How many people do you really trust? I mean really trust? We often get burned, then battle cynicism and tend toward self-preservation. And yet, almost paradoxically, people are looking for something they can trust – something they can stake their life on and win. Many try religion, see problems and come away asking, Who do you trust? Can you trust the Lord? How do we know God has secured our hope? This is the theme of Hebrews 6.13-20. Abraham is a great example. Besides Jesus, there may be no better biblical example of the lengths he went in trusting God.
Abraham Trusted God
Romans 4.3: Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him for righteousness.
Romans 4.17: As it is written: I have made you the father of many nations…
Romans 4.18: In hope against hope he believed,…
Romans 4.21: …being fully assured that what God had promised, He was able also to perform.Â
How James describes the responsive faith of Abraham:
James 2.26: For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.Â
No works? No faith. No salvation.Â
But if you have faith, works naturally follow. Works flow from faith.
They do not enhance or add to the status you already enjoy. They will not make you more saved than you already are.Â
Your salvation is totally by grace through faith. Do you trust?
Abraham’s Early Life
We meet Abraham & his family in Genesis 11.26-32. A pagan idolator, Joshua 24.1-2.
Stephen fills in some blanks in Acts 7.2-4.Â
7.3: Leave your country and relatives, and come to the land that I will show you.
7.4: Response: Then he left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran.
Genesis 12.4: So Abram went, as the Lord had told him,…
Abraham believed: By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed and set out for a place that he was going to receive as an inheritance. He went out, even though he did not know where he was going…
Hebrews 6.13-19a: How Abraham Could Trust God
6.13-15: He trusted God’s character
Hebrews 6.13: For when God made a promise to Abraham, …God cannot lie, 6.18.Â
James 1.17: ..the Father of lights, …does not change like shifting shadows.
6.15: And so, after waiting patiently, Abraham obtained the promise.
6.14: He trusted in God’s promise
Hebrews 6.14: I will indeed bless you, and I will greatly multiply you.
How does God guarantee His promise? See Genesis 15.
6.13b, 16-17: He trusted God’s oath
Hebrews 6.13b: …since he had no one greater to swear by, he swore by himself. Why?
Hebrews 6.17: Because God wanted to show his unchangeable purpose even more clearly to the heirs of the promise, he guaranteed it with an oath,
As We Close…
Hebrews 6.18a: so that through two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, …
What are the two unchangeable things?
His promise, 6.14 & His oath, 6.17
The purpose: 6.18b: …we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement…
For what…6.18c: to seize the hope set before us.
Hebrews 6.19a: We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. What is your anchor?