Hebrews 11:1 Abel, Enoch, Noah. Before the flood and the Abrahamic covenant God had a people on earth who lived by faith. Abel, the first martyr, Enoch, the seventh from Adam, and Noah, the preacher of righteousness, are the three witnesses of the period whose lives are recorded. I. Abel, the fir... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:1 Faith and Things Hoped for and Unseen. I. Faith appears at first sight a very simple thing; it is nothing else but believing the word of God. We know what it is to receive the word of a man, to believe statements, thought strange and surpassing our experience, because we regard the cha... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:3 Faith in God the Creator. I. Reason _cannot_ascend from nature to nature's God. The most comprehensive observation of things seen, and of which we can take cognisance, and the most minute analysis of things with the most remote and simple elements, leave the question of creation or th... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:4 Faith as Acting on Worship. I. All faith implies an effort, a motion of the will towards God. It maintains not existence merely, but living energy; it is not otiose, but active; it even asks, "Lord, what wilt thou have me _to do?_" Think of this as regards worship. To be real it must b... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:8 The Father of Missionaries. He went out, as many had gone out before him, as many would go out after him. He moves onwards and onwards towards the setting sun, till at length all progress is stopped by the sea barrier which parts him from the unknown worlds beyond. There, from those ba... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:8 The Patriarchs. I. The period of the patriarchs has a very peaceful and lovely character. God appeared and spoke to them. There was as yet no law. What is the real peculiarity of the patriarchal life? What else but faith; that they lived before and with God, waiting for the promise, t... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:13 Faith triumphant in Death. I. The excellence of the faith which places its object beyond death may be seen in two respects. (1) First, as it is in itself greater and bolder, existing in spite of greater difficulties. It is this, because it is fixed on an unknown object; our objects in... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:14 The Expectants. I. One of the marks of the saints of God is their heavenward look. They are in the world, but not of the world; strangers, not citizens. Their acts, their failures, their sacrifices, their sufferings, are _here,_but their hearts and their treasures are above. But now,... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:21 The Story of a Pilgrim's Staff. I. The pilgrim's staff represented something. He leaned on it, not because it was needed, but because it helped him to realise. It was the type of those principles which sustain and make strong on which the spirit leans. The spirit flees over many fiel... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:22 I. It is not possible to read the life of Joseph without beholding here the portrait of a great man, not merely as a commanding and guiding intelligence, but that which is higher yet, a strong and noble personal character. Evidently, all his early life was pressed upon by thoughts his... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:23 Moses. I. Israel is a typical nation. The things which happened to them" are recorded for our instruction and comfort. The things which happened unto them, happen unto us also. We also were in Egypt, and had to learn that we could not bring about our deliverance by our own strength a... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:24 The Choice of Moses. Consider: I. The choice which Moses made. If we carefully examine this passage we find it to represent one of the most extraordinary acts of deliberate renunciation of the worldly, and deliberate preference for the spiritual, which the world has ever known. It is... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:25 I. Note, in the first place, that the pleasures of sin are shortlived. In the expressive symbolism of Scripture they are like water in a broken cistern, which speedily runs out, or like the blaze of thorns, which crackle and flame up for a little, and then die down into a heap of ashe... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:26 The Better Country. I. Look, in the first place, to the state of soul here specified, "They desire." That word denotes an ardent longing for the possession of something which we have not now, but which we may come ultimately to call our own; and when used, as here, to designate the at... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:27 Enduring as Seeing the Invisible One. I. What is this virtual seeing of Him who is invisible? There must be wrought in me, between Him and me, some sympathy, some good understanding and fellow feeling about the matter spoken of. There must be established between Him and me some perso... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:30 We may make use of extraordinary examples to encourage our ordinary faith at ordinary times. These models are on a very grand and large scale, and so we can plainly see them. I. Faith works and suffers; faith is busy and energetic. It is our only strength and victory. In suffering we... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:35 Consider: I. The better resurrection. Think (1) of the place of it. "There shall in no wise enter into it anything that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie." The body which here depresses the soul shall be framed to lift it up, to give it perception and vi... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:37 Martyrdom. The word "martyr" properly means "a witness," but it is used to denote exclusively one who has suffered _death_for the Christian faith. Let us consider what it was in the early Christian ages to be a martyr. I. First, it was to be a _voluntary_sufferer. Men, perhaps, suff... [ Continue Reading ]
Hebrews 11:38 Great Men. I. It behoves us to have a care how we judge the men of our own day who take a leading part in the conduct of affairs, and compel the notice of their fellows. It is easy enough to load them with flatteries if they be on our side; but should they be teachers of new things, w... [ Continue Reading ]