Hebrews 6:11-20 And we desire that every one of you do shew the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end: 12 That ye be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises. 13 For when God made promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no greater, he sware by himself, 14 Saying, Surely blessing I will bless thee, and multiplying I will multiply thee. 15 And so, after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise. 16 For men verily swear by the greater: and an oath for confirmation is to them an end of all strife. 17 Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath: 18 That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: 19 Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; 20 Whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.

I have to admit that there are times I get very weary. It seems like I’m trying to put out a forest fire with a thimble of water. I just want to give up. Evil has abounded so much in America, and it seems as if there’s no hope. Our world is spinning out of control.

Then I come to passages like this.

The Bible tells us in Philippians 4:8, “whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things” (NKJV). We can dwell on the sad state of our country – or we can dwell on the faithfulness of our God. We can commiserate over the Goliaths that face the Church in the 21^st century – or we can focus on God, realizing He is bigger than anything that is against us.

Never Stop Being What God Wants You To Be

Hebrews 6:11-12 And we desire that every one of you do shew the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end: 12 That ye be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises.

The story of Old Testament Israel is a story of a people who started strong, but too often let other things get in the way of God’s promises. When the journey was easy, Israel was excited and hopeful. But when the journey became difficult they took their eyes off of Jesus, and focused on that which hindered them. God’s desire for this Church is that we show the …

same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end

Word Study: Let’s break this down. “SAME DILIGENCE” is the Greek autos spoudē. The word translated “SAME” is autos means “HIS”, “HER” or “THEIR”. This is a reflexive pronoun of self. It is pointing to the diligence that someone else showed. The word “DILIGENCE” is the Greek spoudē, which means “diligence, earnestness in accomplishing, carefulness in following through”. The person referred to – the one we are to copy – did not start out like gangbusters then fizzle out. This person acted as if they had a “full assurance of hope unto the end”. We are told in verse 12:

be not slothful

Word Study: This is the Greek ginomai mē nōthros, which means “to become sluggish, dull, or half hearted”. We have the promises of God Himself to rely on. Our God is faithful, and what He has promised will come to pass. God has called us into His Kingdom as sons and daughters of God, as VICTORS and not VICTIMS.

We are to trust God and keep on doing what He has told us to do with ALL DILIGENCE – for we serve the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

The Bible repeatedly tells the Christian, the recipient of the New Covenant:

Ephesians 4:1 (ESV) … walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called ..

Colossians 1:10 (ESV) … walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God …

1 Thessalonians 2:12 (ESV) … we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.

Once saved, we are not to drag our feet, but are to go where Christ bids us go, and do as Christ bids us do.

We do not know when the promises of God will come to fruition, but they will come in God’s own time. The Scripture says:

Galatians 6:7-9 (ESV) Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. 8 For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. 9 And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.

We are to be, as verse 12 tells us,

followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises

We are to follow the examples of the Old Covenant Saints who paid attention to God’s Word, and honored God by – however imperfectly – continuing to have PATIENT FAITH.

We are not to follow the example of the first generation of Israel who whined and murmured and complained their way to the border of the Promised Land – and then refused to enter in. These sad sacks ended up dying in the wilderness over 40 years, wandering in circles while their destination was just over the horizon.

Believers Imitate Abraham, The Father of Faith

Hebrews 6:13-14 For when God made promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no greater, he sware by Himself, 14 Saying, Surely blessing I will bless thee, and multiplying I will multiply thee.

When God first called Abraham (who then was called Abram), the Bible says that:

Genesis 12:4 … Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran.

God had promised Abraham that – if he left his family and his country and FOLLOWED GOD, that God would “make of thee a GREAT NATION” (Genesis 12:2). This intrigued Abraham, as both he and his wife Sarai were without children, and past child bearing years. God promised Abram that if he’d follow God, that he would have not just a child, but a nation of children.

So Abram followed God. And the very next year Abram and Sarai had a child!
NOT!

When God makes a promise, God always follows through with that promise. The Scripture says:

Numbers 23:19 God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?

When God makes a promise, He is ALL POWERFUL. “Our God is in the Heavens – He does ALL THAT HE PLEASES” (Psalm 115:3, ESV). “Nothing is too hard for God to do” (Jeremiah 32:17, AP). God knows “the end from the beginning” (Isaiah 46:10, ESV). So when God promises something, there is NOTHING that can come up to make God change His mind. Further, God is absolutely HOLY – He will not renege on what He has said He will do.

So God promises Abraham and Sarah a child, and a nation of children. But God doesn’t fulfill the promise the next year, nor the year after that, nor the year after that. In fact, God doesn’t fulfill the promise to Abraham until 25 years later:

Genesis 21:1-5 (ESV) The Lord visited Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did to Sarah as he had promised. 2 And Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age at the time of which God had spoken to him. 3 Abraham called the name of his son who was born to him, whom Sarah bore him, Isaac. 4 And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him. 5 Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.

Why did God make Abraham wait 25 years before Sarah had Isaac? What hindered God in fulfilling His promise? Nothing hindered God – absolutely nothing. The reality is,

God delayed in giving Abraham a son until Abraham was READY to have a son.

Abraham WANTED a son sooner than he got one. But Abraham wasn’t ready. God promised to give Abraham a son, but Abraham kept trying to help God out. God made a promise, and God was going to keep it. Abraham was called of God to follow God and do as God said – not to BE GOD and HELP GOD OUT.

We, Like Abraham, Are To Wait On God No Matter What!

So Abraham waited. The Bible tells us to trust God’s Promises, to “wait on the Lord”:

Psalm 27:14 Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD.

Psalm 37:34 Wait on the LORD, and keep his way, and he shall exalt thee to inherit the land: when the wicked are cut off, thou shalt see it.

Proverbs 20:22 Say not thou, I will recompense evil; but wait on the LORD, and he shall save thee.

Abraham needed to learn to “WAIT ON THE LORD”.

What does it mean to “Wait On The Lord”?

It doesn’t mean to be slothful. We who are saved by the promise of God have, as we seen earlier, to keep on diligently serving God, doing as He says. The best way I can describe “Waiting on the Lord” is to talk about table waiters.

Illustrate: I was at “Legends” the other day with my dear wife, and I had gotten a horrible waitress. When we were seated it took her 15 minutes to get to our table. She wasn’t busy – she just wasn’t present. Other waitresses were busy waiting on their tables, and a couple even stepped in to help us though we weren’t their responsibility. Finally she showed up, took our order – and we didn’t see her again until she brought the check. I asked her where she had been, and she said “I was in the kitchen with the manager”.

The waitress is not to be the COOK.
The waitress is not to be the MANAGER.
The waitress is to TEND to the CUSTOMER.
To make the CUSTOMER HAPPY.

When God promised Abraham a son through Sarah, Abraham initially didn’t do what he was supposed to do but instead tried to do what God had promised. That’s a recipe for disaster. When Pharaoh took Sarah to be in his harem Abraham didn’t stand up like a husband should have and said “She’s MY WIFE”. No, he let fear reign, and Sarah was taken. God intervened. Abraham was supposed to leave his family and follow God, but took Lot his nephew with him. He did not honor God fully, and it ended up bringing trouble into his household. When Abraham separated from Lot God spoke to him, showing him the land of Canaan, saying …

Genesis 13:15-17 … all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever. 16 And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth: so that if a man can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered. 17 Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for I will give it unto thee.

When Abraham fought the armies of five nations and won, Melchizedek the priest of the Most High God appeared to him (Genesis 14:18). Jesus said of this encounter that “Your Father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad” (John 8:58). He saw Jesus. God had promised Abraham a son – a nation of children – but he had to learn to wait on God.

In Genesis 15 Abraham offers to help God out. Time has passed, and God has not given Abraham or Sarah a child. So Abraham tells God:

Genesis 15:3 … Behold, to me Thou hast given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir.

Abraham had a young man born in his home Eliezer of Damascus (Genesis 15:2). A trustworthy young man, Abraham had already set him apart from the other servants. After all, if God wasn’t going to give an heir, then Abraham would have to step in and help God out! God told Abraham:

Genesis 15:4-6 … This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir. 5 And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be. 6 And he believed in the Lord; and {God} counted it to {Abraham} for righteousness.

Abraham believed God when he left Ur of the Chaldees. But there are varying degrees of belief. He believed God – but took Lot with him though God had forbidden it. He believed God – but feared Pharaoh and let him take Sarah to be his own. Abraham walked the aisle of the Church – but his heart was not committed to God. The Bible says that “man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the HEART” (1 Samuel 16:7). “The LORD KNOWS THOSE WHO ARE HIS” (2 Timothy 2:19). The Bible says that at this moment “Abraham believed in the Lord; and {God} counted it to {Abraham} for righteousness”. It is faith in God that brings righteousness. Not faith in our efforts, but faith that He is able to do what He says. God promised Abraham that he would have a child and a nation of children – and Abraham believed.

Abraham is a pattern of faith for every believer in Christ.

The statement found in Genesis 15 is repeated throughout the New Testament. The Apostle wrote:

Romans 4:18-24 In hope {Abraham} believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So shall your offspring be.” 19 He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. 20 No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, 21 fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. 22 That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.” 23 But the words “it was counted to him” were not written for his sake alone, 24 but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, 25 who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.

Abraham was physically and sexually dead, unable to have children. But the God Who made the universe is able to make the dead come back to life. Abraham believed God, and God counted that as righteousness. Did Abraham have a child at the end of chapter 15? No. Why?

Because Abraham was not quite ready to have that child.
Though he believed God, he kept trying to help God out.
Which is why Ishmael was born.

We Wait On And Trust God, No Matter What God Tells Us To Do, No Matter What God Sends Us Through!

Year after year passed. Five years, ten years, fifteen years. No child. Twenty years. In the twenty-fourth year from when God first called Abraham God told Abraham “next year” he would have the promised son. Then Abraham turned 100 years old. “after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise”. God promises, but will not give us the blessing of the promise until we trust in and wait on God. Abraham had to learn to trust and obey God. When Abram was 99 years old God spoke to him, saying:

Genesis 17:5-6 No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations. 6 I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make you into nations, and kings shall come from you.

God told Abraham to circumcise himself, and the males of his household – an act that Abraham immediately did. Yet he had to wait another another year until the promised child was born. Why? Why did God wait?

Abraham was not ready yet.

Then Abraham has Isaac. What a blessing that was, after 25 years, to have this precious Promised child. Was Abraham ready for the child? Absolutely! Think about this. You’ve waited for a child for 25 years, and at the age of 100 years old you get that child. How will you treat that child? Some people would make an idol of that child. They’d spoil that child rotten. They’d put that child on a pedestal.

God gave the child, but had He given that child too soon, Abraham would have made that child into a golden calf, a false idol. But Abraham was ready for the child, ready for the blessing – for his focus was on God.

God tells Abraham:

Genesis 22:2 (ESV) … “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.”

What does Abraham do? He loves Isaac, but he loves the Lord MORE. Isaac is not his idol, but his son, his only son. God had promised that:

Genesis 21:12 … in Isaac shall thy seed be called.

Abraham’s seed would only come when he believed in God, putting GOD FIRST. This is the basis of salvation. We come to God, trusting what He has promised us in Christ, and receive Jesus as both Lord and Savior. Ishmael was a seed of Abraham, but not the child of promise. In ISAAC shall thy seed be called.

So now we have the test of salvation. You say you love the Lord. Do you love the Lord if your body fail you? Do you love the Lord if your child die? Do you love the Lord if your business fall into bankruptcy? Do you love the Lord if your spouse leave? God has said in His Word:

1 John 5:21 Dear children, keep yourselves from idols.

And

Jonah 2:8 Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God’s love for them.

God will not share His love with another. He demands you love Him above all else. Abraham was ready for Isaac, for without a whimper he took Isaac to Mount Moriah, laid him upon an altar, and prepared to sacrifice him to God. Abraham told Isaac, “God will provide Himself the Lamb for a burnt offering” (Genesis 22:8).

Abraham understood. What God promised, God will do. Abraham understood that, even if God had him kill Isaac, that God would raise Isaac from the dead. “IT IS IMPOSSIBLE FOR GOD TO LIE”.

Jesus Christ Is The Sure Hope Of Every Believer

Hebrews 6:18-20 That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: 19 Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; 20 Whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.

Abraham put his trust in God. Not in circumstances, but in God. And when he was fully ready to trust the Lord, God gave him the blessing of Isaac.

We who are saved put our trust in God. We run to Jesus. We “LAY HOLD UPON THE HOPE” that is Jesus. We cling to Him like a drowning man would cling to a life preserver, like one who has bailed out from a burning plane clings to the parachute above him. Jesus Christ is the “hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast”. It is impossible to lie. God has set His Son forth as the only PROPITIATION, the only SATISFACTORY OFFERING for our failures.

Just as there was only ONE ISAAC, there is only ONE JESUS, the Son of Promise. It is Jesus Whom the Father …

Romans 3:22-26 (ESV) … the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, 25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. 26 It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Do you know Him? Do you know my Jesus? Is He your Lord and Savior? It is Jesus Who went into Heaven, into the very Presence of God the Father, the Lamb of God offered for those who believe. Oh, that God the Holy Spirit would pierce your heart today, and bring you to Christ. Give your lives to Jesus. Believe in Him, follow Him. Trust Him. Not just momentarily, but for life. May God guide you to Him. Amen and Amen.