Equipping University

The men and women described in Hebrews 11 are used as illustrations for the type of saving faith that actually perseveres. Christians often study this chapter and come to the conclusion that the faith of these men and women has nothing to do with them and their ordinary, everyday lives. This is a seriously misguided and misinformed understanding of what the author of Hebrews is attempting to do at this point in his letter. The author understands what is at stake and he has warned them multiple times of the spiritual dangers of forsaking faith in Christ for faith in the old covenant laws and sacrifices. To fail to endure in the Christian faith is not to travel some less desirable path to God but to travel on a path that does not lead to God at all. The author knows that his readers must press on because the only solid evidence of authentic saving faith is in its pressing on. The examples presented in chapter eleven are therefore given for this very purpose. Each of the individuals presented in the chapter pers

Chapter and verse divisions were inserted into our Bibles about 500 years ago. These relatively recent additions do provide a certain level of convenience. However, because of these numbers, many believers now view the Bible not as a continuous flow of thought but as a collection of sentences that we can cobble together or break apart according to our own whims. It is far too easy for Christians to focus on a single verse within a book of the Bible with no thought of the context for that verse. Though not as frequent as reading a single verse out of context, some entire chapters are divorced from their contexts. The eleventh chapter of Hebrews is a prime example. There is no doubt that this chapter is able to stand alone but the reader does miss something in divorcing the words from their surrounding context. Hebrews 11 is often called the "faith chapter" or the Bible's "Hall of Faith" and rightly so. The chapter is famous for its list of great men and women of faith from the pages of Scripture. However, read

The only true and foolproof test of the validity of one's profession of faith is whether one perseveres in their faith for the duration of his or her life. To put it simply, genuine faith endures. Genuine faith lasts. A "faith" that does not endure to the end of life was not a genuine faith from the beginning. One of the means that God has provided for the perseverance of his children is the issuance of severe warnings and encouraging exhortations. The entire letter of Hebrews was written for this purpose. The timeless nature of this text jumps from the pages of the Bible. Every Christian in every age has needed both warning and encouragement. We need to be challenged to live in the light of God's wrath and encouraged to live in the strength of God's promises. We need reminders of the past, promises for the future, and warnings and exhortations for the present. These will carry us through the Christian life.

In our study of the book of Hebrews, we have learned that true believers in Christ have been granted benefits that make the perks enjoyed by presidents and billionaires pale in comparison. For the author of Hebrews, it is unthinkable that anyone could understand the great benefits of being a Christian and then turn his or her back on such incredible riches. It would be like watching President Obama sit in a traffic jam in Chicago while driving his own Toyota Camry or standing in line at the airport to buy a coach ticket to London. The image is preposterous yet we should have the same reaction when a Christian refuses to enjoy all that has been given him in Christ. In this next section of his letter (10:19-25), the author writes that our manner of living must be consistent with our professed faith.

In the tenth chapter of Hebrews, the author concludes his lengthy argument for the superiority of Christ to everything in the old covenant. However, he does not stoop to sheer emotional manipulation like today's televised jurists. He does not even praise the Lord for the greatness of the sacrifice of Christ's sacrifice. Instead, he presses on and repeats his primary point once more: the glory of the superior sacrificial offering of the superior high priest operating within the superior covenant. There is nothing new here. If fact, much of what he says in the first eighteen verses of the tenth chapter will be very familiar to the reader. He does not say anything new but the way that he says what he says here is new. In doing so, the author highlights for us what he deems to be the central issues in his argument.