Text: Hebrews 11:8–19
Preacher: Pastor Brian Sauvé

Farewell to Shadowlands

It’s been a rough few weeks, hasn’t it? After the earthquake, I almost ran outside just to see if there was going to be a hail of fire and brimstone. Would you pray with me before we get started? 

Now, some of us are probably battling anxiety and fear. Some of us are probably worried about older parents getting sick, or kids getting sick. Some of us are dealing with temporary layoffs, reduced work, or uncertainty about income. Some of us are self-employed or a business, and now have to figure out what to do with little to no income for a while.

Maybe you just watched your life savings drop thirty or forty percent in three weeks, maybe even retirement accounts that are supposed to be supporting you in the next few years.

Now, maybe you’re wondering why I’m not preaching a topical sermon on anxiety or dealing with tumultuous times. And my answer is that I thought about it—many of my fellow pastors are doing just that, and I know it will be helpful to their people. 

But as I thought about it, I asked, “What text would I want my people to hear from in such a sermon?” And I realized that there are few texts that would be better for a sermon like that than those we find in Hebrews 11—this great chapter of Bible stories, telling us how our spiritual forefathers and foremothers walked through great trials by faith, trials that far surpass our own. They were able to walk through both beheading and winning kingdoms in faith. That means they didn’t waver in their trust of God when they went through trial, nor did they waver in their trust in God when they experienced abundance. The great need for all of us today in this uncertain time and every day for the rest of our lives—whether in abounding or lacking—is precisely that kind of faith.

Look with me, if you would, at Hebrews 11:8, and we will read through verse 19. This is the Word of the Living God:

“By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.

These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.

By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son, of whom it was said, “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.” He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back.”

-Hebrews 11:8–19

No Generic Faith

So very simply, what we’re going to see through our spiritual forefather Abraham and his wife Sarah are five things that faith does in the life lived under the providence and goodness of our God. 

Now remember, trust is a transitive verb: We’re not just talking about some kind of generic “faith,” of the just-have-a-little-faith-that-things-are-going-to-turn-out-ok variety. No, what matters when we talk about faith is what that faith is in and why. 

What is our faith in? What kind of faith are we talking about here in Hebrews 11? Faith that clings to the Living God. Faith that trusts in his promises and the outcome of those promises before we see that outcome. Faith that we are not our own, but belong to God, and that our God has paid a ransom, a down payment in blood in order to secure our lives with him in the heavenly places—right now. 

Faith that this is already assured. Faith that he will come through on what he has spoken and what is written. Faith that the gospel is true, that our sin is forgiven, that the ancient divine oaths have been fulfilled and will be fulfilled.

That faith. Not random, generic faith in humanity or in spiritual things or in nothing of real substance—no, faith in the substantive, rock-solid, granite bedrock of God’s character.

Five Things Faith Does

So I will begin each of these five things faith does with the word “that,” as in “That faith I’ve just described.” So number one:

1. That faith moves us to risky obedience in this earthly city in light of the coming eternal city (8–10).

Look again at verse 8:

“By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God.”

-Hebrews 11:8–10

In Genesis 12, the book of beginnings moves from a sweeping narrative of several thousand years—creation and genealogies and the Flood and Babel—into the discussion of really a single family for the remaining 38 chapters of the book, the family of Abraham.

And that whole story begins with God coming to a random man from what would become Babylon, Abram, and telling him to leave his homeland, everything he’d ever known, his whole family and livelihood, and go to a land God would show him. And guess what? He did it!

Abraham went. Why? Because he believed God. Specifically, he believed the promises of God. In Genesis 12:2–4, he promised,

“‘…I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.' So Abram went, as the LORD had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.”

-Genesis 12:2–4

And the divinely inspired, inerrant commentary of the New Testament on the old, which we have here in Hebrews 11, tells us an even deeper why behind Abraham’s obedience of faith: “He was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God.”

Abraham knew that his whole life could either be a journey through an earthly city with nothing beyond it—no meaning, no purpose, no eternal hope—or a journey through this earthly city towards an eternal city.

Your choice, my choice, our choice is the same. Earthly or eternal? Heavenly hope or earthly hope? Notice that this doesn’t mean that our hope is nebulous, that the way to hope in the eternal is by sitting down and thinking spiritual thoughts: “I’m spiritual. My hope is eternal. So watch me do yoga poses and oooommmm for an hour while I think about the cosmic essence.” No!

That means we go in obedience here in this earthly city. Abraham believed God, hoped for the eternal city, and so he started walking! His faith in the eternal city moved him to risky obedience here in the earthly city. So read your Bible, repent of sin, believe God, and go in obedience, whatever the seeming risk to your earthly self or earthly stuff.

2. That faith receives divine power (11–12).

Look at verse 11, if you would:

“By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.”

-Hebrews 11:11–12

Sarah believed in the promises of God—promises which required offspring to a barren woman and her geriatric husband—and through her faith received divine power to conceive the patriarch Isaac.

Now there’s a ditch we can fall in here, and it’s the ditch that the charlatans fall in. It’s the ditch that the New Apostolic Reformation and the hyper-charismatics and the Word Faith heretics and the Bethelites fall in—and it’s the ditch of turning faith into a stick and God into piñata.

“If I just whack God hard enough, candy will fall out.” This is what you’re hearing when you hear people pray, “I decree and I declare that I will receive healing for my illness. I decree and I declare that this offering of $100 will be a seed that grows into $1,000. HALLELUJER!”

That’s blasphemous nonsense that makes God into our slave. May God remove their lampstand and shut the mouths of their leaders. May they repent in dust and ashes and repay what they have stolen by their fraudulent and evil works.

But there’s another ditch, isn’t there? The ditch of acting like faith doesn’t do anything. We could go so far to correct the errors of the charlatans as to act like God hasn’t promised us that he will respond to our faith with his blessing. But he has!

In fact, faith is active in every act of good which God blesses, as we learned last week—without faith it is impossible to please God. God loves to bless faith, because our faith preaches our dependence on him, our trust in him, and our need for him.

Sarah’s womb was opened by faith. That doesn’t mean that she opened her own womb by feeling a certain religious emotion, it means she rested in God’s promise to do something, which he then did through that trust.

What promises are we believing and resting in today? What instructions are we heeding by faith? Do you believe that your sins are forgiven you? Do you believe that money and health and children and a spouse and a good job are never going to be enough to satisfy you? That you need God? This is eminently practical stuff; this is about the disposition with which we live our lives. Do we live them in faith in God throughout trial or abounding? Or do we live in anxiety when we are in trial and comfort when we are abounding?

That preaches that we trust in our circumstances and our stuff, not in God. Faith believes God, and so faith receives God’s power to endure and obey and prosper, whatever God determines prospering looks like for us in our time and place. Faith believes that whatever God gives us is something the Lord is working together for our good.

Sarah was barren. That was her problem. And listen, because this is so, so important, especially right now in the cultural moment we find ourselves: When calamity strikes, when trial comes, when the fires of trouble rage, where your heart goes for security and comfort and help betrays the object of your faith.

Calamity is the great unmasking of our gods. In the face of barrenness, Sarah’s faith rested in here God—and by that faith, she received divine power and help, because her God was God indeed.

When we face calamity, will we turn to the impotent gods of the State for help? Will we turn to the lying gods of our bank accounts, 401k performance, and gold reserves? Will we turn to the strength of our hands, the preparedness of our food supplies, and our stockpiles of ammunition? Or will our first and abiding instinct to be trust in and cry out to the Living God for our help and our hope?

Listen: The government is good. God established it to do good, and we ought to carefully consider its instructions in a time like this. Money is a good thing in the hands of a godly man and a godly woman: You can use it to build good things and care for your own and your neighbor. You can use it wisely to shelter yourself and others in a storm and leave an inheritance. And the ability to protect and serve those under your care, even with violence if necessary is a good thing. I am for having guns and ammo and food supplies and being prepared.

But where is our trust? Not in those things. Those things are impotent gods, even if they can well serve those whose trust is in the true and Living God.

Sarah trusted in the God who raises the dead. May we so do as well in the face of death and calamity.

3. That faith reaches out and grasps citizenship in a homeland we won’t inhabit until long after we are dust (13–16a).

Verse 13,

These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one.” 

-Hebrews 11:13–16a

I won’t belabor this point, because this is an expansion of what we saw in Abraham’s leaving this earthly city in hope of the heavenly city, but I want to expand it with a reference that I just can’t pass up. You guessed it, a Narnia reference.

In the last book in the heptalogy, The Last Battle, the final king of Narnia Tirian, faces setback after setback. A false god and his false prophet misleads the people. An enemy invades and conquers. And finally, all hope seems lost, and the king and his friends are tossed through the doorway of death.

But when they open their eyes, they blink a few times, because they find themselves in a bright, sunlit meadow. And what they realize progressively is that they are in some kind of greater, eternal Narnia. Aslan appears and tells them the truth: Yes, they have died, but death is just the end of the school term.

Now they are in the real thing, real Life, the real Narnia. And they realize that that is the homeland they had always longed for, that everything good about old Narnia was just a foregleam of this good land.

That’s it. I can’t read that without getting something in my eye, and if that means I have to hand in my man card so be it. Friends, doesn’t that put it in perspective? When we’re suffering here? Anxious here? Or even when we get what we want and then go to bed that night and realize that even money or job or spouse or kids or house or possessions—none of it can really satisfy?

All of it is a little beam of sunlight, every blessing that is momentarily pleasing—from a good ribeye to a good night with your wife—is trying to draw our eyes up to the sun, to God himself. Every little blessing is supposed to make us think, “If this is momentarily good, how good must the eternal God be?”

And every trial is preaching, “Hold fast hope: The Old Narnia might be crashing to the ground, but the real one is just over the horizon.” Faith reaches out and grasps our future inheritance before it arrives.

4. That faith wins God’s commendation—he is not ashamed to be called our God (16b).

Verse 16b,

“Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.”

-Hebrews 11:16b

I want you to think about someone that you really, really want to be proud of you. Maybe your father, your spouse, someone you really respect. Think about how encouraging it is when someone whom you respect, someone really worthy and honorable, is proud of you.

Now think about how awful it is when that person is ashamed of you. Like when your dad found out you had stolen money from his wallet, or when your spouse found out something shameful that you had done—isn’t that awful?

We go to extraordinary lengths to hide things that would bring us shame. We use private browsers, we lie to our friends and family, we cover things up. We sneak and conceal. We make excuses and shift the blame.

But here is the glory of gospel-faith: God, the most honorable Being in all existence, the one whose commendation, whose respect, whose approval, is the most glorious—but also the Being from whom it is impossible to hide even one thought, even one motivation—that Being is not ashamed to be associated with us by faith.

Only a kind of 100-proof grace that can remove the shame of our most shameful deeds could do that. Only the blood-payment of the Lord Jesus can do that. Nothing else will suffice to make this God want to be associated with us.

And yet, that is what faith in the promises of God does: It receives God’s commendation. He is not ashamed to be our God, because he has made us worthy through his Son. He came and died and rose to accomplish this. He paid the blood ransom on the altar of the cross. And so we trust him and then we come to that same altar ourselves. Number five: 

5. That faith lays everything down on the altar, knowing that the only way to keep what is precious to us is to give it away (17–19).

Verse 17,

“By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son, of whom it was said, “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.” He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back.”

-Hebrews 11:8–19

Our faith is true faith when it comes to God, body and soul, and says, “Thy will be done. Thy will be done with my body, my health, my soul, my money, my wife, my kids, my job, my things, my everything.”

Abraham offered even his only son whom he loved up on the altar when God asked, because Abraham knew that God had promised an unbreakable linage through this son, and he knew by faith that God would raise him from the dead if he needed to in order to see that promise fulfilled.

Here’s the principle to bet your life on, Refuge: Nothing put on the altar at God’s request, no seed that falls to the ground and dies, will fail to become far more glorious in the resurrecting hand of God. Let me therefore leave you with this glorious word from the Apostle Paul in the twelfth chapter of his letter to the Romans:

“I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

-Romans 12:1–2

Pray & Ask

Before I pray and end our time, I’d like to target a timely exhortation to us in this time:

Pray

Pray. Earnestly. For your own heart’s response to these uncertain times, and for your family’s, this church, out state, and our world.

Ask

Ask. Please let us know if you have needs right now. If you are out of work and facing bills. If you are sick and need prayer. If you are out of something you need. 

I believe that between all of us, we have no lack for resources, whether that be food, money, or even toilet paper. I am absolutely convinced that the only reason one of us would suffer lack during this time is if some of us fail to love one another. And that goes for the next month, six months, year, and beyond. Ok? Let’s pray.