Hebrews 11 - Adventurous

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0:00 The rest of us, we're gonna keep going on this series where we're looking at this little network of churches that we're a part of this multi-site and so I put this thing on your table. We put this together to start to talk a little bit about who this multi-site ministry is so you get a sense of it and if you go to this inside page here that looks like this, these are these core four core

0:31 values that we have put out for our little multi-site ministry adventurous collaborative focused and sincere. Those have come out over the course of this last calendar year and they emerged kind of you know values could be descriptive or aspirational. We're hoping that these are kind of both. We took these core values from who we've been in the past but also who we want to be in the future. So we feel like we have with our little multi-site network of

1:04 churches is these four things adventurous collaborative focused and sincere but also we would like to be these four things adventurous collaborative focused and sincere and so over the next four weeks we're gonna talk about these I'm gonna talk about adventurous because that's my favorite one and next week I'll be talking about adventures at Holy Cross and then later I'll be talking about at Resurrection and you'll next week see I think Pastor Russ talking about collaborative he's the pastor at Holy Cross in Lake Mary and then in a

1:37 couple weeks you'll see Blake talking about sincere but for adventurous I want you to just first look at this inside page the inside of the first page. This is kind of how we we got to the idea of adventurous because of this kind of like history of these things. So in the top right there in the in the blue track a little graphic or shape it talks about the congregations that have come out of

2:08 our multi-site Holy Cross the cross Orlando that's us new city the cross Mount Dora well spring resurrection so each of these churches look pretty different which I really like each of these congregations look really different they look like the town they're in and the people that they're in and one of the things that I love about the way this little ministry has started congregations is that they can look in a way that matches people one of the great joys of my life so far one of them has been that God lets us be

2:40 ourselves and I don't have to be somebody else in order to have a church we can be we can find a church that fits us and matches us and I feel like the cross really suits me and I'm I love being here and it looks different from new city or the cross not to our or well spring in in the land or resurrection in Sanford. The other things that we've started here on the left the Academy in the red that's the school we started about 25 years ago it's now on two campuses and has about 600 students in it 300 in the lower grades and 300 in the upper

3:15 grades it's on to campuses K through 12 and there's a lot of stories in starting that but it's been by the skin of our teeth all the time and it's the idea of serving a community with quality education and then down this maybe on the bottom is maybe the stuff that's closest to my heart that I realized when I looked back over our history that our little multi-site has started all these little nonprofits or mission for for profits over the last going back 20 years

3:50 and so you can see there it says eight mission adventures have benefited from founding support from Central Florida Cross Network and each are now loving and serving their neighbors so we've built these four values into a mission statement about loving and serving our neighbor and you can see those listed there so I just want to call your attention to that like this idea of adventurous comes from who we've been in the past where it's like how can we love our neighbor with creativity and strategy and direction and pulling

4:21 community together so it doesn't come out of nowhere but as I was like thinking about where that idea of adventurous is in Scripture I love Hebrews chapter 11 and so that's where we're gonna look I don't know if you're familiar with that chapter sometimes Hebrews chapter 11 and 12 are called the Hall of Faith in Scripture but if you want to look at the Hebrews chapter 11 with me that's what we're gonna spend our time this morning and especially I want to look at or start

4:54 at verse 13 he's just gone through a couple of people he's told the story of Abel you remember Cain and Abel and Cain and Abel are brothers they're the first two people born outside the Garden of Eden and Abel makes a sacrifice it's a God of first fruit sacrifice meaning he takes the best of what he has the first of what he has and gives it to God and Cain gives a kind of the

5:27 leftovers he's a herder and it gives the leftovers of what he doesn't need and gives it to God and it's kind of interesting because you know these are the first guys making sacrifices to God and so God says well Abel's is a good sacrifice because he gave it to me from the first fruits he knows I'll take care of him and so he can give me the best because he knows that all things come for me and I'll make if he gives me the best he knows I'll make sure he has what he needs and Cain gives me from the back he gives me from he's maybe worried that he needs to keep the best for himself that I won't protect and take care

5:59 of him so Abel's gift is better than Cain's but Cain takes that personally and kills Abel you know and so the writer of Hebrews is starting off talking about the people of God about Abel who gives the good thing and then dies which is kind of a rip-off and so he starts off telling a story about the people of God with this guy who's been kind of ripped off he didn't get what he needed and then he tells the story about another kind of nuanced like niche little person he tells the story about Enoch which Enoch doesn't have there's not

6:31 that much of actually there's almost nothing about him there's like two sentences about him in the story of Scripture not very much and it's in his genealogy and it says that he in other places in the genealogy it follows a pattern somebody like Enoch lived for a certain number of years and then he died well then he had a son and then he lived next to him years later and then he died right it's kind of a flow and Enoch is like instead of saying he lived it says that he walked with God and then he had the son and he lived a couple hundred more years and then he was no more because God took him and so the

7:03 tradition is that Enoch is this guy who didn't die but was taken away it's like a weird story and so the writer of Hebrews is starting off with these two very weird stories Abel first person among the first people born out of Eden gives a good gift and gets killed for it Enoch who walks with God and then he's taken up and doesn't die and then he tells a story of Noah which we know the story of Noah he like survives a complete wiping out of all humanity and he's the

7:33 family through which God starts again and then he says to Abe talks about Abraham and Sarah which we we hear that story a lot but they have this like promise of being a full nation being the parents of a whole nation of people and and having a land that belongs to them and then they die and they have one little cave and one son and he starts to pull out this theme that you see in Hebrews chapter 11 starting at verse 13 he says these all died in faith not having received the

8:08 things they promised but having seen them and greeted them from afar and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles in the earth first of all he said that these all died in faith which is an important point that they died in faith you know I really love if you've been around at all I love the story of the cave of MacPella that's the cave that Abraham and Sarah were

8:38 buried into that he's promised this whole land and when he dies he just has this one little part of the land just this one little cave that belongs to him and though he doesn't have the whole thing he buries himself and Sarah into this hope that the whole thing will come you can see when he dies that he sure God's promise is not done which is compelling because you'd think that when he dies he doesn't care anymore about the promise but he has some hope even in death in the promise and the defining characteristic of Abraham is that he

9:12 has faith that God says he'll give him something and Abraham believes him and what's cool is the writer of Hebrews we don't really know who the writer of Hebrews is probably a student of Paul's but at the beginning of this chapter if you go back to chapter 11 verse 1 of Hebrews he defines faith for us which is not a thing somebody does very often Hebrews chapter 11 verse 1 now faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things not seen for

9:43 for by it people of old received their accommodation by faith we understand that the universe was created by the Word of God so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible he says now this is chapter 11 verse 1 now faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the convictions of things not seen it's kind of crazy that a way of living a faith that starts with the guy who

10:27 did it right being killed by his brother endures you know what I mean like at the very beginning okay with this God he makes the whole earth out of nothing gives us the garden and we figure we make better God so he and then in the way to being God we have all these negative emotions so he moves us out of the garden and he says don't worry I'll take care of you and then the guy that makes the good offering to him is killed by his brother and they continue to retain

11:00 faith that the God will protect him and the banner of our faith the great Abraham father Abraham from whom all the people of God our descendants is promised that he would have this nation and he gets one kid and he's promised that he'll have all this land and he has one cave and what's crazy is that his descendants continue to hope in the God who didn't give Abraham what he said he'd give him

11:33 like the idea of faith is actually crazy actually and when you look at the story of scripture it's somehow confounding that it persists like why would Abraham's children trust the God that didn't come through all the way sure of things hope

12:04 for certain of things unseen the writer of Hebrews tells us these stories and suggests that these guys died in faith tough maybe you have had the experience of God not coming through maybe maybe you

12:48 know what it feels like to ask God to do something and like get crickets I mean most people have experienced that if you haven't experienced that let's talk after I want to hear about how you pray and like how you eat maybe or I don't know we all know what it feels like to like call out to some divine and have nothing

13:27 feel like there's nothing that comes back we all know what that feels like we all know what it feels like to have a thing that we would love to have happen in the world and ask the God for it and then it doesn't happen the writer of Hebrews uses as an example for us people who did not get what they were promised

13:59 what on earth you'd think if they were setting up examples they would set up the victorious winners he actually goes on and in Hebrews chapter 11 to outline several stories from scripture all this why that's called the Hall of Faith he he talks about the different ways people have lived in faith but he doesn't

14:32 mention Solomon the great king with all the wealth of the world and all the wisdom of the world he doesn't even mention Solomon if you read through the story of the Hebrews and look at the questions of faith at least half of the examples of faith are people who did not get what they wanted at least half you know there is a story of a woman in Hebrews chapter 11 receiving back her young from the dead like God breaks in miraculously at times but most of the

15:04 time it seems like he does not and most of the examples in Hebrews 11 are of things not coming through for us so if you feel like most of the time you don't get the thing you're asking for this is not an argument for faith actually but actually you're in good company like most of the people don't get it so the question then is if most of the people don't get what they want from the divine how might faith persist why would why would Abraham cling to hope though he's

15:44 dying and dead why would the writer of Hebrews call to our memory able who for his good sacrifice received death at the hand of his brother well if you the the if you can find if you have a question of the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob the first place you look for an answer is the story of the cross the

16:19 fullest example the clearest depiction of our God is what we see at the cross consider Jesus is in the garden of Gethsemane and he is hoping that God will deliver him from pain and the feeling of guilt and isolation even the feelings of condemnation he's starting to weigh under in the garden of send me got so many he says Lord is there some way where we could not have this happen right is there some way we could not have this happen

16:56 we are in a good 70 hey God can we do this a different way and then he says what course God not my will but your will will do it your way not mine and what does Jesus get for the faith in God to do it God's way he gets death man she's like almost immediately God will do it your way okay cool you're gonna die dude and he dies painfully embarrassingly Jesus dies and also what he is raised

17:39 from the dead he is raised from the dead he is witnessed by his friends raised from the dead he is witnessed by 500 people he walks around for 40 days they document the story of his resurrection he eats meals with them he blesses their little kids

18:10 Jesus a trusts God though death takes him and is vindicated in the end the writer of Hebrews is trying to call us to something that there is more going on for you than this place that the reason Abraham goes down into death with hope though he did not get what he's promised that the promise might come yet is because

18:42 he has a conviction that the God whom he serves the great divine force that has called him and promised him life is broader and deeper and older and newer than the world in which he moves around so broad and deep and old and new that the grave that he hides in cave of MacPella can't keep the promises of God from coming good for him and Jesus has the same conviction this is why he can walk with his head up and not give up

19:15 that when they offer him the gall to numb the pain of the cross he turns it down that he can endure the whole hardship of life Hebrews he'll say here in just in just the next chapter but for the joy set before him did Christ endure the cross scorning its shame that Jesus knew to where he was going and was so settled in his conviction that the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob was broader and deeper and older and newer than this world that he could endure whatever this world throughout him

19:48 because he knew it wasn't the last word or the end of the story and so he got to endure the whole thing there's a this is not a perfect example but it just popped into my head I watched the new Odyssey movie did anybody see the new Odyssey movie it was pretty compelling I mean it wasn't like one to one

20:24 with the actual Odyssey you know it's a crazy story so you got to make choices but there is one point where they're going by the sirens they're on the boat and they're going by the sirens you know and and the sirens in the Greek mythology if you don't remember are these like maidens who sing this irresistible song that everyone comes and wants to be in their presence you know and everyone wants to come and be in the presence of these singers and then they

20:58 drives you crazy you can't get out of their presence it drives you crazy so anyone who hears the song of the sirens dies right and so they're on the boat and Odysseus is like dude I want to hear the song of the sirens I want to be the only guy who lives and hears the song of the sirens right and so it's like just lash me to this mast right here so that I can so I'm because if I hear it I'm going to want to go get them but if you tie me really tight so I can't get up and promise not to

21:29 untie me whatever I say then I'll survive and I will have heard this thing right and there's something about knowing he will be secure that allows him to experience to go on this like dangerous risky experience and there's some attitude of that that are in the people of God where Jesus is like sure I know where I'm going so if you want me to endure a trumped up trial and the crucifixion of the cross and go into experience the depths of the grave I'll do it

22:05 because I know neither height nor depth neither angels nor demons nor anything else in all creation can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus and so I'll go anywhere because I know that you'll pull me through it do you see that when you start to get the idea that there is a current of faith in the people of God that exists in the world but goes through the grave and comes out beyond it then you can join in that current and it builds an adventurous spirit in you that says I

22:37 can go anywhere I can do anything that the God of creation has life as in the God of creation and life has endowed me with the capacity to love my neighbor meaningfully and sacrificially such that they would experience a divine a glimpse of the divine love that brings them into this current of faith that will usher them past the grave into life forever you and I are on this adventure and

23:08 if you read the rest of Hebrews you begin to get a sense of the fact that following the way of God has been always been adventurous the detractors have often made it not an adventure more like a test like a test that you have to get

23:44 right and then the church is like accounting and grading all the time this is not the way of the God the way of our God is one of adventure through challenges and hardships discovering corners moving into unknown places just like the kids said there might be danger there might be learning there might be unknowns there will be fun and we want to be a church we have been and want

24:18 to continue to be a church on adventure together because we know in adventure we deepen our faith and people glimpse the divine let's pray that we could be people of adventure together hey lord thank you for the promise of deliverance in you teach us what it looks like to know that all the hard questions are answered lord remind us that we are loved that we are secure that we have purpose and significance in life remind us that you have secured eternity on our behalf

24:55 and in light of that then lord equip us to live as the writer pepers says to run the race set before ass throwing off all encumbrances for the joy set before us lord just as you did in jesus name we pray