The Church is Sent to Demonstrate Faith

Ben wofford

Gospel Project • Sermon • Submitted 2 years ago

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Notes

Transcript

Hebrews 11:1-2, 32-40; 12:1-2

Main Point:

When your faith is in Jesus, your life will show it.

This morning, we are going to talk about faith.

Here’s what I want us to do this morning,

I want us to get in groups of 2 or 3 and come up with as many examples as we can of things that we put our faith in every day.

GO:

*DISCUSS EXAMPLES THAT GET BROUGHT UP*

Transition:

Now, before we did this exercise I didn’t ask us to define faith.

But how would you do that?

How would you define faith?

Were going to read from Hebrews 11 this morning in just a moment, but verse 1 says,

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, being certain of what we do not see.” - ESV

The Christian Standard Bible says, “Faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen.”

A great example of this that I’ve never used before is a marriage.

When you marry your spouse one day,

The reality you hope for is A long life together, with only that person, as long as you both shall live.

In almost every wedding you will hear that stated between the Bride and groom.

But there is a second part to faith.

“Proof of what is not seen.”

The only way you prove a marriage is literally for one spouse to die and then you look back and see that wow… we were married for 25 years… 50 years… whatever it is.

But when you get married…

You don’t see the end, you only hope you make it there.

And yet even in that, it’s not the end, it’s the day to day that matters most.

You’re not married to someone with the end in mind, your married to them enjoying the day today. right now what is before you.

But here’s why I use this example.

In marriage, there will be days:

you don’t like one another.

you are frustrated

you are happy

you experience the best day of your life

you experience the worst day of your life.

And everything between!

That’s why marriage is so hard! You experience the highest highs of life and the deepest valleys.

So what do we do with that?

We make daily choices that show our spouse that we love them and only them.

That we are in this forever.

Daily…

In the same way, we all make daily choices that show others around us one of two things.

My faith is in Jesus.

My faith is not in Jesus.

What is your life showing others every day?

Let’s read Hebrews 11:1-2, 32-40; 12:1-2

Hebrews 11:1-2 “1 Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen. 2 For by this our ancestors were approved.”

Hebrews 11:32-40 “32 And what more can I say? Time is too short for me to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, and the prophets, 33 who by faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, 34 quenched the raging of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, gained strength in weakness, became mighty in battle, and put foreign armies to flight. 35 Women received their dead, raised to life again. Other people were tortured, not accepting release, so that they might gain a better resurrection. 36 Others experienced mockings and scourgings, as well as bonds and imprisonment. 37 They were stoned, they were sawed in two, they died by the sword, they wandered about in sheepskins, in goatskins, destitute, afflicted, and mistreated. 38 The world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and on mountains, hiding in caves and holes in the ground. 39 All these were approved through their faith, but they did not receive what was promised, 40 since God…”

Hebrews 12:1-2 “1 Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily ensnares us. Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us, 2 keeping our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. For the joy that lay before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

Illustration:

Cookie dough is the best ice cream flavor.

Is this an objective statement or subjective statement?

Objective truth and subjective opinion is important!

It’s very important in our culture today especially!

We are trying to make genders subjective.

Which by the way…

WHat does the B stand for in the LGBTQ+ community?

What about the B?

Bisexual.

The community that insists on us that there are infinite genders and that it is indeed a fluid concept actually has a sexual preference they affirm that confirms only 2 genders…

We need to do a better job as the church to reach this community without affirming them.

However, we also need to do a better job in the church poking holes in worldviews that we interact with every day.

And most importantly for us this morning, your gender is not subjective.

You are unique!

God created you male or female, objectively!

To think of yourself as anything else is to place your faith in yourself above God.

To say “I know what the gender I should have been created as more than God does!”

And that is really at the root of the sexual movement in our culture today.

No matter what or with who.

This is not sustainable.

Why?

Placing your faith in subjective opinion and not in objective truth will leave you broken, defeated, or worse.

- How do we place faith in our cars?

On your way to church this morning, you probably stopped at a few stop signs or traffic lights.

You placed your faith in the car mechanics when you wanted to stop. What were you placing your faith in?

THE BRAKES!

You trust the engine to run

The gas to be full

How do we place our faith in other drivers of other cars?

We trust they view road signs as objective truth and not subjective.

What if traffic lights, stop signs, lanes, speed, and any number of other vehicle laws were subjective?

YOU COULDN’T DRIVE!

It would be chaos!

Faith is not invested in the subjective.

Faith is grounded in the objective.

Don’t put your faith in something you don’t absolutely believe to be true!

Including… wait for it… Jesus.

You may say Ben wait what did you just say, Are you talking me out of a relationship with Christ?

No… I’m not.

But listen to verse 1 and 2 again.

Hebrews 11:1-2 “1 Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen. 2 For by this our ancestors were approved.”

If Jesus isn’t objective to you… If you aren’t trusting Him alone for salvation… you’re actually only hurting yourself.

In other words, if your idea of Jesus is just the person you hear on Sundays and Wednesdays but not the one you live for on the other days…

Your faith is non-existent

And that’s the point I’m making this morning.

Faith by definition is based in certainty.

As certain as you are that your car will stop.

That gravity will work

That the coffee I’m drinking is strong and black… lol

We need to be that certain AND MORE that Jesus has saved us!

And IF WE AREN’T!

We are only hurting ourselves by staying half-committed to Christ

Your life will show it.

Imagine showing up day one baseball practice after making the team and telling the coach you’ll only be at half the games…

Your coach will believe you don’t have faith in the team.

SO maybe you think I’m being too hard this morning…

But this is ultimately the reason I’m driving home a hard point about faith.

In verses 32-40, we read about all these men and women who put their faith in God.

Hebrews 11:36-37 “36 Others experienced mockings and scourgings, as well as bonds and imprisonment. 37 They were stoned, they were sawed in two, they died by the sword, they wandered about in sheepskins, in goatskins, destitute, afflicted, and mistreated.”

y’all they experienced horrible things for their faith in God.

Then we get to vs. 39

Hebrews 11:39-40 “39 All these were approved through their faith, but they did not receive what was promised, 40 since God had provided something better for us, so that they would not be made perfect without us.”

Y’all… some of these people died for their faith.

You don’t die for a subjective faith… You die for an objective one.

Even more, many people believed in God’s promises, but never saw the fruit of His promises.

We do not determine the earthly outcome of our faithfulness

Our role is to be faith. God’s job is to use our faithfulness for His good.

How are you faithful?

Well, like a marriage,

we need to think with the end in mind.

We can live faithful lives because we’ve seen it!

This race of life we are on is hard.

But!

Again, is our faith rooted in the objective Truth of Jesus!

Faith is not blind. Faith is a leap into the light!

As you grow and get older, with a little wisdom, you can look back on your life and see all the ways God has worked and used your faith in Him to reach others!

We can also look around and see those in Scripture who had faith,

We can see our parents faith

our grandparents.

When you get to be my age, some of those important people in your life may have gone on to eternity.

We will think about those people and remember how their lives either:

Showed their faith in Christ.

Showed their faith was in anything but Christ…

Either way, that will impact you and your life.

What will your life show?

When I was in high school, there was a girl named Hannah Sobeski.

She died from cancer at only 18.

But you know what, From her life, alot of people took a leap of faith into the light.

They saw an 18 year old girl going through the worst life could offer only to give Jesus all the glory until the moment she took her last breath.

We have a great cloud of witnesses who have professed Christ and only Christ.

What about me?

What about you?

What are you building your life on?

If Jesus is your life, how will you show it?

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