Hebrews 11:29-40

It’s so hard to wait. It’s so hard knowing that something is coming, but it’s not here yet. It’s so hard to wait. Sometimes it’s just better not to know. We do that with our kids sometimes. It’s actually worse to tell them early about some trip, or when Grandpa and Grandma are coming. They want it to happen now, and it doesn’t make any sense to them that they still have to wait 3 or 4 weeks. 3 or 4 weeks!?! They don’t want to wait until tomorrow. So we don’t usually tell them until it’s tomorrow. It’s just better that way.

But most of us don’t have the luxury of that kind of ignorance. We know too much. We’ve seen too much. We want too much, and it’s hard to wait. What are you waiting for? Maybe the answer to that question is too deep inside. Maybe you’ve had to push it way down inside there because it’s hurt too much to wait. Can you be honest with yourself for just a moment? What can’t you wait for? A healthy body? A healthy mind? A healthy marriage? Safety, where we finally reduce the terrorist level from yellow to green, because the enemy is gone? Complete satisfaction in your work? Even having a steady job? Take a moment and recognize what you’re waiting for. …Got it? The list goes on, and on, and it’s hard to wait.

Guess what. All of those things are good things to want. They are all valid desires. But when we’ve waited this long, and been disappointed this many times, we really start to wonder if this is ever going to happen. 10 years, 20 years, 30 years of waiting is very, very hard. And after all of those years, it’s very easy to give up.

And it’s then that we’ve lost faith. Faith and hope go hand in hand. When we have faith, it’s easy to hope. When faith is strong, then hope is strong. And when faith starts to shake, then hope vanishes like a mist.

But faith doesn’t need to shake. Faith doesn’t need to falter. Faith can be strong. Just look at Hebrews 11. Remember? We’re 20 Sundays past Easter, and the hope of the resurrection is still strong. Let me tell you, if a man can be dead for three days and then come back alive, then we can remain hopeful in anything. If Jesus can rise from the dead, then anything can happen. Any marriage can be restored. Any job can be found. Any body can be healed. We can have faith.

Hebrews 11 is the well-known faith chapter. For 28 verses, the writer of Hebrews has been giving example after example of people who have made through, against incredible odds, and kept their faith. From Abel to Noah to Abraham to Moses, God’s people have been brought through crisis after crisis, and they’ve seen the work of the Lord.

Here’s another example, in verse 29:

The people were surrounded, with a deadly army on one side, and a deep sea on the other. The only reason they were out there in the first place was because of the hope of a new life in the promised land, a land where they would no longer be in slavery and where fields would practically grow themselves. This is what they had to look forward to, but someone huge stood in the way. But by faith, the people passed through the Red Sea, and the army of Egypt drowned. They saw what they were looking for. There was no need to give up hope. They held their faith.

Or take verse 30:

The people had finally made it to the promised land, but getting there was just half the problem. Now they had to deal with all the people there who wanted to kill them. What are they going to do? Give up hope? Lose their faith? Nope. They’ll watch the walls of Jericho come tumbling down because they walked around it several times, and shouted. They saw what they were looking for.

Or Rahab. Verse 31:

She’s facing destruction. That wall that she was living on was going to collapse right under here. She hoped, she hoped to live. And she did. She saw what she was looking for.

The writer has been going on and on in Hebrews 11, and he has more! He doesn’t want the sermon to run too long, the people are running out of peppermints, he’s run out of time, but there’s so many. Verse 32:

Each of these people saw something, wanted something, hoped for something that seemed unreachable. Triumph over enemies, unity of God’s people, a holy government. They all seemed so far off, and they saw it happen. Did you hear those words?

As unlikely as it all seemed, as many years as they had to wait. They saw it.

We hear this, and it sounds really great to us. But it all seems pretty unrealistic. We think, "Come on! We’re talking about Moses here. And Abraham. And David. These are the heroes of faith. These are the superstars. These are the people who will be signing autographs when we get to heaven. Of course they got what they were hoping for. They’re in the Bible. That’s not me. How do I stand with Moses and Abraham. They had faith. That’s not me.

But that’s the point of Hebrews 11. This list can include us. The faith that was given to these men and women is the same faith that is given to us. Remember what faith is? It’s a gift. It’s not something we create inside ourselves. It’s something the Spirit puts into us. This is what the Christian life looks like, with insurmountable odds being surmounted by God. With indestructible obstacles being destroyed by our Lord.

Listen to what the Lord does for His people:

How about you? What have you seen? An answer to prayer that you never really expected? The resolution of a fight that seemed unsolvable? A sickness healed? A hope restored? What promise have you already received? What has the Lord brought you through?

But then things take a turn in verse 35, and it gets bad:

For as many that saw what was promised, just as many didn’t. For as many as walked through the Red Sea on dry land, just as many were cut down by the sword. For as many as were honored, just as many were persecuted.

But Hebrews 11 keeps our attitudes right. They suffered terrible things, but it wasn’t because they were failures. Those who had good lives were not better than those who had hard lives. In fact, verse 38:

See, the world thinks that if you’re life isn’t working out very well, then you are a failure. The successes are the people who drive the nice cars, walk the red carpet at the Oscars, own the corner offices, have wonderful lives. But you’re not a failure. If you’re walking with the Lord through the suffering, if you’re not seeing the promises, and you’re hanging on to the Lord, listen, the world isn’t worthy of you. You’re the one who’s doing it right.

And sometimes we may think that if our life isn’t working out very well, then we’re not having enough faith. If we only believed more, our life would be better. If we only believed more, we would become pregnant. If we only believed more, we’d be healthy. Our lives are hard because our faith is weak.

But wait. These people who suffered so much, who lost so much, verse 39:

It wasn’t their great lives that they were praised for. It was that they kept hanging on. It was that they didn’t give up hope. They didn’t let go of their faith.

But let’s go back a moment. Again, this faith was not self-generated. They didn’t hold on to their faith because they were such strong people, and there’s no way we could ever be like that. Once again, their faith was given to them. It was a gift that they accepted from God. They simply chose to accept it, and even that choosing was something that God got them to do. They kept receiving it, and kept receiving it, and kept receiving it. They didn’t give up, even though, verse 39:

Wait a minute. Didn’t we read in verse 33 that they had received what had been promise? And now they didn’t receive what had been promised? How can we have both? Already, and not yet.

And that’s exactly where we are. We’ve already received, and yet we haven’t yet. Already, and not yet. Those words describe every day of our lives. Look at today. What have you received from the Lord today? Some of the gifts are big, and some are less noticeable. Some are gifts of healing, and some are gifts of peace. Some are gifts of provision, like food, clean water out of a faucet, and some are gifts of support, like a smile, a hand on the shoulder, a hug. Some of us can tell stories about miracles, where something happened we never thought possible. Some of us have seen things happen that we’ve hoped for, so hard, and then there it was. Most importantly, we received our Savior. He came to us and He lived with us and He died for us. That alone was a miracle, and that alone gives us comfort.

But some of us are still waiting. In fact, I’d say most of us are still waiting, if we’re honest with ourselves. If we can open up those parts of us that we protect so fiercely, and recognize that we want something, we crave something, we’ll see that we’re all hoping for what we haven’t yet seen. We’re watching for complete health. Most of us enjoy pretty good health, but what we really want is no aches and pains, no trips to the doctor, no medications, no concerns at all. Most of us are employed well, but what we really want is an existence where our work is in balance with rest, where how much we produce equals how much we work, rather than working with little to show for it.

Most of us live fairly happy lives, but what we want is for there to be no more tears. We want no more separation from loved ones. We don’t want loved ones to move away. We don’t want to have to move away from loved ones. Most importantly, we don’t want death. We don’t want our own death. We don’t want the death of loved ones. We’re tired of death.

In other words, we want to see that promise that God makes in Revelation 21:

That’s what we wait for, and that’s what God has promised. Now, He’s already given us some of what He’s promised, and that gives us hope for what’s coming. If He’s already given us care, support, comfort, healing, even miracles, then absolutely He will give us what is still coming.

That’s how we keep going. That’s how we keep receiving the faith. When the waiting just seems so long, we look to see what God has given us, and we know that more is coming. We name the promises we have already seen. We list the miracles, we see the care, we see our Savior who died, and we know, verse 40:

Our spiritual ancestors waited. We wait. And someday, together, Abraham and Moses and Gideon, and Chuck and Roger and Jean, we’ll see the Lord. We’ll see what was promised. We know this will happen. We know. So we keep going, holding on, receiving the gift of faith.