Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.2
For by it the people of old received their commendation. 3
By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible. 4
By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.
5 By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God.
6 And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
After a definition of faith and its relationship to the created order, our text moves to Cain and Abel. As you probably are aware there is a long debate over whether
Abel’s offering was preferred because it was itself the proper sacrifice, that is blood sacrifice, the offering of the herd, while Cain gave simply the fruits of the soil as his offering to God.
There may be some truth to that but I think the bigger issue, especially in the context here in Hebrews is to be upon Cain’s lack of faith, more than the particular
nature of his offering. As one put it: Cain’s sin was tokenism.
The text says that he brought “some of the fruits of the soil” for his offering, but that Abel brought “the fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock.”
In other words, Abel brought the very best, as he should have, But Cain didn’t. He should have brought the first-fruits but he decided differently…according to his own heart and his own conclusions.
This “tokenism” was the sign of a lack of living faith and of true love for God. It was a, “Oh well, this otta do…” type of offering. This way of thinking about giving
to the Lord would be repeated many times in Israel’s history and the prophets would point out that what was wrong with it was precisely that there was no care to give the best, no true acknowledgement that this was being given to the Lord and according to
His desire.
Their giving was perfunctory, they were simply checking the box and filling the square, they were not giving in an expression to faith and love. (RSR)
We might want to pause for a minute and think about this idea of tokenism. It seems it is quite easy for us to live our Christian lives with a list of duties that
we are supposed to do and even discipline ourselves to do them…but perhaps more to check them off the list, than to do them out of love and devotion to the Lord.
Oh sure, sometimes it is just a habit, and perhaps a good habit and so we do our duty without much thought. But that could be where it starts. Think of when you give
God’s tithes and your offerings in our worship. My guess for many, maybe most of us, we write the check, put it in the bag without thought…and that is a good habit to be sure. But maybe it would help if you gave it more intentionally…with more thought…with
a prayer of thanks for the Lord’s provision.
Or we load up for evening service or prayer meetings or some other good thing to do…but maybe without a heart of joy and thanksgiving…maybe it is more “box checking”
than it is love and devotion to the Lord and His church. I am only bringing this up so as to keep my heart and to help you keep yours from falling into this ‘checking boxes’ mentality.
We know very little about Enoch, only that he was a man of true faith and that he walked with the Lord. When the Bible speaks of someone walking with the Lord, that
is a metaphor for living one’s life pleasing God. Walking with the Lord is to live one’s life in faith, trusting and believing what God has said, done and called us to.
Enoch and Elijah as you will remember are the two figures in the Bible that did not die in the natural sense but were taken to Heaven supernaturally. Perhaps you remember
the puzzle from your Sunday School days: The oldest man who ever lived, died before his father did. How can that be true? Methuselah’s father was Enoch and Enoch never died.
Next we have Noah and of course we all know about him.
Noah’s faith consisted in his believing what God had told him, against all the evidence of his eyes and against any evidence with regard to what Noah had experienced.
God said that he was going to destroy the world and Noah believed that God would keep his promise to do just that. So, Noah built a boat.
Don’t run by that too quickly. No one had ever seen a boat before…WE can only imagine all the ridicule and mocking that Noah had to endure and all because he had the
faith to take God at His word. And of course, Noah’s faith was vindicated while the rest of the world did not heed God’s warning and was destroyed.
It is an interesting lesson that we are given here. The three ante-deluvians, the three men mentioned who lived before the flood, that is what ante-deluvian means,
were all examples of what it means to live by faith.
And, listen carefully because this is vitally important for us, having the same faith did not mean that they lived the same lives. Faith worked itself out differently
in each of their lives as it does in each of ours. Faith is not a cookie cutter mold.
Abel believed and was murdered. Enoch believed and did not die. Noah believed and everyone else died. We cannot predict or control the outcome of our lives, God
never tells us that, nor does He tell us that faith demands such a thing.
We want, of course, Enoch’s outcome! But God will decide that. Ours is to believe, to trust Him and live whole-heartedly and joyfully in obedience to what God has
revealed to us.
That is what faith is. An 18th century pastor put it this way: “Faith in its most elementary sense, faith in its first and foundation sense, simply means
the reliance placed by one man on the truthfulness and power of another. You make a statement of fact to me or give me a promise and offer an assurance and faith is that state of mind in me to you, that state of mind in me which accepts your statement and
relies on your promise.”
Prayer: Father, I confess that I have taken your gifts for granted. I have behaved as if faith was some kind of right that I have instead of seeing it as
Your gift of love. Please forgive my misuse of your gifts and my presumption that I do not have to discipline myself and seek Your face as if seeking buried treasure. Give me courage this day, to be laid out fully for the honor and glory of my Savior, through
Jesus Christ my Lord, Amen.
Psalm 51