And this is a familiar passage. Everyone knows the Hall of Faith. And just a little background to the book of Hebrews, just so we know where we're at. Hebrews was written to Hellenistic Jews. And you say, what does that mean? It means Jews that had been saved and they were living like Greeks. So when Paul writes, which I believe Paul wrote, there's some debate, but I believe Paul wrote Hebrews and he was writing to them to shore up their faith and to encourage them not to go back into Judaism. So when I was in Fort Knox, we had two rabbis with us. We had a Buddhist chaplain and a bunch of Christians, a handful of Baptists. You'd say, what is faith to the Jewish community? I'm not trying to, you know, throw dirt at anybody, but it's like their theology, what they believe is, what is faith to the Jewish community is adherence to rules. And see, the rabbis, you know, followed all those rules, and they were very strict on that. And especially like the Sabbath, they start on Friday afternoon, it goes into Sunday. And there were times where they would want Jewish services on Saturday, and the rabbi could not go and do that. because of their Sabbath and what they believe. So when Paul is writing to them, he's writing mostly about Jesus becoming the high priest and taking the place of that high priest in the Old Testament. He's talking about all that, but it's also relevant to us. So the hall of faith here, we're speaking about the hall of faith, speaking about different things of faith. And I would like to define faith. What is faith? We think about that. Well, faith is a noun. It's a person, place, or thing. There's a few definitions here I just wanted to look at. So faith, complete trust or confidence in someone or something. We get that one. A more religious definition. Strong belief in God or in the doctrine of a religion. Based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof. I was like, what is apprehension? Well, we think anxiety, fear. We know that, right? You're kind of skittish on something. You're afraid to do something. It brings you anxiety. But then the second definition. Understanding your grasp. Like apprehension of work of art. Like, I see this. I understand what they were going for. I see that painting, I see that thing, I have apprehension of that, I understand it. So if you put that into that definition there, strong belief in God are in the doctrines of religion based on spiritual understanding rather than proof. So we look here at Hebrews chapter 11, it kind of defines it for us even. Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. For by it the elders obtained a good report. Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear. So I was in Fort Knox and we had 620 cadets and it was 3rd Regiment, there was 10 Regiments, so you got thousands of cadets coming through the summer. And I, I mean just statistically and the way that the culture is, I was wondering if at some point we would run into someone struggling with transgender ideas. Three days. It took three days. for a cadet to come to us about this. He spoke with the other chaplain first, and then he kind of gave me, and I spoke with him later. When soldiers tell me things, it's confidential, but I ask him if it was okay for me to share some of it. I'm not going to give all the details, but he was okay with that. He grew up as a Christian. No dad in his life. His dad was in prison. And when he started the conversation, he came up and he was asking me, I don't know how to be a man. He's like, I just got an engagement ring for my girlfriend. Try to be a fiance. And you're struggling with this and you think, where is this coming from? But he said, he's like, I don't know how to be a husband. I don't know how to be a man. And he's like, I'm looking at being an officer in the army. I don't know how to do this because I've never had a positive male role model in my life ever. And so he's looking at ways to be loved. I was like, I feel like I am unworthy of this. How do you get love? You become a woman. So that's his mindset of where he's going with this. But he's starting with this, like, how do I be a man? And then he's like, I don't understand faith. And I'm going through just, you know, he said he grew up very contemporary, and he's swinging over more to like liturgical services, like very rigid religious, like more like Catholic or something like that. And so we're talking through faith, and I was like, you know, hitting very hard on salvation. And it's like, I think he has an understanding there. He was saying all the right things, there's no reason for me to question it, but he's definitely screwed up on some things. So we're talking about faith, and he's like, I'm praying, and I'm praying, and I'm praying, and I don't hear anything from God. I don't understand this. So I would ask him, and we said, what is faith? What does faith feel like? Is faith a feeling? No. It's a noun. It's something you grasp. It's not an emotion. Faith doesn't make you feel fuzzy. When your faith is strong, you're not buzzing like a bee. You don't have butterflies in your stomach. So here, I put up Matthew 12, 38 to 41. I'll read it in a second. Why are you convinced God made the earth? We see that in Hebrews 11.3. We believe that God created something out of nothing. That things which are seen are not made of things which do appear. God spoke that into existence. You say, we understand that. We grasp it. We know it. By what? By faith. You say, well, you know, this cadet talking to me, he says, how can I have faith if I've never seen God in my life? The burden is not on God to prove to you. God does not have to earn your faith. That's not the way it works. Here in Matthew 12, the scribes and Pharisees are speaking to Jesus, saying, Master, we would see a sign from thee. But Jesus answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after his sign. There shall no sign be given to it but the sign of the prophet Jonas. For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the wheel's belly, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation. And shall condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonas, and behold, a greater than Jonas is here." So I'm speaking with this cadet. And I told him, I'm going to say the same thing to you. Don't think I'm prideful when I say this. I'm just saying, he's looking for a sign that God is hearing him. He's looking for God to show up. And I just told him, I was like, God is not going to speak to you out of a bush. Right here, Jesus says, the sign of the prophet Jonas. And then he said, they repented at the preaching of Jonas. So what was the sign of Jonas? It was the preaching. God sent Jonah to Nineveh. Jonah was God's sign. He was God's revelation to him. So I said, I'm explaining all this to him, but I'm saying, I'm not being prideful, but me here talking to you, is God getting your attention? Not that I am special, but I was like, the Lord placed me here, you are praying, and I am here speaking with you. And the same thing here with this congregation. If you're looking for God to reach out to you, He is right now. Through the preaching and through the ministry of the church. Jesus said, The sign of the prophet Jonah is preaching. That's how you're going to hear. If you're looking to hear from God, you're looking for guidance, you know, you have your relationship established with him. You're reading, you're praying, you're studying, and you come to church. That's the full circle. That's how you're going to understand where he's leading you. And that is how he's going to show you where he wants you to go. So why are you convinced God made earth? Because of your faith. Through faith, we understand that the world's reframed by the word of God. Through faith, you have been convinced of that. because of your faith. God does not prove He exists in order to earn your faith. God rewards faithfulness with His actions. He shows up. God has proven Himself to you. That's why you're convinced that He created the earth. Because you know He exists. You've experienced Him in your life. He has shown up for you because you have faith in Him. Because you were one of His children, because you were seeking Him, and He says, I will show you, I will. We'll read a few more verses here. By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts, and by it he being dead yet speaketh. By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death, and was not found, because God had translated him. For before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God." So Abel and Enoch both are leading into the thought in verse 6, saying that their faith inspired their actions. And what they did pleased God. And then it says in verse 6, but without faith it is impossible to please Him. So it's not just that their actions pleased God. It says what in the beginning of this verse, both of those verses, verse 4, verse 5, by faith Abel did this, by faith Enoch did this. So then, number one here, it's impossible to please God without faith. Faith leads to obedience. Obedience pleases God. You say, well, where does it say that? Right there at the end of verse 5. He had this testimony that he pleased God. So both of them, their actions pleased God. But their actions pleased God because they were doing it out of their faith. Does that make sense? Their faith is inspiring them, is leading them to obedience to God. And then the actions that they took were pleasing to Him. Because they're living a life of faith, and they are following Him. In 1 Samuel 15, it's one of my favorite passages. The teenagers probably roll their eyes because I talk about Saul and David so much. But it's 1 Samuel 15. The Lord tells Saul to go to the Amalekites and wipe them out. It's called a biblical curse, kind of, that they're wiping out every living thing. Everything. And so Samuel comes to the battle, comes to the camp, whatever, and Saul walks out and says, I've done all that the Lord commanded. And that's when Samuel says, really? Why do I hear oxen lowing? Why do I hear sheep bleeding? And Saul says, well, we kept back the best of everything to sacrifice to the Lord. Action. But his action is not out of faith. He is not offering that sacrifice out of faith. He's probably just lying to Samuel to smooth it over, but even if he was, that's not what God told him to do. God didn't tell him, go and take all the best stuff and sacrifice it to me. He said, wipe it out. And so in Samuel here in verse 22, in Samuel sayeth, Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, he hath also rejected thee from being king. Saul obeyed like 75%, but not 100. What Saul did, from our perspective, is logical, but it's not what God told him to do. And there's multiple instances before this where Saul does things and screws up, and he always blames other people. Always. He's always shipped in blame. And this is kind of the final straw with him. The Lord says, I can't deal with you anymore, Saul. Actually says that the Lord repented. He made Saul king. To grieve the Lord that Saul had chosen to do these things, the Lord had to remove him. So you see in verse four or five and all these people in chapter 11, they're talking about their actions, but all of them, it says by faith, by faith, by faith, by faith. The hall of faith. The faithful people. Saul was not faithful in his actions. And he did not please God. He was unfaithful. In verse 6 it says, But without faith it is impossible to please him, it is impossible to please God. For he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. Remember who Hebrews is written to. It's written to Jewish people. When they say, He is, what does God call Himself in the Old Testament? A lot of things, right? Jehovah, Yahweh, I am. So when He says, without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he that cometh to God must believe that He is. God says, I am. And we show that He is the God that He claims to be by your faithfulness. by our living out what God has said, by believing that God is faithful, by living in faith to God, and then He shows up. God does not need to prove your faith, or He does not need to earn your faith. That is not God's job. He's a lot bigger than that. We know that He is faithful because He said He is, and that's enough. Because He's perfect, and He does not lie. So, number one is, it is impossible to please God without faith. You cannot do it. You cannot do it. Number two, faith in God leads to action. That's kind of what we were talking about already. We'll read 7 to 12 here. "...By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house, by which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith." By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed. And he went out, not knowing whither he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Through faith also Sarah herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged unfaithful who had promised. Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by the seashore innumerable. So, faith in God leads to action. Or, on your part, obedience. Obedient action. Your faith should lead you to obeying God. Because you see Him and you trust Him and you are walking His will for your life. That should inspire you not only to action, but obedient action to God. The obedience leads to God showing Himself in your life. So, there in verse 7 it talks about Noah. It actually says that Noah is moved by fear. You say, well that's not faith. It says by faith, Noah. But what is Noah fearful of? He is fearful that God is going to do exactly what He said He's going to do. He's like, I know God is faithful, I know that He is true, and I know that He's going to flood the world, so I better build this boat and save my family. That's what it means when I'm moved by fear. He's not afraid. I mean, He is afraid, but it's not like a fear of God. He's like, I know God is truthful, and this is going to happen, so I better build the ark. In verse 8, I like this, it says, Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should, after receiving an inheritance, obeyed. So that's where I'm getting that from. When Abraham got the orders from God, he obeyed them. By faith, he obeyed God. He sojourned, he walked. So I was talking with that cadet, when I asked him, what does faith supposed to feel like? What do you think faith feels like? I do not think when God told Abraham to do this, he said, yes, yay, I'm excited about this. When God told Noah, it said that Noah was afraid. It wasn't a good feeling. Sometimes God calls you out on faith to do things that make you uncomfortable. But it's the right thing. So these cadets, they're all learning leadership. They're grading on their leadership. The last two weeks, they were sleeping in patrol bases, they were out in the woods sleeping, they were doing missions or whatever. And they didn't grade them on mission completion, because it didn't happen very often. But it's designed for them to be challenged. But they're grading them on their leadership. They're getting evaluated on leadership. And so I held services for him every now and then. And they were out in the field. That was part of what I was doing, just preaching to the cadets and counseling them, doing different things. But part of leadership is you make decisions. Sometimes right decisions don't feel good. But that doesn't mean it's not the right thing to do. Abraham is sojourning in the land. It means he's wandering around, away from, he's leaving his comfort. It says he dwelt in tabernacles. It means he was dwelling in tents. Tabernacle was a tent. So he's living in tents with his family. He's leaving the house that he had to live in a tent and wander around until the Lord tells him, you're in the right place. He was living by faith. He's saying, this is uncomfortable, but I trust the Lord because He's told me to do this. I know that I'm in the right place because God has told me to do this. And then Sarah, his wife, says she conceives a child after she was past age. And in verse 12 it says, because of Abraham's faith, because he obeyed, because he and Sarah obeyed, because they were faithful. They're spraying there even of one, talking about Abraham, and him as good as dead. So he's saying like, it's kind of a joke almost. He's like, he's way too old for this to happen. He's like, he's way past having kids. He's basically as good as dead. And people as innumerable as stand on the seashore come out of this man. His family, his inheritance, his descendants, or as innumerable as the sand on the seashore coming out of him because he lived by faith, because he was faithful in this. Number three, wrapping up here, pretty close. God always rewards faithfulness. Always. And we'll look at verse 13 to 16, quickly. These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. But now they desire a better country that is in heavenly, wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he hath prepared for them a city. It says, these faithful died, in verse 13, not having previously seen heaven and their reward. They have faith that it's coming. They haven't seen it yet. But they were persuaded, persuaded or convinced. They are convinced that there's something to this life. We go back to verse three. It said, through faith we understand, we grasp, we know that God spoke the world into existence by our faith. These people live their lives in faith because they were convinced there's something to this. If I can think of my life as a timeline. I can pinpoint the areas where I know God showed up because I could not have orchestrated it that way ever. Doors open, people were in my life randomly that I needed at the time. There's no way I could have known that. These people lived by faith because they were convinced. It says, having seen them afar off, were persuaded of them, embraced them, confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on earth. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country. So in verse 14, it means that when you live that way, you are, without saying it, declaring there's something past this world. There's something bigger than this. You're living in a perspective of something bigger. These people were living that way. In verse 15 it says, "...truly if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out." He's saying, if Abraham had looked back to where he came from, he could have gone back. But he didn't. Think about Lot's wife that looked back. And again, think about Hebrews. Paul's writing to them and he's telling them, don't go back. Don't go back into trying to keep all those laws to make yourself holy. Don't go back to your old system. Don't go back to your old idols. That's the same to us. When you start that journey of faith, you do not go back. You don't go back the way you came, you go forward. Forward in God's will for your life. And verse 16, but now they desire a better country. Now living a faithful life, now having experienced God in your life, the desire of a better country that is heavenly. Wherefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he hath prepared for them a city. When Jesus said, I go to prepare a place for you, what is he saying? Well, he's going to heaven, right? He's building our mansions. What is he doing? What's the purpose of that? He's rewarding the faithful. Heaven is a reward for the faithful. When we think about it, yes, it's the place that we don't go to hell, we go to heaven. That's our eternal abode with the Lord. But also, that is your reward for faithfulness. It's your reward. That's what it says right there. Verse 16. God is not ashamed to be called their God. That's huge. Abraham's called the friend of God. He's mentioned in here twice. I believe he's the only person mentioned twice in this chapter. He's called the friend of God. These people in this chapter that are living so faithfully to the point that God says, I'm not ashamed of that person. I'm OK with being that person's God. Because they're choosing me, they're living faithfully. Enoch was translated, he was taken up without having to taste death because he pleased God. Because he was faithful. God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared for them a city. God says, these are my faithful ones. I'm not ashamed of them. I'm preparing the place for them as a reward for the faithful, the saved. People are living their lives in light of there's something more. So same conclusion. What do you draw from this? Do you agree with all this? Yes. Faith is not a feeling. It is a choice. You have to choose to follow God. You have to choose to put effort into your relationship with God. You will not be spiritually mature on accident. I tell the teenagers that a lot. It's like, I can't spiritually mature anyone. I can't look at you and think, spirituality. No, it doesn't work that way. You have to do it yourself. Your faith has to be on you and is yourself. It's a choice. These people had to choose to obey God. And when they did, they were rewarded and God showed up. People thought Noah was a crazy person until it happened. And he was thankful that he lived in fear of the Lord. So faith is not a feeling, it is a choice. Your motivation for faith is not a fuzzy feeling. It's not a religious high that you get when you leave the building. It is obedience to God's will. And in turn, God confirms His will by making the way clear and making Himself known in your life. He will show up if you are living faithfully. God always rewards faithfulness. He will be known to His faithful people. That's what the message of Hebrews 11 is. If you are faithful to God, He will show up in your life. He will be faithful to you. All right, I'll pray and I'll turn. Let's pray. God, thank you for this day. Lord, we thank you for your word, the ability we have to look at it, Lord, and receive help. God, I pray that all of us would be strengthened, Lord, in our faith and our pursuit of you. God, just seeking your will for our lives and following you wherever that is, God. Just help us to be encouraged. Lord, help us with all the different programs that are coming up at the church and to just reach out to the community. Lord, show them we are a people of faith. Show them that there is something here that they are missing. In your name we pray. Amen. I love you. I love you. you