Is Walking In Faith Worth The Cost? | Hebrews 11 | Liz Trenkmann

Good morning.

It is a pleasure to get to be here with you today.

Second Sunday.

Caleb told me that I should have switched my sermon and preached on the fiery furnace.

Didn't have one of those.

So we kept with what we're going.

And then he said we should just think that this is the Holy Spirit moving through us.

So let's pray that the Spirit is in the room with us today.

Father God, we thank you that we get to come together, that we get to be together as brothers and sisters, who people who know your love.

And if we don't know your love, Lord, I pray that you would fill this room with it, that you would saturate our hearts, and that you, your spirit would be in us and moving us and showing us who you are.

Lord, we just love you and we thank you for loving us.

In your name.

Amen.

Let us hold unswervenly to the hope we profess for he who promised is faithful.

There's certain times in life that spur really big questions.

When I was 18, I was finishing up those high school years.

And like all of my classmates, I was wrestling with what was next.

I was asking the questions like, who am I?

What am I good at?

What do I want to do with life?

Do I want to go to college?

If so, where and what do I want to study?

All those like easy questions that you have to answer when you're just 18.

One of the options on the table was to go to a Bible college in another state.

Some of my family members were really supportive, but others really weren't.

I got this manila envelope in the mail that was like stuffed full, like you could barely, you know, seal it.

I'm sure they like stretched it, and it was all the reasons why I shouldn't go to that school.

And and the pressure from both sides brought out some big questions about what does it mean to walk in faith?

Such as, is walking in faith like the card game 52 card pickup?

Do you know that game?

You just chuck them all out there, and then whichever one we grab is God's will?

Or is walking by faith like the game risk?

We're chasing winning by having bold hope and smart planning?

Or is walking by faith like Catan or Pilgrim's Progress?

It's about all of us together moving step by step to a higher goal.

What is faith?

And is walking by faith worth the sacrifice?

Is something that is invisible and unseeable and intangible actually worth the cost?

Think of a time when you are making a big faithful decision.

Maybe it was when you were thinking about marriage.

You're looking at that person across the table from you and wondering, are they the one?

Or maybe it was when you were making a career change, should I take it?

Should I not?

Maybe it was when you were making a huge financial investment.

Do I have the money?

Do I spend the money?

Do I take out a loan?

What did walking in faith look like for you?

How do you know when you're walking in faith and when you're not walking in faith?

I find that faith can feel complicated.

Um, sometimes it feels like the yellow brick road on the way to Oz, you know, clear and glowy and glistening.

But other times it can kind of feel like a slip and slide.

You're like walking on it, hoping that one fatal step doesn't end you flat on your face in front of a rather critical crowd.

Um, sometimes faith feels super certain, but sometimes it feels really uncertain.

So is walking in faith worth the cost?

Think to yourself, what is one area of your life right now that you're struggling to trust God in?

Maybe it is that finances.

Maybe you need that car that costs more than the money you have.

Or it's your job, should you take another job, or should you stick with the one you have?

Maybe it's the choices your adult children are making, they're they're chasing jobs that you don't agree with, or they're living with someone that isn't their spouse.

Maybe it's friendships at school, you can't seem to find that one friend that helps you become who you want to be.

Or perhaps it's romance and partnership or marriage.

You're nervous about dating, or you want to be married in art.

When struggling, relying on what is invisible and unseeable and intangible is hard.

Would you give everything for something that you cannot see?

This morning we're betrene series, so we're taking a look at the book of Hebrews, um, chapter 11, a little backstory on this New Testament book.

We don't know the author, um, but some scholars say it could be a woman, possibly Priscilla.

Um, and there's several good reasons for this, but my my favorite one is actually at the end of Hebrews, it's chapter 13, um, which does make it like the third longest book in the New Testament.

But it says the author refers to it as a brief letter.

Um, but I think we can all know that in this very word room here that wordiness is not a characteristic limited to just us women, right?

The letter is written to Jewish Christians who are experiencing persecution and discouragement.

And sadly, when life is hard, it has a way of pulling us from faith to fear.

And this is what was happening to the Christians that this letter is written to.

After facing ongoing threats of violence and imprisonment and loss of property, some of the believers were considering abandoning Christianity and leaving behind their faith and turning back towards Judaism.

They were becoming spiritually weary of fighting and being rejected by their families and communities.

I remember one of my first times really seeing persecution.

Um, Rob and I were in Hungary with a mission organization called Josiah Venture.

I loved being there and I loved watching young people come to Christ.

They were finally finding that hope and peace and purpose in life.

In our neighboring country, Slovenia, um, some of our teammates were so excited when one of their young people came to know the Lord.

Um, in Slovenia, less than 0.1% of the population has a professing faith in Jesus.

That means that Pakistan has more Christians than Slovenia.

So you can see why they were just like thrilled.

But they they were broken when this girl came to them and said, I told my parents.

And they told me that because you've made this decision, you have left the family.

Getting really practical, what did this look like?

Um, she came home from school one day and a shelf in the refrigerator had been cleared for her.

And they said, Because you have left the family, you can't eat the family food.

So whatever you can afford to put on that shelf, that is for you.

She just stood there.

But I don't have a job.

I don't have money.

I can't buy my own food.

Well, you've left the family, that's not our problem.

So she was left with huge questions.

What was she to do?

What does faith look like for her?

And does she choose her family or her faith?

Is what is unseeable really worth the cost?

Like the girl in Slavania, the Christians and Hebrews weren't facing a theoretical question, but they're facing a practical one.

What is walking by faith and is what is unseeable worth the cost?

Chapter 11 is a chapter about the cost of walking by faith.

And this morning we're gonna look at what faith is and how it relies and responds and remains.

How faith relies, oh, it just disappeared.

How it relies, um, just one sec.

Here we go.

Relies on God's promises, responds to God in action, and remains through trials.

So read with me, verse one and two.

Now faith is confident in what we hope for, and assurance about what we do not see.

This is what the ancients were commended for.

Have you ever thought about what it is to live blind?

What it would be like to not see the flowers bloom or the mist rising from the bottom of a waterfall, revealing its power and its strength, or not seeing bright lights fill the sky on the 4th of July, or not being able to join in on watching worldwide events like the FIFA World Cup or the Olympics?

When we can't see, we miss out on things that others can.

How then do we find hope and be certain in something that we cannot see?

There's also a flip side to this.

Usually when people claim something is true and you can't see it, it's really hard to believe, right?

You're kind of like, that person's crazy.

This is kind of an embarrassing story, but I'm gonna share it, share it with you anyway.

Um, when Rob and I were first married, I struggled to trust him, but specifically at night.

So many of you know my parents were divorced, and um, I grew up with my mom working nights as a NICU nurse, so she held those teeny tiny little babies.

Um before my grandma died, my brother and I stayed at my uh grandma and grandpa's house, but then after she died, we started staying home alone.

Um we really we didn't have any problems.

Like my brother was strong, he played varsity football as a freshman, and so I felt like really well protected.

Um, but then when I was 16, he left home to go into the army, and I was home three or four days a week by myself.

It really wasn't a big deal.

We had a very large dog, I would triple check the locks, and I had a phone in my room.

So I felt I felt fine.

But then I got married, and the poor guy did not know what was coming for him.

Um, so he was a youth pastor, and I would stay until everyone left, and then I would head home, and and he would lock up the church.

By the time he got home, and then after his snack and after he read, he would, he would come into the room, and I would be like dead asleep.

But the door opening to our room sent me into this fight or flight sensation, and pretty soon I would be in the corner of our bedroom, curled up, yelling, go away, go away.

And in a really calm voice, he would say, It's me, Rob.

It's okay.

I think he was shaking even more than I was, but it's okay.

It's Rob.

You're okay.

You can get back into bed now.

It took multiple rounds of him saying this to me before I would finally crawl back into bed.

But the crazy thing was, was the next morning, I didn't remember any of it.

Rob would kind of look at me with that like side eye crazy look.

Um, when I would shake my head at him and be like, I don't know what you are talking about.

Because I was totally asleep.

I couldn't see him.

I couldn't see, I could see the man in my bedroom, but I couldn't see Rob.

It's in those moments when I struggle to rely on him and to respond to his words and to trust in our relationship.

Because it's really hard to believe in what you can't see.

But Hebrews 1 and 2 say, now faith is confident in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.

This is what the ancients were commended for.

But it totally makes me wonder what did the ancients believe that gave him confidence and what they could not see?

And why were they?

All those that came before Jesus commended for this.

Let's keep reading.

I am gonna skip around just a little bit.

By faith we understood that the universe was formed at God's command so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.

By faith, Abel brought God a better offering than Cain did.

By faith, Enoch was taken from this life so that he did not experience death.

He could not be found, because God had taken him away.

For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God.

By faith, Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear, built an ark to save his family.

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 even know where he was going.

And by faith, even Sarah, who was past childbearing age, was unable to bear children because she considered him faithful, who had made the promise.

Notice our examples in this passage.

It says, we see Abel trust God's way by bringing God the best offering that he could.

And we read of Noah trusting God's warning by building a boat in the desert.

Kind of crazy.

Um, we watched Abraham trust God's call when he left.

Um, what was familiar to become a foreigner?

And Sarah trust God's promise when she believed God was faithful despite years of unfulfilled prayers.

These stories shout God's faithfulness.

They scream, life of adventure, they come cry, come join the race, and beckon us to trust and believe.

These stories feel like we're climbing a ladder to a waterside.

Each story exciting and exhilarating.

The energy building, you know, when you're climbing, like the energy is building in you, and your heart starts to beat a little faster, and your hands get a little shaky, and your your legs get a little shakier as well, and the thrill just moments away.

And then, and then there's verse 13.

We have reached the top of the slide, and there's a sign that says closed.

Our only choice is to go down.

Read with me, verse 13.

All these people were still living by faith when they died.

They did not receive the things promised.

They did not receive the things promised.

In fact, Abel was killed by his brother.

Moses didn't get to lead the people into the promised land.

Noah came off a ship to a land without people, like everyone was dead, and Sarah's years were more, were full of more unfulfilled prayers than fulfilled ones.

All of them had faith in God and yet didn't receive what they had hoped for.

Though they believed in brave and hope-filled lives, but was their faith in the unseeable really worth the cost?

How were Abel and Enoch and Noah, Abraham and Sarah, able to have faith and rely in the God they couldn't see?

I think it's because they relied on what they could.

They knew God's promises and God's character.

Knowing God's promises and knowing his character helped them rely on the God who made the promises to them.

We read in scriptures that they talk to God, that they listened to God, that they spent time with God.

They were able to trust in the unseeable because they knew his voice, they knew his character, and they knew his heart.

They believed in God's words.

And therefore they were able to trust in the God who made the promises to them.

Often what we need isn't bigger faith, but a bigger view of God.

So how do we grow in our faith in what we can't see?

We spend time getting to know a really good father.

Like savoring a love letter.

This is what it is.

To a loved one, we read the word and we memorize it.

Notice what the author says earlier in Hebrews in 4.12, it says, For the word of God is alive and active, sharper than any double-edged sword.

It penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and morrow.

It judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

The word is where we meet God and we we see him in action and we're transformed by his truth.

Saturating ourselves in the word will shape you from the inside out.

When we read of stories of God's faithfulness through history, his unchanging character, and his power at work in the lives of people, we can't help but rely on the God behind the promises.

Because we see his faithfulness in them, we can trust his faithfulness in us.

And when we see his heart of love for them, we trust his heart of love for us.

As we draw close to him, he wraps his arms around our fragile hearts.

If faith is based on the promises of God and God's character, then we need to spend time in the Word, reading it.

We need to know the promises God makes and see how He answers them.

Though we might not be able to see what is ahead of us, we can see what is behind.

We've got thousands of years of stories.

We can see how he acted, and then we can trust him in the future.

In Matthew 1.37, just after Elizabeth and Mary have both uh found themselves pregnant, it says, For no word of God will ever fail.

Memorizing God's promises gives us confidence in the future because of who he is in the past.

And reading about the faith of Abel and Noah and Abraham and Sarah gives us confidence that God is the same yesterday and today and tomorrow.

So I ask you, do you know what is behind?

Do you spend time in the word?

Do you know the promises of God?

God really delights when we get to know him, and he loves to show you who he is in his word.

So I invite you to take 20, 30, 40 minutes a day and read the word.

Spend time writing down God's promises that he makes to his people.

And then go back and cross them out in your journal.

I think you will be amazed at what your journal looks like at the end of Revelation.

Everything is fulfilled.

Look at your daily life and ask: does my life reflect someone who knows and trusts in God's promises?

So what is walking in faith?

Walking in faith relies.

It relies on God's character and God's promises.

But I still keep coming back to this question, but is something that is invisible, unseeable, and intangible actually worth the cost?

Read with me the next set of verses.

We'll start in verse 17.

By faith, Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice.

He who had embraced the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God said to him, It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.

By faith, Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau in regard to their future.

By faith, Jacob, when he was dying, blessed each of Joseph's son and worshiped as he leaned on the top of his staff.

By faith, Joseph, when his end was near, spoke about the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt and gave instructions concerning the burial of his bones.

Okay, I love these next verses.

It kind of gives us like generation one.

By faith, Moses' parents hid him for three months after he was born because they saw he was no ordinary child.

And they were not afraid of the king's edicts.

Now we have generation two.

By faith, Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh's daughter.

He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin.

He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.

By faith he left left Egypt, not fearing the king's edict.

He preserved because he saw him who is invisible.

And now we have generation by generation three.

By faith the people passed through the Red Sea as on dry land, but when the Egyptians tried to do so, they were drowned.

By faith, the walls of Jericho fell after the army had marched around them for seven days.

And by faith, the prostitute Rahab, because she welcomed the spies, was not killed with those who were disobedient.

Multiple generations, all responding to God.

And we see in these stories that faith responds even when responding is costly.

Abraham offered Jacob or Isaac, Moses chose suffering over Egypt, Israel marched around Jericho, and Rahab welcomed spies.

Every example shows the same pattern that God spoke and they responded.

James says, faith without works is dead.

Faith is not merely intellectual or a belief or a label.

Faith is something that moves us to action.

Faith responds.

But sometimes, as we all know, responding is really hard.

When Rob and I were trying to decide if we were going to move to Central Europe, we decided to take a prayer and fasting weekend.

And of course, we felt like these like super Christians because we were seeking God's will for our lives.

However, the weekend did not go any way that we had planned it.

We thought that God was gonna give us this like clear and glowing, sparkling call that would say, go.

This is what I have for you.

Instead, we cried like all weekend.

We really should have taken up stock in Kleenex because it could have support the rest of the mission.

Um to be honest, we were hoping for something magical, and God kind of gave us something miserable.

Instead of sunshine, he brought us face to face with the cost.

That weekend we cried about leaving the ministry that we were in, about missing our parents and our family, about our son not growing up near his grandparents, about the loss of hobbies and things we enjoyed.

We cried about loneliness and learning a new and really hard language, about navigating a new life in an unfamiliar country with unfamiliar people.

It was a hard weekend.

There were moments when I wanted to tell God, no, I'm not going.

I'm not saying goodbye.

No, God, this is way too hard.

I don't know what will happen when we get there.

I don't know when we'll be back.

No, God, this cost is too high.

But God has a way of leading us, right?

And he looks at me and says, Liz, walking in faith is trusting me and responding to me.

It isn't one without the other.

And I remember sitting on that little couch in our camper and saying, I don't know, this is really hard.

Going, leaving, responding.

Really, God?

But one thing I love about God is that he appreciates our honesty.

And in my experience, that's when he's met me.

And as those words came tumbling out, he showed me that I wasn't alone.

He has called and walked faithfully with many throughout history, and he was going to do the same with me.

I flipped to this chapter, chapter 11, and he reminded me how Abram trusted God with his own kid all the way to the altar because he believed that God would provide another way.

He showed me Moses, who chose suffering over Egypt, because he thought God was of greater worth than gold.

He reminded me of Israel, despite, you know, seizing with fear, they trusted him and they stepped into the Red Sea and then later marched around Jericho, actually believing that that would destroy a city.

And finally, Rahab risking death to protect God's spies.

All of these responding from a faith and a God that they knew.

All putting their faith into action because the God they knew was faithful and loved him.

Sometimes God calls us to do costly things.

And faith responds, even when responding, is costly.

As you think about your life, where is God asking you to respond to Him today?

Think about on a scale of one to ten, one being easy, ten being hard.

How hard do you find it to respond when God calls?

Do you come to God with those clenched fists and that locked jaw?

Or do you dwell in the Father's love when you're facing an unknown call?

Are you able to respond when he calls, even when it's costly?

So what is faith?

Faith relies, it relies on God's promises and God's character before he sees results.

And faith responds even when responding is costly.

But I'm gonna keep coming back to this question: is something that is invisible and unseeable and intangible actually worth the cost?

Read with me our final verses, verses 32 through 34.

As we're reading, think of this as like the climax of this story.

We have made it to the top of the slide, and the close sign is gone, and now we're pushing our way down the slide.

So it says, and what more shall I say?

Do I have time to tell about Gideon and Barack and Samson and Japheth, about David, Samuel, and the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised, who shut the mouths of lions, quenched the fury of the flames, and escaped the edge of the sword, whose weakness was turned to strength, and who became powerful in battle and routed foreign armies.

Women received back their dead, raised to life again.

Here it is, life after life, calling the cost worth it and remaining till the end.

These saints experienced incredible victory.

It's amazing.

Let's finish it up with reading these last great stories.

There were others tortured, uh, refusing to be released so that they might gain an even better resurrection.

Some faced jeers and flogging and even chains and imprisonment.

They were put to death by stoning, they were sought and toy were killed by the sword.

They went about in sheepskin and goatskin, destitute, persecuted, and mistreated.

The world was not worthy of them.

They wandered in deserts and mountains, living in caves and in holes in the ground.

I think I liked the other verses a lot better.

Um, these saints experienced incredible suffering while the other ones experienced great victory.

But whichever group that we're finding ourselves in now, the next verse is really important.

Verse 39 says, these were all commended for their faith.

Both are called faithful.

Why?

Because faith remains.

All of these saints have something in common.

They lived out to Timothy 4 7.

I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, and I have kept the faith.

The heroes of the faith kept their eyes on the God who is faithful and on Jesus, the founder and perfecter of their faith.

There is a really great book, The Insanity of God.

It's filled with stories about faithful heroes.

There's one story in it about a guy named Dimitri.

He lived in a country where it was illegal to be a Christian.

And so many churches were destroyed.

And for his family, it was a three-day journey for him to get to a church.

And yet he really wanted to raise his kids in a Christian home.

And so he started a Bible study.

What he didn't expect was that Bible study grew to 150 people.

They were filling the house and they were peering in windows.

So many people were gathered around to hear him teach the word.

When authorities heard, he was arrested and he was thrown in jail for 17 years.

He was the only believer in this jail of 1,500 prisoners.

But he still rose every morning and he sang a song to Jesus.

The other people threw food at him and threw waste at him, all to try and get him to stop.

In desperation, the guards told him, Your family is dead, and we will free you if you will just denounce God.

So one day he said, Fine.

Bring me the confession, and tomorrow I'll sign it.

And that night in jail, he sat grieving, grieving that he had given up.

However, at that same moment, a thousand kilometers away, he heard his family praying.

And somehow, through the Holy Spirit, he could hear their voices and he knew that they were alive.

And so the next morning he received he refused to sign the declaration.

The officers then beat him and they dragged him down the hall to be executed.

But as they did, the 1,500 hard criminals that stood at the front of their cells began to sing the song that Dimitri sang every morning to Jesus.

And the guards let him go in terror and said, Who are you?

And he replied, I am the Son of the living God, and Jesus is his name.

And Dimitri was released from prison.

Like Dimitri, faith doesn't guarantee us comfort, and it doesn't promise us happy endings, but it does promise us the same hope that the saints in Hebrews chapter 11 had.

Hebrews 11 · chapter mention

And that is Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

The Christian life is not measured by immediate results, but by faithful endurance.

Faith isn't stagnant, but active.

In John 15, Jesus tells the disciples, remain in me.

And this is an active command.

Remaining in Jesus is like any relationship.

It's either moving forward or it's moving backward.

And Jesus is saying, Remain in me by knowing me, spending time with me, being in the Word, praying, steeping in my love and marinating in my Father's love for you.

Remain in me.

When you think of your faith, is it durable?

If you were to face persecution like the saints, would your faith last?

If so, I'm curious, what are you doing to strengthening your faith?

How are you actively remaining?

If you were to share one tool with the person next to you, what would it be?

And if not, think to yourself, how would you like your faith to grow?

In the next weeks, in the next months?

And then when we're done, ask the person next to you, hey, what are you doing?

So, what is faith?

Faith relies on God's promises before seeing the end.

Faith responds even when responding is costly, and faith remains, it remains through trials and through difficult seasons.

I want to end with coming back to the question we keep asking.

Is something that is invisible and unseeable and intangible actually worth the cost?

Chapter 11 is a picture of what faith looks like, what it tastes like, what it feels like, and what it endures like.

But why is faith worth the cost?

Last story I'm gonna share.

I I really love reading Christian stories.

Um they help me see see God.

Help me see His um through their actions and their convictions and their character and their response towards others.

I see who God is.

And for me, someone that sticks out is Corey Tenboom.

Um Corey was uh a Christian who hid 800 Jews in her house.

She had like walls cut in her wall, um holes cut in her walls and tunnels under her house for people to hide in.

Eventually she was discovered and she was arrested, and she was put in a concentration camp.

Um a few years ago, I took a trip to Poland, and we spent a full day in Auschwitz and Birkenov.

Um there's not much that can prepare you for what fills those those camps.

One building we saw piles and piles of clothes and of jackets and shoes and suitcases and baby blankets and toys and glasses and purses, um, the most sacred possessions that people grabbed when they tried to run.

And yet all of them left.

These people stripped bare of everything that they had.

And then there were rooms filled with hair, piles and piles of hair.

It felt like their dignity had been disposed of like a dirty diaper.

The walls, when you enter each building, began with pictures of life.

But two pictures later, they were pictures of death.

Young and old, male and female, tortured and beaten and killed.

Corey's dad and sister were among those.

Due to basically a fluke, she walked out of the notorious brutal Ravensbrook camp.

I think it was one of the worst, if not the worst.

And though carrying no suitcase, because she had no possessions, she was still way down by years of deprivation and cruelty and loss and death.

A few years later, she went to church.

Corey saw a familiar face.

And her blood ran cold and her face went as white as snow.

When she finally felt enough feelings in her legs, she began the walk to the front of the church.

Her fists were as hard as rocks, and she was ready to take her revenge.

And then she stopped and stood face to face with her and her sister's captor, the man who helped her sister die.

And these were her thoughts about the experience.

Even as the angry, vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them.

Jesus Christ had died for this man.

Was I going to ask for more?

Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive me and help me to forgive him.

Jesus, I cannot forgive him.

Give me your forgiveness.

And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness and more than on our goodness that the world's healing hinges, but on his.

When he tells us to love our enemies, he gives long along the command, the love itself.

And then Corey said to the man, I forgive you, brother, with all of my heart.

I'm always amazed at these words.

It would have been far easier for Corey to turn away and to walk away.

She could have never forgiven him, and no one would have questioned her for it.

She could have even walked away from God and no one would have chastised her for it.

No one would have blamed her for seeing God's unfaithfulness rather than his faithfulness in her life.

But during her trials, she relied on God's character and his promises.

She responded to the opportunities that he gave her.

And she remained through the cruelest of circumstances.

Our trials aren't signs of God's absence, but evidence that we share the same faith as Abraham and Moses and Rahab and the prophets and Dmitri and Cory and all who wait the fulfillment of God's promises in Christ.

And the cost is worth it.

Because Jesus' death means life doesn't end here.

One day we will walk the streets of gold and we will stand arm in arm worshiping the Lord.

We will be in a world where children play freely and the light flows abundantly, and Jesus is the light, and our eyes will see the face of God.

God is the only one who can offer perfect faithfulness and perfect hope and perfect love and perfect forgiveness.

And in a response, he says, Hope in me, remain in me, because I am with you.

We believe in an extraordinarily faithful God.

Today, we can stand in confidence knowing that we are loved by the creator of the world and the maker of the universe and the redeemer of humanity.

And it is because of who He is that as we walk by faith, relying and responding and remaining, we see that faith is not blind optimism, but confident reliance on God's character and God's optimism.

Although the Hebrews heroes in Hebrews 11 never saw the fulfillment of all they had hoped for, and Christ may not come back in our lifetime, they believed, and we know that Jesus' death and resurrection prove that faith is truly worth the cost.

Let me pray for you.