"By faith Abel..., By faith Enoch..., By faith Noah..., By faith Abraham..., these all...confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth." (From Heb. 11)
"....strangers and pilgrims on the earth." Keep this in mind and you will never know defeat. Remember what the Holy Spirit said earlier in the Epistle, "This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil...." If a person's "hope" and "anchor" is only, "on the earth," they are, "of all men most miserable."
In Hebrews 11 we meet quite "ordinary" people, people who are now beatified by historic Christianity, but who in their sojourn upon earth were nothing more than you and I can be, only if it can be said of us, "who by faith," because that, my friend is the only common denominator of the Covenant People, Followers of Jesus Christ-------------- "who by faith."
In Hebrews 11 we meet quite "ordinary" people, people who are now beatified by historic Christianity, but who in their sojourn upon earth were nothing more than you and I can be, only if it can be said of us, "who by faith," because that, my friend is the only common denominator of the Covenant People, Followers of Jesus Christ-------------- "who by faith."
Some get all "theological" about trying to understand the meaning of, "faith." It is obedience, obedience to the Person and Words of Him Whom Revelation 19 calls, "The Word of God." What we read in Hebrews 11 is the best definition of faith because it doesn't belabor concepts and extensive hermeneutics. Here we have living examples of people who walked, "as strangers and pilgrims on the earth," sometimes jubilant, sometimes depress, sometimes healthy, sometimes sick, sometimes with abundance, sometimes with just enough, but none without participation in the cosmic struggle, "Then he said, 'do you know why I have come to you? And now I must return to fight the prince of Persia; and when I have gone forth, indeed the prince pf Greece will come.'" Prior to this it was Egypt and Babylon, then later it would be such as the prince of Rome, of the Ottomans, and so it continues, right to our day. And through the battle with such princes, the faithful have won their victories.
We will look more at our brothers and sisters, those who have gone before us and won their battle, but for now I just want to say with the hymn writer:
"For all the saints who from their labors rest,
Who Thee by faith before the world confessed,
Thy Name, O Jesus, be forever blest.
Alleluia, Alleluia!
"Thou wast their rock, their fortress, and their might;
Thou Lord, their captain in the well-fought fight;
Thou in the darkness drear, their one true light.
Alleluia, Alleluia!
"O blest communion, fellowship divine!
We feebly struggle, they in glory shine;
Yet all are one in Thee, for all are Thine
Alleluia, Alleluia!
"From earth's wide bounds, from ocean's farthest coast
Through gates of pearl streams in the countless host,
And singing to Father, Son and Holy Ghost, Alleluia, Alleluia!"
*************
Read of the Prince of Islam fighting the "Prince" of Heaven: www.apf327.blogspot.com
When Peter, an 18 year old Norwegian, "heard the call to evangelize China, on that day he not only emptied his wallet into the collection plate, but included a small note with the words, 'and my life.'"
"Looking unto Jesus"
Hebrews 12:2
