Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. (NRSV)
Sermon for the Ninth Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 14
| Text: Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. (NRSV) |
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The certainty of faith
Would you consider yourself a
risk taker – a person who trusts something or someone, perhaps your own ability,
and takes a risk?
We may not take the risks of a
skydiver or a V8 Super Car driver but all of us take risks every day and think
nothing of it.
We set our alarm clock at night
trusting it to wake us in the morning at the right time.
We board a plane and have total faith in the pilots in control.
We trust the makers of our bread or baked beans that there is nothing
harmful in their products. We take
risks every time we drive on the roads.
Life is a risky business.
There is a cable car that
enables visitors to view Mont Blanc, the highest mountain in western Europe.
The cable car ascends some 3800 metres almost vertically up the face of
the mountain on what seems to be a very thin cable.
We were told the view at the top was beyond belief, so we decided to take
the risk.
As the cable car rose up the
mountain, we could see the village below through the glass floor become just a
small dot. Some people refused to
look down. I looked to the cable
car operator for assurance that everything was okay.
He was a very young man, (I figured he was a uni student on a holiday
job) sitting in the corner quite unperturbed, reading a novel.
It dawned on me I didn’t know anything about this young man, what skill
he had controlling this cable car beyond pushing a lever, whether he knew what
to do in an emergency while we were dangling thousands of metres in the air.
I had to have faith in this young man and trust he knew what he was
doing.
If we can have faith in a
youthful laid-back cable car operator, why do we find it so hard to trust the
Ancient of Days, the all-powerful God.
Is it because we can’t see him face to face?
Is it because we can’t put our trust in something so flimsy as promises written
in an old book?
Is it because having faith in someone heal us when all the professionals are
saying that healing is out of the question,
or to ask someone we can’t see do the impossible, like help me in my addiction
or temptation or depression, is just plain stupid?
And so, we come to our text
today from Hebrews 11. “Now
faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen”.
To rephrase that – faith in God
is trusting his promises; his love for us;
and knowing that God is always faithful and true.
Faith in God gives us certainty and security even about the things we think
don’t make any sense or we don’t understand.
Faith in God’s grace frees us from sin and gives us a certain hope for the
future.
Martin Luther said, “Faith is
a living, bold trust in God’s grace, so certain that it would risk death a
thousand times trusting in it” (Preface to Romans).
Faith and trust go hand in hand.
For example, in the explanation of the 2nd Article of the
Creed, “I believe that Jesus Christ … has redeemed me a lost and condemned
person. He has freed me from sin,
death, and the power of the devil … (so)
that I may be his own, and
live under him in his kingdom” (Small Catechism).
This is what we believe, not just as a list of facts, but we believe with
faith that Jesus not only died on a cross, but he died to free all people
from sin and death.
But more than that.
Faith is a personal trust that declares that Jesus died for me,
and I belong to him and no sin or evil can separate
me from God’s love or stop me from entering eternal life.
Jesus has done all this “that
I may be his own, and live under him in his kingdom” (Small Catechism).
As Luther explains, “Faith is
a sure confidence of the heart, and a firm trust that through the merits of
Christ I have a gracious God” (Large Catechism, Second Article).
Have you ever walked across a
glass bridge? There’s one out west
that crosses Cobbold Gorge. You can
stand on the end of the bridge, admire how beautiful it is, how strong it looks,
see the beauty of the gorge and the river below.
You watch other people walk over the glass bridge, and yes you agree, the
bridge looks trustworthy but until you actually step onto the bridge, you
haven’t trusted it to get you safely to the other side.
That’s what faith is – not just
agreeing that Jesus is good and trustworthy but actually resting your whole
weight on Christ alone for forgiveness, for release from guilt, for help
forgiving others, for overcoming temptation, and trusting him to get you through
to the other side of whatever is striking fear in your heart and shaking your
confidence. “Faith is a sure
confidence … and a firm trust” (Luther).
To help us understand faith our
readings today direct our attention toward Abraham, often called the “father of
faith”. Out of the blue, God said
to Abraham, “Leave your country, your
family, and your relatives and go to a land that I will show you.
I will make you into a great nation” (Gen 12:1-2).
There are two problems here.
Problem number one for Abraham was the whole idea of packing up his comfortable
life and moving to an unknown destination.
It wasn’t simply a matter of calling in a removalist, loading the family
in the car and heading off. He had
to move family, servants, cattle, camels, sheep and whatever else, and travel on
foot to an unknown faraway land.
Why was Abraham able to leave Haran
where life was so good?
Why was he able to take the risk of uprooting his life, his family, his
livelihood and head off to an unknown destination?
Why was he able to set out on a trip that would take years if not decades?
You know the answer – faith.
We are told, “It was faith that made Abraham obey God” (Heb 11:8).
“By faith he lived as a foreigner” in that strange land, always on
the move.
We heard in Genesis God say to Abraham, “Do not be afraid, Abram.
I will shield you from danger and give
you a great reward” (Gen 15:1).
Then we are told, “Abram put his trust in the Lord” (Gen 15:6).
Problem number 2.
God promised that from him there would come a great nation.
Only one difficulty – there needs to be at least one child for this to
happen, and Abram and Sarah were well beyond the years they could conceive and
bear a child.
Humanly speaking there was no way that
Abraham could believe these wonderful yet highly improbable promises of God.
Sometimes it is difficult to have faith in God when we can’t see any
results and even though Abraham had his moments of doubt and impatience, God
continued to keep the flame of faith burning in Abraham.
Faith in us is a miracle from God.
There is the story of the young
soldier crouched in the trenches, clutching his rifle.
The enemy’s fire had pinned his unit
down for hours. Ammunition was running
low. Every sound of shells exploding
around him reminded him how fragile his life was.
But then, over the radio came the
message: “Hold your position. Reinforcements
are on the way.”
He couldn’t see any reinforcements.
From where he sat, there was no sign of
help. The horizon was still filled with
smoke and gunfire. Every instinct in him
screamed, “Run! You’re alone!
There is no-one there to help you.”
But he stayed.
He held his ground—not because he could
see the reinforcements, but because he trusted the word of his commander.
He had faith in the promise,
“No-one gets left behind”.
Living in the trenches can be
difficult. Faith is a difficult
thing for so many reasons.
Belief in Jesus Christ?
You believe he is the very Son of God come in the flesh?
That his death on a cross somehow covers the sins of the whole world?
And that he then rose from the dead, actually came alive again, on the third
day?
And you believe this?
You see, this whole faith thing should
be impossible. Yet you believe.
More than just believe it, you’re
staking your life, and your life after death, on Jesus.
It’s a miracle.
Or else you’re crazy, we’re all crazy,
all the millions and millions of us Christians who have believed the gospel and
held the faith, despite all the things we haven’t seen.
As Hebrews puts it, “To
have faith is to be sure of the things we hope for, to be certain of the things
we cannot see”.
Often we are pinned down in the
trenches panicking, worrying, as the shells of life’s challenges burst around
us.
We start to believe that God hasn’t come through for us the way we had hoped.
Our world comes crashing down on us, and there’s no magical happy ending.
In the trenches shells explode around us as we hear the biopsy report come back
“malignant”,
or we aren’t happy with our job but we can’t afford to find something better,
or a child takes a wrong turn in life.
Alone in the trenches with
shells exploding all around us we’re afraid, and our faith in God is severely
tested, severely shaken. We want to
cry out with the soldier, “Run!
Hide! You’re alone!
There’s no-one out there to help you!”
It’s then God says, “Hold your ground.
Trust me. I’ve got your
back. No-one gets left behind.”
Or to use God’s words to Abram, “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield.”
Faith is not about seeing an
immediate victory in front of us. It’s
not about the battle suddenly turning our way.
It’s not about the clouds of gloom disappearing or our health suddenly
taking a turn for the better. We
still hear the noise of sin, death, evil and the devil raging around us.
As Christians, we live by faith in the
middle of the battle, and we are afraid. Our
faith may be the size of a mustard seed, but it keeps trusting the promise of
the One who has already won the battle.
Christ, our Commander, has
spoken, “It is finished.” The
victory is won. And so, now in this
moment, in the heat of battle we hold our ground—not because of what we see, but
because of what has been promised.
“If God is for us who can be against us. …. Nothing shall separate us from
the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 8:39).
Faith trusts that Word from God
that says, “I will not forget you.
I have written your name on the palm of my hands” (Isaiah 49:16)
Faith simply takes God at his word even when the dust and smoke are so thick and
the way ahead so dark we can’t see what’s coming and we don’t know what danger
lies ahead.
Faith believes the promise that despite the noise of the battle, we are his
dearly loved children and that he will always be watching over us.
Faith grasps the promises of God’s grace that frees us from sin and the fear of
death.
Faith in our loving heavenly Father leads us to obedience even though we can’t
see where God will lead us, we believe his plan for us is good and gracious.
Faith is a gift from God that
enables you and me to walk with God as his children, to have the arm of our
Saviour around us to comfort us, and to know that we can trust his grace and
goodness even in the darkest valley and the deepest doubts.
Praise God for his mighty work
of giving us faith and keeping us in it.
© Pastor Vince
Gerhardy
E-mail: sermonsonthenet@outlook.com
