Faith & Our True Home
Hebrews 11:8-10, 13-16 | Genesis 12:1-4
Main Idea: Faith embraces the call of God as we long for our true home in the city of God.
I. Embracing the Call (11:8)
God appears to Abraham (Abram) in Genesis 12 and asks him to leave his “country, kindred, and father’s house;” God asks him to leave the primary things that would mark his identity, security, comfort, and future.
By faith, Abraham obeys this call from the Lord. He embraces an uncertain future & a painful leaving in faith because he trusted:
God’s Promise: He is promised and inheritance and blessing, even though this would have made no earthly sense.
God’s Presence: God is ultimately calling Abraham to himself more than a place.
The call of God on Abraham’s life is a paradigm for the Christian life. ‘The church’ literally means ‘the called out ones.’ We are all called, in repentance and faith, to leave behind the world & our own priorities to follow the Lord who has called us to himself.
Philippians 3:7–8: But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ
II. Living in Exile (11:9, 13)
By obeying the Lord in faith, Abraham and his family live the rest of their lives as “strangers and exiles” (11:13). They live in ‘tents,’ the ultimate picture of a temporary dwelling place.
It is not only in Canaan (the Promised Land) that Abraham is a sojourner: he & his family acknowledged they were strangers and exiles “on the earth.” Nowhere on earth was truly ‘home’ and the same is true of us today in the church (cf. 1 Peter 1:1)
Hebrews 13:14: For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come.
Philippians 3:20: But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ
Two temptations while we live as sojourners & exiles:
Arrival: Assimilating & making our home in the world
Escapism: Disengaging from the world & withdrawing back into our own silos
1 Peter 2:11–12: Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.
“The question of the tension of the between becomes a catalyst for pilgrimage – prompting me, like Abraham, to answer the call and “go” – or whether I try to decamp in that distant country, turning my exile into arrival, suppressing my sense that there must be something more, that another shore is calling… So much of our restlessness and disappointment is the result of trying to convince ourselves that we’re already home. The alternative is not escapism; it is a refugee spiritually – unsettled yet hopeful, tenuous but searching, eager to find the hometown we’ve never been to.” ~ James K. A. Smith
III. Longing for Home (11:10, 14-16)
The ‘homeland’ Abraham was seeking was not the palace he was born (11:15); instead, it is a place he has never been before. His true home is:
A City with Foundations (11:10)
Designed & Built by God (11:10)
A Better & Heavenly Country (11:16)
Prepared for God’s People (11:16)
Just as Abraham refused to go back to what might have been comfortable in Ur (cf. Gen. 24:6-8), the author of Hebrews is urging his recipients not to turn back to their former life. The Christian life is a call to live by faith as we keep our eyes fixed on our true home that is still in our future.
Colossians 3:1–4: If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
“Most people, if they had really learned to look into their own hearts, would know that what they do want, and want acutely, is something that cannot be had in this world. There are all sorts of things in this world that offer to give it to you, but they never quite keep their promise… if I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world… I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that other country & to help others to do the same.” ~ C.S. Lewis
Jesus has gone before us in this journey of faith; he knows what it means to leave home & to leave his Father to walk into an uncertain future. Jesus left home to bring us home; until we arrive and are welcomed to this place, we live by faith and not by sight.
