Through Faith and By Faith - Hebrews 11

Looking at the achievements of faith from the perspective of persuasion and credence. Part Four - Abraham

Author: Randy Pritts

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Part of the SoGreatSalvationSeries

Today's Text:

"By faith Abraham" v8

We last left off in our study at Noah. God speaks, man reacts, man reacts to what God has said, man reacts to what God does. Some actions speak louder than words, the flood of Noah and the dramatic end of the Antediluvian Age is one such loud speaking action. The four sons of Noah alone with their wives are left to start up the next age that will repopulate the Earth that the word of God will be framing.

Frame this we gather that the framing word of God means serious business. A generation is not allowed to react to that word in total opposite and get away with it. Whatever it was that was done in those generations (we are not told with any detail) obviously amounted to a wickedness so opposite the word of God that it came to a point where only one person remaining in all the Earth could be found to be righteous. Noah had believed in the framing word of that age, as it had been mounting up for ten generations before him. Add to that the direct utterences made to him, Noah believed and acted well upon it to the saving of his household, as he did the continuation of mankind.

But, as we can read, things from that point still did not go so well. We must still consider that the framing word of God does not yet contain a Law or a priesthood, and until the time today of Abraham there is no covenant other than the cryptic covenant from kjv@Genesis:3:15 of a messianic seed. We also now have a promise that the Earth will never again be flooded this way, the Earth is reserved now for a judgment made by fire. It is not like Noah had to travel the Earth to spread this word, the world for him was close by in the four neighboring tents. This age begins with everyone knowing and being framed by the very same word; the evidence is now clear that life is not a game to be played with God. Life is what the word of God says. It should be lived by faith. This should be the substance of their faith moving forward from here and the essential evidence behind the future claims of what is yet to happen unseen. There will be a continuation of man. There will still be a messiah seed.

Between Noah, the bridging patriarch of both the former and next successive age, and Abraham it's primary Patriarch, there are multiple generations leading up to the "Tower of Babel" another major revolt of the Earth's masses against the word and image of Jehovah which leads to an additional framing action, the confusion of man's tongue dividing tribes off, scattering tribes out further into Earth's inhabitable reaches. Our study here today now leads us to man living near his dad in what today would be in southern Iraq, the land known back then as Chaldea.

"...when he was called to go out..." v8

Let's try to look at what needs to happen here from God's unique perspective. We have Abraham with whom God is about to make a very substantial unconditional covenant with here in Chaldea. We have Christ Jesus who will be the promised seed appearing on a cross 2000 or so years later outside the wall of a city that hasn't been built yet in a nation of Abraham's that doesn't exist yet and won't exist for another 400 plus years after Abraham. You're going to make this covenant with Abraham, but you want him to know and have a sense of what is needing to occur between now and then, before you finally unconditionally fulfill your oath to him.

So you make an unconditional covenant with him (you walk through the token cutting just you alone), but you don't leave it at that, you take him to the land his descendants will possess and show him as it stands right now. In a sense, you have given Abraham something on which to hope, and now your are adding to that hope the type of substance that will turn that hope into a solid faith, and adding further substance to the faith that will be carried on for generations and ages to come. Before those descendants enter back into this land, you will be making another deposit to grow their substance through another man called Moses and a lesser explanatory conditional covenant called Law that will lead them to see the need for none other than the savior Christ where the promise made to Eve will be ultimately be fulfilled.

Now let's look at this now from Abraham's perspective best we can. How can a man of any time or background wrap his mind around all of this that needs to happen. Man for the most part is only focused on the here and now and the day to day. A man like us is likely to say "can't you use somebody else? I have it pretty good here and have a beautiful wife. We'd love to have kids, we'd love to have enough kids to foster an nation, that part of it sounds good. Why don't we just stay here and see how things play out". Well, substance to our faith does not ever come to us so easy. That is why so few people here on Earth ever have it.

No, Abraham you see must be "called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance". And though the covenant made is unconditional, before the faith of Abraham can be filled and supported with full and measurable enduring substance he must find it in his human heart and excitement to obey.

"...and he went out, not knowing whither he went..."

And so must we if we are to have any substance.

"By faith he sojourned in the land of promise..." v9

What a really cool way to name this "Land of Promise". I can almost see it up there on a roadside billboard sign. "Come on honey, get packed up cause you and I are moving to the Land of Promise". Truly it is the land of promise, God's promise, let's not loose sight of this. I can see the happy couple on a hilltop "over there I want to put a curtain...we'll line up the bassinets along that wall...this can be your work room" and so on. At this particular time and age however, the land involved that you have come into and are sojourning is nothing but a pit of sin, the ground cries out for bloody murder, and giants (oh did I forget to mention the land has been invested by a family of massive giants?) (honey..honey..where are you going?). You'll recall that when the nation of Israel finally gets to the billboard sign, most of them want to turn back around for Egypt, 10 of twelve spies firmly stating "there ain't no way we are ready to move in there". The stench of sin was so foul and deep that it wasn't for another 400 years when the sin of these inhabitant's were completed before Israel would even be allowed to even consider stepping in.

Then there was a plague in all that land that Abraham and Sarah had to escape into Egypt, when Abraham feared for his life because of the stunning beauty of his wife, a beauty so rare it attracted the marital intentions of the king of Gerar. Nephew Lot had to be rescued out of Sodom and Gomorrah. There was a nasty war between several well armed kings Abraham had to mount his own army against. You see the "land of promise" and this sojourning pilgrimage was nothing easy, nothing that either could have expected. The question that I have is why is that? Why did God put them through this?

It is probably the question saints have had ever since this. Why is God putting me through all of this? Why does the land of promise that you and I have entered into always seem to be such? The answer involved is not an easy one for any one of us to digest; the trials of faith require for us to meet them head on with a sizable measure of substance. It is not just hope that sees us through, though hope is a strong component. It is the reliance upon God's framing word, reliance upon substantial covenants, the believe that Jehovah exists/has said/has promised/has provided and that HE is a rewarder of those who diligently seek HIM, the experience of HIM in these smaller but hostile matters that grows within us faith of such overcoming substance.

Abraham was rewarded well for his obedience under trial. Some criticize him because they see him as a rich rich man. What they neglect to consider is that his riches were the reward of a faithful and obedient quest, a pilgrimage, a sojourning among a dangerous people that had long been (since the Tower of Babel) in direct rebellion against God.

"...he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God" v10

We are not done with Abraham yet, but to get to him another time the author here first wants us to properly consider the faith of his loving but barren wife Sarah. Before we get to her, let us conclude today by considering "...he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God" v10

I had mentioned the Tower of Babel. It consisted of four cities designed by Nimrod. In the midst of those cities on the plains of Shinar near Babylon (not far/north from Chaldea) was to be built a Tower that reached to the heavens towards a much different God. This was the heart of man at that time, to the flood they paid no mind, in fact now God Jehovah was a god much to be blamed, and so man revolted. Abraham is the first step since the time of that dispersion that God has once again uttered and is actively framing that age. An entire nation of descendants for generations since then have been able to look back at what was said, what was done, what had been promised, eventually having the strength of substance to enter into that promise land and allow the mighty arm of God to show itself victorious over rebellious tribes and sinful nations.

At the same time however, the Law later given has proved to all that the descending recipients of this land have also been rebellious and frequently hard of heart. And there we have proven the need for all to rely upon the salvation (So Great Salvation) of God's only son/our risen savior Lord Jesus. To Christians today and our brethren messianic converts, a good share of God's promise remains a future hope for which hope we must be tried and grown in enduring substance through our belief and obedience.

We too have been rebellious and frequently hard of heart. We think that we have a faith that knows it all and doesn't need to be reformed or tested. We strike out at those that we have been sent to serve and sojourn with. We have thought that we are the city built by God and that we will make the world well, the world to us has been promised. Better for us that we look for the real deal, the real faith, the real substance, and the real "city with foundations", leave the land that we have lived in, obediently go out into a place which we should after receive for an eternal inheritance.

Comment Board: ThroughFaithAndByFaith04

Tags: Faith, Abraham, Noah, Babel, Sojourn, Pilgrimage, ,

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