“These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth.“ Hebrews 11:13
Faith, as a biblical concept, means different things to different people. Growing up in a predominantly Charismatic or Word of Faith Movement circles, faith was meant to be the magic key to receiving whatever we wanted from God. After all, it was Jesus himself who said if we had faith like a mustard seed, nothing would be impossible for the believer (it doesn’t matter the passage is often quoted out of context). If sickness was not healed, it was because the recipient didn’t have enough faith. If someone did not receive the breakthrough, it was because their faith wasn’t strong enough.
However, the writer of Hebrews helps us to think about faith in a very different way than it’s taught in many Christian circles today. In chapter 11, the writer lists down all the stalwarts of faith and, in the middle of the chapter, inserts a small commentary, “…these all died in faith, not having received the things promised…“ Isn’t it astonishing that all the people described as heroes of the faith didn’t receive what was promised? According to many modern Christians, that makes the people mentioned in Hebrews 11 faith whimpers because they did not receive their breakthroughs.
In our text, the writer tells us the reason why they didn’t see themselves as faith failures, even though these men and women didn’t receive what they had prayed or believed God for. Faith, for them, was not a channel through which one receives whatever they wanted in this world. Instead, faith for them is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. They knew that the promise was not in this world but in the world to come. They were looking for the city which had true foundations and whose builder is God. They acknowledged that in this world, they were but strangers and exiles. That’s a true faith!
So, my Christian friend, don’t measure the genuineness of your faith or lack thereof by the breakthrough you received or didn’t receive. Throughout the ages, faithful believers have seen and greeted the promise from afar and known that the promise is not meant for this life. Don’t let anyone disqualify your faith because true faith doesn’t receive the promise in this life.
