By TC Lo 盧天賜
Original Chinese Edition (中文版 ): https://hocl.org/blogs/tincheelo/?p=73
How do we make sense out of Hebrews 11:1?
Many years ago, I came across a church brother who sincerely loved the Lord very much. He gave a rather esoteric definition of “faith.” He said, “Faith is to ask God with a bold belief that God has already answered what you have just asked.” His definition of faith places special emphasize on the word “already“.
It happened that this brother later lost his job, but soon he got an interview opportunity from another company. After the interview, before he would have received the formal letter of employment, he told us that he believed that he has “already” found a new job. Hearing what he said, everyone were dumbfounded.
In our regular Friday evening fellowship meeting, he openly made a thanksgiving testimony; he thanked God for giving him a new job! His sincere thanksgiving was admirable and his spirit of gratitude was something we should learn from. But his premature announcement of certainty made everyone speechless. Few days later, the fact set in that he didn’t get that job, unfortunately. No one dared to mention anything afterwards.
I don’t think his “not-yet-but-already” is faith. I like Lee Strobel’s definition (Ref. 1). Strobel said, “Faith is taking a step in the same direction that the evidence points.” In life, no matter small or big things, we do put this statement in practice unwittingly.
For example, I am thirsty and I am thinking of sipping from a bottle of water. Is it possible that this bottle of water I am holding in my hand toxic? Yes, the possibility is not zero. But I did an informal evaluation on the evidences available: when I got the bottle, it was sealed; the water inside looks clear, the trademark attached to it is a respected brand; most importantly, this bottle water was given to me by my wife. She loved me, and I don’t have any inkling that she would harm me. Now, I opened the bottle, I didn’t smell anything foul. Therefore, based on all these evidences, though not exhaustive, I took a step of faith and taste the water with confidence and find out it is really good.
Similarly, the Bible says, “Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him (Psalm 34: 8).” Faith is real not just in your intellectual assent, it must be accompanied with action. “Taste” and “Take refuge” are actions to prove that you have faith.
There are numerous evidences pointing to the reliability and trustworthiness of the Bible and the Gospel. This blog site is dedicated to this end—to show the reasonableness of the Christian worldview. So, you should take a first step of faith in the same direction as the evidences point and accept Jesus Christ as your personal Savior.
In fact, the Bible does not shy away from giving “definition” to faith. The Book of Hebrew (11:1) says, “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” This verse is familiar to me and to many Christians. It baffles me because I seem to understand, but really I don’t fully understand. During this Covid lockdown, I carefully take a second look at this verse (Ref. 2).
First part: “faith is being sure of what we hope for.”
What are the things we hope for? The text and the examples given in subsequent verses does not refer to the hope of our wishes, such as hoping our sickness be healed or the virus be eradicated. It refers to the character and deeds of God. This is important to note.
- We hope for the resurrection
- We hope for the return of Christ
- We hope for the glorification of the saints
- We hope for the heavenly city
These are the promises of God. Hence, we must be sure of God’s promises first before we can even talk about faith. How can we be sure? We can borrow the bottle-water analogy to point us to (but not fully proof of) the reality of God’s promises. There are numerous evidences pointing to the reliability of the Word of God. So, first part of verse 1, in effect, says, “Faith is to believe that the promises of God must first be believed as sure” to be our starting point.
Second part: “faith is to be certain of what we do not see.”
What are the things that we do not see? The text and the examples given subsequently does not refer to the future of our career or our investment and bank account, it does refer to the deed of God wrought by His invisible hand such as:
- The forgiveness of sin through Christ’s blood
- The present intercession of Christ in heaven
- The presence of God in the midst of our suffering
These are unseen activities of God that we must first believe before we can even talk about faith. In both parts of the verse, they do imply faith is “not-yet-but-already.” So, my friend is not exactly wrong when he thinks that his faith is the sort of “already but not yet.” What is wrong is that his faith focuses on the outcome of what he hopes for (which is uncertain) rather than the attributes of God (must be believed as unchanged truth in the first place).
When Prophet Daniel and his friends were framed by the evil men, Daniel’s company prayed, as recorded in (3:17-18):
(v. 17) If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and He will rescue us from your hand, O king.
(v. 18) But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”
We see, Daniel’s Faith was not placed on the outcome which admittedly wasn’t certain to him but he placed his faith on the certainty on God as he says, “Even if God does not deliver us, we still have faith in God — the object of their faith.” His faith was built on his Faith in God. This convoluted concept of faith (you need faith to explain Faith) manifests the wisdom of God and provokes thinking in our mind. In short, the object of faith must be God. My church brother placed his faith on the outcome—his job. So, his faith was wrong headed!
Now, we see that verse 1 is not exactly the definition of faith as we usually think. Because a definition statement should not contain the word that the statement intends to define. One cannot define faith with the language also containing the word “faith”. Therefore, Hebrews 11:1 is not so much a definition of what faith is as it is a description of what faith does. What does faith do? This kind of faith motivated men and women of faith in the past to live for God and trust Him to fulfill His promises (Hebrews 11:2-40). This is what it mean by ” to live by Faith, not by sight (c.f. 2 Corinthians 5:7).
On a winter lake, the water was frozen unevenly. a child was walking freely on the thin ice area. His father was nervous and shouted, “My son, it is dangerous! Come back to the shore.” The child replied, “I’m not afraid, I have great faith.” Another timid child, who was skating on the thick ice area, nervously cry out “I am scared, I don’t have faith, I want to go ashore!” Which child of these two is safer?
Therefore, faith is not a matter of how loud we claim we have, it is the object of faith that matters. If you have little or even no faith, you can ask God to give you some or to give you more. But if the object of your faith is wrong, then, the greater your faith is, the more dangerous it would be. The object of our faith is Jesus Christ, He is the thick ice on which we should stand upon.
References:
- “A Conversation with Lee Strobel”, Decision, Nov.2007, P.31.
- Reflection on several commentaries on the subject of Faith especially on Hebrews 11:1.
