[Randy Stiver] Well, today I want to talk about the story of the faithful. There's the title for the sermon, "The Story of the Faithful." We had a memorial service last Sabbath in Pittsburgh, Wheeling, a combined service, for Wilma Hardesty. She was one of our elderly widows, one of the… she dated back in the Wheeling congregation to very close to when it started way, way back. And she died actually during the Feast of Tabernacles. Her health has been going down for some time. She had lost the ability to hear entirely. Her mind wasn't slowed down at all. Sharp as a tack the entire time right up to the end, but she couldn't hear and she couldn't see toward the end. So her family had a funeral for her during the Feast while we were all… wherever we were for the Feast. So we went ahead and planned a memorial service after services. As I was thinking about… Mrs. Hardesty. Keith Wilson has visited her more than I.

She actually lived pretty close to where Michelle Wilson's family were down in edge of West Virginia but had moved up closer to Washington, PA later. So we did a lot of reflecting and had a nice time. There were quite a few of the C.O.G.W.A. brethren that came for the service, the church service, as well as the memorial service afterwards. And we had a nice meal afterwards, sat down and visited with everyone. It was just a very delightful time. But we wanted to be sure that we had a memorial service for one of God's brethren, one of our brethren, as well. And in so doing, I was analyzing what would be the appropriate sermon for a day like that. And then it dawned on me, Hebrews 11, the story of the faithful. That's the appropriate sermon, I mean the chapter. And we're going to actually go through the chapter and look at it as a sermon and look at it.

So let's turn over to Hebrews 11 and reflect upon this. It's not just for the end of the life of one of the faithful brethren that is applicable. It is applicable to each of us every day, as the examples will show. God's faithful brethren over the decades, over the centuries, really. You know, we think in decades because, you know, it's an our time. But we're only part of the history of God's people. When we read the Old Testament, Paul was, you know, occasionally praising and occasionally scolding the brethren in whichever congregation it was. You know, in Corinth there was this problem. And then one of the other congregations, it was another problem that needed to be corrected. And Paul did it. And they took it and they regrew from that. That was all beneficial.

So as congregations, we haven't changed really. We're human beings. And he would have to deal with human nature and with the divine nature. Now what we're trying to do is to shift the divine nature, which is a converted nature, God's Spirit working in conjunction with the human spirit that God gave us, His spirit in man, to think and act in a converted manner and an obedient manner to God. But the carnal, selfish nature, human natures we typically call it, resists that. And it's being empowered on the other side by Satan's influence both through society and indirectly and sometimes directly through influence. So there's this struggle going backwards and forwards in all of us. And it went as in all of them then. Those who gain traction become the faithful. That doesn't mean that they don't have their challenges and their setbacks or, you know, probably habits that you thought you'd overcome, speaking out of turn or disrespectful. And it suddenly pops up now and then you have to deal with it again. That's human nature that pops up. It gets us all from time to time.

So they had to deal with that. We have to deal with that. You know, we really aren't any different than our brethren were 2,000 years ago, you know, you could say we drove here in a car, so they came in chariots. And those that didn't have chariots walked. And the congregations were more localized because most of them walked. I don't think most of them had chariots in those days. You know, we just live in a chariot-rich society, except there are horses built like a chunk of metal stuck under a hood. And it's not quite as exciting as an actual horse. But you can get faster and further that way. But it's a story of God's faithful brethren who having been called to the true faith of God's true Church have given their whole lives to Christ and the Father. God's faithful brethren studied God's Word as they heard the gospel of the Kingdom of God being preached either in person or through in our history, radio waves, and then television or in print.

They proved the true doctrines, rejecting the false doctrines of the world's version of Christianity and the false doctrines of secular society, as well. They faithfully rejected the false values and ideas of the world and came to believe, truly and faithfully believe, God's true teachings from Scripture. That's what our faithful brethren have done. That's what we're doing too. That is the true faith. Our faithful brethren and God's faithful brethren faithfully lived their lives, supporting the work of God in their time, that Christ was doing through His true Church. And we have done the same and we are doing the same. Why their faithful prayers? In words and examples, they became active members of the truly faithful brethren throughout history, whatever century it was, whatever set of decades it was within each of those centuries. The true brethren have everything in common with us today.

So I want to look at this as a sermon about the faith chapter, Hebrews 11. So let's go through that. It's a fascinating chapter and carries so much weight for us to contemplate. So let's wade through it. ''Now, faith is the substance of things hoped for," verse 1, ''the evidence of things not seen.'' That's one of the primary definitions of faith in the Bible. “The substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.” Substance and evidence are pretty much interchangeable terms in the concept. What things do we hope for? We hope for the resurrection to eternal life in the Kingdom of God. And we live our lives fully anticipating to be resurrected when Christ returns. And so did the brethren when that was written in Hebrews 11 and before because this is one of the last later books to be written for the New Testament. The evidence of things not seen. Well, we haven't seen the world tomorrow yet, except in our mind's eye. When we read the Scriptures, the prophecies, when we hear a sermon at the Feast of Tabernacles that gives life to conditions in the world tomorrow, as best as we can anticipate them, then we can see it. But it's only in the mind's eye. We will actually see it with the regular eye. Well, of course not regular eye because if you're resurrected, it's the spirit being's eye. So that's a whole different kettle of fish than a human being's eye.

These details are really quite fascinating to contemplate. But this faith is what the elders obtained by a good testimony because, by it, they obtained a good testimony that they were faithful. The testimony brethren, that we want to obtain as well. We want to be considered faithful. "Well done now, good and faithful servant," is what we would like to hear when, you know, we're resurrected and God and Christ or are handing out the… I don't use the word accolades in a shallow way, but in a deep way, the praise and appreciation, the thanks. “Thank you for your service” phrase that we use in America today for those who defend the country and they are in their way serving the country. But you know what? We're serving our country too by living God's way. We don't do it with, by violent means. We do it by a completely different means. Our prayers can be more powerful than the cruise missiles that they've got aimed and programmed to blow up every city on the earth. At least, I presume they have that many ready to go between us and Russia and China and Europe and wherever else they happen to be.

So in verse 3, ''By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen are not made of things which are visible.'' And, you know, what does that mean? Well, that means that the worlds or the creation that we see, the world around us, the physical earth, the planets and the stars, were not made of things which are visible. In other words, when God created the universe, what do you make it out of? Was there another sort of thing called a universe, but it had a different name? So technically it wasn't a universe. And He went over there and He mined a bunch of dirt and rocks and threw them into this, you know, vast universe around us. No. He created every planet. Every speck of dust and every comet trail, God made it. You think, well, how could He do that? Well, how can your laptop out compute those gigantic IBMs that filled a whole building when they first started and it's your laptop. Your phone can do that. And they crammed all that competing power into a stupid phone. Sorry, I'm a little derogatory towards phones sometimes. Yeah, they have. You see, God just made everything, the whole universe, all aspects of it.

Now, you stopped to think about that, you think, "Wow, that's something. God made all that." And we begin to get an inkling of how great God is. But what if you didn't believe in God and you thought it all evolved? Except hold it. How can a universe evolve? The evolution is for life, just life forms that evolved, which doesn't work either at all, no matter what they say. You know how they're marketing evolution today in the school system? Talk about robbing it of history. They now market the laws of genetics as evolution in action. You know, Luther Burbank identified many of the basic laws of genetics, plant genetics and animal genetics. And those who breed plants and animals understand the genetics end of it all, you know, very thoroughly. Those are laws. So how did those laws evolve? Did the evolutionists just claim that that's evolution in action? Well, how was it in action? If it's guided by a law, it works. That's the way it is. Now, we don't want to think about that, not us. They don't want to think about it because that will ultimately succumb their foolish theory to the trash heap where it belongs. It makes no sense, whatever, but they're marketing it now by using laws.

They say, “Well, see, we've got an evolution happening.” It's not evolution. It's breeding. Anybody that knows anything about breeding livestock or poultry or anything, goldfish maybe, understands the laws of genetics. I forgot plants. Plants are governed by it, as well. See, God made all of that. He made all of the creation. He set in motion the laws, not just the 10 commandments, which are the laws that govern the relationships between humans and God and humans and humans. But those are the spiritual laws. He set in motion the physical laws that govern the genetics, that govern the way the planets move and gravity and all of the nuances the scientists, you know, are delighted to learn and love to play around with, but so seldom will pay homage to the one who gave them the laws to mess with or to play with. You know, it was like selfish little kids that aren't thankful to daddy because he brought him home a toy.

Well, faith is the proof, the evidence. The worlds were framed by the word of God. God made it. All the star systems, all the planets, all the everything, every bit of cosmic dust and the… What was that guy they named that belt after? Von Ryan? No, no. That was the Von Ryan Express. It's the Van Allen Belt that circles I think around the earth are around the solar system, one or the other. It's funny how people's names get attached to things. “The worlds were framed by the word of God, so the things which are seen are not made of things which are visible." Not made of things which are visible? Yeah, a spirit's not visible, is it? But God made everything. Now, with that overall premise, we wade into the examples of how we live by faith by looking at those who did. “By faith, Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, through which he obtained witness that he was righteous,” Abel was righteous. Cain was not. Cain could have been. And if you open your Bible or turn in your Scriptures, you may want to hold something in Hebrews 11 to Genesis 4. Let's look at that incident, at least part of it. Genesis 4, Cain and Abel, chapter 4 and verse 4.

Abel earlier mentioned was a keeper of sheep. Cain was a tiller of the ground. I wouldn't say he was a vegetarian, but he grew things. Verse 4, ''Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and their fat. And the Lord respected Abel and his offering,’' see, when it says he brought it, he brought it to God as an offering. And this was a blood offering, an animal sacrifice, which would be reminiscent or a presentient of the sacrificial system under Moses that Israel would have standardized. And why would it have the shed blood of animals? Why can't you just shed the vegetable juice of a carrot? Yeah, maybe this was Cain's argument too. I don't know. Well, we know why, because when Christ came as a human being and lived the perfect human life, it was His blood. It was shed. The animal's blood is similar, but obviously not the same as His blood, but it is reminiscent of it. Vegetable juice is not. “And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought an offering of fruit of the ground to the Lord.” He brought some of his vegetables or his fruit, one or the other.

And “Abel also brought the firstborn of his flock and their fat. The Lord respected Abel and his offering, but He did not respect Cain and his offering.” So God did not say, "Well done now, good and faithful servant," to Cain. He said it to Abel, but he didn't to Cain. And you wonder why. Well, it's because he wasn't Abel. Abel did it the right way. Now God watched Cain's reaction. And notice the next verse. “So the Lord said to Cain, ‘Why are you angry? Why has your countenance fallen?’'' You ever see somebody that gives you a blank stare? It's because their countenance fell. It's gone. They pick it up, put it back up. There it is. No, that's not how it works. Countenance fallen means that the corners of your mouth have turned down and your brow is furrowed, everything's down. You're angry and you're lazy because it takes more muscles to smile than it does to frown. So frowning, you know, in a situation like this is not a good thing.

Now, here's the challenge that God gave to Cain. The Lord said to Cain, ''Why are you angry? Why has your countenance fallen?'' Verse 7, ''If you do well, will you not be accepted?'' Now the implication is you haven't done well here, Cain. “But if you do well,” go back and do this over and if you do well, “will you not be accepted?” “I've just accepted Abel because he did it the way I said.” And the implication is that God told him what, you know, they were supposed to bring as an offering. “And if you do not do well, then sin lies at the door.” And that is ominous Cain, very ominous. “Sin lies at the door. And its desire is for you,” to consume you, to destroy you, in essence, “but you should rule over it.” You rule over sin. How do you rule over sin? Well, first you repent of it. Second, you overcome it. Abel was on the right track. Cain was on the wrong track. And Cain didn't respond very well to God's counseling. And that was not good for Abel because he murdered his brother.

“Now Cain talked with Abel, his brother; and it came to pass, that when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother and killed him.” The first murder, the first homicide, in human history when Cain killed Abel. And why? Because Cain was upset that God didn't accept fruit juice in place of the shed blood of a sacrificial animal. Sobering, sobering event. Abel lived faithfully. Cain did not. So we go back chapter 11 and verse 4. ''By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, through which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts; and through it he being dead” Abel, being dead “still speaks.” Through his example, Abel still speaks to us. Now there's an important lesson. If you're going to live the life of the faithful, well, there's one of your role models was Abel. We don't know lots about his life because there wasn't a lot to know. It got ended too soon. But he was a good one. And he is a good one. And he will be there in the resurrection. And we'll meet him.

Verse 5 of chapter 11. ''By faith Enoch was taken away so that he did not see death, ‘and was not found, because God had taken him.’'' That's in Genesis 15:21… or sorry Genesis 5 not 15. Just go over to the page, Genesis 5. And the key section is 21 to 24. “Enoch lived sixty-five years… or Enoch rather “lived sixty-five years,” in verse 21, “and he begot Methuselah.” So not only was Enoch a preacher of righteousness in the pre-flood era. But he is the father of the longest living human being, Methuselah, of all. "And after he begot Methuselah, Enoch walked with God three hundred years, and he had sons and daughters. And so all the days of Enoch were three hundred and sixty-five years. And Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him." And when we come back then to Hebrew, we reread what he said about Enoch in verse 5. ''By faith Enoch was taken away so that he did not see death, ‘and was not found because God had taken him,’ for before he was taken he had this testimony, that he pleased God.''

In other words, Enoch lived out his life. But he lived it out in peace because there were other Cains trying to get him. There were those who were upset that he was faithful to God and that he told that the straight scoop of what God said, a preacher of righteousness. And they were going to kill him and God intervened and protected him, just like he's going to intervene in the end of the age and protect the bulk of His Church in the place of safety. There is a place of safety. The details, we don't know where you'd want to go there and buy a cave and live in it. But then you might have bought the wrong cave in the wrong spot. So best it is to wait until God makes the reservations and sends for us. We'll get into end time prophecy another time. But that's just a little sideswipe there. Verse 6, Enoch had the testimony. He pleased God. Now we come to verse 6. It says, ''But without faith, it is impossible to please Him,’' That is to please God.

You can't negotiate with God where God, "Okay, I'll do this, if you do this for me." That is the unbelievable apex of human arrogance that you can bargain with God like that. God doesn't bargain with arrogance. Arrogance is not a good thing in God's book, not by any means, because that’s… The one that controls the market on arrogance is the devil, Satan, and we don't want to be like him. Without faith, it is impossible to please God. You've got to believe. We have to believe that God exists. We have to believe that God made everything around us, including ourselves in all of our incredible intricacy. And we've got to believe that God's way is the right way to live and that Christ is going to return. And all of God's prophesied plan will unfold as it is written because it will.

"Without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is,” that means I believe that He exists. That's the first step and secondly, that He's powerful, that “He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.” God promises to reward us. And we say, "Well, why do I have so many trials?" Well, sometimes your reward is a leg up in overcoming the next thing you need to overcome, which you didn't realize needed to be overcome until you had the trial, right? Oh, right. But overcoming the next thing and the next thing, then you make progress. That's living by faith. He who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder. God does good things for us. He gives us blessings indeed. He also gives us trials that are blessings to make us come to grips with other things we need to overcome. “A rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”

Verse 7, ''By faith Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen, moved with godly fear, and prepared an ark for the saving of his household, by which he condemned the world and became the heir of righteousness which is according to the faith.'' Noah built the ark. It was a boat. This wasn't the Ark of the Covenant, which was like a chest, that golden chest for keeping… Let me see. What was in the Ark of the Covenant? The tablets of the law. And there was a jar with something in it. I've forgotten what it is now. You can look it up. But whatever the case, this was the ark that was a boat, the big boat. You know, there's a replica or a theoretically a replica of it. And I haven't seen it. We were at the Feast in Cincinnati, but we didn't actually make the journey down to see the ark. It didn't have a free afternoon to do that at this particular time. And besides, I don't relish looking at the dinosaurs in the ark because the dinosaurs weren't there. The people that built the ark thing down in Kentucky are what we call young earthers. And they believed that nothing existed before 6,000 years ago as far as the animals or any organisms on the earth.

So they think that the dinosaurs were at the time of Adam and they all died in the flood, except every kind of animal survived the flood. So how come we don't have Tyrannosaurus and Brontosaurus running around? See, they're supposed to have survived the flood of all the animals because they are animals, but they didn't survive the flood. Therefore, they were in a previous time before Adam. They were. There was a time that the angels were looking after the earth and God was making, I don't know, prototypes, what our animals look like today. That's always a possibility or He was just making things. Some things He liked really well. Crocodiles, they haven't changed. Crocodiles' skeletons in the fossil record are almost identical to the crocodiles, the Nile Crocs, the big ones in Africa today, almost identical or may be identical. It's hard to say. Probably almost is better to say because you've got live ones that you can investigate and then you've got rock ones. And the rock ones don't give you quite as much data now as the live ones, except for dimensions and dentures and things like that.

So but they placed the dinosaur era at the time of Adam and Eve and before the flood. And that wasn't the case. We are not what we call a young earther. God made life on earth back when He had the training time for the angels and there were some decisions that were made. A third of the angels made the wrong decision. Two-thirds were faithful. Then that's when you go back and you read the Scriptures like that and it all fits together. If the dinosaurs were in the wrong time, then it doesn't fit together. But Noah was “divinely warned of things not yet seen,” and there's going to be a flood, Noah. And it's going to rain for days and days. And “he moved” in spite of the fact that it was sunny and warm or frigid and cold, it didn't matter, “he moved with godly fear, and he prepared an ark for the saving of his household,” his household was himself and Mrs. Noah and Shem, Ham and Japheth, their three sons and the wives of their three sons. Eight people came through the flood in the ark, which is stated in the New Testament and “by which,” because he prepared, he said… he believed God. It's going to rain.

And so it was want to be a while. The forecast, it was 120 years out, but he believed it was going to happen. So he built the ark just like God said into the dimensions God said. And he did all the preparations God said, and he was ready when it came. But the rest of the world wasn't “by which therefore he condemned the world and became the heir of righteousness which is according to faith.” It was Noah's family only that lived through the flood. Then we have Shem, Ham and Japheth, the sons of Noah, who are the progenitors of the large groupings of the population, Japheth being the father of the Oriental peoples, Ham being the father of the African and Indian peoples. Africa and India are very close. The term for Africa in the ancient world was Kush and the term for India was Hindu Kush. The same people. So they're related. And then Shem, but the other ones they mostly, they didn’t… when they all settled out, they mostly settled in Europe. And, and then in the New World, you had a blendings here and there of the three branches or races of human beings. So that's how it came through the flood. And that's how it all happened.

Now we go on to look at some more faith. Verse 8, "By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go to the place which he would receive as an inheritance." What do you mean, go out to the place? Well, history says the ancient history, say that Abraham was in Babylon, presumably the Babylon we know of as Babylon because Babylon is older than the flood. And so he was in Babylon and according to the history… It's not the biblical history, but the other secular histories that have come down. He had a phenomenal mathematical, scientific type mind. He probably had a very bright future ahead of him and God… But he believed God and he loved God in an age when very few did. And God said, "Abraham, I want you to leave. I'm going to take you someplace. I'm going to give you something else, somewhere else." And so Abraham said, ''Yes, Lord, which way do I walk?'' “And out he, went not knowing where he was going.”

And then verse 9, "By faith he dwelt in the land of promise” he ended up in the Promised Land. He dwelt there as in a foreign country because it wasn't populated with his relatives. Abraham was it, “dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob,” his son and his grandson, “and the heirs with him of the same promise;” Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob the three fathers as we sometimes… or patriarchs as we call them sometimes, "for he waited for this city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God." So Abraham was looking beyond just Jerusalem because you can say, "Oh yeah, that's Jerusalem." No, yeah, Jerusalem is going to become a physical city. In fact, it existed in the days of Abraham to a degree. It got larger later, as most cities do. But that wasn't the city that he was really looking for. He was looking for a city that has foundations whose builder is God. And you go to Revelation, read about the New Jerusalem and the foundations of that, and you find that in the latter chapters of Revelation. Read about that. It's a pretty amazing, but that was what Abraham was looking forward to. God told him of this. He believed God. He had faith.

And so how many… What was it, 5,000 years or 4,500 years, since Abraham, he was out there preparing for that time like it was tomorrow, living by faith. “By faith” verse 11, "Sarah herself also received strength to conceive seed,” here they were to be, you know, the progenitors of nations and they couldn't even have children. She finally received strength to conceive seed and she… In other words, way past her childbearing age. She gave birth to Isaac “she bore a child when she was past the age, because she judged Him faithful who promised.” She thought it was also funny. She laughed when she heard that she was going to have a child. And it shows he had a good sense of humor. And it gave her joy to contemplate actually becoming a mother when she was at the age of a grandmother or even a great grandmother. "Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born as many as the stars of the sky in multitude — innumerable as the sand by the seashore." Vast numbers of people's descended from Abraham with more to come.

''These,'' verse 13, ''all died in faith, not having received the promises,” they lived by God's way. They were faithful to God. They loved God. Oh, they made mistakes sometimes, but they didn't make what my Father would have called “boneheaded mistakes.” They made regular mistakes and they repented of those mistakes when they sinned. "They died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off" how could they see them afar off, these promises being fulfilled? How could they see them afar off? In their mind's eye, they could see them. God said it's going to happen. They started to imagine what it might be like and they could see that vision. You create that sort of vision in your mind. We do that with a world tomorrow. Come Feast time, we start thinking, "What's it going to be like in the world tomorrow when everything's changed and we don't have the culture that we have today? And how will business be running? How will farms be running? What will schools be like?" And we marvel at that and we think about that all the time. We like to speculate what it'll be like in the world tomorrow. They did too. "Not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off and were assured of them, and embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.” Technically on this earth, “For those who say such things declare plainly that they seek a homeland."

I'm living here. I'm happy to be here, contend to be here, but where I really want to be is in the Kingdom of God. “And truly if they had called to mind that country from which they had come out,” and you know, Babylon, “they could have had opportunity to return. But now they desire a better, that is, a heavenly country.” or spiritual country. They see the future or saw the future of the spiritual before there was basically anybody else converted except them. You know, we feel kind of isolated now, but they were really isolated then. “Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, because He's prepared a city for them.” God was proud of Abraham and Sarah and Noah, his family, and Enoch and Abel. All of them, he was proud of them. He was happy to be called their God, “not ashamed to be called their God, for He had prepared a city for them.” And the city that is prepared for them? Oh, there was a physical Jerusalem you could say, except they didn't hear it. Not this group didn't, but the spiritual Jerusalem to come. That's the ultimate Jerusalem. God's Kingdom comes in Christ with Christ from heaven at His return, His second coming. It is not heaven itself, but it comes only when the King of kings returns to earth.

Now let's go down to verse 17. ''By faith Abraham,’' Now we're going to look at Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the patriarchs, and a little different angle. ''By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac,’' so finally, Sarah had a child and it was Isaac. And she laughed when she found out she was going to have a child. And so his name was laughter. It's what Isaac essentially means. “Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac," God told Abraham after Isaac was a young man and grown, He said, "All right, I want you to sacrifice Isaac to Me." And, of course, as you can imagine in Abraham's mind, how sad that was, but God said it. And “He said that Isaac my seed, my descendants, would become through Isaac.” “In Isaac shall your seed be called, your descendants be called.” Therefore, even if Isaac dies as a sacrifice, God can bring him back because he will be the father of the descendants. So Abraham had to wrestle with the challenge and the trauma of that, but he did it with faith. We have traumatic things we go through. We have to do it in faith. That's how we live by faith.

“He had received the promises offered up his only begotten son,” you know the story and they went up to the top of the mountain. They had all the wood. They stacked it all up and Isaac got on top of it to be sacrificed. And as Abraham was about to do it, God had an angel standing by, grabbed his arm, said, "Nope, you're going to sacrifice that ram. I've got his head stuck in the blackberries over there." Nothing stuck in the blackberries is going to get away. Well, the brambles, briars. I figured they were blackberries. "Of whom it was said, ‘In Isaac shall your seed be called,’ concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead, from which he also received him in a figurative sense.” Because in Abraham's mind his son was dead, a son he had longed for and that's why he and Isaac were ready to go through with what God had commanded. And then God stopped it. And it was as like having him all back again. You can imagine, think about it.

Now, it's interesting, "In Isaac shall your seed be called," that statement there in the end of verse 18. ''The Israelites would be called after Isaac.'' Now as Israelites, they were called after Jacob because that was Jacob's other name. But they were called Isaac. When we start tracking the tribes, when they go into captivity, what we track are the names of Isaac, variations of Isaac's name. The Scythians, for example, because the Israelites are taken into the Assyrian Empire and they disappear. But then we find out they've got these people called Scythians that aren't the Assyrians at all. Well, Scythian is S-C-Y and we would say it as Scythian, but other people will pronounce that “Skythian” S-K sound. The Scythians were the Israelite tribes breaking away from the Assyrians on the west side of the Caspian Sea. The Caspian Sea is the one that's stuck over between Russia and Iran and over in that area. When some of the tribes were dumped out in the cities of the Amides, they migrated on around the bottom of the Caspian Sea and came up on the Asian side.

They were known as S-A-K-A, Saka. They were the Saka over there, the Scythians over in on the western side. The same peoples, just various branches of the tribes. We see that S-K or S-C sound in Scandia for Scandinavia. You see it in Scotland, the S-K. We'd write it with a C, but we pronounce it as a K. Saxon, you can take an X and you've got a K-S sound. The Saxons is a variation of Saka, as well. And you follow those in history, that's where they're from. They're named after Isaac. Isaac's name is one of the great keys of tracking the tribes of Israel. Verse 20, ''By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau concerning things to come.'' See, Isaac looked forward into the future and the prophecies that God had revealed to him. And so he blessed his son's thinking through those prophecies. “By faith Jacob, when he was dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, and worshiped, leaning on the top of his staff." That's in Genesis 48.

Ephraim was the younger one of Joseph's sons. Manasseh was the older. And as you know the story, as he went to bless them, he moved his hands across. He put his right hand on Ephraim's head and his left hand on Manasseh's head. The right hand would normally get the greater blessing, a firstborn would typically get. And Joseph saw that and tried to change his hands. And Jacob said, "I know it, my son. I know it. And he will be a great people." great as in the greatest people Manasseh would be. "But truly his younger brother will be greater than he and he will be a company of nations." The British Empire came out of that. Ephraim is the father of England. And from that came the British Empire, the biggest empire the world had ever seen. It made Rome look small, way small.

In 1939 the British Empire, it's still in an extent at that time, governed at least 20 to 25% of the world, huge numbers of the world's population. You think, "Well, that was then and what's now?" The British Commonwealth. There are more people in the British Commonwealth than were ever, ever in the British Empire. I made that comment over in Milwaukee when I was giving the tribe trackers guide and somehow one of the members in England saw it online. So he watched it and he wrote me a note. And he says that "I was curious about how you said that. So then I went and looked it up and we have 7.5 or 7.6 billion people in the world today and the British Empire… or the British Commonwealth has 3.26 I think billion people that are part of the British Commonwealth, which is way, way, way beyond what the empire ever had." So even now, the tribes of Israel are fulfilling prophecies and those who are connected with them are fulfilling prophecies.

''By faith, Joseph, when he was dying,'' this is verse 22, ''made mention of the departure of the children of Israel,’' Joseph was stuck in Egypt, stuck in a way. You know, his family was now there, but his longing was the Promised Land. So he gave instructions about his bones. You're going to take my bones back when you go back. It would be a long time before they went back, but they did take Joseph's bones. Verse 23, ''By faith, Moses, when he was born, was hidden three months by his parents, because he was a beautiful child; and they were not afraid of the king's command.'' See, it takes a certain faith to stand up to Pharaoh. This was not a happy pharaoh. This wasn't a good pharaoh to have to work under. This was cranky one. But they weren't afraid of him. "By faith Moses, when he became of age, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter," because as you know, the story of the birth of Moses and they slid his little floating basket down into where she did her bathing. And so Pharaoh's daughter adopted him, which is not uncommon in the ancient world to adopt a child.

"Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God” he refused to be called Pharaoh's daughter’s. He's going to be what he was, a Levite and an Israelite. Rather “than enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, esteeming the reproach of Christ,” correction of Christ, “greater riches than the treasures of Egypt; because he looked to the reward.” And it wasn't a physical reward he was looking through. He was looking into the spiritual reward. And brethren, so are we. "By faith Moses forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king; for he endured as Him who is… as seeing Him, who is invisible. By faith” that is God, referring there in the Mount Sinai. "By faith he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of blood,” on the doorposts and the lintels so the death angel would pass over those homes. He kept the Passover “…lest he who destroyed the firstborn should touch them. By faith they” being, you know, Israel led by Moses “passed through the Red Sea as by dry land, whereas the Egyptians, attempting to do so, were drowned."

I mean, what a getaway. Lead them down into a box canyon that tangles you in the mountains right up against the neck of the Red Sea, the Gulf of Suez, the one that comes up along Egypt there. And then, you do what God says. Hold the staff out over the water and watch what happens. And the waters open up and the wind starts blowing down. By the time they're ready to go, even the bottom of the sea has been dried out. And it stayed dried out until all of the Israelites got across, Judah in the for the vanguard and the rear guard was Dan as they marched in order down through there, all the rest of the tribes in between. And when they got up and out of the water, then what do you know? Water gravities came back. But unfortunately for Pharaoh's Cavalry, which was a chariot cavalry, they were down at the bottom of the sea and that was the end of them. Then Egypt had no power to project. Nations can project power militarily by having highly mobile forces that can go and do things. We call them, you know, supersonic bombers, but we don't do bombers now. We do missiles. So you know, we have those. Now, they had chariots. They're all washed up in the Gulf of Suez, and so they couldn't chase the Israelites. And that's just why they don't really have any more problems with the Egyptians while they're in 40 years of wandering.

In verse 30, ''By faith the walls of Jericho fell down because they encircled him for seven days." They walked around for seven days, God said. “And the seventh day you're all going to shout at a certain time and the walls will fall down.” "By faith the harlot Rahab…” Well, not all the walls fell down. There was a wall beside the gate. One of the gates, it didn't fall down because that was the house of Rahab. “The harlot. Rahab did not perish with those who did not believe, because she received the spies with peace.” So here we have those who are faith or not just Israelites, but those who choose the God of Israel to worship, and she did. “What more shall I say? For the time it would fail me to this…” Is it failing me? Oh, it sure is, “…time would fail me to talk of Gideon and Barak and Samson and Jephthah,” these are judges. Some of the great judge. Gideon and Jephthah by the way of interest are Manessite. They're from the tribe of Manasseh, “also of David and Samuel and the prophets:” You notice David isn't referred to as a king here? He's referred to along with Samuel as the prophets. But he was also a king and we know that, "who through faith subdued kingdoms, worked righteousness…”

You know, through faith, we work righteousness in our own lives every day or we don't. That's the scary part. We need to be faithful, working righteousness in our lives, in our thinking, in our words, in our attitudes toward each other towards those we work for, “working righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,” Daniel in the lion's den, “quenched the violence of fire,” Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in Nebuchadnezzar's wood stove. It was a really bad, big, bad wood stove. But it was warm, but it wasn't bad. They enjoyed it, “escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, became valiant in battle,” For us, it's spiritual battles, “turned to flight the armies of the aliens. Women received their dead raised to life again.” And Elijah would revive the child of the widow and other times, even in the New Testament when children were brought back to life. “Others were tortured,” you go, "Oh, I don't want to do that. How can you have faith and be tortured?" Well, I don't know, there have been a lot of people that had faith they were tortured. When you get a chance, ask them how they did that. But I think we can figure it out.

This is probably… because bear in mind, this is in the book of Hebrews, which was written later on in the first century after most of Paul's writings were done. The Maccabians. The Maccabians were Levites. A levitical family, a famous one, a fierce one during the time of the Greek Empire. And you had Alexander's Empire broke into four sections. So you had the Ptolemaic line of kings in Egypt and then up in Syria, North of the Promised Land, you have the Seleucids. And they didn't like each other more than they didn't like other people. And they didn't like the Jews. And the Jews were right in between them because they were back in the Promised Land by that time. And so they were constantly being harangued by one or the other, especially the Seleucids to the north with Antiochus Epiphanes and offering the swine's blood on the altar, a burnt offering, and so on and so forth. The Maccabians intervened. They were a Jewish resistance movement. Their father, Mattathias, was the leader of it. But it was the sons who carried it out and Judas Macccabee was the most famous. And you think, well, their last name was Macccabee.

Nope. Nope. That was there a nickname. It means hammers. Judas, the hammer, got on the case of the Greeks and his brothers too. And they were able to gain a certain significant measure of independence until Rome came in and took over. And that was, you know, for many decades. The Maccabians were tortured, some of them were, “that they might obtain a better resurrection. Still… Still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, of chains and imprisonment." Paul did. Peter did. You can go back and count the times in 1 Corinthians. Oh, where is it, that… chapter 11 I believe it is. No, 2 Corinthians 11 where Paul lists the times that he was beaten with rods and then he was scourged with 40 lashes, minus one, and on and on and on and on. It lists all the things that he went through to do what he did as far as taking care of the Church. So he had mockings. He had scourgings. He had chains. He had imprisonment and they were stoned, some of them were.

Zechariah, not this Zechariah we know of in the prophet but this Zechariah was a priest back during the time that the House of Judah was still in existence. They were sawed in two. That was Isaiah, sawed in two, by King Manasseh who is not from Manasseh. He was Jewish. He was the son of the righteous king, Hezekiah. Manasseh was not a righteous king for 48 years of his 50-year reign. The last two years. he shaped up pretty good. But he sure did a lot of damage in between before that, some “…were slain with a sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, and tormented —“ we haven't had to do that yet unless you got a leather jacket and, you know, leather breeches or something and you're wandering about in those. And we haven't had that dire of circumstances yet in the modern era. But it doesn't mean we may not at some point be fulfilling that very verse, "of whom the world was not worthy.” Because that's the second birth part, verse 38, is when we also want to fulfill of all things, "of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in mountains… deserts, and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth.”

There have been brethren down through time that did that. There were some in the Old Testament and in the New Testament era and others that have come on down through the time. God's people live by faith. We don't live by the moolah. We don't live by the sings. We don't live by the accolades of others. We live by God's faith. And God gives us the faith to do this, to be as brave as these others were. They are our spiritual ancestors. We're related to them spiritually. We, therefore, need to live up to their reputation of God's people. "All these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise,” that means they weren't resurrected yet. Well, what's going to happen? Don't they get to receive the promise? You betcha you they do. The same time we do, they will be in the first resurrection and we will get to meet them firsthand then.

They “did not receive the promise, God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us." So we will be made perfect in the sense of being resurrected into the Kingdom of God at the same time that these faithful ones will be resurrected. We want to live up to that calling, brethren. We want to be there for that resurrection. We want it to be in the Kingdom of God. We want to be with our brethren of old who have shown the great examples of faith, the kind of faith that we want to have and must have. When we bury or memorialize one of God's truly faithful brethren in our age, we profess the same true faith that our spiritual ancestors professed. That faith is summarized in 2 Corinthians 5:7. Jot the reference down, 2 Corinthians 5:7, we are memorialized by this statement, ''We walk by faith and not by sight.''