Looking towards home

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for. By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible. By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. By faith Abraham, even though he was past age--and Sarah herself was barren--was enabled to become a father because he considered him faithful who had made the promise. And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore. All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance. And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country--a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them (Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16).

Suppose you woke up suddenly at about two in the morning. The last thing you remember is a voice telling you to quit your job, sell your house, and load all your things into a moving van. When everything is packed, you are to get onto the highway out of town and head away from civilization. You don’t know where you are going or how long it will take to get there, but you’ll know when you’ve arrived. You’ve never had a dream like this before; it seemed real. You wonder if God spoke to you in your sleep. The question before you is: will you make the trip?

This is basically what happened to Abraham. He was told to pack up his wife and possessions and start walking into unknown territory. He left behind the land of his birth and all his relatives, and walked to a place where no one spoke his language, no one worshipped his God. Abraham did this because he believed that God had told him what to do, and he was confident that God would take care of him. Abraham trusted that God’s plans for him would result in a better future for his family. Abraham had faith in God.

The writer of the letter to the Hebrews defines faith this way: faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. Faith is about belief in the invisible; it’s about living your life as if unseen things are real. Lots of people claim that they don’t live by faith, but it simply isn't so—everyone lives their life with faith in something.

Most people have faith in their senses; they believe in what they can see, hear, touch, taste and smell. The tree in my front yard is real because I can see it and touch it. If I didn’t believe my senses, I would withdraw into a coma because the world would become nothing more real to me than a dream.

Most people have faith in their memories. I know from experience that if I drop a ball, it will always fall to the ground. My remembered experiences help me to predict the future in a limited way; I know that if I go and stand under the tree in front of my house on a hot sunny day, I will feel a bit cooler. Memories can also protect me from danger, because I can remember that a red oven burner is too hot to safely touch.

Most people have faith in recorded media. If I see a videotape of a man robbing a bank, I’ll believe that he should be put on trial. If I recognize the handwriting in a letter, I’ll believe it was written by the person who signed it.

Most people believe in eyewitness testimony. Eyewitness testimony is almost always needed to assure a conviction in court. The more eyewitnesses to an event, the more likely I am to believe that the event really happened, no matter how extraordinary.

As you can see, we live our lives based on faith every day. You decide what time to set your alarm for, based on your faith in your car starting up. You shop for food, based on your faith in your freezer continuing to work. You decide to have children, based on your faith in your ability to care for them. You take pills, based on your faith that the doctor has prescribed the right pill, the pharmacist has given you the right pill, and the manufacturer has made the pill correctly.

But how is living by faith possible? Eyewitnesses sometimes get together and agree to lie in their testimony. The special effects used to make TV shows and movies can also be used to create falsified news footage. A person’s memories can play tricks on him with age, or be changed through hypnosis. People who drink or take drugs can’t even trust their own senses.

We live by faith because we must. To try and live without faith in anything or anyone results in a life of constant uncertainty and fear. Yet again and again, our faith is betrayed. For some of you, your parents didn’t keep their promise to be married to each other for their entire lives. For others of you, a trusted friend betrayed you by telling a lie about you or revealing a secret you entrusted to them. All of you, at one time or another, have given in to temptation and have disappointed yourselves with your own weakness. We live our lives trying to have faith in ourselves and in the world around us, and we are repeatedly disappointed.

When the world that we can see, hear, and touch disappoints us at every turn, how is it possible to have faith in God, who we can’t see or touch? It’s easy for us to be envious of Thomas the disciple; after Jesus’ resurrection, Thomas got to see Jesus, talk with Him, touch Him! But Jesus told Thomas blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed (John 20:29). Jesus and the writer to the Hebrews both praise people who, without personal proof, believe that God exists, that God loves, that God saves. How can we, living in a world that thrives on betrayal of trust, have the kind of faith that Abraham did?

First of all, we don’t have to have a heroic faith like Abraham. Abraham is held up to us as an example, but many of us will never have faith like his. But we don’t have to. Faith in Christ saves, regardless whether it is great or small. A person with the smallest flicker of faith has exactly the same promise of joy in Heaven as Abraham or Noah or John the Baptist. Yes, we want to have a strong faith, a faith that can stand up to Satan’s sinful promises and hateful threats, but all we need is the faith of a new born child, washed in the waters of Holy Baptism, and heaven is ours!

More importantly, making true faith a part of our lives isn’t our job. Our faith in God is a free gift from God. When we read or hear God’s Word, the Holy Spirit uses those inspired words to build faith in us. We don’t have to do a thing—the Spirit creates the faith we need to believe that Jesus died for our sins, and rose again from the dead to prove His mastery over life and death. The Spirit makes it possible for us to not only believe that Jesus has the authority to forgive sins, but to also trust that He will forgive each and every one of us when we repent of our wicked ways and humbly ask Him to take us home to heaven with Him. The Spirit makes it possible for us to believe the eyewitness testimonies of the people who saw God’s miracles first hand, and wrote down what they saw in the Bible so that we too could believe.

I said earlier that any faith, large or small, gives us salvation. That’s because faith by itself doesn’t save us. Jesus’ atonement for our sins and His promise to forgive repentant sinners is what saves; faith is our way to get access to Jesus’ salvation. Consider the plumbing in your house. If you are thirsty, you need water. The well provides the water, but you can’t get the water from it without a pipe. It doesn’t matter what size pipe you have—as long as you are connected to the well, you will have water.

Of course, thirsty people with small pipes will want to get their water lines enlarged; similarly, Christians nourished by the Holy Spirit want their faith to grow. Since the Holy Spirit works through God’s Word, it makes sense for us to read and hear His Word as much as possible. You can attend worship, go to Bible class, hold family devotions, and read the Bible before going to bed at night. All of these activities encourage the growth of the faith that God has given you. We all want to arrive safely at our home in Heaven, and it is faith that holds our hand as we journey there.

The benefits of faith are also experienced now while we are alive. People who have faith know that God loved them so much that He sacrificed His perfect Son on their behalf; knowing this, they also have confidence that, no matter what, God always has their best interests in mind. When a person knows with certainty that Heaven is his eternal home, and trusts that God will see him safely there, the problems of life don’t seem quite so bad.

Abraham was lead by God to the land of Canaan; God promised Abraham that the land would belong to his descendants. But all his life, Abraham lived as a nomad, pitching his tent on land owned by others; he had to purchase ground in which to bury Sarah when she died. Abraham did not consider Canaan his home; Hebrews tells us that Abraham looked for his true home in the city designed and built by God Himself. Abraham considered his home to be the New Jerusalem, God’s city in heaven. Canaan was just a place he was passing through on his way home. When we live a life of faith, it is the same for us. Our life on earth is a journey towards heaven. When this world and its citizens disappoint us, when our trust in earthly things is betrayed, God’s gift of faith sees us through. God’s gift of faith gives us spiritual eyes that can see the unseen. The home that God gives us here and now is only a distorted glimpse of our true, perfect home to come. We are like Abraham. He lived his life as if he was on a ship, journeying towards home. Just as passengers on a ship can see their home port long before they actually arrive, Abraham saw his true home through the eyes of his faith. Even though he wasn’t home yet, even though he was still aboard the ship of life, he knew for certain where home was and he lived his life accordingly. Through the eyes that faith gives us, we too can clearly see our home, the New Jerusalem. And seeing our home, we know that it is real, and we live our lives like passengers aboard a ship, able to endure patiently the choppy waters because we know that we are almost home. God gives us faith, faith gives us hope, and hope carries us through our troubles to our Savior’s waiting arms.

We need a living faith as much as we need to breathe and to eat. How blessed we are that God gives us everything we need, including the gift of faith. Take time to thank God for your faith, and care for it as you care for your body. Feed your faith on God’s Word, and it will see you to the end of your journey—your journey to heaven.