Sermons 2025

Text: Hebrews 11:1-13

Outline:
Faith for living
1.    What is faith?
2.    Examples of Faith lived out
3.    Our Clinging Faith

Sermon

Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

My dear beloved flock, the text for our mediation today is the Epistle lesson from the book of Hebrews chapter eleven verses one through thirteen.

Boys and girls, I pray that you are doing well today. I want you to imaging that you are walking down a long hallway. On either side there are pictures of great famous people. Pictures of people like Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Abraham, Issac, and Jacob. That is what our text shows us today. It takes us down this grand hallway stopping by the pictures of the saints that have gone before us. This is to remind us of what they have done, how they lived by faith, and how we currently live by faith. What is faith? How does our faith help us to live today? Ponder those questions as you hear the rest of the sermon.  You may go back to your seats and those who love you.

1.    What is faith?

What is faith? If you were asked that, what would your reply be? H. L. Mencken, a 20th century American journalist wrote that “faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable.” [1] Faith has been mocked as a blind leap in the dark, a rejection of scientific fact, or a fuzzy feeling that you get in your stomach.
Even Christians can have a false understanding of faith. Some fall into the false trap of equating faith to behavior. If you do good things – live a clean life, work hard, obey the Golden Rule, attend church, donate your time and money – many equate that to having faith. Others have faith in faith, thinking “it doesn’t really matter what you believe, as long as you really believe it. So long as you believe in something, or someone, then you are good.” 

Still others see faith as a way to bribe God for his blessings. They have fallen for the televangelist heresy that “if you truly believe, you will be able to name and claim great worldly riches and success for yourself.” 

There are many false definitions of faith – but only one that comes from the Holy Spirit himself: now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. According to the Holy Spirit, Faith is the conviction that things we cannot see or prove are true and reliable. But faith is not a blind leap into the unknown Faith is not a blind hope or empty feeling. 
Faith sees God’s promises – printed in black and white in his Word – and holds onto them despite any external, visible circumstances to the contrary.

Faith is being sure of what you hope for – we could also look at Habakkuk 2:4; Hebrews 10:38 Being sure means  “a sure and strong foundation” Hope means “to wait with confidence and assurance” (Psalm 5:3) II. Faith is being certain of what you do not see We could also see earlier in  Hebrews 6:16, 10:1 If you can see it, then it’s not faith, see what Saint Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:7 If it’s not real, then it’s not faith

2.    Examples of Faith lived out 

Given this explanation of what faith is, we are given a prime example of it. The creation of the universe, everything that we see and cannot see. We were not there. No scientists were there. No one was, nothing was. We accept on faith what God Himself says since He was there. He tells us that he created everything in six normal days with nothing but his Word, we believe it. That’s faith. It’s not blind. Not a denial of the facts. It’s certainty regarding things we cannot see or prove – like creation – simply because God says so.

As we continue down the Hall of Faith, we are presented with the lives of the Patriarchs and saints as examples and illustrations of what it means to live by faith. Abel, Noah, Enoch who walked with God, Abraham, who walked not knowing where he was going, solely following God’s direction. None of these saw the final promises of God in their lifetimes. They died, seeing them from a distance, clinging in faith to the promises of God. They trusted in the promise of God that He would send a Savior, which would be fulfilled at the right time. 

Their lives proclaimed their faith in God’s Promises. Abel knew that his sacrifice could not pay for any of his sins, but he trusted that the sacrifice God had promised would pay for all of them. (Hebrews 10:10) Noah, whom God saved by the water of the flood, was never baptized in Jesus’ name – but through faith in the coming Savior his sins were washed away nonetheless. And Abraham – who we will hear more about next week – trusted that God would keep his promise to preserve the line of the Savior through him even though, in terms of fertility, he was as good as dead. (Hebrews 11:12) None of them knew the specific details of how God would keep his promise – how Jesus was born of a virgin, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried, and on the third day rose again from the dead. None of them could have made the full, detailed confession of faith that we can, but they trusted that if God promised to send a Savior, he would. And this was what they clung to in spite of dangerous, uncertain, and frightening circumstances.

3.    Our Clinging Faith

We likewise cling in faitht to the same promise of a Savior that the Patriarchs did. Even though our faith is one of hindsight, we have the benefit of looking back at what Jesus did for us rather than forward like the Patriarchs. Yet, faith is still fully dependant upon what our God says to us. None of us were there when Jesus walked the earth, was crucified, died and was buried, and rose from the dead on the third day. Yet, we cling in faith to what God says, “Because of My Beloved Son, your sins are forgiven.”

While we have the benefit of hindsight, like the Patriarchs, we also look in faith towards the future. Jesus promised that He will come again in power and glory. He will raise the living and the dead. He, as the Anointed Messiah, has won the right to judge all of creation. He will renew all of creation as we will live with Him in perfected body and soul forever.

How can we be sure of this? It is something that is hidden in the future, how can we be certain of something we, do not see? Faith alone, given by grace alone, grounded in Scripture alone. Faith doesn’t care if this world mocks and ridicules us. It does no matter that Satan hurls temptations at us, tantruming, “It’s been sooo long, give up!” It responds with Paul: let God be true, and every man a liar. (Romans 3:4) Faith clings to Christ’s cross – where he paid our admission price into heaven; and his empty tomb – which is a living testimony to his promise: because I live, you also will live. (John 14:19) Being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see – focused on Christ alone, grounded in Scripture alone, given by grace alone – that’s saving faith. Faith is not a feeling, it’s a conviction; it’s not based on what I see or how I feel, but in what God has promised in his Word; it’s not a hope for a better, longer or happier life in this world, it’s the assurance that we will live forever in a much better place – the city of our God, the new Heavens and the new Earth forever and ever.

Martin Luther wrote on faith: when faith performs its proper office, it looks to absolutely nothing except Jesus Christ, the Son of God, given for the sins of the whole world. It does not look at love, does not say: What have I done? Which sins have I committed? What have I merited? It rather says: What has Christ done? What has He merited? What is faith? Faith in what? Faith for what? Faith is certainty in God’s promise of eternal life for Christ’s sake. May God grant us, and keep us steadfast, in such as faith as this.

The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard, and keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.