What good is faith if it cannot protect us from such horrors in this life?
There's plenty. Faith can also protect us through the horrors of life. While those things are taking place, faith can protect us and keep us strong. There have been those believers that have gone to the stake, burned at the stake, singing hymns, raising their hands in protest against their persecutors, and to say in a defiant way, I serve the Lord. This is Cross-Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville. Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the book of Hebrews.
Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about Cross-Reference Radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. Today, Pastor Rick will continue his message called Deliverance and Endurance as he teaches through Hebrews chapter 11. The Philistines were against God and against God's people. They had their own gods.
They were satisfied with making up their own gods. They really didn't appreciate God revealing himself to the Jews, and so they were the inveterate enemies of the Jews for centuries. So if you're a Philistine and you're offended by this scripture verse, you are race-centered, not Christ-centered.
Now we're coming closer to the point. Whatever is said in truth about your race is not the issue for a Christian. The issue for us is not our race, but our kingdom.
That's where we pledge allegiance to our King, the Kingdom of Heaven. I hate racism, and you should too. It has been the cause of countless deaths and miseries over generations in every culture on earth. When the Bible talks negatively about a particular people, we're to own it.
That's the story. It is always given with an opportunity to repent, to change sides, to come under the authority of the King. That's why when Paul said there's no longer Jew nor Gentile in Christ, all that stuff is gone. Ethnically, you'll be what you are. Maybe you don't know. It doesn't really matter.
Maybe you do know. Does that mean you cannot celebrate certain ethnic holidays? It does mean that your citizenship, your primary citizenship is in heaven. You are the child of a king who is God the Son, God the Father, and God the Holy Spirit. There is no kingdom or race that I want to belong to except His kingdom, and that is the race that I am running. And so I just take that time because, again, this is Philistine's here, but what if it was insert your ethnic group there, and he stood against the, you fill in the blank. Would you be offended? I think it's, well, is anyone that short-sighted that they think when they get to heaven there's going to be an Irish section, a German section, you know, this is the Asian town?
Is anyone here that short-sighted? In Christ there will be people from every tongue, every kindred, every people in heaven, but they'll no longer, they'll no longer belong to anyone but the king, and we'll all be in it together. World without end, without suffering, without fighting, without cliques and divisions. Churches should not have cliques.
Yeah, there are people in a church that you may get along well, better with one than another. That's fine, but we don't, you know, block others out. Well, I've spent a lot of time on that.
We've got a long way to go. Turn to flight the armies of the aliens. Now, these were the out-of-space Martians that were landing in Israel.
Everybody knows that. Of course, these were the foreign forces that were coming against the people of God. Isaiah and Hezekiah is a great example.
The Assyrian army had taken out the northern kingdom because of the idolatry, and now they were coming to the southern kingdom that was struggling with idolatry too, but it was not as full-blown, as brazen in the south yet. And God raised up the man Isaiah and King Hezekiah, and Isaiah greatly influenced and supported Hezekiah, one of the good kings in Israel and Judah. And Isaiah succeeded with his influence, but Jeremiah, who would come a hundred years later, he couldn't sway the kings.
The kings were so base, so depraved. Jehoiakim and Zedekiah, they were so messed up. The great prophet Jeremiah could not sway them to righteousness, and he suffered for it. But at this time, Isaiah succeeded.
And you know the story. The Assyrians came. Isaiah prophesied that God would deal with them because of Hezekiah's prayer. And then in Isaiah 37, 36, and the angel of the Lord went out and killed in the camp of the Assyrians 185,000.
And when the people arose early in the morning, there were the dead corpses. All dead, says the Scripture. Isaiah 37, 6.
And so, turned to flight the invading forces, the armies of the aliens, and we again, it translates into New Testament, may with truth we turn away the lies that are launched again against our Lord. Verse 35, women received their dead raised again to life. Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance that they might obtain a better resurrection.
Well, of course, Elijah and Elisha, both prophets, were used by God to revive those that had died. But this first clause, verse 35, women received their dead raised again. It really should be in verse 34. The reason is because it is a turning point. It is the last mention of deliverance through the next list of events that the righteous confront in our lives. This is an abrupt, it will be when I read it in one moment, an abrupt change from deliverance to endurance.
This is the Christian life. Not as intense in this country as a rule right now, but in other countries it is. If that Jezebel won the last election, it would have ramped up against us.
You will know them by their fruit. And I don't know how much time we have left before we are finally encircled and pounced upon. The forces of evil are hard at work to bring about this, to come in and destroy the church, and to persecute the church.
So here, this change is now significant. So we move from women received their dead, verse 35, raised again to life, and all the glory and beauty that accompanied those moments, to this, others were tortured. That's pretty intense.
When Saul of Tarsus, who was a Pharisee under the rabbinical teachings of the Jews in the days of Christ and just after Christ, he hated Christians, he hated the church, and he set out to destroy it and to persecute it. And when he was saved, God said to another servant, Ananias, I want you to go to him, and we pick it up in Acts 9, 16, for I will show him how many things he must suffer for my name's sake. Every combat soldier wonders how they're going to do if their time on the battlefield comes. Will they cower? Will they turn and run? Or will they fight and be brave? I think every Christian should have that thought as far as facing persecution goes. How will I perform? Will I deny my Lord? I will set my heart to never do such a thing. I know that this is what he will strengthen me to do.
He will strengthen me to be strong in the face of opposition. So he says others were tortured. Having mentioned again the blessings, the victories of Joshua, Rahab, all the names that preceded this, and now he gets to those, the cavalry did not come. They went to heaven. Heaven didn't go to them in terms of delivering them from the moment of torture. That word in the Greek, torture, tumperezo, you won't hear that likely again today. It means essentially a drum. And it is connected with this circular device that they had made, especially for torturing, and they would stretch out the victim on this circular device as you would stretch the skin over a drum, you know, making that skin taunt so when you beat the drum it would make its noise.
Well, they would stretch out the victim, and while they were fully stretched on this wheel, this drum-shaped item, they would then beat them to death with rods or clubs or whips or whatever instrument of cruelty was the choice at the moment. And so when he says others were tortured, other believers were victims of violence to the death. Well, what good is faith if it cannot protect us from such horrors in this life?
There's plenty. Faith can also protect us through the horrors of life. While those things are taking place, faith can protect us and keep us strong. There have been those believers that have gone to the stake, burned at the stake, singing hymns, raising their hands in protest against their persecutors, and to say in a defiant way, I serve the Lord, and I'm not going to recant, I'm not going to take away. Well, here's the thing. Other people, not believers of Christ, have suffered just as much as any other. There are other martyrs for their causes too. The problem is that in most cases, that's it. That's all they get out of this life. There's nothing beyond.
I'll come back to that point later. But faith is not a magic wand where when there's a danger, we just wave it and the danger goes away. And that doesn't make faith hollow at all. It is not for us to be spared this or that.
It is for us to obey, to hold to our testimony. We read this in 2 Kings 13. Then Elisha died and they buried him.
The great prophet Elisha, one of the prophets who was used in the Old Testament to raise the dead back to life, to revive them. And yet, with all that faith, the day came when he had to go home. You cannot say, well, he didn't have much faith.
He had more faith than anybody would make such a silly statement like that about him. So we may feel it empty. If God does not come along and rescue us, we may feel, what's the use of faith? This was the story at the end of the book of Malachi. We've tried trusting you.
We didn't get anything from it. So ours is to be faithful to the end, otherwise it's not faith. So Satan, he understands that he can get people to leave the faith by attacking them. It's the story of Job. Yeah, Job, of course he doesn't curse you. Of course he's blameless. You give him everything. Take that stuff away from him and I'll show you. He'll curse you to his face.
And of course, he attacked Job and it didn't happen. So not accepting deliverance here. Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance. Matthew 10, 22. We Christians need to hear this. This is about persecution. This is about suffering in life.
We need to hear it. It's in the Scripture and it's not in there to be passed over or ignored. And just as all the rest of Scripture is not to be passed over or ignored. Jesus said, and you will be hated by all for My name's sake, but he who endures to the end will be saved. The one who endures to the end. And persecution is just that, endurance, not deliverance.
Not all the time. We must be ready for that. Others can suffer and die for their causes.
We are not to be an exception. So at the cost of faith, the devil demands that believers renounce Christ so that they can gain temporary relief and escape suffering. Denying Christ worsens death.
That's what it does. Faith embraces God will not leave me. And that He does not deliver me does not mean He hasn't delivered me because my relationship with Him exceeds this life. It goes beyond this life.
It is not defined or limited to this life. This does not mean that He will spare us because He's always with us from the things that come against us. The New Testament is more concerned with preaching the Gospel under all situations as led by the Spirit than protecting the righteous as with the armies of the Old Testament. The New Testament is more concerned with the message being delivered at any cost to those delivering it. And so, again, our marriage vows, we being brides of Christ, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, till death do us part. The thing is with the Christian, death will not do us part from Christ.
We are forever joined to Him. Satan does not want pastors to preach these kinds of messages and he likes to make Christians uncomfortable hearing them so that he can continue to fortify his causes while we remain weak and not facing the facts concerning what we believe. So we have to understand if God is glorified by something that happens to us, then we receive it. We're not supposed to belong to a faith where talk is cheap. Yes, Lord, I'll serve you all my days anywhere you want me to.
And then the pressures come. I'm out. He didn't rescue me.
I'm done. The Bible doesn't work. The promises don't apply. Again, that's the story at the end of Malachi chapter 3, at the end of that chapter. That they might obtain a better resurrection, though there are two resurrections. There is the resurrection of the just and there is the resurrection of the unjust.
Both will stand before God, one to condemnation, the other to address their service in this life, their rewards or not. And so by faith, the church in Smyrna, that is in the book of Revelation in chapter 2, that church was persecuted. And the Lord said, you've kept to my name in the face of persecution, where Satan's throne was.
The source of power of Satan's darkness was upon them. Verse 36 of Hebrews 11, still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, of chains and imprisonment. But there are others, still others. There's more that we encounter.
Had trials of mockings. Is it true that someone can be brave in the face of violence and danger, but can't stand being laughed at? I mean, there are, I think it is true. I think that there are those that cannot bear it.
You're better if you're a Christian. Maybe you've been in the workplace or school and you've heard someone take a shot at Christ, or some of you are very bothered when you hear someone use the name of the Lord in vain. Well, they're not under the covenant as we are. They're lost. They've got more problems than that. And if we can get to the source of the problem, they'll no longer take the Lord's name in vain.
But what I'm trying to say is we feel the pressure of that. Peter, he is writing again to persecuted Christians. He said, yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in this matter. So there are those that suffer not as Christians, and there are those that suffer as Christians. One will get the crown, the other gets nothing.
And that makes all the difference. Who's king? Whose kingdom do you belong to? Which king are you subject to?
Because that king will be the victor, and the other king will be vanquished. And so will his subjects along with him. He says here in verse 36 that they had received scourgings, yes, of chain and imprisonment. Jeremiah never backed down from his message.
All the junk that he had to endure from his family, from his countrymen, the ridiculed, being hunted, physically attacked. Jeremiah 38, 6, so they took Jeremiah and cast him into the dungeon, which was in the court of the prison. And they let Jeremiah down with ropes, and in the dungeon there was no water but mire. So Jeremiah sank in the mire. You know how miserable that was for him? It was just not, oh, this is a Bible story, and there's some actor just carrying it out, and afterwards they're all going to clean up and go to some restaurant and have a good time.
This really happened to someone, and worse has happened. But he sank in the mire. How many times have I thought about that?
Sinking in the mire of something. Like, God, why is this necessary? You know, the little things really get me, I think, more than the big things. You expect the boogeymen, the big ones.
It's those little fleas that just want it. Because they're so unnecessary, but they're unstoppable. And so you find yourself saying, at least I find myself saying, I've got to work on my response to these things. I have got to stop being so hurt by things that in the scheme of heaven really are nothing. I'm right with Christ.
That is the major thing, and I will keep that the major thing. And the hits that I take, well, I have armor enough to survive. Not to take the hit. You know, if you've ever had a shield, growing up I had a friend that had a shield. And, of course, what the boys do when you have a shield, you get something to hit the shield, with you behind the shield. And if you've ever been hit, you feel it, your teeth shake. If the guy is big enough, he'll knock you down. Yeah, you didn't get hit with a direct blow, but you get hit.
You feel the impact. And that's Christianity. The shield of faith will take hits.
It's not a, you know, it's not a force field. Activate the Christian force field. That will happen when we get to heaven. Hebrews chapter 13, the writer of this letter is writing at a time when Christians are already being persecuted for being Christians. So he writes in the 13th chapter, remember the prisoners as if chained with them, those who are mistreated.
There's a euphemism for you. Since you yourselves are in the body also. This part of your body is being persecuted, being tortured. Remember them in prayer. Verse 37, they were stoned. They were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins being destitute, afflicted, tormented. Now he's emphasizing, of course, the Old Testament believers.
And the New Testament will have their share also. Where he says they were stoned, well that's Stephen and Paul. Acts chapter 7, and they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. He didn't say, Lord Jesus, if you don't save me from this, I'm going elsewhere. He allowed himself to be stoned to death in faith, knowing that there are better things on the horizon when it comes to Christ. And so the Christian martyr dies the death of meaning. The rejecter of Christ may suffer and die meaninglessly.
It's just this life that it is nothing after. That's how we have to preach it because that's what we're told to preach. The mercy of God is the mercy of God. That's his department. I cannot exercise the mercy of God on that level, on his level. I can exercise the mercy of God and the sphere that he's given me to exercise it, but it will never reach the level that he has in dealing with those who have left this life without confessing Christ as Savior.
That is his department. And so while I am here, I have to preach it as he has given it to me. He says they were sawn into a prevalent form of execution in the ancient world. In Daniel chapter 2, we read about Nebuchadnezzar saying we're going to cut him in two. Now, yeah, I have to say there is, outside of the Bible, there is some history that says Isaiah the prophet was ultimately martyred, great man of God. We have the prophecies of Isaiah. Put in the hollow of a log and the log was sawn in two with him in it. That's a tradition of the Jews.
Whether it's true or not is irrelevant because it certainly has happened in other places. Now is a good time to read John Bunyan in Pilgrim's Progress. He gets to a scene where Christian, the character, is in heated dialogue with Satan, with Apollyon, the enemy. And he's winning the argument, so the enemy gets infuriated and attacks him physically. But one of the things that led to that was these words in the story about why God does not deliver his people from all sorts of things.
He says, God's forbearing at present to deliver them is on purpose to try their love, whether they will cleave to him to the end. You've been listening to Cross Reference Radio, the daily radio ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel in Mechanicsville, Virginia. As we mentioned at the beginning of today's broadcast, today's teaching is available free of charge at our website. Simply log on to CrossReferenceRadio.com. That's CrossReferenceRadio.com. We'd also like to encourage you to subscribe to the Cross Reference Radio podcast. Subscribing ensures that you stay current with all the latest teachings from Pastor Rick. You can subscribe at CrossReferenceRadio.com or simply search for Cross Reference Radio in your favorite podcast app. Tune in next time as Pastor Rick continues teaching through the book of Hebrews right here on Cross Reference Radio.
Whisper: medium.en / 2023-05-02 02:05:42 / 2023-05-02 02:14:45 / 9