FOR WE WALK BY FAITH...

Hebrews 11 is one of my favorite chapters. When I read about any testimonies about how God’s Spirit has touched the lives of not only the “heroes of faith” mentioned, but also the lives of us ordinary people, my heart soars. My faith soars. May yours, too, as you meditate on God’s “faith chapter,” Hebrews 11.

ETERNAL PERSPECTIVES  by Sally Bair

Keep the faith

Most farmers believe in the success of their endeavors. They plow and disc and plant with eternal optimism as they await the harvest. 

We non-farmers also have faith in the success of our “plantings.” We expect a paycheck for our work, we count on our furnaces to work, and we use our vehicles without a thought of accident or breakdown. When things do go wrong, we believe they can be fixed, if not by us then by someone else.

Most of us also have faith in other people, trusting them to do what is right. We trust our spouses to remain faithful and our children to obey us. We see evidence of trust everywhere.

Faith is the foundation of the Christian religion. What is faith, exactly? Hebrews 11:1 gives the answer. “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Called the “faith chapter” by many, Hebrews 11 accounts the examples of people who, by faith and against all odds, believed God’s promises. Noah, Abraham and Sarah, Moses, Rahab, Gideon and Barak, Samson, David, Samuel, and the prophets all believed in God’s unseen promises. So did the countless martyrs of the early Christian church and so do modern-day martyrs throughout the world.

The Bible says we are “surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses” such as they. (Hebrews 12:1) Their testimonies of faith are meant to encourage us to put aside our weighty concerns and our sins, trusting instead in God’s promise of eternal life through His Son, Jesus. We can’t “see” God with our physical eyes, but we can see Him with our spiritual eyes—especially through the eyes of His Word and Spirit.

How ironic that, though we sometimes mess up in the middle of our faith walk, just as did all the heroes of faith listed in Hebrews 11, God remains faithful to us. His faithfulness never ends. As He sees ahead to the farmer’s harvest, He also sees ahead to the spiritual harvest worked by and through our submission and obedience to Him, even when we struggle to believe in a good outcome.  

Lord, may our faith not falter but grow deeper than that of a farmer waiting for the harvest as we meditate on Your Word, especially on the stories of faith. In Jesus’ name, amen.