Simply Jesus
Faith in Action
Sunday, February 16, 2025
Welcome!
Call to Worship: Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.
Let us gather today, hearts open and spirits lifted, to celebrate the precious gift of faith that God has bestowed upon us. With believing hearts, we come before Him, ready to worship in spirit and truth, acknowledging that through faith, we can overcome any obstacle by His power at work in us and His grace that goes before us. By faith, we are invited to come boldly to the throne of grace and experience the fullness of His presence. Let us come before Him. Let us offer our whole hearts to our Lord this morning and let us lift up a sound of praise for He is worthy.
Holy Spirit we welcome You here. Come and fill up this space with Your Presence and move in our hearts. Grant us eyes to see the glory of You Lord all around us. Grant us hearts willing to believe fully who You are. Stir in us Holy Spirit and move us to lift up praises to our God.
Praise Songs
Intro: We are arriving near the end of the book of Hebrews and to date we have been building up the greatness of God, the supremacy of Christ as our Savior and Lord, and the incredible gift of the new covenant of grace He offers for all of us to enter into with Him. By now, there is no reason any one of us should have doubts about the abilities or sovereign power of our Lord; it should be evident who He is.
Evident that is, to those who have faith; to those who believe in their heart that which has been shared is true and real. For it is faith that creates this conviction within our hearts to say YES Lord-I know what You say is true and I believe in Your promises! I believe they are for me!
Faith is a powerful force and unleashes the power of God in and through our lives.
Faith knows, this is impossible for me, but with you Lord all things are possible. I don’t see a way out, but that doesn’t matter because I know Lord You will provide a way. I don’t understand what is happening, but Lord I know You work all things for good for those who love You. This hurts right now, but I know this is not the final word or ending-for Your promises say a day is coming with no more tears, no more sorrow and no more pain. I can’t see clearly right now, but I know You and that’s enough for me.
You see this is exactly what faith is, trusting what we know of God and then relying on Him for things we don’t know. God takes what we cannot see or understand and uses it to make good on His Word.
At this point in Hebrews, the author is taking time to call out -after hearing all the unchanging truths of who Jesus is, what faith in Him is then. The author reminds of wonderful examples of faith in action from their ancestors and these people become known as the Heroes of Faith. This chapter has been called the Hall of Faith as names are memorialized because of their great faith. Were these people perfect? Goodness no. But as they walked with God, they chose to believe and in believing who God was, and what He said to them, their obedience followed. None of what we’ll look at today was about the works any of them did or highlighting their amazing talents. The reason they are listed as some of the greats, is solely because of their faith. What we learn about faith is, obedience follows our level of faith-which then is putting our faith into action. Whatever we believe, our life will conform to that belief. The greater our faith, the greater our willingness and even compulsion to be obedient to our God.
Let’s look at some faith in action and let it inspire our faith today.
Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16 NIV
Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. 2 This is what the ancients were commended for. 3 By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.
8 By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. 9 By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. 11 And by faith even Sarah, who was past childbearing age, was enabled to bear children because she considered him faithful who had made the promise. 12 And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore.
13 All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. 14 People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. 15 If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.
- Evidence of Things Not Seen.
Faith relies on what we have seen of God and trusts Him for our future.
Verse 1 is not so much a definition of faith as it is a declaration of what faith does:
Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.
Depending on your translation it will say an assurance, or the evidence of, or possibly the conviction of things not seen. Faith is convincing us and convicting us to believe in what is unseen and know it does exist and it is real. We believe God is real. We believe His power is real. We believe His promises are real. We don’t see Him or His power always in the physical but that doesn’t mean He is not at work and moving. We can feel Him. We can experience Him and know without a doubt He is very real.
Think of other things we believe in that we don’t actually see:
The wind. We don’t see the wind; we see the effects of the wind. We see trees bending and leaves blowing. We see dust being carried in the air. We can feel the wind though, can’t we? We can feel the power of the wind pushing us or the gentle breeze cooling us. Because we see the effects of it moving and we can feel it moving, we believe the wind exists.
What about magnetic force? We see the effects of its power in motion when opposite poles come together-the attraction drawing them together. So, we see evidence of it and believe this force exists.
We can also see the evidence of God all around us. We can feel the power of God moving. We can feel the love of God and experience His presence as we open our hearts to Him, we can learn to hear His instruction even though we don’t audibly hear His voice. We don’t physically see God, but because of the evidence, we believe in God.
Jesus even said to the disciple Tom who doubted that He had in fact raised from the dead and was alive,
John 20:29 29 Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
This is faith in the evidence of things not seen in our hearts. Believe first, and you will see more and more clearly.
Let’s look at Abraham as one of the examples of the heroes of faith in this chapter.
God called then Abram, to leave his homeland and follow Him to a new country and God gave Abram a mighty promise.
Genesis 12:2 2 “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.
What we need to know is Abram was 75 years old already when God called him on this great adventure. But God talked directly to Abram and Abram chose to believe He was who He said He was and amazingly believed this crazy promise God spoke about his future. At this time of being 75 Abram had no children yet. In the physical, things weren’t looking real promising for this supposed future to come about. And yet, Abram believed and followed.
What do we see in Abraham’s journey with God to bring about this wild promise of an entire nation being raised up through him? Learning to trust in God. The more we trust in God, the greater our faith grows.
- Trust in What We Know About God.
Hebrews 11:8 8 By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.
It was faith that caused Abraham to be obedient and go where God was leading him. He didn’t know the end point, how long the journey would be, where he would be settling, or anything that was going to happen in between that moment of deciding to believe in that promise and seeing that promise fulfilled.
This is important for us to take note of. God has ordained our days; He has a plan with great purpose for each of our lives and He’s calling us to follow Him fully trusting in who He is, even though we don’t know where He’s leading. Let us by faith, follow and trust He whatever our path, it will be good and it will be for His glory.
We know Sarah and Abraham became impatient, doubting and started to take matters into their own hands to bring about the promise of this nation coming about-after all many years passed by and still no children. Yet Abraham stayed with God and followed wherever He led him. Through their own plans, Ishmael came about who indeed was Abraham’s son, but he was not the miracle child whom God had purposed to bring about for His glory and He was not the one God’s covenant would be with to build the nation of Israel. God called Abraham to believe in what He told him and trust He will surely do it.
We see this interaction when God is calling Abraham be faithful and know I will surely do as I have stated. Genesis 17: 18-19 18 And Abraham said to God, “If only Ishmael might live under your blessing!” 19 Then God said, “Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.
Now this miracle child is given a name, Isaac, and Abraham chooses to believe. And of course, as God stated Isaac did come about through Sarah, not another woman of their choosing. Sarah was 90 years old and Abraham 100 years old! The beginning of this promise of this nation rising up through Abraham’s seed didn’t take shape for 25 years when God first called him. 25 years Abraham followed God in this foreign land, believing if He said it, He will surely make it happen. Was he perfect throughout-no. Did he try to take the reigns at times-yes. So we see his humanity enter when there is much waiting and wondering. But he kept his faith in God. Also notice the mercy of God. Ishmael was never meant to be, and his arrival caused many problems in their family camp, BUT Abraham loved him as his son and God heard Abraham’s cry to bless him also. See that God said yes, I will bless him, but the covenant is going to be through Isaac. So Ishmael did rise into a mighty nation and also had many descendants.
We like Abraham, must choose to trust in what we know about God. Who does He say He is? What does His Word say He will do? What has He already done that proves He is trustworthy?
We must practice pausing when we feel fear or anxiety rising, or when we like Sarah and Abraham become impatient and then want to doubt if we heard God right…. STOP and ask ourselves what do I know about who God is? What is truth about God’s nature and character? What has God already shown me about who He is?
Then as we remind ourselves, we must choose to say, I am going to trust in what I know of God because He is faithful. This is what Abraham learned to do.
There are so many unknown details in our lives and the trials we face, and ultimately, those details don’t matter because they are ever in flux. What matters is WHO is for us and what His promises say-because those promises are eternal. These promises are often unseen to the world around us, but can be seen by our spiritual eyes, by the faithful believer if we only look for them.
Standing in these eternal promises will give us greater strength and staying power to endure more than anything we can find in this world. Think about some of your hardest trials in life- was it not your faith that pulled you through? Faith in what? The eternal promises of God-that they will be realized for you. Faith in God’s unchanging nature. Faith in the power of Jesus’ name-because He tells us there is nothing more powerful. Faith in His Word that is true above all the noise or lies we here. His Word is our truth to rest in and find ourselves again when we get lost in this world.
It all comes down to our confidence in what we hope for and the assurance about what we do not yet see. This is faith and this is our power to be using now. Faith is needed now while we wait to join Him in Heaven.
Let’s be remined for a moment about what we know of God. What does His Word tell us?
Psalm 145:13 13 Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and your dominion endures through all generations. The Lord is trustworthy in all he promises and faithful in all he does.
Deuteronomy 7:9 9 Know therefore that the Lord your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments.
Do you know this as your truth? These are the truths Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and all the greats in this Hall of Faith learned and lived their lives by. We must practice living by and making decisions based on what we know about God. If you don’t know Him, then you need to dig in and start getting to know Him. He is so gracious to tell us exactly who He is, if we will seek Him. He says in Jeremiah 29 you will find Me when you search for me with all your heart. He WANTS to make Himself known to those who want to know Him.
We also want to learn to live our lives as believers, who look forward to the fulfillment of every promise. We can get very fixated on the here and now living and all that is or isn’t happening as we want it to. But these lives are temporary. There are a fixed number of days given to each one of us, but our lives don’t stop here on this earth. God continues to write our stories for eternity with Him! Look forward to all He desires to show you and what is yet coming!
- Look Forward.
Hebrews 11:10 10 For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God
Having this forward looking outlook allowed Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob to live among strangers in a foreign land and find contentment and joy in what they were creating. A nation was beginning to emerge; a people set apart by God and for God. They were not tied to the things of this world but were willing to do some hard things throughout their lifetimes with the hope of that greater promise coming about. They also allowed some incredible miracles to take place because they were obedient to God and trusted in what they knew about Him. God showed up and did what they couldn’t-time and time again. God does this in our lives too as we trust Him and give Him room to move.
Every person listed in this chapter has their own story of great faith during trying times and they like Abraham learned to trust in what they knew of God and follow where He was leading. They believed a greater promise was coming about and they held on to that promise. This is what we need to learn to focus on too-the greater promise.
Hebrews 11:16 . 16 Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.
Take note, at the end of this chapter of sharing many examples of great faith we see this shocking statement:
None of them saw the full realization of the promise in their earthly lifetime. They heard God speak a great promise, they chose by faith to believe and trust in God, and in that trust, they were obedient to do their part in bringing this promise about. Their lives came to an end and then they were waiting, for the arrival of Christ. More waiting. When Christ died and rose again He took those with Him to glory who had long been waiting. So awesome! But wait there is more to come! The best has not even happened yet!
Hebrews 11:39-40 39 These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised, 40 since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.
Why has God not brought about this heavenly city yet and done away with this broken world? Quite simply we are the reason! “Us”! All who are alive right now and we have even more evidence available to us today than those heroes of faith before. God in His grace and love is allowing us time to choose to believe and trust in what we know about Him, so we too might share in these eternal rewards with those who went before us.
2 Peter 3:9 states The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.
How many are grateful today for a patient God? Might God know more than us in how and when things should come about? This is why we trust in what we know about God.
Conclusion: Faith relies on what we have seen of God and trusts Him for our future. Let us have confidence in what we hope for and live forward looking to the fulfillment of all promises in our heavenly kingdom. Since He has spoken it, He will surely do it!
Let’s pray.
Offering
Prayers:
Final Song
Final Blessing: 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24 Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.
