For when God made a promise to Abraham, since He had no one greater by whom to swear, He swore by Himself…
Hebrews 6:13-20
We may well be living in the most anti-intellectual era in the history of the church and, it goes back as far as the Enlightenment, when the guns of intellectual criticism were aimed against Christianity. Believers, then as well as today, came to see reason as a tool of the enemies of their faith and, so, they want nothing to do with reason. Given this state of affairs, the concept of faith that is preached mostly today could be preceded by the word blind. The church telling the world that it must accept the Gospel “by faith” apart from any reasonable foundations does violence to God, the fountainhead of all truth; to God the Son, the incarnation of the truth; and to the Holy Spirit of truth. Faith is “blind” only if the object of that faith is untrustworthy, and that faith is foolishness. Christians place their faith in God, who is trustworthy indeed, powerfully demonstrated Genesis 15 with Abraham. Abraham took God at His word, trusting His promise of a son. But, when God mentioned His other great promise to Abraham, the land of Canaan, Abraham asked for a sign to strengthen his faith, and God graciously responded. He instructed Abraham to bring animals cut in two pieces, and to arrange the pieces. Then, a smoking oven and a burning torch, symbolizing God, appeared and passed through the pieces. In that ancient culture, this was a covenant ceremony. God was saying that He would allow Himself to be ripped asunder before He would allow His promises to Abraham to fail. Our verses today say that God swore by Himself because there was no one greater than Himself by whom He could swear. God put His deity behind His promises, His eternal being. God cannot die and God cannot lie. Faith in a God who will so swear is not blind faith. All that He has and all that He is He put on the line as guarantee for His word. God will not let it fail. God is totally trustworthy. Do you believe that all sin is, at its root, unbelief? When we sin, we are disbelieving God’s testimony in His Word that sin brings grief, pain, and separation from Him. By contrast, obedience is rooted in trust that God’s prescribed ways are best. Ask God today and every day for grace to see Him as absolutely trustworthy. Then, obey God.
Source: S C Ball April 2, 2024
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