Abraham's faith

Frank here blogging from Sydney.

On Saturday I led out a teen worship. I talked about Abraham and his great faith. Our objective was to learn what his life teaches us about faith. I think faith is what a lot of people have been lacking, including myself. So this was a learning process not only for the youth I was sharing with, but also myself. I just thought it would be good to share my notes with you all as well.

The passage is taken from Hebrews 11:8-16. The author of Hebrews (Paul) uses 2 critical issues in Abraham's life to help us understand biblical faith: the promised land and the promised son.

The Land

Hebrews 11:8, "By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going." God simply called Abraham to go to a land he would show me. Abraham did not even know where!

Imagine if you are in Haran, talking to Abraham. You ask him if he believes the promise that God gave him. And he says, "Of course!" Eventually you will probably say, "If you believe in God's promise, what are you doing here? Why haven't you left yet?" This is exactly what Paul is trying to tell us, that by faith, Abraham obeyed by going.

Here we learn the first insight to biblical faith, is that it is active rather than passive. It involves a willingness to act on God's truth. James 2:14, "What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such fath save him?" Verse 17, "In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead."
It means here that if there is no action on God's command, there is no evidence for others or for us that we believe in God's promise. That's why they always say, action speaks louder than words!

Now there is another aspect of faith present in Abraham. Hebrews 11:9,10 “By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.”
Here you can see Abraham's willingness to act. God promise him land, and yet when Abraham reached Canaan, he found that the land was already owned by other people. He did not complain or whatever. He did not try to buy the land. He did not try to conquer the land. Instead he just hung around living in a TENT! Even when his wife Sarah died, he had to buy a burial plot for her even though God had already promised that that land would be his.

Very often we think that we have a lot of faith at first. But we wait and wait and slowly we become inpatient and lose our faith. So here is another aspect of faith. It involves not only the willingness to act according to God's truth but also depending on God to perform His will for us, instead of taking matters into your own hands. i.e. It is not only about believing that God can work miracles, it is also about having faith that God WILL do them, even if it takes a long time.

God calls on us for a specific reason. He calls on us to choose personally to receive Him.
John 1:12, “Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.”
Rev 3:20, “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.”

Gal 2:16, “Know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.”
When it comes to being accepted by God, we cannot do anything for ourselves to make ourselves acceptable to Him. We have to depend totally on Him to make us acceptable.

Rom 10:11, “As the Scriptures says, “Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame.” This attitude of dependence on God, is just as important as the action which I mentioned earlier.

Now we take a look at another example from Abraham's and Sarah's life that illustrates biblical faith.

A Son

Hebrews 11:11,12. “By faith Abraham, even though he was past his age – and Sarah herself was barren – was enabled to become a father because he considered him faithful who had made the promise. 12 And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore.”
God promised that he would grant Abraham and Sarah a son.

Gen 12:2. “I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.”
15:4. “Then the word of the Lord came to him: “This man will not be your heir, but a son coming from your own body will be your heir.”
17:19. “Then God said, “Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.”
And yet, there was a major problem here. Sarah was 65 years old already and she had never given birth before. Abraham was 75 years old. How on earth would both of them exercise faith in this kinda situation?

God actually gave Abraham a few actions through which he could express his faith. For example God called Abraham to change his name from Abram (exalted father) to Abraham (father of a multitude of nations).

Obviously their faith involved more than just action. It also involved dependence on God to perform His will for them, because obviously they couldn't do it by themselves, as they were old and everything.

Rom. 4:19-21. “Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead, since he was about hundred years old, and that Sarah’s womb was also dead. 20 Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God.” Abraham knew how humanly impossible this could happen. And yet he continued to look at the situation and decided that, “whatever God has promised, He will surely perform it.”

So lets compare our own lives and that of Abraham. Let us think of ways we can have more faith in God. Certain things we have to realize is that:
- Change will not happen overnight. It can take weeks/months/years/decades!
- There will be times when you wonder if the change will ever occur.
- You may attempt to change things by your own power. But these attempts will be rejected and fail. Just like the example of Abraham who went to sleep with Hagar who gave him a son called Ishmael. That clearly wasn't God's instruction.
- Most importantly, PRAYER. Prayer is very important!

Just like Abraham, over time we will see God gradually changing our lives and accomplishing His purpose through us more and more. This will bring us confidence that God is good and faithful, but the problems or challenges that we face will definitely still continue for the rest of our lives. Hence we need be patient and persevere even though we see no immediate changes. We will surely have to wrestle with contradictory thoughts and feelings. Ultimately, we need to trust that God knows what He is doing, and that He will make the proper changes at the proper time.