BACKGROUND:All of the people mentioned by name in Hebrews 11 and those alluded to received God’s approval because of their faith. These people looked forward to a better day and salvation, but none of them received all that God had promised. Of course, they saw some of God’s promises fulfilled, but not the promises that referred to the new covenant and the promised eternal Kingdom. These people did not live to see the Kingdom arrive, but their future citizenship was secure there. Thus, they were able to endure suffering.
Hebrews 11 has been called faith’s “hall of fame.” No doubt the author surprised his readers by this conclusion: these mighty Jewish heroes did not receive God’s full reward because they died before Christ came. In God’s plan, they and the Christian believers (who were also enduring much testing) would be rewarded together.
The far better things that God has in mind refers to the new covenant. The forefathers did not receive this; rather, it is experienced by those who live after the death and resurrection of Christ, for he is the one who introduced the new covenant and the new promises.
There is though a solidarity among believers. Old and New Testament believers will receive the prize together. Not only are we one in the body of Christ with all those alive, but we are also one with all those who ever lived. One day all believers will share in the promised blessing with Christ. We will then be complete and perfect in him.
SO WHAT? (what will I do with what I have read today?)
I’d like to finish of Hebrews 11 by taking you to a passage that details a man who Jesus described as having the greatest faith he had ever seen. Matthew 8:5-10 says, “One day a Roman army officer came to Jesus and said, “I have a servant who’s very ill. In fact, he’s paralyzed and he’s suffering in bed.’ Jesus said, ‘I'll go to your house and heal him.’ And the Roman centurion said, ‘O Lord, You don’t need to do that. I understand authority and I’m not worthy for You to come to my house. But I know this obedience and authority thing. I’m a captain in the army. I give commands to my soldiers and they obey immediately. I make commands to my servants and they obey me immediately. They do whatever I tell them to do. So I understand authority and obedience. You don’t need to come to my house, Jesus. If You just say the word from right here I’m sure he’ll be healed instantly.’ Jesus looked at that man and said, ‘This is the greatest faith I’ve ever seen in Israel.’”
The greatest faith. Why? Because faith and obedience are interlocked. When you trust someone you do what they say. If you don’t do what someone tells you to do it means you don’t trust them. God has linked faith and obedience together so that all of the promises of God are conditioned upon you following the directions that He gives you.
Deuteronomy 5:33 says, “Follow all the directions the Lord has given you. Then life will go well for you.” That’s a great promise – a promise you can build your life and faith upon.
I want you to know this morning, that God has made some incredible promises in His word about obedience. The Bible says that if you follow God's directions you will be happy. You will live longer. You will lack nothing good and you will have all that you need. And guess what? That’s just 10 of the more than 7000 promises in the bible. Think about it, you could memorize a promise a week and it would take you 20+ years to get through them all. What would you’re faith look like if you claimed them all? If you knew them and trusted them? You could /would change the world!
Folks, I know that a lot of these commands, they don’t make sense from a human standpoint. But God says do it. It’s a matter of trust. It’s a matter of obedience! Obedience is a demonstration of faith. Obedience unlocks the key to all of God's blessings in life. God promises to reward you if you’ll just follow His directions.
As your pastor, I don’t want you to miss out on all the promises. I don’t want you to miss out that God will bless you and save you and watch over you and take care of you and help you and you’ll be happy and live longer and you’ll lack nothing and you’ll have what you need and you’ll have perfect freedom.
What you must do in order to appropriate all these things in your life? The Bible is very clear. You do four things.
#1. Obey God immediately!
The greatest faith. Why? Because faith and obedience are interlocked. When you trust someone you do what they say. If you don’t do what someone tells you to do it means you don’t trust them. God has linked faith and obedience together so that all of the promises of God are conditioned upon you following the directions that He gives you.
Deuteronomy 5:33 says, “Follow all the directions the Lord has given you. Then life will go well for you.” That’s a great promise – a promise you can build your life and faith upon.
I want you to know this morning, that God has made some incredible promises in His word about obedience. The Bible says that if you follow God's directions you will be happy. You will live longer. You will lack nothing good and you will have all that you need. And guess what? That’s just 10 of the more than 7000 promises in the bible. Think about it, you could memorize a promise a week and it would take you 20+ years to get through them all. What would you’re faith look like if you claimed them all? If you knew them and trusted them? You could /would change the world!
Folks, I know that a lot of these commands, they don’t make sense from a human standpoint. But God says do it. It’s a matter of trust. It’s a matter of obedience! Obedience is a demonstration of faith. Obedience unlocks the key to all of God's blessings in life. God promises to reward you if you’ll just follow His directions.
As your pastor, I don’t want you to miss out on all the promises. I don’t want you to miss out that God will bless you and save you and watch over you and take care of you and help you and you’ll be happy and live longer and you’ll lack nothing and you’ll have what you need and you’ll have perfect freedom.
What you must do in order to appropriate all these things in your life? The Bible is very clear. You do four things.
#1. Obey God immediately!
Don’t delay. Don’t wait. Don’t procrastinate. Don’t put it off. Don’t make excuses. Don’t drag your feet. Just do it. You do it now. Don’t do it later. You do it now.
Psalm 119:32 says “I will quickly obey Your commands. ... Without delay I hurry to obey Your commands.” If there’s any time in life you really ought to hurry it’s when God tells you to do something. Don’t delay on that. You hurry. You obey God immediately whether you feel like it or not. Whether you understand it or not. Just do it immediately.
Can I say something that is so key here - You don’t have to understand something to benefit from it. You may say, what do you mean by that?
I don’t understand how heavy planes fly in the air but I fly all the time. I don’t understand how computers work but I sure like e-mail. I don’t understand internal combustion but I’ve driven a car for years. You don’t have to understand something to enjoy it, to benefit from it. And you don’t have to understand God's commands in order to obey them and benefit from them.
Every parent knows that you’ll tell a kid something sometimes and they’ll say, “Why should I do that?” and you say, “Because I said so.” Behind those five words you’re actually saying, “Because your little pea brain isn’t big enough to understand it and one day you’ll understand real reality but right now trust me. I know better than you. I’m doing this for your own good so you do it.” All of that is behind, “Because I say so.”
And God sometimes tells you to do something and you say, “Why?” and He says, “Because I say so. Because I know more than you. I don’t owe you an explanation. One day you’re going to understand. But now, just do it.” It is pretty audacious to question the creator of the universe, “Are You sure, God?” Some of you say, “What if I don’t have a good attitude?” Listen, you still obey. “You’re telling me to obey God with a bad attitude?” Absolutely. That’s far better than disobedience.
You parents, if you say, “Kids, I want you all to clean your room but you don’t have to do it until you have an enthusiastic attitude.” They’re never going to do it. You do it in spite of.
Question: What if God responded to your needs at the same speed in which you obey Him? When we get in trouble, we want God's help immediately. “God, I need You help now! I need it fast!” and God would say, “I’ll think about it. I'll get around to it one of these days. But right now I’m a little busy. I intend to help you but it will be awhile.”
If you want the blessings of God, all the ones I just read, if you want those in your life, you must obey God immediately. If you want all the blessings of God in your life, you must also ...
#2. Obey Him completely!
Not just immediately but completely. You don’t say, “I’ll take this one and not that one... I like this command but I don’t like that one... I’m going to follow this one but I’m not going to follow that one.” You need to not be partially obedient, but totally obedient. Psalm 119:4 says, “Lord, You gave Your orders to be obeyed completely.” In order to do this, to obey God completely, you need to understand two very important truths.
1. God’s standard of right and wrong has never changed. It never has. It never will. If something was wrong 6000 years ago it’s still wrong today. If it was right 10,000 years ago, it’s still right today. Lying was wrong in the Ten Commandments. It’s still wrong today. Truth doesn’t change. Culture changes, popular opinion changes. Lots of things change but truth does not change. It is eternal forever. And what’s right is right and what’s wrong is wrong. Regardless of what the popular opinion polls say.
2. God has a bigger perspective than you. He sees things you can’t see. You trying to see from God's perspective would be like an ant trying to see from your perspective. It isn’t going to happen. You’re not capable of seeing it all like God sees it all. You need to trust Him. James 4:11 says “Your job is not to decide whether God's law is right or wrong, but to obey it.”
In 2 Kings, there is a story about a guy named Naaman. Naaman had leprosy. He went to Elisha and said, “I’m a very famous man but I’ve got leprosy. What do I do?” and Elisha said, “I’ll tell you what. Just to show your faith, God wants you to go down to the Jordan River and dunk yourself under it seven times.” Naaman says, “You’ve got to be kidding. It’s humiliating.” Elijah says, “Yes, it’s humbling yourself before God.” On the last time he comes up and he was cured of his leprosy. Was there special power in the water? Absolutely not. It was because he was obedient to God. He had faith. And he obeyed God completely.
Several years ago, a pastor friend of mine got this fax from one of his members. “Dear Pastor, in 1995 I opened up a video store as a side business. I decided to carry adult videos since they make up 35% of all rental revenues. But a couple years ago I began attending church. One day I told my wife, “How can I ask God to help our store if I don’t do what He wants. I’ve got to get rid of those adult videos.” My business partner said, “Are you crazy? We depend on that income.” But I knew we couldn’t expect God's blessing unless I obeyed Him so we got rid of them – all of them. The first weekend without the adult videos, something strange happened. I was flooded with new customers. And I didn’t now why. Then people told me that you told everybody to come in and rent a video just to support our decision. Boy, did they come. I had to call all of our employees in just to handle the crowds. I eventually closed that store but I haven’t forgotten that lesson about obeying God even when it doesn’t make sense. My life changed and I committed to doing whatever God wants. Obey God immediately and completely.
#3. You must obey God joyfully!
Psalm 100:2 says “Obey Him gladly.” Psalm 119:16 says “I enjoy obeying Your commands.” Psalm 119:47 - “I find pleasure in obeying Your commands.” How was it enjoyable to do what God tells you to do?
It’s enjoyable because I love God. I know what He’s done for me so I love Him and I want to obey Him. In marriage, the longer you live together, the more you know what offends and grieves your partner – your husband or wife. Am I right? The longer you’re married the more you figure out what will offend that person. Like blowing your nose at the dinner table or passing gas on the couch or leaving the seat up. You learn what offends your partner. But if you love that person, the longer you’re married the less you do those things because you don’t want to offend them or hurt them. You love them.
When you walk with the Lord through many years the more you realize what God has done for you, how good He’s been to you, the less you want to offend God. You enjoy doing the right thing. You enjoy keeping His commands. You do it because you love God.
Do you know how God measures your love? Not by what you say. (“I love You! I praise You!”) God measures your love by your obedience. By how well you follow directions. Jesus said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” That’s how we prove our love. If you want the blessings of God in your life you obey Him immediately, completely, joyfully and...
#4. Obey Him continually!
Life is not a 50-yard dash. It’s a marathon. God doesn’t want you to just love Him some of the time – spasmodically. He doesn’t want you to obey Him for just a season of your life, but for all of your life. Psalm 119:112 says “I am determined to obey You until I die.” I love that verse, because it makes a declaration. It says Lord I am your until I stop breathing – until I am no more. Have you made that choice? I have made the choice that I am determined to obey God until I die. I pray you will as well.
Psalm 119:33 says “Just tell me what to do and I'll do it, Lord. As long as I live I'll wholeheartedly obey.” Just tell me what to do and I’ll do it – would you make that your prayer today?
Some of you are saying, “Why doesn’t God tell me what to do? I’ve been praying what to do in this situation.” I'll tell you why He hasn’t told you. Because you’re not already doing what He’s already told you to do. Why is He going to give you further revelation if you have not acted on the truth He’s already told you?
Philippians 3;16 says “We must be sure to obey the truth we have learned already.”
I love you guys. Stay faithful. Stay the course.
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