A Greater Faith
Jesus is Greater: An Exposition of Hebrews October 5, 2025 Hebrews 11:1-7 Notes
You’ve probably heard someone say, “Keep the faith.” In our culture, that usually means, “Stay positive,” or “Don’t give up hope.” But notice what’s missing—it never defines the object of that faith. No wonder so many today are “deconstructing” their faith, pulling it apart piece by piece until nothing remains, because if faith is only a vague feeling or a cultural inheritance, why hold on to it?
But biblical faith is different. It’s not about how hard you believe—it’s about who you believe in. It’s not great faith in God that matters, but faith in a great God. And our faith is greater because its object—Jesus Christ—is greater.
In the epistle of Hebrews, the Jewish background believers were encouraged not to shrink back from believing because of trouble and persecution, but to live by a faith that is greater because it rests in Christ Jesus as its fulfillment as the believers of old had done.
Audio
Good morning, church. Great seeing all of you here this morning. I'm just returning from the men's retreat in Asheboro, North Carolina. We had 70 men go to the retreat. And so that as we heard earlier in the service, that's why more empty seats today because we have a good majority of our men went to be at men's retreat.
And so I'm still pretty supercharged from that. I preached last night, got in a little around a little bit after midnight last night, and I'm still trying to remember if I'm preaching last night's sermon or this morning's sermon. And so first service, I chased all kind of rabbits. I don't know what's going to happen. This service.
I was just so fired up. I left a service last night with men lined up to come forward with tears in their eyes to pray that they would be priests of their home, that they begin to pray for their wives and their children and their workplace and their schools. And there's a powerful service last night and we've got men coming home. I pray that they come home fired up to serve their communities and their families. Well, we're in the Book of Hebrews.
And we started two years ago on the Book of Hebrews. We broke it into three parts. So if you're looking at your notes like it says Sermon 19, what happened to the first 18 sermons? Well, we did the first eight sermons in 2023, and then we did. I think we did 10 last year.
And we'll finish up the Book of Hebrews this fall. That's our plan, Lord willing, going verse by verse through the Book of Hebrews. Our title for this series is Jesus is Greater. And we call it that because the keys are under the doormat to this house. As soon as we get into the chapter one, verse four, it tells us what the theme of this book is.
It says, this shows that the Son is far greater than the angels, just as the name God gave him is greater than their names. This book is about Jesus, and Jesus is greater than anything you're facing today. And that's what the Book of Hebrews is about. It's showing us that he is greater. That's the theme.
Now, Hebrews is an unusual book. It's an epistle, which means it's a letter, but it has no benediction. It has no final greeting. It has no salutation. It doesn't tell us who the recipients are.
It has no author's autograph. It's an unusual book. Yet its title, Hebrews, is appropriate because it's clearly written to 1st century Jewish background Christians. So they came from a Jewish background, but they came to faith in Christ. And you might say that the Book of Hebrews is really about explaining to us how to read the Old Testament.
You could say that the Book of Hebrews is like the reader's digest version of the Old Testament, especially Chapter 11, that we're entering into today, because it's teaching us that the way to read scripture and to understand scripture rightly is to read it through the lens of Christ. That from Genesis to Revelation, this book is about Jesus and to rightly understand it. This Book of Hebrews has helped Jewish background people, I think, to understand how their book fits in to the new covenant in Christ. The internal evidence would direct us to this book probably being written around 65 A.D. prior to 70 A.D. when the temple was destroyed by the Romans. Because of the way it refers to the temple, it seems to refer to it as if it were still standing.
The majority view of the book is that it was probably written by the Apostle Paul. That's the traditional view. We're not certain. But it certainly sounds like the way Paul talks. Although he always signed his letters and he always had who he was addressing and those kind of things.
It's unusual for Paul to read write one like this. And so. But that's still a traditional view. Some say, well, it might have been written by people who traveled with Paul and would have been marked by his voice, his way of talking. So maybe they were writing it and it sounds like Paul because they hung out with him so much.
And so some say, well, maybe it was Apollos or Barnabas or Clement or one of those guys that would have sounded like Paul. No one knows for sure. I tend to lean towards a minority view. Not that it matters that my view matters, but I like looking into these things. And I think perhaps Luke is the one who penned it.
Luke was a traveling companion of Paul. He was a very educated man. He was a physician. We know he wrote the book of Luke. We know he wrote the book of Acts.
Perhaps he wrote the book of Hebrews. And the reason I really lean into it is because I'm a student of the Greek language of Koine Greek, which is the language of the New Testament original writing. Koine means common. Another way of saying it is it was written in southern Greek. It's y' all Greek.
Okay, it's that kind of Greek. And so the. The one place, though, actually three places where it's not Koine Greek is the first four verses of Luke, the first four verses of Acts, first four verses of Hebrews. It's not written in Koine, it's written in classical Greek. It's highbrow Greek, very formal.
And that, to me, lends itself to the possibility that Luke's author. Well, perhaps it doesn't matter, because what really matters is it's the word of God. Author is the Holy Spirit who inspired it. Now, last fall, we finished up with chapter 10 with a sermon we entitled A Greater Possession. And our greater possession is Jesus.
And today we're going to be talking about a greater faith. Now, the reason it's titled Greater Faith is not because of the quality of our faith nor the quantity of our faith, but the object of our faith. It's a greater faith because it's a greater object of our faith. It's not great faith in God, it's faith in a great God that makes it a greater faith. The reason it's a greater faith, biblical faith, true faith is a greater faith.
Not because we faith harder, believe harder, believe more. That's not it. That would put it on human effort. It's a greater faith because we have a greater Lord, Jesus. We have a greater God.
And so if you have faith as a mustard seed, Jesus says, you can move mountains. It's not how much faith you have, it's whom you believe. It's not what, it's not how much, it's whom you believe. It's a greater faith because of Jesus. Now, you've probably heard people say, you got to keep the faith.
People say that whether they're part of our faith or not. They could be Muslims, they could be Buddhists. They could just be someone who doesn't believe in any kind of religion. But they'll say keep the faith. They'll write songs about it.
What do they mean when they say that? When somebody says to you, keep the faith, they probably say that to you because you're feeling discouraged about something. And they say, you got to keep the faith. Got to keep the faith, Susie. You got to keep the dream alive.
What do they mean when they talk about keep the faith? They're not really talking about keeping the faith the way biblical faith is described. They're saying, don't get discouraged. Believe in yourself. That's what they mean.
Don't give up, don't quit. That's nice. It's what you would call positive thinking. Keep the faith in that environment. And that way of saying it is you got to stay positive.
Don't get down on yourself. That only has so much Value, because it's up to you to keep the faith. In fact, today we see a movement among young people that's been described as deconstructing the faith, as if it were something constructed by man that needs to be deconstructed in order to examine its validity. And so, especially among the millennials and Gen Z, we hear this popular idea and you see this on social media and discussions about deconstructing the faith. Perhaps they've been misunderstanding the meaning of faith because perhaps the reason they want to take it apart is it was never faith in Jesus.
It was faith in their parents religion. And then their parents let them down and they now have to deconstruct it because it was never really their faith in Jesus. It was their faith in their parents religion, or it was their faith in a preacher. And then heaven forbid they found out the preacher was a sinner too, or that was their faith in a certain denomination or etc. And so the church let them down.
Their parents let them down or something let them down. But did they have biblical faith? Because it's not how much faith you have, it's not even the quality of it, because we're all sinners saved by grace, if you know Jesus, but it's faith in him, that's what makes it a greater faith. Do you have that faith today? Do you have faith in Jesus?
That's what we're going to be talking about in Hebrews chapter 11. We'll be looking today in the Epistle of Hebrews Jewish background, believers were encouraged not to shrink back from believing because of trouble and persecution that they were experiencing, but to live by faith that's greater because it rests in Christ Jesus. And I believe today that we can see why faith that rests in Christ is greater. As we look at the text, I believe we'll see three reasons why faith in Christ is greater. Let's dig in.
Chapter 11, we're going verse by verse. Are you ready? Got your seatbelts on? We're going to move. Here we go now.
Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it, the people of old received their commendation. By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible. By faith, Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous God, commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks by faith.
Enoch was taken up so that he should not see Death. And he was not found because God had taken him. Now, before he was taken, he was commended as having pleased God. And without faith, it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
By faith. Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen in reverent fear, constructed an ark for the saving of his household. By this he condemned the world and became an heir. The righteousness that comes by faith. This is God's word.
We're looking for three reasons why faith in Christ is greater. Here's the first. Because it's the only faith commended by God. It's the only faith commended. Do you see that word in your text?
If you're taking notes today, we encourage you to do that. It's in there three times in different forms. Commendation. Commended. Commending.
Verse 2, verse 4, verse 5. Do you see it the first time in verse 2. You see it for by it. Now what's it? The neutered pronoun here points back to faith.
You could read it like this. For by faith, verse 2. By it, by faith, the people of old received their commendation. He's letting us know where he's headed now. In chapter 11, he's about to give us the Reader's Digest version of the Old Testament.
He's about to give us what some have referred to the faith hall of Fame. He's going to show us, especially if you were a Hebrew background, a Jewish background believer, how to understand where Jesus is at in the Old Testament story and how it was that God showed favor to particular men. He lists three here, three exemplars of biblical faith. He. He mentions Abel, he mentions Enoch, he mentions Noah, he mentions more.
But that's where we're stopping today. What was it about them? Is it because they were sinless? No, they were sinners. What was it about them?
God showed them favor because they had faith in that which is not seen, that which they hoped for but had not yet received. In fact, he begins like this by telling us his definition of faith. He wants us to understand biblical faith is different than worldly faith. It's different. And he gives us a definition in verse one of his faith.
Now, why is he doing this? Well, let's remind ourselves we are on Sermon number 19. We've done 10 chapters already of Hebrews. So what was the last thing that we read in chapter 10? Well, it was verse 39.
But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith. And preserve their souls. So he brought up faith as being that which would help guard against them shrinking back because of persecution and trouble. But now he's going to say, now, I don't mean just keep the faith. I don't mean like that.
Let me tell you what I really mean by this, this word faith. And I'm glad he does this. It's helpful to me. I hope it's helpful to you. He first of all says now faith is the assurance of things hoped for.
That word assurance is an important word. It's a particular word that could be translated foundation. It could be translated confidence. Faith is the confidence of things hoped for. And it's the firm trust, the assurance.
It's like the rock upon which things hope for. So our hopes. And that's kind of like future tense. It's things that haven't happened yet, but God says they're going to happen. It's like promises that God has made, but we've not yet received them.
And so biblical faith has a concrete rock of assurance that's inside the believer. I think it's a gift from God.
Worldly, lost people don't have this kind of faith. They. They don't have. But we have this, this heavy foundation that we could call assurance or confidence that what God has promised, we hadn't seen it. We're only hoping for it, but we believe it's going to happen.
Jesus said he's coming again. I believe it. Jesus said he's going to judge all the earth. Everyone will stand. There's a payday someday.
I believe it. Hadn't seen it yet. There's a lot of violence in the world today. There's a lot of brokenness. When's God going to move?
He says he's going to. He's going to wrap it all up someday.
And I believe that I have hope. I believe I have the hope of heaven, that someday I'll depart this world, but it won't be the end of me. And for those that believe, it won't be the end of you either. I have hope. Have I seen it?
No, I haven't. But I have this firm assurance, this rock, this anchor for my soul. I just believe it with all my heart. That's biblical faith. Then he says, so that's the aspect of faith that takes hold of hope.
It makes it better than, I hope it doesn't rain today. That's hope as a wish. It's more like hope as a rope. It's more like anchored in the empty tomb and, and beyond the Veil to the throne room where Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father. You can take a hold of a rope like that.
It's anchored on both ends. It's anchored in the past and it's anchored in the future. And it's hoped like a rope.
And this kind of faith has got that kind of anchor. And so I can believe, I can have faith in that which is to come. Things hoped for. I have assurance of it. Here's second part of that definition.
He says, now faith is the conviction of things not seen.
And then he gives us an example of something we didn't see. Verse 3. By faith, we understand that the universe was created by the word of God so that what is seen, the physical universe, the material universe, was made out of things that are not visible.
That takes faith. There was a time when the universe did not exist and it came from that which was not visible. The Latin term for that theory, which is not a theory to me, it's a faith doctrine, is ex nihilo. Out of nothing, God said, let there be light. By his word, he spoke the universe into existence.
He flung the stars across the galaxy, he lit the sun, he put the earth a spin on it, and he sent it around in orbit and took the dust and he made himself a man and he breathed into him and he became a living soul by faith. Now, I wasn't there. Boy, you sound convinced. How old are you? Well, in.
In regards to comparison to other people, I'm pretty old. Not compared to those people back there in the book of Genesis. I'm 67 years old. I've seen a few things, but I didn't see any of that. Well, how do you believe that?
I have faith in things I haven't seen because God said so.
That's biblical faith. I have a conviction. The word conviction could be translated proof or evidence tested evidence. I have a sense of conviction, of evidence in my soul and plus Romans tells me when I look at the creation, if I'm honest with myself, and it implies there has to be a creator because of the intelligent design of the perfection of everything and how it works, of conviction, and gives us that example. But by the way, that's not the only thing I haven't seen, you're going to find that I have very little credibility by the time I finish here.
You'll be like, wow, I didn't see.
I didn't see Noah when the flood came. I didn't see the ark. I didn't see that. Did you see that? I didn't see it whenever Enoch walked with God and was not.
What is that?
That's been bothering me since the first time I saw that. The first time I read that, I think I was like 12 or 13 years old, and I was like, that's the coolest thing ever. What is? That I wasn't there when Jesus carried that cruel cross on the Via Dolorosa outside the city gates of Jerusalem, up the hill called Golgotha to Calvary's hill, I wasn't there. Were you there?
Did you see that?
Faith has the conviction of things not seen. Were you there when they crucified my Lord? Were you there? Were you there when they nailed him to the cross? Were you there?
Were you there when they spit upon him and put a crown of thorns upon his head, when they beat his back 40 lashes with that cruel whip of the cat of nine tails that had metal and glass broken and tied into the leather so that it ripped his flesh to the bone? Were you there by faith? I have a conviction that not only I believe it, but it was my hand that nailed him to the cross.
It was my hands that beat him because it was my sin that put him there. And it was yours too. By faith. We have a conviction for things not seen. We didn't see any of this.
We didn't see any of it. But for the believer, we believe it. That's biblical faith. And by it, the people of old, he's going to name some people of old, he's going to give us Abel and Enoch and Noah in today's sermon, and they receive their commendation. And what's their commendation?
The word commendation I've said is here three times. It has the idea of God's approval. Now, have you ever applied for a job and they asked for references and you had to put down names and addresses, phone numbers and emails or whatever you usually call those people and say, hey, hey, I put your name down as a reference.
Hope you'll say something good about me.
People like to put my name down or not.
They put my name down, they'll call me, hey, preacher, I put your name down on a reference. I'm trying to get this job. I said, well, do you want me to say something good about you? Well, please, I'll try to think of something.
That's what a commendation is. It's a reference of approval.
The people in the Old Testament, the people of old, they didn't receive their commendation because they were good people. They weren't. They didn't receive a commendation because they were sinless. They Weren't they were sinners. How'd they get it?
By faith. In what?
In themselves. It wasn't in works, it wasn't in self effort.
They looked into the future and they had a thin thread. They didn't have all the revelation that we have. Jesus hadn't come yet, but they had little hints like in what's called the proto evangelium in the book of Genesis, chapter 3, verse 15, where it said that there's a seed of the woman that's coming which seems to hint at the virgin birth that's coming. And that the evil one, that Satan is going to bruise his heel, but he's going to crush his head. That's often referred to as the first gospel.
They had that. Adam and Eve got that before they had kids. I'm sending one, he's going to handle this. And little by little through the ages, they get more revelation. They get a progressive revelation that points more and more to a Messiah, to a Christ that's to come.
And finally New Testament he comes. And so the people in the Old Testament get commendation because they're believing that which is promised but have not yet received. And people in the present are believing things that have already happened that we didn't see, but we believe it. And we all look to the center of Jesus and we receive his commendation by being in Christ and Christ in us. Are you still with me?
And now we get to the, to this example of Abel. It says by faith, Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain. Now why was it more acceptable? I think it's clearly because he offered a blood sacrifice. We don't have background in the Bible.
We have hints about how much he would have known.
It's not wrong to bring as Cain did because Abel, it says as they grew up, you know, Adam and Eve had two boys, they had many other children, but Cain was their firstborn. Second born was Abel. Abel became a shepherd, it says, and Cain became a farmer. He worked with crops. Abel worked with sheep.
How did, how did he get more acceptable? Cain brought, he brought from his harvest. It says he brought some of his harvest at harvest time. God didn't accept it.
Abel, it says, brought the best of the first few lambs that he had. There's some hints there, brought the best. And Satan says some of, for Cain brought the best. Now the Bible has offerings in it that you bring the first fruits of your crops. So what Cain did wasn't wrong in terms of bringing a gift, but it didn't make him right with God.
But what Cain offered. He offered by. Or what? Abel, rather, offered? He offered by faith because he brought the blood.
It says in Hebrews 9, without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sin. The hint we have prior to this is that when God saw Adam and Eve and Adam, why did you hide Adam? And he said, because we were naked. He said, who told you you were naked? They covered themselves, they hid themselves.
That's what we do when we. We sin. We hide from God. God has to go looking for us. No one looks for God on their own.
God has to go looking for us. They hid themselves and they tried to cover themselves with leaves.
And then when he puts them out of the garden because of their sin, it says he covered them with what? Animal skins. Where did he get them? He offers the first sacrifice, the first blood sacrifice. So then they, they get it right there, don't they?
We don't have a lot of detail. Abel offered an acceptable sacrifice, Cain did not. And so in Abel, we see a foreshadowing of the whole Old Testament sacrificial system that's fulfilled in Christ Jesus at the cross. So we see in Abel a type that by faith he recognized. I'm a sinner.
I'm not perfect. But somehow, by faith, me offering this little lamb points to a future lamb that will be given. I haven't seen it yet, but I hope for it. I know my father Adam told me that there's one coming that's going to be the seed of the woman that's going to crush the evil one's head who lied to them in the garden. And so he didn't have a lot of information.
I don't know how much information he has. I just know what I see here in Genesis. But by faith.
And then God goes to Cain. He says, why do you look so dejected? Cain's out there kicking mud clods. His face is downcast. He's starting to harbor bitternesses in his heart.
And he says, will you not be accepted if you do what is right?
God's so patient with us, see, we don't get to decide how we make ourselves right with God. God provides the provision for us to be right with. Yeah, we can't do it with our own self effort. He provides a way. He goes, you'll be accepted if you don't, if you do what is right.
But if you refuse, sin is crouching at your door like an animal of prey, like a lion. And it desires to have you, but you must subdue it and master it. He warns him he loves Cain. Cain says to Abel, he said, come out of this field. I want to show you something.
Now, if you're a younger brother, you know, you never let your older brother show you something.
If you're a younger brother, you know this already. If your big brother says, hey, come here, I want to show you something, you do not go over there, right? Cain took him out into a field and he killed him. And so we see the first murder didn't take long. First generation murder.
Then God's not finished with Cain. He goes to him. He goes, where's your brother? He goes, am I my brother's keeper?
He says, the blood of Abel is crying out from the earth to me. And from now on, the earth will never yield its crops to you. Cain, he still showed grace to Cain even after all that. From now on, you'll be a homeless wanderer on the earth. Abel's faith pleased God not because of the amount, the quantity, not because of the quality.
His faith pleased God because he offered a lamb that pointed to the lamb. And that's why he's in the faith hall of fame. That's why he's here. It's not because of his great faith, but the object of his faith. And as a result, it was commended to him as righteousness.
God commending him by accepting his gifts. And though his through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. We're speaking about him today. The life of Abel, his faith still speaks.
Abel's faith pleased God because he trusted God's way to get right with God, not his own way. Here's number two. Here's the second evidence. Because it's the only faith that pleases God to draw near. It's the only faith that pleases God to draw near us and for us to be near him so that we're in relationship with him.
We're on Enoch now. That's our second Old Testament hero here of the faith. Of all the people, he would pick. Okay, so Abel's in chapter four of Genesis. It's like he went, well, let me go to the next page.
And he went to chapter five and picked up Enoch, who's only got five. He's only got four verses, and they are strange. Like, if I was going to pick somebody, I would avoid Enoch because I'm not sure what happened there. Not a lot of detail. He was born to his father, Jared.
He's the father of Methuselah, who's the longest living human that's listed. Enoch, it says he walked with God for 300 years of his life. For 300 years, he walked with God and was not. When I read that the first time, it was like I heard music in the background.
What in the world? You got to get over to Hebrews to go. What did that mean? And it says, By Faith, verse 5, Enoch was taken up. Well, that's not how it words itself over there in Hebrews, although it is sort of similar.
But here it gives more clarity. See, this is what I tell people. If you're a new believer, read the New Testament first, okay? Don't jump over there in Leviticus, okay? Start with the New Testament and maybe read the Old Testament through the lens of the New Testament.
More specifically, read it through the lens of Christ and look for Christ on every page. It'll help you. And that's what Hebrews is trying to do for us, right? Okay. But Enoch, I probably wouldn't have picked him, but the Holy Spirit picked him.
By faith. Enoch was taken up. Taken up.
He's the first rapture, okay? He's the first one that gets raptured. The word here literally means to transfer from one place to another. The King James says it like this. He was translated.
It could also be. It could also be translated. The word here in the Greek could be translated to be transported. Which, as an old Trekkie myself, I kind of visualized Scotty beaming me up in my thinking, like, what is this? I don't mean to make fun.
I believe it. I heard of an old preacher talking about this and saying he kind of visualized God and Enoch walking along together. They'd been doing it for 300 years, him just talking to God like a way of life. He had a relationship with God. It wasn't this distant theological, religious kind of thing.
It was Lord, he's talking to him. And they was walking along one day, and God turned to him and said, you know what? You're nearer to my house than we are. Your house. Why don't you just come on home?
So he didn't die. He got transferred. He got translated. He got transported to heaven. There's only two people in the Bible like that.
One's Enoch, you know, the other one, Prophet Elijah, caught up in a fiery chariot, never saw death. This is why some who read the Book of Revelation and they see the story of the two witnesses that come to preach in Jerusalem. Many think it's Enoch and Elijah. We're not sure. They're not named, but makes sense, possible.
What's this Enoch story in here for? Why is it here? By faith, Enoch was Taken up so that he should not see death and he was not found. I guess some people went looking for him because God had taken him. Now, before he was taken, he was commended.
He was approved as having pleased God. How do you please God? Well, good question. Let's look at the next verse. And without faith, it is impossible to please God.
You can't do it. And it's really not your faith itself that pleases him, but it's your faith in Jesus that pleases him.
You're sitting in a chair. I see you sitting out there. Did you get a cup of coffee or something to drink? You got a cup holder there? Where?
Have you ever been to a church that's got cup holders? Huh? How about that, then? When you sat down, did you have faith that that chair would hold you up? Was it the amount of your faith that held you up?
Was it the quality of your faith that held you up? Or was it the quality of the chair?
It was the chair. It was the chair. Some of you, if that chair had not been there, you'd have hit the floor, right? And some of you have been pushing that button that says, help. I can't get up.
You know who you are.
It's faith in the object of Jesus. And that's why. That's why Enoch is commended. He has faith that pleases God. For whoever would draw near to God.
You want to walk with God and God to walk with you. You want to draw nearer to God. You must believe he exists and that he rewards those who seek Him. And how does he reward them? Jeremiah 29:13, you will seek Me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
How does he reward them? James 4. 8. Draw near to God and he'll draw near to you. What's the reward for wanting to walk and seek God Himself?
He gives you himself.
He gives you Christ to live in you and you to live in Him. How do we draw near? Ephesians tells us, now, in Christ Jesus, you who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. It's faith in the sacrifice of Jesus. It's faith in the cross, of what Jesus accomplished.
I wasn't there. I didn't see it with human eyes, but I saw it with eyes of faith. So did you, if you believe.
Enoch's story reminds us that it's not just believing about God, but it's the kind of faith that walks with God, that prays and talks to Jesus daily and draws closer to him through His Word and through prayer and through fellowship. With other believers. And hearing the preaching of God's word, we sense his presence.
It's less about religion and more about relationship. Which leads us to the third reason. And that's because it's the only faith that inherits God's righteousness. It's the only kind of faith, the faith in Jesus. And he gives us our third exemplar here.
He's given us Abel. He's given us Enoch. Abel in chapter four of Genesis, Enoch in chapter five. Now we're in chapter six. Who do we run into here?
Noah. We got several chapters on Noah. It begins by talking to us about the fallenness of man and how God repented that he made man. He looked at humanity and he was sorry. He regretted that he made us because we were waxing more and more sinful over time.
It wasn't getting any better, it was getting worse. He said, I'm going to have to put a stop to it. But Noah, it says, found favor with the Lord. The word favor could be translated grace. And grace means unmerited favor.
It means you didn't earn it. It's a free gift. Or as the acronym, G R A C E. God's grace at Christ's expense. Noah, he found in him one that would obey him, that would believe things hoped for, yet not seen. And he went to Noah.
It says, let's see what he says here in Hebrews, because we're trying to learn how to read about Noah from the New Testament. And he says, by faith, Noah being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen. He says, I'm going to destroy all flesh.
He'd never seen that happen before.
Some. Some have suggested that this time period, that no one had ever seen rain, that the earth was fed by dew. The scripture talks about, when it describes the coming of the flood, that he broke up the waters from the deep. And some suggest that maybe was only one continent at that time. And the continental plates were moved apart and the waters rushed up and created the oceans.
And maybe Noah had never seen an ocean. Maybe he was completely an inland guy. He didn't live out at the Outer Banks. And so he's supposed to build a boat. People like, what are you building?
An ark. Why? Because everybody's going to die if they don't get on board. If you don't get on God's boat. Well, that's crazy.
You're crazy. Noah. And he spent the next 100 years. The scripture said he was around 500 years old. And the flood came at 600, when he was 600.
Some suggest they'd never seen rain. That the waters were held in a canopy like environment that shielded us from radiation, allowing almost an Eden like temperature worldwide. That would allow plant life and animal life to grow to huge sizes and for the longevity of man to be increased. Well, these are suppositions. I offer them only as speculation, but possible explanations.
Trying to dig in. Maybe they'd never seen rain. He says, water's going to fall from the sky. It's going to burst forth from the earth. God told me that.
And he told me to build this boat. And it took him a hundred years to build it. And they said, you're crazy. And no one believed. And the only people that got on the boat was Noah's family.
And it says, God shut the door when they got on board.
It reminds me of Romans 8:1 that says, There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. You know who that ark represents in Noah's flood? It's not a boat. What saved Noah from the flood? Was it because he built a boat?
No, it's because by faith he went on board the boat that God told him the design for that boat. That ark is Christ. There's therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. You got to get in the ark, which is Jesus. And this is Noah.
By faith, he hadn't seen it yet. He's got assurance of things hoped for. He knows more about it than Enoch, he knows more about it than Abel, because God's told him more. But he still don't know as much as you and I know. We got the whole book.
But he believed what he saw and what he heard from God. And in reverent fear, he constructed an ark for the saving of his household. And by this he condemned the world. Now, did he set in judgment of the world? No.
But if you light a candle in darkness, that that candle by its nature condemns the darkness and it tells the darkness. Hey, you're in the dark. No, I'm not. Yeah, you are. Here's light.
That's what light does. Light makes those that are in the darkness be aware that they're in the darkness. And when he built the ark and he told them the floods were coming and they didn't believe it. And when the floods came, they found out they didn't condemn. Noah didn't condemn them as the judge, God did.
But his message condemned them because they didn't believe it. And then as a result of him believing God, he became. These are our final words here, an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
An heir. Now, how do you get this righteousness? Was Noah righteous? Noah? Did God count him righteous?
Yes. Well, that's not fair. He wasn't righteous. In fact, keep reading. Chapter six, Chapter seven, Chapter eight, Chapter nine.
First thing he does, plants a vineyard, gets drunk on new wine. Well, hallelujah, Noah. Glad we rescued you of all humanity. Is it because we're supposed to go, man? Be more like Noah?
No. It's because you better get in the ark. That's the only way he got saved. And how did he get righteousness? He's an heir.
He inherited it. How did he inherit something? Do you have to be good to inherit? No. Do you have to work hard to inherit?
No. You have to be the child of someone who would give you something. If you want to inherit eternal life, you have to inherit it from the only one who has it. If you want to inherit righteousness, there's only one righteous. You have to become a child of God.
Are you with me? But that's not fair, you say. Oh, absolutely, it is fair. He only offers this to his children only those who by faith believe the ark of God, which is Christ Jesus. Here's what Paul says in Romans.
Romans, chapter 3. This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There's no difference between Jew and Gentile. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. And all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
Friends, I'm a sinner, saved by grace. I'm no better than you.
I have no quality that would allow me to go to heaven. I have no qualification that would allow me to stand before you as your pastor. I don't deserve it. I don't. But Jesus in me does.
He lives in me. And as I get older, I desire less of me and more of him. How about you? I want to get in him, and I want him in me. And this is why.
We'll see Abel, we'll see Enoch, we'll see Noah and Glory someday. And I'll see you, and you'll see me. If you have a little faith. Faith like a mustard seed in the Ark of God, the Lamb of God. When it walks with you, Jesus.
Oh, he's greater. He's greater.
Let's pray.
I pray for the one this morning that you came in on a thin thread. Someone invited you to church. Or maybe you were just like, I need something. Something's missing in my life. Maybe you've been.
You've Left church. You've got a church hurt. You've been deconstructing your faith. But today you heard something.
That's the Holy Spirit speaking to you. That's the spirit of Christ.
Would you give your life to Jesus today? Right where you're at, right in your seat, Bow your head, every eye closed. Pray like this. Dear Father, I believe that Jesus died on the cross for me. He died for my sins.
I believe that. I believe he was raised from the grave on the third day and that he lives today. He's risen to heaven, sits at the right hand of the Father. Father, I believe that. And I invite right now him to come into my life by his Holy Spirit, to forgive me of my sin, to make me a child of God, to impute to me his righteousness, his eternal life, his relationship with you.
Father, in place of my sin, in place of my death, in place of my separation, I believe that by faith I receive that right now. And if you're saying that if you're believing the Lord Jesus will save you, he'll make you a child of the King.
Others are here. And you're a believer. You believe in Jesus, you're a follower of Christ. But there's an arena of your life that you've yet to by faith and trust to Him. Is it your marriage?
Is it your job? Is it your school? Is it a relationship?
Is it your family? Is it your children?
Lord, I give you my all by faith. Less of me, more of you. In Jesus name, amen.
Audio
Alright. Good morning, church. So thankful you're here this morning. If it's your first time with us, we're so grateful you're here. Some of you are jumping in at just the right time.
We are hopping back into the Book of Hebrews this morning. We've been as a church going through the entire book of Hebrews over several years. We take some breaks. It's just how our church works. So we just finished up another series last week on spiritual habits, on spiritual disciplines.
And we're coming back in to the Book of Hebrews and finishing it up this year. And so we're going to be in Hebrews chapter 11. And this whole series over the last few years has been called Jesus is Greater. And you can find all of those episodes on Eastgate Church. I know that they'll be a blessing to you.
But we're going to dig in this morning on a topic that's called a Greater Faith. A greater faith. If you haven't heard this before, Hebrews chapter 11 is what some people call the faith hall of fame. And so you have the repeated phrase throughout the whole chapter, by faith, by faith, by faith. And you're going to see that over the next two or three weeks as we dig through this chapter.
And the theme of Hebrews is really based around right away in Hebrews Chapter one, verse four. And I want to repeat this every week to you because it really shapes what the whole book is about. Hebrews chapter one, it says, this shows that the Son is far greater than than the angels, just as the name God gave him is greater than their names. The whole book is about the idea that Jesus is greater. It's a repeated phrase throughout the entire book of scripture.
And so that's the theme. Hebrews is a very unusual book. I just want to note this again to you. Some of you have been on this journey with us, but there's some characteristics of Hebrews that are curious in that there is no autograph in this book. It has a benediction, but it doesn't have your typical, hey, this is Paul.
Hey, this is Peter. We're preaching to these churches. It doesn't have that typical introduction. And so because of this, church history has a various amount of views as to who wrote this. What we know confidently is that it was widely accepted by believers and by the church in the first century.
Most people think it's written by the apostle Paul, but for some reason we don't have an autograph. It's clearly aimed here at Jewish background believers who are dealing with a Very difficult time period where it was hard not only to be a Christian, but really hard to be a Jewish background Christian, where they were persecuted both by the culture and by their former people. It's a very difficult time. And they're really asking kind of a big question. They're overall Hebrews is answering this question, what do we do now?
If God really loves us, if Christ really loves us, why is it that we're still suffering? What are we to do with persecution and things like this? I think what we're going to find this morning is yet again another good encouraging word. First to them and now to us, that there is a greater faith in Christ Jesus. Now, last fall when we finished up chapter 10, that last one was called a greater possession because Jesus Christ is our greatest, our greatest possession.
He is what brings all of this meaning and so picking up now into the idea that Jesus is greater, the greater faith that we're talking about today is not that you personally would have a more quality or a greater quantity of faith. That's not what we mean by a greater faith. We're not talking about that. We're talking about having a faith in, in a greater object. That's what it means to have a greater faith in Jesus.
You've probably heard people say this many times in your life, maybe even this week, things like, hey, just keep the faith, all right? Just stay the course, keep the faith. And what people mean by that generally isn't necessarily Christian at all. What they mean by that often is, hey, stay positive, you know, believe in yourself. And the trend there for a while was like, hey, have positive vibes, whatever in the world that means.
And don't give up hope. The Bible is more helpful than this. This is why I love the word of God and why I love following Christ Jesus is because he tells me the truth. And the truth is I can't really depend on myself. Sometimes I wake up in a terrible mood and I have no idea why.
It may not have anything to do with anything that's going on in my life. I don't find myself to be all that dependable, but I find the word of God and I find Christ Jesus to be very dependable. So when we're talking about a greater faith, we're not talking about, hey, keep the faith in yourself, whatever that might be a conclusion to you. But no, no, keep the faith in the one who is faithful, not in quantity, not in quality, but in whom it is. And so this is this wonderful thing we're going to dig in, chapter 11 of Hebrews, we're seeing that biblical faith is different than this.
It's not about how hard you believe or how much faith you have in some. No, it's about who you believe in. It's not a great faith that matters to God. It's a faith in a great God. There's a huge difference.
So let's dig in. We're going to be in the Book of Hebrews, chapter 11. And here we're getting this wonderful encouragement to not shrink back. This is how chapter 10 ends, that you're experiencing trouble. And some of you in the room are experiencing trouble, hardship.
Some of it is out of your control, some of it you've caused. Sometimes trouble comes in many different ways. And here he's telling them that they can live by a faith that is greater because it rests in a person. It rests in God himself. And I think the text is going to show very clear, three clear reasons why faith in Christ is greater.
So let's dig in. First few verses of Hebrews, chapter 11, it says now, faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it, the people of old received their commendation. By faith, we understand that the universe was created by the word of God so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible. By faith, Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain.
This seems like it's coming out of left field. I can't wait to talk to you about this. Through which he was commended as righteous God, commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. Wow.
Verse 5. By faith, Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death. And he was not found because God had taken him. Now, before he was taken, he was commended as having pleased God. And without faith.
Don't miss this part, Church. Without faith, it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. And here's the last verse. By faith, Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen in reverent fear, constructed an ark for the saving of his household.
By this, he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith. This is God's word. Amen. I pray this is encouraging to you. I also pray that some of you in the room this morning will get a deeper understanding of scripture.
I'm okay with trying to help you get both. I'm okay with both helping you understand the word of God better and also encouraging you to new life, encourage Christ Jesus. I would love to accomplish both. We'll see if I can pull that off today. And so we're going to dig in this idea of why faith in Christ Jesus is greater, and it begins with this concept because it's the only faith commended by God.
It's the only faith commended by God. This is an interesting place to start. It says, faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction. Some versions say the evidence of things not seen. This idea of faith here is incredible.
One commentator writes on this. He says one of the author's primary goals is to teach us how to read the Old Testament. And that is Christologically. I heard it put this way in seminary. You should see Jesus on every page when you read and study your Bibles at home, even if you're in the book of Leviticus, which can be a challenging read.
But if you'll begin to think Jesus is somewhere on these pages, and you'll start to see him appearing not in name, but in what God is building towards that. From Genesis chapter one all the way to the end of Revelation, the story is the Savior, Jesus. That's the story. And so that was the way we were taught. And this commentator goes on to say God embedded in the history of redemption, types and shadows that pointed forward to Jesus Christ.
Thus, from Genesis to Revelation, the Bible tells one story, the story of the grace of God found only in Jesus Christ. And so we've got these really interesting characters here that you've probably barely studied. And it's not your fault because they're barely in Scripture. We're talking about Abel and Enoch today. If you go back to the book of Genesis, you'll find a paragraph about these people.
You're like, why in the world are we pulling this? I can't wait to share why it's so great. Noah. Now we know Noah. You know, even if we didn't grow up in church, we heard about the ark, right?
We heard about all that good stuff. But who is Enoch? Where are we getting this? I can't wait to tell you just what God is doing through his word here. He wants to show us something so important that what it is that made men righteous in the Old Testament was not their deeds or but their faith.
Have you ever thought about this? It wasn't the fact that Abraham or Noah or Enoch or Abel were in themselves righteous and did righteous deeds. That's not what saved them. It was their what faith. Faith in what?
Faith in a promise. Faith in a person that they could not yet Know they believed. It says of Abraham, it was credited to him as righteousness that he believed. God believed. What about God, the promises?
He was saying? He says to Abraham, through your seed is going to come salvation to the nations. These are the things that Abel and Enoch and Noah and next week we'll talk about Abraham. They're saved just like you, by faith. This should forever destroy any thought that you have in your mind that I can work my way to save salvation.
That's not how it works. It never has been. Now your faith should produce works. That's what James talks about. But that's not how we receive him.
We receive him by faith. So this is wonderful. He says this faith in Hebrews chapter 10, where we were before in the last fall. It says in verse 39, we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith preserve their souls. So he's talking to us who are working towards faith in Christ Jesus and are struggling with doubt, at times with trouble.
And he's calling us not to shrink back, but to be bold in our faith. And now he comes to verse one and tells us what this means. Did you know Hebrews 11:1 is one of, if not the only places in scripture that, that defines faith. I don't think you'll find it anywhere else where it says, now faith is. Okay, I better listen up.
What is faith? He says it's two things. The Bible says it's two things. It's the assurance of things hoped for. What does that mean?
This means that what it means for me to have faith in Christ Jesus, what it means for me to have faith in God is that I believe what he says will happen, will happen. I believe the word of God. That means what it means to be a Christian and to have faith and walk in Christ means living in such a way that I agree with what God is saying. I believe his promises are true. And there's a lot of these friends.
There's a lot of things that we as the true church of Christ have to say when we live by faith because we cannot see it, we cannot know it clearly. We only trust that God is not lying. Things like this, that Jesus Christ's payment on the cross was more than enough for you and I. That is faith that there is an eternal destination in store for us, that he is preparing ahead of time. Have any of you seen that?
I've heard stories of people who had like, near death experiences that claim to have seen things like this and perhaps so, but I know this. I. I Believe it by faith that there is something coming, that the Lord Jesus is coming again. These are promises. He says, here's what faith looks like. It means hoping in something future that you can't see, taste, touch, know for sure.
And that's not all. It's also having a conviction or evidence in things unseen. So what is faith then? It's also based on the past and the present, not just the future, not just hoped for things. Were any of you there in the first century?
If you were man, you've been holding out on humanity, all right, because you are eternal. None of us were there. None of us were there in the first century. We've got pictures, we've got stories, we've got, we've got oratory from generations we trust. We have faith that in fact Christ Jesus did die on that cross.
Now I would say that faith is pretty solid. I don't know if you've heard this before. We only have about five or six original manuscripts that define someone named Julius Caesar. We have a similar amount of information about a guy like Alexander the Great. These are all contemporaries in the same similar time period as Jesus.
We have less than 10 for a lot of significant characters that I don't think anybody debates on whether or not they existed. Do you know we have over 20,000 manuscripts about the person of Jesus? It's ridiculous. It's more about a person in history than just about, if not the most of any person in history that all talk about the crucifixion, many of which talk about the resurrection. So if we're just talking about evidence, there's pretty good evidence.
But let's be honest about this. None of us were there. We come by faith saying I believe it's true and not just that it happened, but that it meant something. Because he could just be a man that died. Lots of men die.
Every man dies. Well, was his significant by faith? I say absolutely. Do you understand this definition of faith? It's really powerful, actually.
It's really powerful. In very short sentences, he's saying what it means to be a Christ follower, to have faith in Jesus Christ. I believe his word wholeheartedly. And guess where I'm about to go? I'm about to go to Genesis, chapter two, three, four.
I'm going to the beginning. I'm going to tell you about a dude named Abel. This is great. That means the whole story is about this savior. The whole story is about a greater faith in Christ Jesus.
I hope you're getting that. Verse two tells us what this whole chapter is. Going to be about. It says the people of old received their commendation. What kind of commendation?
The one that was in faith. That's why he leads there. So what made them righteous, their faith? What made them saved and set apart? They their faith.
And what else do we believe? I love this. He could have gone to a lot of places. Verse 3, it says, we understand that the universe was created by the word of God so that what is seen was made out of things, was not made out of things that are visible. Do you know part of what it means to be a faithful believer is to believe.
And a God who created this has been widely debated over the last 100 years. The word of God is really quite clear on this. He made this world out of things we can't see. We come to that by faith. Now, I would say some of you can talk to me afterwards.
I would say, no matter what you believe about how things started, it comes by faith. It comes by faith. Either it all began out of nothing. And that's a real amazing kind of nothing. This is the problem we call in apologetics.
We call it ex nihilo. That means something comes out of nothing.
Either it's that just there's this crazy event which you have to come to by faith, or you come to it by faith that there's a God who created the people of the Word. The people of the Bible say it is a God who created and that by faith we believe this. So he's going all the way back to creation and saying, the reason that we have righteousness, the reason we have salvation, is by faith. And now he points to three characters. And that's where I'm going to spend my time today.
It's really valuable here. It's not accidental that the word of God picks these three characters. They're not perfect men. They're not the Christs of the Bible. They are mere pictures.
They're mere foreshadowings of what Jesus will do. They are meant to point us to the Savior. Let me tell you a little bit about a guy named Abel who's only got like a paragraph about him. It says of him here in Hebrews that he has a greater, more excellent, superior sacrifice to his brother Cain. That's what's said of him.
And it also says that even though he died, he still speaks. Now, that's wild. How is a dead man still speaking? Here's a part of the way that a dead man's still speaking. How many of you in the room have heard of Cain and Abel before this Morning.
Just about all of you and the rest of you are just scared to raise your hand. I mean, I think it's 100% of you have probably heard of Cain and Abel before you showed up this Sunday. So his story, guess what it's doing. It's still speaking. Now, what does it mean to people?
All kinds of crazy stuff. Hey, man, y' all gotta be better to your siblings, man. Don't be so hard on your brothers and your sisters. That's not what that story's about. It's not.
And there were times in my childhood where I really wanted to hurt my brother. I never wanted to kill him. But man, I. Mm. So I might have looked at that story and said, I gotta be good to my brother. That's not what this is about.
No, it's not about the individuals. It's about the sacrifice more than it is about anything here. That these two men. Right away, God is asking his people to come to the altar. And this is the relationship we've had with a holy God from day one.
He wants us to worship. Why did he make you friend? He made you for worship. He made you to praise him, to be in fellowship with him, to be in fellowship with each other. If you don't like that, I got bad news.
That's heaven. So if you don't like praising him, that's going to be an uncomfortable place for you. Where the angels and the saints and the people who. Or praising God. And I think we're gonna have missions, and I don't know what those missions are gonna look like.
God's got a big plan for our eternal future. But we better be deeply in love with the Lord. Cause that's heaven. And that's how he began the story. In Genesis, chapter one.
He made a people who would walk in the still of the night with the Lord God walk when it's peaceful with God. I would love that. That's what Adam and Eve had before fall the fall of man. And so now, right away, he's building in an opportunity for his people to come and worship and to be made right. That's part of what it means to bring sacrifices.
You come with repentance. You come with a desire to be made right and be made holy before a holy God. And these two boys bring something. Abel, it says of him that he brings an acceptable offering. He brings the firstborn from among his flock.
And Cain brings some of his produce because one was a farmer and one was tended to the flocks. Now, there's a lot of variety on why his was acceptable and why his wasn't. If you just read it based on Genesis, Hebrews gives us access to something. Why was Abel's acceptable? Because his came by faith.
And Abel's points to an eternal sacrifice that's costly. It costs life. Your salvation, my friends, although it may bother you, it comes at the expense of another. It comes at the blood of Christ Jesus. That's how you receive it, because a payment needed to be made.
So Abel gets that. The Bible doesn't tell us a lot about him. But clearly Abel comes by faith with an acceptable sacrifice that is pointing to the Savior who will come. And I think Hebrews indicates that Abel understood that enough to have faith commended to him. Do you understand this?
And so Cain brings from the fruits of his stuff, and it's unacceptable. And God has this conversation with him, and it's like, hey, look, look, if you'll bring the right stuff, I will accept you too. It's not that I love Abel more. I don't. I love you both.
But Abel gets it and he's bringing a sacrifice. You've brought what you wanted to bring. This isn't the point of the sermon today, but there are many churches that have made the decision, many Christians who have made the decision that we want to worship God the way we want to worship God. Whatever makes us feel good. That's not how it works.
We worship God the way God has instructed us to worship him. In this case, Cain brought the wrong stuff and God had a way out. What does Cain do instead? You know what? You know what he does?
He kills his brother instead, out of anger.
And because of that, the Bible said that his blood still speaks. His death still speaks. What does it speak? That there is a sacrifice necessary for the fall of man, which we have murder in the first few chapters of the book. How bad are we?
We barely made it. We didn't make it one generation before we started killing each other. You're no better than this, my friend. We're in this together, under the headship of Adam, all of us fallen and broken. And maybe you've never committed the act, but I bet almost every one of you in the room has.
Thought, man, God, I wish you'd let that guy just go ahead and disappear. Can you get my boss out of my life permanently? Some of you thought that probably a lot of you, that classmate. Some of you go back a little bit. Think about high school, think about middle school.
That one that picked on you all the time. You were like, if they just disappeared, that'd Be pretty great. You're no different, my friend. What sets us apart is that the sacrifice of Christ has come. Hebrews, chapter nine.
It says, without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins. It costs something for you to be saved. It costs the blood of the Savior, Jesus. One commentator writes on this. Abel understood that his greatest problem was that he was under divine judgment.
Did Abel know Jesus? No. Doubtful he knew that name. But he understood that I'm under judgment and I need to be saved. He goes on to write, he needed a sacrifice.
His blood sacrifice pointed to his own sin and to his hope in God's provision of a sacrificial savior. This is why Abel's sacrifice is acceptable. It's because it's offered by faith in God's promises. So Abel's commended as righteous. That means friend.
What makes you righteous? It's your faith. Not in yourself, not in what you bring. Hey, look. Great news, church.
Some of you have come today. You're new around here. You might not feel perfectly comfortable yet. You're still trying to figure out how we worship, how we interact. And I get that.
You know, it takes a minute to feel like you're part of the family. Here's the great news. You don't come here needing to do all the acts, right? You don't have to be perfect. Hey, man, why are the people.
People are moving there. And later in the service, people are going to take Lord's Supper, and you might be going, what's going on? I have great news. Your authentic worship is not based on you getting all the details right. It's based on your faith.
So tomorrow, my friend, when you wake up and you didn't start the day quite like you wanted, maybe you wanted to get up in prayer. Maybe you wanted to study your Word and it just didn't go right. I pray that it does go right, but maybe it won't. Does God suddenly go, this God? No, he doesn't do that.
Because your righteousness is by faith, not by works. This is what this whole thing is pointing to. Abel is accepted. His gift is accepted because it came by faith.
Abel's faith pleased God. Here's the second. The second reason that we can have a faith in. In Jesus. That's greater.
It's because it's the only faith that pleases God to draw near. The only faith that pleases God to draw near.
The second example is the strangest. Who in the room has ever heard of Enoch? Don't be bashful. Who's heard of Enoch? There's a few of you in here, those Bible readers, you stumble on this guy.
There's some of you in the room that started reading when you were little children. And the person Enoch really like, blew your mind. I'll tell you why I grew up reading the King James some just because I thought it sounded so cool. Not because I'm holy or anything. I just thought this book sounds like it's from another planet.
That's what I loved about it. Guess what? I still love it. I love reading the King James. Every week I look at the passage and go, whoa, here's what it says of old Enoch in Genesis chapter 5.
In the King James, it says, enoch walked with God and he was not, for God took him. Enoch walked with God and he was not. That doesn't even sound like good English. When I read it, I'm like, what is going on here? I remember thinking as a kid, like, and the story of Enoch is so amazing because it's just a few verses where, what did Enoch do?
Who is this guy? Enoch was taken up. It says, some of you come on this journey with me. You're gonna have a lot of fun. The word here for taken up that we see here in Hebrews 11:5, it says, by faith, Enoch was taken up so that he wouldn't see death.
This man never died. He never tasted physical death, not once. That's wild. There's only two characters in all of scripture that that's set up. Does anyone know who the other one is?
Elijah, I think I heard over there. That's right, two guys, Enoch and Elijah. If your first name starts with E, you've got a good shot. You got a good shot today. The rest of us are in big trouble.
Probably going to taste death. But Enoch was taken up. And the reason he was taken up is that he pleased God. I think I'm pleasing you. I'm really trying to.
Something unique going on with this Enoch character. In the Bible, he's meant to be a type of. He's meant to model something that we can lean in on. It's not meant to be normative. Most of us, if not all of us, are not going to be taken up, even though we please God.
This one is meant to point to Jesus. Again, the word here in the Greek. Some of you like this kind of stuff. It's the word metat. The word meta you might be acquainted with.
It's the idea of change, like metamorphosis. It's the idea of things changing. This word literally means to transfer or to transport. Am I sci fi people in the room. I mean, it's like beam me up, Scotty is the kind of idea of this word.
All right, so Jesus, or so God sees Enoch, is pleased with Enoch and just snatches him up. And what's really wild, and I'm a weirdo, y'. All, I like to get into the weeds on this kind of stuff. I'm looking at timelines this week going, okay, because these guys lived a long time. Enoch gets snatched up, he gets transported when he's 300 and something.
Some of you are like, I don't even know if that's true. It's in the Bible. Okay, so you make the decision today. Me and you aren't. We're not going to be on team Jesus together unless you say with me.
The Bible is true and I believe what's in there. There's guys in there that live for 900 plus years. I don't know about that, Jonathan. Well, I do. It's there and it's been there for thousands of years.
And the people and the saints of old faithful people have believed it for a long time and so do I. What do I do with it? By faith, it sounds crazy to me. Adam lives 900 and some years. His son Seth, there's several guys, there's Lamech, there's all these characters.
You see bam, bam, bam in the book of Genesis. And edict lives for 362 or 365, something like that. And God transports him. And what's really wild about that is like his dad, his granddad, his great granddad, they're all still alive. So one day everybody's just hanging out, where's Enoch?
I don't know who it was that knew the story. Dude, I was walking with Enoch and homeboy, he just disappeared.
Got no clue, man. Got no clue. All I looked over there is I saw clothes and shoes. Like, what in the world? Maybe not even that.
Maybe God took him shoes and all. I don't know. Somebody knew. Might have been his sons or his grandsons. This dude, there's a lot of people around him who knew this happened.
Seth, the son of Adam is still alive. When Enoch is transported, there are generations of men who were alive. You understand this? If you look at the timelines, you start to go, this is wild. Adam was nearly alive when Noah was born.
Eight generations later, it's a different time period in human history.
It says Enoch was taken up. And why was he taken up? What is it about him that pleases God? Well, verse five and six, help us A ton. We'd be in big trouble without verse six because it said that he's commended for having pleased God.
Okay, I get that. I get that. But he's meant to point us to something, that there's an impossible task ahead of us. We should be honest with one another as believers. And those of you in the room who are still trying to figure out what's going on with this Christian faith, there's something you need to know.
That it comes by faith. That it is impossible to please God apart from faith in Christ Jesus. This means. This idea means you are powerless. It is impossible.
You have no strength to reach God apart from Jesus. That there's. I heard it most of my life, kind of pictured this way. And I've seen this in, like, gospel tracts and things like this. That man stands on one side of the chasm, and in this hole is the depth of our brokenness and sin.
And on the other side, God stands, beckoning us to come. And that what we can try to do is run across that gap, maybe take a long jump. And we do that by works. We do that by effort. We do that by trying to live right.
Guess what? It's way too far. It's not even close, friends. It's not even close. There are sins you've committed, you've forgotten about, you never repented or anything of them.
That's not meant to terrify you. That's meant for you to see this better. Picture that in between these two giant mountains is the cross of Christ, like a bridge between. And that the greater faith comes. The ability to please God comes at the expense of the Son of God, who did this willingly because he loves you.
So now you can come across this bridge. You don't have to jump. You don't have to work. Now all of these things happen. You work out of your faith.
You don't have faith because of works. That's how it's been done. James spends all of his time on this. So now we walk across the cross of Christ by faith, and we can reach God because of what Jesus has done. And now we live our lives according to that.
Now we live in order to please God, not because it's the worst to salvation, but it's the way to be a believer. It's mere humble obedience and devotion to Christ. Now, looks like I want to. I don't have to. I want to because he's so good.
This is what Enoch's life is apparently about, although we have such limited information. He pleases God.
God rewards those I Love that verse six ends this way. He rewards those who seek him. This is a common thread throughout Scripture. In fact, Hebrews is picking up on an old word. It says in Jeremiah 29, you will seek me, and you will find me when you seek me with all your heart.
James 4. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. How do we draw near? Paul writes in Ephesians. He says, now in Christ Jesus, you who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
I pray you hear this this morning, that the faith that is necessary for you to be made right with God and to please God comes with the cross of Christ. And now you have the opportunity to please God, which was far from where your intentions were before. This original account is wild. Go back and read Genesis chapter five at some point. When you're doing some leisurely reading this week, read about Lamech, his dad, and this Jared, I think is his dad.
Read about his ancestry. But he walked with God and he was not wonderful. The original Count Charles Swin Dahl, in writing on this, he says this account of his miraculous rapture to heaven is found in just four verses in Genesis. We're told twice that he walked with God and that he fathered children. And then we're told that God took him.
Besides this Jude, chapter one, which Jude is a wild read as well, I'd encourage you to read Jude. He tells us that Enoch was a prophet who foresaw the future judgment of God. So it's credited to him that he pleased God, it was commended of him, that he had faith that God would one day judge the world, and that he had provision for us in the person of Jesus. I don't know if you're getting this. Let me paint this like super clear to you.
Let me paint the picture really clear. The reason that when we get to heaven, believers when we get there and there's going to be guys like Enoch and Abel and Abraham, the reason we're going to see them there is not because these guys were super cool. That ain't it. We're not going to get there and find out. Wow.
Abel, I'm so glad that you brought the best of your flock. I'm so glad. No, we're going to get there and we're going to find out that Abel's going to say, I just believe what God said to me in my generation. I just believe that God said, hey, there's a promised future, there's a promised savior coming one day. You may not get to see it, but I believed Him.
And I went and got a sacrifice for him and said, I need that Savior. Do you see this? Abel comes simply saying, I know what I need. Here is my offering. And God says, I accept that.
So when we get there and meet a guy like Abel, we're going to find out. Hey, welcome to the family. We all just believed what God said by faith. We said, Jesus, he really did what he did. You didn't know his name, but you knew he was coming.
Enoch's the same story. He spends time with God. He walks with God. He's pleasing God, and he believes. And Jude tells us that he's even believing in a future judgment that would come.
Then we have this third character. And I know you're excited about this, and I've got just enough time to talk about it. This third one, this third reason that we can have a faith greater that's in Jesus Christ is because it's the only faith that inherits God's righteousness. Now, I don't know if you're catching this so far, and this might really rub somebody the wrong way today, and I'm very sorry if it does, but I just have to teach you what the scripture says. The scripture is pretty clear over and over again that the way in which we come to God, the way in which we approach God's throne room, there is only one way.
There's only one. Jesus says this of himself. Some people really like the person of Jesus. They say, he's a great man. He seems like a healer.
He seems to be nice. Those are people who haven't read his words. He's pretty tough sometimes. He says some harsh things to some people who need to hear it. They like him.
Generally talk to people about Jesus. They like this Jesus. Guess what? Jesus says, I am the only way. I am the way, the truth and the life.
And guess what else? No one comes to the Father except by me. So the credit of righteousness to these men of old comes because they believed a savior would one day come. They put their faith also in the only way to approach the throne, Jesus. Some of you need to hear that today.
You've been trying to walk in God's favor, in your own power. It's not the way of the word of God.
You come by faith, saying, yes, I believe in Jesus. Now you pray and ask, now, God, you empower me to live according to your will. The power comes on the other side. Does that make sense to you? This is the great news to you and to your friends and to your family.
Some of you have been trying to reach your brothers and your sisters and your uncles and your co workers. You've been trying to reach them with the gospel. And some of them are thinking, I can't go in there yet because I got to clean up first. That's not how he works. You come and he helps you clean it up.
You don't roll into someone who is excellent at building the building and say, hey, let me build it first. And then you come inspect it. That'll go well. You ever had that happen to you? Sometimes I try to be manly, and it doesn't always work out okay.
I want to do grunt work sometimes just to prove that I'm more than just a communicator. You know, I can fix a car. I cannot fix a car, y', all, to save my life. I can break them. I'm so good at breaking them.
My wife's even better. She is excellent at breaking them. And I know. I know in her heart of hearts she would never say this to me. I know she wishes she married a man who could feel.
Fix a car. I just know it. I don't know what I'm doing under there. I can build a deck, and I can do pretty good with that. Sometimes I feel like my wife just walks around the house going, I wish there was some dude that would fix this stuff.
And I wish I knew how. Sometimes I get myself into it. Guess what I've done several times at my house? I've fixed things. And then bring one of you brothers in later.
Go. What did I do? Help me. Tim's not here today. Tim Jenkins is healing from ACL surgery.
Y' all pray for him, but he's a guy who showed up and seen what I've done before. Matt Dew, he's at the men's retreat. He's showed up and seen what I've done under the hood of a car before.
That's not how faith works, friends. We don't roll into Christ Jesus and say, look how much I've cleaned up my act. He goes, not even close. Not even close, but I can help you. Let's start here.
Let's you and I start together. Next time you come by Faith, you come in prayer. You come spend some time with me, and I'll teach you how to be a good husband and a good wife. I'll teach you how to parent your kids. You want to know how to handle that difficult, boss?
You come here first next time you getting this. And when it comes to salvation, it's even more true. You don't come clean. You come dirty and he cleans. That's how it works.
That's how it works for me. It's how it works for you. None of us gets this right. We don't show up going, hey, finally, God. You got the guy you've been longing for.
I showed up. Ready. Nope. You show up. Just like every saint of old, needing desperately a savior.
This is the only faith that inherits God's righteousness. Noah's the third example. Noah survived the judgment of God. How did he do it? He did one thing.
He did one thing right. He believed God. And he did something really crazy. This is what it said of him. Go back and read the story of Noah.
It's much longer than the rest. You'll find this in Genesis 6, 9, God shows up and says, I am so done with how people are living. And the brokenness of man has reached a pinnacle that I can no longer tolerate. This is a hard scripture, but this is what happens. And he comes to Noah and says, you've been faithful.
How have you been faithful? Simply, you've been walking with me. And you believe me. That's kind of all that's said of Noah there. And he comes and says, I want you to build a big boat.
I want you to build an ark. And my impression has always been he just starts building it out in the middle of the field, just in the middle of nowhere. There's no water. The theory around this is that perhaps it had never even rained before. If you've never studied the idea of the canopy theory, I think there's some good evidence for that possibility.
The Bible describes the flood as coming from up and from up and from down. Read that again. This wild. That perhaps if you think about this scientifically, that there was tectonic plate movement and that maybe it rains for the first time. That would be terrifying.
Imagine if you'd never seen rain before. And all of a sudden it starts pouring from the sky. So Noah's just building a big boat out in the middle of nowhere. That's what I like to think. Now, I don't know if that's true, but that's my impression.
And people walk by making fun of him. He builds this thing for years, for a hundred years. Did you know it was 100 years before it flooded? This goofball believed God for 100 years. Some of you.
I don't know who this is for today. Some of you have given up on prayer. You've made the decision. God's not listening. He's not answering my Prayer?
You've been praying for one whole week.
I'm very sorry. Maybe God has some other plans for you that require more time. Guess what prayer does. It doesn't just cause God to move. God's going to move according to his purposes.
He loves you. He wants what's best for you. Sometimes he wants you to dig in in prayer because he wants to change your heart in that poor Noah is out there for 100 years before it ever starts to flood, before it ever starts to rain. How did he get the opportunity to survive that judgment? Well, because he believed he was warned by God.
And it says in verse seven of our current text that with reverent fear he constructed an ark. Reverence. All Noah's obedience to the divine warning is the evidence that he revered and honored God and that by faith he believed. And something crazy, oh, it's the whole earth's gonna flood. What do you do?
I don't understand any of what you're saying. God, I have to admit something to you. I know the Lord Jesus, but Noah seems to me to have a powerful faith, maybe more powerful than mine at times. I have the very words of Christ Jesus and sometimes I doubt them. And yet Noah, all he gets is, I'm going to wipe out the planet and I want you to build a boat.
And he goes, got it. I have a lot of questions. Why are animals showing up? God, what are we doing? You want me to build a triple decker?
Go back and read this. We're building a triple decker boat out of gopher wood. What even is gopher wood? What even is that? Most historians think this was a very strong wood, perhaps certainly a hardwood that maybe we don't even have on the planet anymore, but similar to some extremely hard woods.
And he just gets battle orders, he just gets instructions. And Noah, from what we have in the scripture, just says, yes, God, you know what faith looks like. I believe God. He didn't do anything great. He didn't come up with the plan?
He didn't have some wild haired idea? No, he just said, all right, God said, so I'll do okay.
And then it goes on in verse seven to tell us this, that he condemned the world then and became an heir of righteousness. God is a just God. He is a God who wants both to love and to be just simultaneously. These two things, they do not compete for who God is. They are equally who God is.
And he pours out his love and his justice simultaneously.
And here we have this idea that because Noah listened to God and did what God Instructed. Noah is said to have condemned the world. The he of this text is not God. It is Noah. What does that mean?
Guess what happens every time, my friends? That you make the decision to stand out. Every time you do this, you condemn the darkness. Every time you decide to be a light in your workplace, you condemn the darkness. That's what he's talking about here.
So when Noah makes the decision, I believe God and I'll stick out like a sore throne, a sore thumb. Everybody else is now condemned, if you will. Now, is this a bad thing? Not necessarily. What if people had a rolled up to the boat and said, I don't know what you're building here, but I know you walk with God.
Can I talk to you about that? That could have happened, but it didn't happen. What could happen to you in your workplace is you make the decision to be an example to people in speech and in love and impurity. That you decide to be a lighthouse to your family and to your friends and to your community. And now you begin to look different.
And that's a good thing. Some of you are resisting that. You're reluctant to stand out. When you follow Christ, you. You have no option.
You stick out.
And then people have the opportunity to come and say what is going on with you. And then you have an opportunity to share faith.
It says he became an heir of righteousness. This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus. This is what it says in Romans, chapter 3. This righteousness is given through faith in Christ Jesus to all who believe there is no difference between Jew and Gentile. For all have sin sinned and falls short of the glory of God.
And all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. So I've got good news. I want to close with this. I've got good news and bad news this morning. The bad news is we have all fallen short of the glory of God.
I have, too. Don't feel bad, my friend. My goal is not to make you feel guilty or ashamed. I feel it too. I'm not enough.
I am not enough. And neither were Abel, neither were Enoch, neither were Noah. None of them, none of the saints of old were enough to bridge the gap. That may sound like bad news. The good news is too good to stay there.
At no expense to you, the God of the universe set you free. Do you understand that? This morning, I don't know if you've ever heard it put that way. You did nothing and God did everything. Now, does that mean you live your life however you Want?
No. No, it doesn't. However, the salvation that you receive comes merely by the grace of God.
Someone in the room this morning has been trying their best to work towards the Lord by faith, Abel by faith, Enoch by faith, the Apostles by faith. Jonathan has approached the throne room of God. Not because I'm good. I'm not. Not because I'm better than you.
I'm not. Some of you are smarter, prettier. You got it going on. None of that's going to work unless you come with me by faith to the cross of Christ. This is what sets these men apart.
I'm inviting you now to the good news. This is why we call it good news. This is why we call it the gospel. It's because we're not lying to you anymore. You're not going to be okay without the Lord Jesus.
You're not. What hinders you from receiving that today, man, God's going to make me stick out like a sore thumb. Yep. You've not recognized just how wonderful that is. So that everybody begins to come to you.
They may make fun of you for a while. Those warehouse workers in the room, those first responders in the room. There's some of you that work some gritty jobs where every other word starts with F. Some of you are there. Some of you are in school systems where it's no different. I'm going to stick out.
Yeah. And you're going to get made fun of. You're going to get minor persecutions, maybe even felt major sometimes. Guess what else is going to happen? Give it a few weeks, give it a few months.
Follow the Lord Jesus and guess who's going to come when something gets real tough in their life? They're going to come to you in secret, like Nicodemus coming to Jesus privately. They're going to come and say, hey, Jonathan, I know you probably pray.
Could you pray for me? I think my wife's going to leave me. I think my kid's doing drugs. I'm struggling with alcohol. I think I'm broken.
Would you pray for me? I'm just asking you, friend, what kind of person do you want to be? What do you want to have the privilege of getting to do? Because some of you would like to be that guy. I want to be that guy.
That's an example to others in belief and in faith. I'm okay with the fact that I'm going to stick out a little bit. And I've resolved that. Guess what? I like my marriage.
I like the way I parent. I like hanging out with my church, I like spending time with God. It keeps working out. It keeps being a huge blessing in my life. I've made the decision that walking with Jesus is far superior.
Have you?
You have an opportunity this morning to go ahead and say it. Absolutely. I want this. Let's pray now, together, church as a family. Heavenly Father, we thank you that first and foremost you are a God who saves.
You are a God who loves. You are a God who sets us free. Not because of our goodness, which is never enough. One day we're good, one day we're bad, one day we're happy, one day we're angry. We are a mess.
Lord Jesus, even the best of us, we thank you, Lord God, that you are unchanging, that you are all loving, that you are all powerful, and that you made the decision in and of yourself to set us free from our own brokenness and sin. I'm so thankful for who you are, God, and that this picture we have in Hebrews chapter one, that faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. I put my faith in that today. Lord, I long for your people. I pray for them as I've prayed for them all week.
I pray for them again now. Lord, help them to believe your word. Help them to believe by faith that God, what you said is true, is true and what you said is coming, is coming. That they would stake their faith in your promises. Do that in believers lives today.
There are people in the room right now that are faithful believers, but they struggle to believe every aspect of your word. Would you sow, move them this morning to trust your voice? That word there in verse three, word of God. It's not logos, it's this other word that means the spoken word of God. That we would hear your voice and believe it.
That we would read your word, your voice on these pages and we would trust it. God, do that in your people and help us to live in such a way that we would be unashamed of that. That our faith is in something bigger, our faith is in something. Something divine.
And that rather than shame, we would feel excited and ready. Prepare us Lord, because there's some people in the room right now that are going to get serious about this this week. And they're going to live by faith and action in word and deed and thought. And it is going to set them apart. God, I pray you give them opportunities to share their faith.
I pray for that person who's shown up today and I'm not sure what inspired them to come, but I'M thankful they're here, who's been on the fence about this thing, thinking that maybe they could work their way towards heaven. Work their way towards a holy God, or thinking maybe if I live right, there's some destination beyond this point. And that's understandable. That's logical. I get that.
However, it's not true. We can never quite get there. No matter how far we jump, no matter how hard we work, we can't quite make it. God to that person today I pray you're stirring in their heart. Not because of my words, but because of what your Holy Spirit is doing in the room.
What the spirit of God is doing in their heart. God. And if you're here today, and that's where you are, you recognize today. Hey, I can't get there. I'm not enough.
I need a savior. If that's where you are today, I would ask you to simply pray with me. A simple prayer of confession saying, jesus, this. Say this. Lord Jesus, I believe.
I believe this morning that you died on a cross for my sins, my brokenness. I know I can't cross the chasm. I've tried. I trust you today, Lord Jesus, I trust you that your payment was more than enough. And God, I believe that you raised Christ Jesus from the dead.
That it's not just a historical fact, it is a life changing event. So that now I know and I believe that your death not only paid for my sin, my brokenness, but your resurrection has given me hope in the promises of God. And so I ask now, Lord, would you guide me? I want to be listed in the book of life. I want in front of my name, Lord Jesus.
I want it to say by faith. By faith. Jonathan walked with God by faith. You put your name in there, friend.
If you prayed that prayer with me just now. Welcome to the family of God. We are thankful for you. We are blessed that you are here with us in this believers. We pray right along with this person who has just come into the faith.
We pray this, we pray, Lord Jesus, help us also, that at the end of our days it would say by faith. Jacob lived by faith. Christie lived by faith. God, would you do this in us? That our righteousness would not be in ourselves, but would be in how well we lift up the Savior high up so that others could see just what a great God you are.
Do this in us. We pray in Jesus name. Amen.