Colleen and Nikki continue through chapter 11—the “Faith Chapter”. They talk about the true faith that these ancient believers possessed. Transcription by Gwen Billington.
Colleen: Welcome to Former Adventist podcast. I’m Colleen Tinker.
Nikki: And I’m Nikki Stevenson.
Colleen: And we’re glad to be with you, finishing up chapter 11 of the Book of Hebrews this week. Last week we did the first 16 verses, and we’re going to look at the rest of the chapter today, as the author of Hebrews finishes walking through his summary of the people of faith and the acts of faith that are the legacy of all who believe. So, Nikki, today we’re going to start in verse 17 with a reference to Abraham offering Isaac, and then we move into mentioning Jacob and Joseph, and I just thought I’d like to ask you, as an Adventist, did you know who the patriarchs were or how they were significant, or what did you think of them as an Adventist?
Nikki: I did know who the patriarchs were, but I didn’t think a lot about them, I don’t think. I didn’t really understand the covenants and how things moved from the Old Testament to the New, but I did know who they were. I didn’t really give them much thought until I got married, and I remember talking to my husband. He was a pastor’s kid, and when he was very young he really wanted to serve and honor God and know God, and there are stories of him when he was just learning how to read. He’d wake up early in the morning to be reading his Bible, and he was just earnestly wanting to please the Lord, but the more he learned of Ellen White, the more he realized he could never please God, he could never know if he was even right with God, and he began to despair and just gave up altogether by the time he was an early teen, and spent many years in the world and fully sold-out committed to it. He figured that he wasn’t going to make it to heaven anyway, and so he was going to have his fun here, and he’d burn one way or another. When he decided to clean up his life, you know, the typical Adventist conversion story. [Laughter.] He decided to clean up his life, give up his bad habits, and go back to church, and he started to pray again. And he was not sure who he was always praying to was hearing his prayers, and he told me that he would often pray to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. That’s how he would start his prayers, to make sure that they were going to the God of the Bible and not a spirit, an evil spirit, which is something we were taught in Adventism, that Satan hears our prayers and he can answer them, and so I kind of followed his lead, and I thought, well, that’s a good idea. That’ll make sure it goes to the right guy, and I would pray to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and that was kind of when they became the most significant in my thinking. That was in my 20s.
Colleen: Isn’t it interesting, by the way, that you can look back now, on this side of being born again, and see the evidences that the Lord was calling you and was directing your life and helping you know Him, as He was reaching out to grab you for Himself. It’s just so interesting, that retrospect.
Nikki: He definitely put that desire in our hearts to know Him and to make sure that we were communicating with the right God, the God of Scripture. And then when He truly revealed Himself to us through His word and we were born again, we’ve never prayed to the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob since. We pray to our Father, our Abba.
Colleen: But what a wonderful thing, that He gave you that knowledge, that that was the true God and that that was the God you really wanted to serve. That’s a knowledge from Him. As we continue in Hebrews 11, Nikki, would you begin by reading verses 17 through 22, please. We’re going to just see what this author says about the patriarchs. We’ve talked a bit about Abraham already, but this is his wrap-up of Abraham, and he’s going to move into the patriarchs before we launch into talking about Moses.
Nikki: “By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son, of whom it was said, ‘Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.’ He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back. By faith Isaac invoked future blessings on Jacob and Esau. By faith Jacob, when dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, bowing in worship over the head of his staff. By faith, Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones.”
Colleen: I think I knew who the patriarchs were as an Adventist, but I don’t think I understood them in the context of how they related to Israel. And I just think it’s worth mentioning here that the patriarchs in Scripture are considered to be Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. That’s who we see in these verses that we just read. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph preceded the law, but they were the fathers of the Nation of Israel. Abraham had Isaac, Isaac had Jacob, Jacob had the 12 sons, who all became heads of tribes. So there are three people that were the patriarchs before the 12 sons of Jacob, and Joseph is often considered in that number because of his really significant role. Going back up to verse 17 here, where Abraham is offering up Isaac – I think we all know that story. But what strikes you about it here in the Book of Hebrews? What do we learn here that we didn’t know in the Book of Genesis?
Nikki: Well, he knew. He knew that God was able to raise him from the dead. He was prepared to complete the task.
Colleen: Isn’t that amazing? I can’t even imagine how this would have felt to him, to walk up that mountain – and we know in the Book of Genesis that Isaac says, “Father, we have the wood and we have the fire, but where is the lamb?” Abraham said, “The Lord will provide.” Isaac was willing to climb on that altar when Abraham told him this is what the Lord had asked him to do, and he allowed his father to tie him onto that altar and to be sacrificed, but here in the Book of Hebrews we learn Abraham was convinced that God’s promises about Isaac being the son of promise were true, that Isaac would be the father of his descendants of promise, and he believed that God could raise him from the dead. Now, that is amazing to me. Is there any indication that there had been any resurrections or resuscitations from death at this point in the history of the world?
Nikki: No. No, but he knew. If we go back to Hebrews verse 1, “Faith is the assurance of things hoped for or expected and the conviction of things not seen.” He knew that God was going to do what God said He was going to do. He wasn’t sure how, but he knew it was going to happen.
Colleen: It’s amazing. And it was such a personal thing and such a devastating thing that God had asked him to do, something that we know from the rest of the Old Testament, through the giving of the law, that God forbade. God forbade human sacrifice. But here He appeared to ask Abraham to do a human sacrifice, but at the last minute He rescued Isaac by putting a ram in the bush. What do we know at this point that this was foreshadowing?
Nikki: The Father giving up the Son for the sins of the world.
Colleen: And somehow the Lord used the poignancy of a father having to face the obedient act of offering up his son for God’s purposes. That’s an amazing thing to help us understand the significance of the Father giving up the Son for us. Now, it’s not a perfect parallel, and it doesn’t tell us everything that went into this reality that God has done, but it is an amazing foreshadowing, an amazing portrait of what God did. I just think it’s significant because people talk about God giving His Son as being a form of divine child abuse sometimes, like we talked about that last week. But that’s so far from the truth. It was a sacrifice of love, that God can raise the dead, and that’s what He did with Jesus. And Abraham knew God could raise his son.
Nikki: And you know, I think, as an Adventist, when I heard this story – and of course, now I have all the pictures in my head from the children’s book as we talk about this – [Laughter.]
Colleen: [Laughter.] Of course!
Nikki: But when I thought about Abraham doing this, the biggest message in my head was his obedience. It was that he was obedient. I just kind of flew past the “by faith,” even reading it in Hebrews. “By faith” sounded like just something very simple, very – like a very watered down kind of trust or hope. Because of that, he did this really scary thing. He was obedient. He did the right thing. But after our last walk through Hebrews – well, the beginning of this chapter, as we walked through the beginning of this chapter and really spent time thinking about what that definition of faith meant, it’s changed the rest of this chapter for me. When we read “by faith” in front of each of these things, it’s not just sweet, trusting obedience. It’s more than that. It says that the God of the Bible has revealed truth to them, revealed reality and convicted them and convinced them so much that they act outside of the realm of normal behavior when the rest of the world looks on.
Colleen: In the next verse, we have another “by faith,” where something is going to happen outside the realm of normal behavior, and it’s just a sentence, “By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau, even regarding things to come.” Well, what does that remind you of, that story, Nikki, that was outside the normal way of human behavior?
Nikki: Well, Isaac believed what God had told him about the future that would come through his kids, and because he believed God he was able to prepare for the future from that perspective, and he blessed them, sending them the fulfillment of these promises.
Colleen: And as we remember from the story in Genesis, Jacob had deceived Isaac. Esau was supposed to receive the birthright, but Jacob deceived him and received the birthright before Esau could get there. And Isaac was upset. He really had been deceived, but he still knew that this was God’s will, and it’s interesting because it had been revealed to Rebekah, their mother, that the older one would serve the younger, and Esau was older than Jacob. So she had understood this, but Isaac apparently hadn’t, and yet he trusted God, and he followed through, giving the birthright to Jacob, which was God’s plan, and still blessing Esau, even though it couldn’t be the birthright. But he by faith, knowing that God is sovereign, trusting God’s purposes to fulfill the covenant he had renewed with Isaac, the same covenant that God had made with Abraham, Isaac acted on that and blessed his sons, in spite of the fact that it was different from the way he thought it was supposed to be. Then what do we learn about Jacob in verse 21?
Nikki: Well, “By faith Jacob, when dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, bowing in worship over the head of his staff.”
Colleen: Jacob had 12 sons, who were the fathers of the 12 tribes of Israel. When Jacob was dying, we learn in the Book of Genesis, that he did prophetically bless each one of his sons and said something about the kind of men they would be and the kinds of things they would do, and it’s interesting that it was in the Book of Genesis that we learned, for example, that Judah was the one from whom the scepter would not depart from him until Shiloh came. And Judah became the father of the kingly tribe, and that prophecy was fulfilled in the Lord Jesus, who came from that tribe. So he blessed each one of his sons in that way, and then we learn something really interesting in 22 about Joseph.
Nikki: Well, “By faith Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones.” And I find that so interesting. They were told – I’m sure it was passed down from Abraham – what God had said, that a time was going to come when they were going to go into slavery, but He would bring them out, and anticipating that and believing God, not just hoping for it, but functioning from that complete and total trust, he made plans for his bones.
Colleen: Isn’t that amazing? The unique story of Joseph, of course, is that he served as an official in the court of Egypt for most of his adult life, and the other brothers, the other 11 sons of Jacob, and Jacob himself, came down to Egypt during a famine because Joseph had been able to provide. That is where the sons of Jacob became the Hebrews, the Nation of Israel, and multiplied, so that at the end of the time prophesied to Abraham there were well over a million people that God took out of Egypt and brought out to the Promised Land. And just as you said, Joseph knew those prophecies, and he, as he died, asked them, “Take my bones when you go,” and they weren’t going yet. They had just all gotten together in Egypt. There were still hundreds of years to be played out, but he believed what God had said and made plans for them to take his bones.
Nikki: It strikes me that this faith that they have is rooted on what God has already said He would do, and so much of what we hear nowadays about faith is about trusting for something we want. It’s a very different kind of faith. But the example and the pattern that we’re seeing in Scripture is that these things are completely based on the promises of God.
Colleen: Exactly. I’ve been so struck by that as we’ve been doing this chapter. Like you said, having walked through the definition of faith in the first part of this book, it’s something tangible, something real, something rooted in God Himself, not just a wish or a hope, and it’s not surprising to me that Satan would have done such a successful job of perverting the understanding of faith.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: Because faith is the essence of what we have when we believe God. But faith as it’s used in the Word Faith movement and so many superficial religions is something completely different.
Nikki: Yeah.
Colleen: Something we bring about why our own words or desires. In verses 23 to 29, we have some references to Moses. Would you read that for us, please?
Nikki: “By faith Moses, when he was born, was hidden for three months by his parents, because they saw that the child was beautiful, and they were not afraid of the king’s edict. By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward. By faith he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured as seeing Him who is invisible. By faith he kept the Passover and sprinkled the blood, so that the destroyer of the firstborn might not touch them. By faith the people crossed the Red Sea as on dry land, but the Egyptians, when they attempted to do the same, were drowned.”
Colleen: What an amazing passage. Moses, of course, starts his life in what country?
Nikki: In Egypt.
Colleen: He’s there with all the other Hebrew people that had descended from the 12 sons of Jacob. In verse 22, the sons of Jacob had just arrived in Egypt, and hundreds of years were going to pass while their descendants became more and more numerous. By verse 23, we come to Moses, who is at the tail end of this several-hundred-year period, 400-year to be exact, and they’re just on the verge of being ready to be led out of slavery into the Promised Land. But Moses comes along, and we all know that story too. What was that king’s edict that his parents did not fear?
Nikki: Well, his first edict was that the midwives would kill the babies, and then when that didn’t work, he told the people of Egypt to kill the babies.
Colleen: He said everybody under two, all male babies under two, had to be killed. And what did Moses’ parents do? And it’s interesting because in verse 23 we learn not so much about the faith of Moses, but about the faith of his parents. What did they do by faith?
Nikki: They hid him away, and they weren’t afraid.
Colleen: You know, by all normal human reckoning, they should have been afraid. The pharaoh was going to kill that baby and undoubtedly punish those who didn’t kill. Moses was hidden away. He was put in a basket on the river, and we remember how his sister watched over him while he floated on the water of the Nile and then ultimately how pharaoh’s daughter adopted him. What do we learn in verse 24? And here’s where we do start hearing of the faith that Moses had.
Nikki: Well, by faith he refused to be called the son of pharaoh’s daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God. He chose to line up with God’s people and to give up all of the privilege and all of the rights that came with living in the palace.
Colleen: It’s really interesting to me, when I think about the privileged life Moses had growing up. I mean, here he is a Hebrew child. Obviously, pharaoh’s daughter and pharaoh himself knew that this was a Hebrew baby that slipped through the cracks that was not killed, and undoubtedly because his rescuer was pharaoh’s daughter, the pharaoh let it slide, because his daughter wanted this baby. He would undoubtedly have been educated in all the best schools that were available to Egyptians at that time. Egypt was at the peak of ancient civilization. They had the best knowledge of math, of science, of literature, of all culture, and Moses was educated, highly educated, and isn’t it an interesting thing that God provided that background for the man He selected to lead the thousands of Hebrews out of the land into the Promised Land. He trained him in all the intellectual pursuits of the day before taking him out to the wilderness, where he kept sheep for 40 years. But we learn that this crucial thing happened. By faith he did not identify with the daughter of pharaoh. By faith he identified with the people of God. Using the definition of faith that we’ve been talking about, what can we conclude about what Moses knew, even as a man in the palace?
Nikki: He had been taught about Yahweh. Well, they didn’t have His name yet, but he had been taught about God. And he had been taught about the promises. Yes, the patriarchs and the promises in the future for Israel.
Colleen: And God had made that very real to him, more real to him than the blessings and privileges of royal living. It’s interesting because I think a lot of people would have just said, “No, you know what? I like this life. There’s power and privilege, and I’m going to forget about that.” And he didn’t. He identified with the slaves. And in 26 we learn what it was that kept him going. What was it?
Nikki: “He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward.” He was looking for what he had been told would be. He believed it.
Colleen: And somehow he also understood that he was going to be part of this reward coming to pass, that he was going to play a role in God’s purposes. Somehow he understood that. Then, in verse 27, what do we learn the next act of faith was?
Nikki: He left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king. And I love this part: “He endured as seeing Him who is invisible.” It was as if he could see Him. It’s like you said, He was more real to Moses than everything he was leaving behind, even the anger of the pharaoh. It’s incredible.
Colleen: And we know that prior to his leaving Egypt, he had murdered an Egyptian he had caught abusing a Hebrew, and that had gotten back to the pharaoh, and the pharaoh was angry. It kind of makes you think he must have had some regrets about his daughter adopting a Hebrew. Can’t you just hear him say, “Blood is thicker than water.” [Laughter.]
Nikki: [Laughter.]
Colleen: After leaving Egypt, because God was more real to him even than the anger of the pharaoh, we move to the next act of faith, and I find it so interesting that the author of Hebrews chose this particular event as the thing he mentions. It’s such a powerful foreshadowing. What do we learn in verse 28?
Nikki: “By faith he kept the Passover and sprinkled the blood, so that the destroyer of the firstborn might not touch them.”
Colleen: So what’s the significance of Moses keeping the Passover? How did that happen, where did he do it, and what significance was the blood?
Nikki: This was the last of the plagues on Egypt, the angel of death. He believed God when He told him that if he put the blood of the lamb on the doorpost that this angel of death would pass over. It’s interesting to me, there were so many other signs and wonders that happened before this last one, and the author of Hebrews left all of that out and pointed to this one. This was a shadow foreshadowing of what Christ was going to do, that His blood is going to redeem us from death, protect us from the destroyer.
Colleen: In the book of Exodus, Moses told the people even that anybody who was in their house the night the death angel passed over, anybody who was in the house of an Israelite who had the blood on their doorpost, that family’s firstborn would be saved. The Lord used the symbol of Jesus’ blood that first Passover and profoundly indicated that blood was necessary for the saving of life, and those who trusted that and obeyed that whole ritual of killing the lamb and putting the blood over their doorposts, all of their firstborns were saved. And then in verse 29, talk to us about 29, Nikki. You were telling me some of your thoughts about this before we started recording, and it was so interesting.
Nikki: Well, 29 says, “By faith the people crossed the Red Sea as on dry land, but the Egyptians, when they attempted to do the same, were drowned.” I was just thinking, as my understanding of the definition of “faith” has changed through time in the word, or become more clear, I realized that faith is – it’s this assurance of things and this conviction of things that aren’t seen. It’s reality. God gives us reality. He reveals Himself to us, and He tells us what we need to know. And when we trust that, that is faith. It completely changes the way that we interact with the world around us, and on the basis of what God had shown to the Israelites up to that point, they knew that He was leading them and that He was protecting them and that He was specifically protecting them from pharaoh and from their enemy. And so as they stand there and the sea parts and this is the work of Moses and of God, they cross, knowing what God’s doing, knowing that He’s making a way for them. But then you have these other people who are in the exact same situation, this exact same physical reality in front of them, the sea is parted, and they go in, completely unaware of what God’s doing, unaware of the fact that they don’t have reality, they don’t understand that God is protecting His people, and they’re actually on the wrong end of the situation. Had they known, had they had faith to believe who God is and what He does, I don’t think they would have stepped into that sea. I think they would have understood that He was protecting those people. They attempted to do the same thing without this knowledge of God, and they were drowned.
Colleen: I’d never thought of it quite like that before, Nikki, that it’s reality. Faith is anchored in reality, and reality is more than we can see. It’s something God convicts us of and reveals to us. And He had revealed His faithfulness and His guidance to Moses and to the people of Israel.
Nikki: I don’t believe that if the Egyptians had entered into that sea believing for those waters to stay parted and believing for that that they would have exercised some kind of effectual faith. That’s not what faith is. Faith is knowing that what God says and what God does is reality. The only thing that having a right view of the situation would have done for them would have been preventing them from going in at all.
Colleen: I think that’s so important because so many people, even Christians, or people who believe they’re Christians, consider faith to be something that if they hang onto a certain belief strongly enough and don’t deny that belief with their words that they can bring about what it is they hope for. That’s not faith. Faith is believing God and understanding what He is doing, going where He leads because you know He’s truthful.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: In verse 29, it doesn’t specifically mention Moses, although he’s leading them, but it’s by faith they, so this is actually referring to the faith, the knowledge of the Nation of Israel, like you pointed out, as they passed through those waters. They knew God was doing this, and they acted on that knowledge. And Moses, their leader, was an example. He was playing out his belief in God, and they followed him, they believed. And I think that this is interesting partially because at the beginning of their exodus from Egypt, by faith Israel marched through that Red Sea. Verse 30 again fast forwards, not through as many years as we had earlier, but through about 40 years, and we go from leaving Egypt and walking through the Red Sea, the author completely bypasses the wandering in the wilderness, and we come to 40 years later when, under the next leader, after Moses’ death, Joshua leads the people into the Promised Land, but the author doesn’t even mention that. He just mentions the first battle in that Promised Land. And in 30, again it’s the faith of Israel and Israel’s leader, Joshua, but it’s the collective faith that he seems to be referring to. And what does he say happened, in 30, 30 and 31?
Nikki: “By faith the walls of Jericho fell down after they had been encircled for seven days. By faith Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who were disobedient, because she had given a friendly welcome to the spies.”
Colleen: This is the battle of Jericho summed up in two verses. What happened, how did they conquer Jericho? Do you remember?
Nikki: Yeah, God told them to do this. They didn’t just come up with this plan and believe the walls would fall. God said, “Do this. You’re going to march around the city and you’re going to blow your trumpets, and on the last day the walls will come down, and you’ll take the city.” And before that, they’d sent spies in, and that’s where they meet Rahab. This is the assurance of what God said was going to happen. It was conviction that what hadn’t played out yet would.
Colleen: And Rahab, a prostitute, which is such an interesting thing, accepts these two spies into her house, and when you go back to the book of Joshua and you read the story, she tells them the people of Jericho knew who Israel was before Israel got there because they had heard the stories of their God from the time the Red Sea parted. So for 40 years the people of Canaan had been hearing about these people. They’d seen them coming, and they saw and heard of the works of their God, and Rahab believed. Somehow God gave her the faith to believe that Israel’s God was stronger than her god, and she believed Him. So she acted on that faith by doing what?
Nikki: By giving a friendly welcome to the spies. She protected them.
Colleen: When the officials of the city came looking for them, because they knew that those two spies had entered the city, she hid them on the roof under some straw, and then she sent the soldiers and said, “Oh, they’ve left.” And she directed them out the city gates and protected the two spies from being found. But then she made a deal with them. She said, “When you actually come and take the city, please save my family.” And what did they tell her to do as a symbol or a signal so that when they came they would know where her family was?
Nikki: They told her to hang a scarlet cord outside her window.
Colleen: I think all of us as Adventists grew up with that story. But that scarlet cord represented something. It’s kind of like Moses with the Passover. Israel didn’t understand that Jesus was going to come and shed His blood, but the blood protected them, and that scarlet cord represented the blood of Christ that marked these people as being saved from death. That was the story of Rahab. And then fast forward with Rahab. She actually became a follower of Israel’s God, she joined Israel, and she married a man named Salmon who, it turns out, was the father of Boaz, and Boaz was the father of Obed, and Obed was the grandfather of David. So Rahab, this Canaanite prostitute, is in the line of the Messiah, and it’s interesting that in the brief lineage we have of Jesus, there aren’t many women, but Rahab is one, and she wasn’t even an Israelite, she was a believing Gentile. And I think it’s so cool that our Jewish Savior had believing Gentiles in His heritage.
Nikki: Yeah.
Colleen: So would you mind reading verses 32 through 38, please.
Nikki: “And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets – who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Women received back their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated – of whom the world was not worthy – wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.”
Colleen: Well, the author sort of does a summary here at the end of this chapter. He fast forwards through the history of Israel from the time of the judges probably clear up until the time of Christ, really. But he mentions specifically – not in any particular order, it’s not chronological – he mentions some of the judges and the famous king and the transitional person. So the judges he mentions are Gideon, Barak, Samson, and Jephthah. Is there anything about any of them, Nikki, that you remember in particular?
Nikki: I know that they weren’t necessarily the guys I would have chosen to put in front of my kids as examples of, you know, righteous living. [Laughter.]
Colleen: Exactly! [Laughter.]
Nikki: I know that it would not have fit my Adventist paradigm to see them in this Hall of Faith had I actually known their stories and read this chapter as an Adventist.
Colleen: Gideon is famous for his test. He was from the tribe of Manasseh. He was completely unknown. The angel of the Lord found him and asked him to do God’s bidding, to kill the Midianites, to rout the Midianite army. The angel of the Lord appeared to him. He was actually threshing his wheat in a winepress, hidden away where the Midianites couldn’t see him with the grain so they wouldn’t steal it. He was afraid of the Midianites. And God asked him to lead the army. Gideon is famous for his two tests of fleece: “Please, if this is really you asking me to do it, I’m going to set out a fleece. Make one dry and make the ground wet around it.” And when that happened, it’s like, “Make the fleece wet and the ground dry.” And God did it. And then he’s also famous for reducing his army from 32,000 volunteers who showed up to 300. First he asked those who were afraid to go home. Thousands left. And then he chose 300 men by God’s design and God’s authority by having them drink from a stream, and those who lapped the water up in their hands, lapping it up like dogs, stayed. Those who knelt down and drank went home. So with 300 people he routed the Midianites, but they didn’t kill a soul. Instead, do you remember the story of their trumpets and their torches? At night these 300 men went to where the Midian army was encamped. They had oil torches, and they broke the pots that had shadowed the light so that the Midianites couldn’t see them approaching, and they blew their trumpets, and the Midianites were so frightened, they were roused from their sleep, they turned on each other, they killed each other, and they ran away defeated. God defeated the Midianites under Gideon’s leadership. And Barak was another unknown, and he was so terrified to go out against the Canaanites that he said to the prophet Deborah, who had said, “God wants you to do this,” that he said, “Oh, I’ll only go if you come with me.” And she said, “Fine.” But it ended up that he was a strong warrior. He defeated the head of the Canaanite king’s army, and he saved Israel. So, Nikki, what do you remember Samson for?
Nikki: I remember him for his physical strength and his weakness, his emotional weakness, his weakness for women and for pleasure.
Colleen: And he actually allowed Delilah to wear him down, and he gave her the secret of his strength. And how did she ruin him?
Nikki: She cut his hair.
Colleen: And he didn’t realize the Spirit of God had left him. The Philistines came – Delilah called them while he slept – captured him, gouged out his eyes, but at the end of his life, as they brought him in to a celebration of their god Dagon, saying “Dagon has given us Samson,” Samson prayed, and God gave him one last burst of strength, and he put his arms around the pillars of that temple, and what happened?
Nikki: He pulled it down, right on top of him.
Colleen: And it says in Judges that he killed more in his death, because he died with them, than he had through his whole life, he killed more Philistines. And the Philistines were subdued and stopped bothering Israel for a period of time. Is there anything you remember about Jephthah, Nikki?
Nikki: Well, he gave up his daughter, didn’t he? Didn’t he sacrifice his daughter?
Colleen: When he was asked to lead an army to, again, protect Israel from the enemy, he made a deal, he made a vow to the Lord and said, “If you give me the success of this battle, I will offer to you whatever I first see leaving my house,” thinking, of course, it would be an animal because his vow was that he would sacrifice this thing, and it turned out to be his daughter. And we learn in Judges the daughter believed that his vow needed to be kept, and she allowed it to happen as it had been said. Now, theologians dispute this. They say it might have been a sacrifice or it might have been that she simply was a virgin her whole life and never had marriage and children carrying on the family’s lineage, but whatever the case, he offered his daughter, not knowing it was going to be his daughter, but he did what God asked him to do, trusting in God. And then he mentions David, the man after God’s own heart, the king to whom God made an unconditional promise that someone would always sit on his throne, the father of Jesus, and we also hear of Samuel. Who was Samuel?
Nikki: Samuel was a prophet. He was the prophet who ordained David as king, and he was the son of Hannah, wasn’t he?
Colleen: Yes, he was. And he was the transitional figure between the time of the judges and the time of the monarchy. So he was the last of the judges, but God asked him to ordain both Saul and David. As he ushered in the monarchy by anointing the first kings, he transitioned from being a judge into being a prophet. The interesting thing about David and Samuel is that both of them actually held dual roles in Israel. David was a king, and looking back, we also know he was a messianic prophet. His Book of Psalms is full of messianic prophecies. And Samuel started as a judge and transitioned into the role of a prophet as the monarchy became established. In both cases, they were foreshadowing the Lord Jesus, who would in Himself take all the roles that God had given to Israel, but in Israel they had been held mostly by individual people. And in Jesus, prophet, priest, king, and judge would all be fulfilled in Him. And then we just walk through a list of terrible things that happened to people who had faith. What do you think when you read through verses 33 through 38, Nikki?
Nikki: That these people knew something. They knew God. You don’t submit yourself to this kind of a life, to this kind of torture, unless you’re looking to something more real than what you’re facing.
Colleen: We don’t even know who all the people were to whom the author is referring as he talks about the things they endured and the things from which they escaped, but we do know that in verse 38 we learn that these people all were people of whom the world was not worthy. What does that mean?
Nikki: The world wasn’t worthy of them. They were God’s people; they were set apart for Him, for His holy purposes.
Colleen: Because they believed Him and knew His purposes were bigger than the world. And he ends this chapter of faith by reminding us of some things. What does it say, Nikki, 39 and 40?
Nikki: “And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.”
Colleen: How do you understand that, Nikki?
Nikki: Well, I’ll admit, I’ve wrestled a little bit with this as we were preparing for this podcast. When I look at verse 39 and 40, I can’t help but think about earlier in the chapter, in verse 13, where it said, “These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar.” There were promises made to them that I believe God still intends to keep, but there’s an even greater promise that they hadn’t yet fully understood, and it’s all because of Christ, it’s all because of what He has done for us, that any of the other promises matter. I also thought about the passages of Scripture that talk about letting your yes be yes. God is a promise keeper, and so I don’t see this saying that He doesn’t keep His promises, I see this saying that He hadn’t yet, the time had not come, but the time will come.
Colleen: And it’s also interesting, it says, “Apart from us they would not be made perfect.” When the Lord comes and receives His own, we will all be glorified together. They won’t precede us in that glorification, and we won’t precede them.
Nikki: Um-hmm.
Colleen: We will meet Him together. This chapter is intended for believers to understand that they have security, that they have faith because Jesus has already fulfilled all the shadows of the Old Testament. That has been the point of the first ten chapters of this book, and he’s showing that even the Old Testament people who believed God knew that He would keep all those promises, although Jesus hadn’t yet come inside of time, but now that He has come, we can knowthat He will keep His future promises, which is that He will come for His people, and He will establish His kingdom, and we will reign with Him. And we can know these things are true, and He gives us the faith to know that this is reality. Reality is God’s purposes are true.
Nikki: And the word “faith” in Greek here is synonymous with the word “trust.” The word is “pisteōs,” and it’s synonymous with “trust,” and you can’t trust something that isn’t there. These people trusted what they knew. They trusted what God revealed to them. There was substance to it. I was looking up some commentaries on faith this week, and again, I’ve come to really enjoy the website preceptaustin.org, and one of the commentators on there said that faith has three elements. The first is firm persuasion or firm conviction, the second is surrender to that truth, and the third is conduct emanating from that surrender. And this chapter 11 is – we see that played out. They are witnesses of that kind of saving faith, that firm conviction, the surrender to that conviction, and then the conduct that emanates from that conviction.
Colleen: So if you haven’t surrendered to the conviction that Jesus is the fulfillment of all the promises of God, if you haven’t acted on that belief, we urge you today to remember what Jesus did when He went to the cross and took your sin in His flesh and broke the curse of death and defeated the devil, and place your faith in Jesus and ask Him to be more real to you than your fear, ask Him to be more real to you than your shame and your guilt, and trust Him, knowing that He cannot lie, and He will never let you go. So, thank you for walking through chapter 11 with us. If you have comments or questions, you can write to us at formeradventist@gmail.com. Please don’t hesitate to go to proclamationmagazine.com. You can leave an online donation there, you can sign up for our weekly emails or the magazine. Don’t forget to write a review wherever you listen to podcasts, and follow us on Facebook and Instagram, and we’ll see you again next week.
Nikki: Bye for now.
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