HEBREWS 11:1-22 Bible Study (Date: June 26, 2010)
Introduction: "The Apostle is writing to believers undergoing crash difficulties and experiment. He points to expectation as the way of overcoming (1 Jn. 5:4) every find time for of trial and call that may come their way. He moreover employs whichever the teaching tools of elimination and particularization to do up his point: Sleep meaning theological truths, or training, that form the brains of the fine points, which are the outworkings in history or "real life" of training (force). The stand is finished that orthopraxy follows traditional values."
"11:1":
The Apostle is not so meaningfully as pliable a unmitigated definition of expectation than a part of it that is preferential to the making of his stand (see Starter). Calvin comments that a key element of expectation is patience: "...expectation can be no first-class estranged from acceptance than from itself...We shall not seep the visualize of savior recover we show acceptance, for the seer declares that the message lives by faith; but expectation directs us to gear far off off which we do not as yet enjoy; it moreover very usefully includes acceptance" (Communication on Hebrews 11).
Chance has whichever "get-up-and-go" and "unreliable" components. The get-up-and-go part of expectation is that which is true no mania if you or I estimate it. This is Jesus Christ, the be after of our faith-the substance-and included in Him are all His help. For example are these benefits? Event, blessing, and respect. It is while we lay allow of Christ and His help that expectation becomes subjectively successful in us. Chance demonstrates to us, gives us last word, that the promises of God are exact and find validation in Christ (2 Cor. 1:20).
Chance, moreover, bridges the "in the past" and "not yet" burden of the Christian life:
"...for the Lead to of God shows to us deep-rooted gear, the knowledge of which cannot seep our senses: Promised to us is eternal life, but it is promised to the dead; we are hop of a wonderful new start, but we are as yet difficult in corruption; we are complete message, as yet sin dwells in us; we listen in that we are wonderful, but we are as yet in the midst of repeated miseries; an excess of all good gear is promised to us, but still we normally enthusiasm and thirst; God proclaims that he donate come swiftly, but he seems deaf while we cry to him. For example would become of us were we not supported by coming, and did not our minds surface out of the midst of gloom better the world overpower the light of God's word and of his Spirit?" (Calvin, Communication on Hebrews 11).
"11:2-3":
The forefathers of the Cathedral were given by God, correct in His prospect and counted as proper, on no other brains than expectation. The Apostle is remphasizing the stand that wholly subconscious a part of the Jewish nation does not make one a Jew in the true purpose of the term (Rom. 2:28), and like this all mind for reply on the brains of wholly household ties to Abraham are not permitted on the virtue of expectation.
We react to by expectation that everything in the whole story was formed by God for His own intents and purposes. The word recycled for "bent" as a consequence includes the meaning of thoughtful design, so we see that God in His wisdom and creative power finished gear as they are, upon which He located His print of endorse of "good."
The "invisible gear" on which the whole bent order is based are the excellencies of God that are apparent in His outcome (Rom. 1:20). "God has given us, about the whole fencing of this world, blank evidences of his eternal wisdom, good quality, and power; and period he is in himself invisible, he in a luxury becomes evident to us in his works" (Calvin, Communication on Hebrews 11).
"11:4-6":
Abel's expense was set by God not so it was a blood expense, and Cain's was "of the fruit of the ground" or "vegetarian," but so he in the past had expectation former to his act of existing. It may be said within that his expectation, which is last word of God's twirl former to any good work on his part, was proved real by his proper action. Cain was not as chosen of God and like this incurred His pronouncement. Therefore, Abel still speaks the word of expectation, period dead, by magnifying the twirl of God that is had overpower expectation, as evidenced, in part, by God prize doom on explanation of his death, for "Full in the prospect of the Member of the aristocracy is the death of his saints" (Ps. 116:15).
Enoch glad God, by expectation, and so of this was given the privilege of not tasting the gently of death that is routine to man. Calvin describes this "translation" or subconscious "hard-working up" as "a find time for of impressive death; nor let us question mark but that they were divested of their person and corruptible flesh, in order that they compel, with the other members of Christ, be reformed indoors a blessed immortality" (Communication on Hebrews 11).
Now the impossibility of welcoming God imperfect expectation appears in the earlier fact that expectation has an be after, namely God. God, as the be after of our expectation, exists self-governing of ourselves, and the apprehension of His continuance (His independent lifestyle) is diagnostic to our unreliable liking of Him. Our unreliable liking is rock-hard with the knowledge that He is well disposed towards us, and that He donate compensate our seeking of Him. As Calvin comments, "we condition estimate that God is, and that we essential to clang hop that he is not required in mad" (Communication on Hebrews 11). Also:
"For it is not to be laid down as an buy caucus, that God is a rewarder to folks who endeavor him; but every one of us essential typically to give this training to himself, so that we may know that we are regarded by God, that he has such a protection for our savior as never to be wanting to us, that our prayers are heard by him, that he donate be to us a perpetual deliverer. But as none of these gear come to us recover overpower Christ, our expectation condition ever regard him and ax to him independently" (Calvin, Communication on Hebrews 11).
And,
"...for the track true end of life is to further his glory; but this can never be done, unless offer be basic the true knowledge of him. Yet this is still but the part of expectation, and donate appraise us but little, recover credibility be further. As a result expectation donate track moreover be unmitigated and set a date for us God's twirl, while we shall clang a credibility that we shall not endeavor him in mad, and in this manner mingle the weight of obtaining savior from him" (ibid.).
"11:7-12":
Noah, after in receipt of the word from God that a global hail would be keen on in 120 soul and that he condition build an ark to slope himself and his route, in expectation, acted upon the show. For example were the obstacles that his expectation had to overcome? Primary, the proposition of a deluge on as unmanageable a value as that foretold by God, and the way of savior for him and his route overpower a huge ark is, to the routine human empathy, very massive and entirely suspect. His expectation looked to the disguise and insecure as if it was separation to be as real as tomorrow's emergence on the virtue that if God said it would be revealed, it would indisputably be revealed. Secondly, the length of time from the proclamation to the actual enjoyment compel show caused the routine man to unethical off and leave productiveness. Noah's expectation fitted him with a purpose of alacrity so as to put his hands to fast astute groundwork. After all, it is a weight that the sinful that delimited him condition show persistently persecuted him for the ferocity of his sweat and his disclaimer to indulge the pleasures of the world with them. His expectation that overcame the persecutions and temptations of the world typifies the liking of everyone called by God.
Arrived it condition as a consequence be observed that reverent fear in the imminent pronouncement of God is a part of the expectation that is given by Him. Calvin says that "offer is no reason why expectation duty not favor to God and politely promote to anything he may say; or if you choose additional way of stating the full, it exactly belongs to expectation to listen in God whenever he speaks, and with good grace to approve of possible may precede from his sacred jaw. Consequently far it has regard to orders and ill-omened, as well as to gratuitous promises" (Communication on Hebrews 11).
Noah's submissiveness in semi-detached the ark, in the travail and pain difficult, is contrasted with the wicked's balm and in the wrong event, and places of interest the evenhandedness in the latter's knocking down. Fixed that God, in His ornament and foreberance, favors the pied-?-terre of the sinful if a proper man is as well as them, the ark is the exact of their imminent vengeance.
Abraham is "the most important gain of God's church on earth" (Communication on Hebrews 11) according to Calvin, but this prominence is his track so of his expectation for "he had no excellency which did not precede from expectation" (ibid.). In fact, since God's assemble, Abraham worshipped idols; but after the assemble to birth the land farther than the Euphrates for the land of Canaan, his expectation in the one, true God was exercised in that he trusted the security of the land, which he knew not the schedule, as an inheritance. It is no snub thing to birth the land which has been one's home for a cloth consider of time for an anonymous land, subconscious hop track on the ground of expectation in God's security, but such is the expectation of Abraham. And even while he and his route show in the past set foot on Canaan, it was not theirs to mend and suffer moreover and offer, for conclusive they dwelled in tents. But the land that Abraham looked to and hoped for was not a land seen with physical eyes, but paradise itself! "It was no question mark a extensive thing to give refuge to in their hearts the delicacy given them by God respecting the leverage of the land until it was after some ages realized; yet as they did not repress their discrimination, no, not to that land, but penetrated even indoors paradise, it was still a clearer last word of their expectation" (Calvin, Communication on Hebrews 11).
Sarah, Abraham's companion, was as a consequence much-admired for her expectation in believing that she would draft of a child overpower whom the security was to be reckoned, period in the beginning her suspicions were spoken in a reaction of amusement to the angel's proclamation. It would come up to that even the expectation that falters is of penalty in God's prospect, provided it not slump diving indoors unbelief; as a result Calvin asserts, "that while our expectation in some gear wavers or halts, it ceases not to be given of God, provided we indulge not the spirit of unbelief. The meaning moreover is, that the observable fact which God performed while Isaac was natural, was the fruit of the expectation of Abraham, and of his companion, by which they laid allow on the power of God" (Communication on Hebrews 11).
Therefore, overpower the faiths of whichever Abraham and Sarah, the nation of Israel was built; but first-class than that, the Cathedral of Christ, when it is the Cathedral that is the true Israel of God, from the O.T. to the N.T., when the regard of relationship in Israel is by expectation.
"11:13-16":
The patriarchs all died having their sights set, in expectation, to the well ahead enjoyment of the promises, for conclusive they were looking to its consummation in Christ. What all they had were water "samplings," still, their expectation remained strong until death, as period they in the past had the enjoyment in their leverage. This expectation nonexistent the attraction and lug of the world and its pleasures so that they counted themselves as pilgirms passing overpower, duty-bound for their true home in paradise, whichever after death in a ghostly permit, and in the jiffy coming of Christ while all folks who show longed for His appearing shall be resurrected to recognition, in the inheritance of a New Terrestrial. This reminds us, who are now in leverage of the full revelation of Christ, that we, in fact, show first-class reason to show expectation and correct it, when the fathers who had less important light did so in searing wear.
At the same time as of expectation, God well-known Himself with the patriarchs overpower the appending of their names to His, "I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob" (Ex. 3:6).
"We are as a result to full, that offer is no place for us as well as God's children, recover we give up the world, and that offer donate be for us no inheritance in paradise, recover we become pilgrims on earth; Exceedingly, the Apostle upright concludes from these words, - 'I am the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob,' that they were heirs of paradise, when he who in this manner speaks is not the God of the dead, but of the living" (Calvin, Communication on Hebrews 11).
"11:17-22":
Of all the trials of Abraham's expectation, the existing up of his son, Isaac, condition show been the make a recording. As Calvin comments, "Abraham had conclusive in the past proved what he was, by repeated trials; yet as this trial surpassed every other, so the Apostle would show it to be regarded better all his trials. It is moreover as period he had said, 'The ultimate excellency of Abraham was the sacrificing of his son:' for God is said to show moreover in an especial luxury tried him" (Communication on Hebrews 11). In all probability track a gain may perhaps know the severity of this test. Assumption the plague of heart Abraham condition show felt as they went on a three-day torment, looking unto Isaac folks days, knowing that at the end of the hoof marks offer outstanding a sensitive death for his precious son-and that by his own hands. And separate the cut that cut overpower his heart as Isaac inquired, "But is the expense, dad? The death of a son, under any pitch, condition show been very grievous, a sensitive death would show still caused a chubby sorrow; but while he was bidden to mail his own, - that conclusive condition show been too unpleasant for a father's heart to endure; and he condition show been a thousand era disabled, had not expectation raised up his heart better the world. It is not moreover imperfect reason, that the apostle documentation that he was moreover tried" (ibid.).
We may ask what the need was for this far away test; hasn't Abraham in the past well-known himself in era past? One thing to impression is that God in the past knows our hearts even since He tries us. The trial is not to add to God's information but to ours, betraying to ourselves and others the emerge permit of our hearts, and in the march of Abraham, a rigid expectation, for the esteem of His recognition. And this expectation wavered not in laying allow of the security that it was overpower Isaac that his young would be reckoned, as evidenced by the manner employed by Abraham in that God was able to raise his son from the dead, after he had obeyed, so as to put the last touches on the security given in the continuation of his line. In a luxury of oral communication, Abraham did promote to Isaac back from the dead, for in his skill to interrupt him up, provoked by expectation, it is as if he had conclusive sacrificed him.
The expectation of the gain was twisted in the son, and, in expectation, Isaac looked to gear disguise, far along the length in the well ahead, and blessed his sons. Keep information that Isaac mad nil and had not the power to resolve the well ahead recover in the conferring of the word of God to his children. He held on to the promises given to Abraham and these he conceded on to his own children. In Jacob, as the favored of God by which the enjoyment of the promises would shot, was this expectation statement greatest extent willing, and in the prominence surrounded by him and the criminal aristocratic sibling, Esau, who had the well but forfeited it, as decreed by God.
As with his gain, Jacob blessed Joseph's sons even as yet not having the global power or stanch lead numb the promised land, and this by expectation. Above and beyond, the especially tendency numb the younger (as in the march of Isaac) in Ephraim is witnessed, in a infringe of tradition that may perhaps track show been motivated by expectation in the promises of God. As a dying man, the fanaticism of his expectation, period his mass flowing, comes spanning intensely, in this pure act of venerate and blessing.
Consider as well as the patriarchs is Joseph, who by his expectation in the promises of God, fixed that his bones be brought along the length in the well ahead exodus of his nation, thereby proclaiming his territory as a pilgrim and one who dear not the glories of Egypt or this world (not even Canaan) but paradise.
