Sermon Tone Analysis

Looking to Jesus

Last week I talked about Hebrews 11.

This morning, I’m going to talk about Hebrews 12.

But before I do that, there’s one more thing I want us to notice in Hebrews 11.

Hall of Faith

This chapter is sometimes referred to as the great hall of faith, for the author writes of Hebrews tells of Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Issac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and Rahab, and then he says:

Hebrews 11:32–35 (ESV)

And what more shall I say?

For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets—

who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,

quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight.

Women received back their dead by resurrection.

If we wanted to, we could go back through there line by line to see exactly who the author is referring to, but we’re not going to do that this morning.

Instead, as some of you may remember, I gave you a homework assignment last Sunday.

I wanted you to go home and read Hebrews 11 and look for the shift.

I won’t ask for a show of hands to see who did their homework, but let me show you the shift.

Notice the change in tone right after this first phrase in verse 35.

To live by faith is not to always get what we want.

To live by faith is not to always have things go our way.

By faith, according to v. 34, some escaped the edge of the sword.

And yet by faith, some were killed with the sword, and both were experienced by faith.

If we think that living by faith means that everything will always go well for us, we don’t really understand what faith is.

By faith, sometimes you escape the edge of the sword, and by faith sometimes the sword pierces through your body.

By faith some were stoned, and by faith some conquered kingdom.

By faith, the mouths of lions were stopped, and by faith some were torture.

Let’s call this what this is: The Anti-heath-and-wealth Gospel.

Gospel faith or saving faith is not faith that things will always go well for me.

It is, rather, faith that believe that no matter what this world does to me the promises of God will comes true no matter what, on this side of death or on the other.

And the reason the author of Hebrews has to make this clear after going through this list of the Heroes of the Faith is because, quite obviously, the HERO of the faith is Jesus, for whom things didn’t exactly go quite well on the other side of Easter.

This is exactly the point the author makes to begin ch.

12.

He writes first, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses,” and let me stop right there.

That’s what the saints are.

The Old and New Testament Saints are for us a great cloud of witnesses who are encouraging us, through their lives and their writing, to continue to run our race to the end.

The reason that we honor and remember them, like we will honor and remember the Blessed Virgin Mary tomorrow, is because we need to hear their voices as they encourage us through their examples to continue to run our race.

To pray to them, as some do, is merely to recognize that they are alive and not dead, and already in the presence of God.

But their main witness to us, their main encouragement to us, is through what has been written, in Holy Scripture and in their own writings.

The author continues:

The imagery here is of course a race, with the saints in the stands, the great crowd of witnesses who are encouraging us through their lives and writing to set aside the sin which clings to us and weighs us down as we try to run the race that is set before us with endurance.

And we do this, he writes, we run this race, with the Hall of Faith cheering us on, not by setting our eyes on the crowd, but rather, by looking to Jesus.

There is so much to unpack here, but I’ll be quick.

First, the word ‘founder’ refers to a trailblazer.

That is to say that Jesus is the one who has already blazed the trail for us.

He has run the race.

He has made it across the finish line and so we look to him so that we can follow his path.

Again, this is why I expect you to be reading your Bible throughout the week, because we must be looking to him if we are to know the path, or if you will, the way to the finish line.

Second, Jesus is not just the trailblazer of our faith, but he is also its perfecter.

It cannot be said enough that we are becoming who we already are in him.

Who we are has already been made perfect in Jesus Christ by his own blood, and so he doesn’t just blaze the path for us but he also is the one who perfects in us the faith that he demands from us.

Let me say that again.

Jesus is the one who perfects in us the faith that he demands from us.

And third, we come back to the switch we noted in Hebrews 11.

Jesus is the ultimate example of faith, the one to whom we look and no other, and yet he endured the pain and shame of the cross.

He endured humiliation.

He endured agony.

And he did this… why?

For The Joy That Was Set Before Him

That’s how faith works.

Faith doesn’t guarantee us anything in this life.

We may escape the edge of the sword, and we may die by the edge of the sword.

Because saving faith is about the life to come, about the joy just beyond the horizon that we cannot see yet but we believe that it is there because we have heard the promises of the one true God and heard the disciples testimony about what the one true God did for Jesus of Nazareth.

And so we set our eyes on him, and nothing else.

We…

Jesus is our trailblazer.

We are a church on the way, and the way is the path on which he has gone before us.

On the way is the cross, shame, and hostility.

On the way we may escape the edge of the sword and we may die by the edge of the sword, but that’s not what matters.

What matters is finishing our race well, that is, by faith.

What matters is crossing the finish line because just beyond the finish line is the last great Easter Day, and that day is so filled with indescribable joy that anything we endure on this side of death will seem meaningless and insignificant by comparison.

So let us run the race, let us follow Jesus on the way, wherever that way leads, because there is joy set before us.

We can’t see it.

But it’s there.

Just over the horizon.

Just beyond the finish line.

If you believe that, then go from this place, run your race, and look to Jesus as we follow him on the way.

Amen.