, not wavering. Three hundred years of that. And God was so pleased with his faith that he took him up and he was not found. He never died. He's in the presence of God on a continual walk with God. A life of trusting faith. Well, let me come to Noah. God tells Noah, build an ark. I love this when I try to teach this to my little ones when they were younger. You know, honestly, Noah was saying, what's an ark? Well, there's going to be rain. What's rain? These are things that had not happened on the earth. Do you realize that he spent a century building an ark? A century. With his children. In the midst of being jeered and laughed at and mocked. But he was a preacher of righteousness, the Scripture tells us, because God had told him what to do. He trusted God's Word. He believed it. And he did it. You know, my dad and mom, when they were living in New York, they used to have little bumper stickers on their car. I don't know why. Maybe it was just what they did in their little Christian community. But one of those little bumper stickers on my dad's old Oldsmobile was this. God said it. I believe it, and that settles it. I know it's a little hokey and quirky maybe, but here's the essence of it. God said it. Really, you should say, that settles it. I believe it. That's what Noah's life was. Hey, God told me to do it, and I'm going to do it. He built the ark for a century. And because of that, God saved his whole family, and all the rest of the world was condemned. Do you really do what God tells you to do even if it doesn't make sense? Are you willing to maybe go past your own formulations or thinkings and say God's Word is enough? God's mind is smarter. God's ways are higher. True faith. True saving faith. is rock-solid trust in the words of God and of a reality that is promised because of the death of His Son, in which the Holy Spirit is daily reminding us and convicting us of. And you're walking a journey and walking and walking and walking until God takes you home. My brothers and sisters, we're going to come to Abraham next week, but I'm going to end kind of just with this idea. You know, I pray to God that I will stay the course. I pray to God that you will stay the course. You know that for a few years I served as a chaplain. One of the things I used to struggle with the most was when I was at deathbed of certain people, you know, patients who were dying. There are many times I was the chaplain in the room as they passed away. And it was heartbreaking, and many times I would pray, Lord, I hope that there is faith here. Sometimes I got to share the faith, sometimes I didn't. Sometimes I knew the person's family was a believing family, but those were difficult things to do. But there was one time when I was actually with a person I knew. It was actually a person that I had close communion with. She was almost like a mother to me. There was an older lady, not so old, who had cancer. And I remember in just ministering to her in these last days, one thing that she told me, she said, Jacob, I don't want to turn my back. This is so hard, I don't want to waver in my faith. I would hope that the Lord may take me before I would ever do that. I hope that I would stay the course. Because I'm fearful that I'm going to grumble. And I could see a woman with a heart of faith saying, you know, I'd rather be with the Lord today than ever have a word of grumbling against my Father. my heavenly father. That's what staying the course is like when we put our trust in Christ. Listen, have discussions of faith at home. Describe what real faith looks like. Go to these examples and and study it together with your children. We'll come next week and really look at Abraham together. Let's pray together for a moment. Lori, thank you for this passage. I asked that you would Challenge us and convict us to be men and women of faith and action. That we would have faith shape our lives and the things that we would do. Lord, I do pray that You would increase our faith. That You would strengthen our faith because of Your Word and communion of the saints. and on the foundation of everything the Lord Jesus has done for us. I ask that you would bless our church to be a community of faith that is a light to the world around us. I pray this in Jesus' name, Amen.