The Supreme Climb

He said, ’Take now your son . . .’ —Genesis 22:2

God’s command is, “Take now,” not later. It is incredible how we debate! We know something is right, but we try to find excuses for not doing it immediately. If we are to climb to the height God reveals, it can never be done later— it must be done now. And the sacrifice must be worked through our will before we actually perform it.

“So Abraham rose early in the morning . . . and went to the place of which God had told him” (Genesis 22:3). Oh, the wonderful simplicity of Abraham! When God spoke, he did not “confer with flesh and blood” (Galatians 1:16). Beware when you want to “confer with flesh and blood” or even your own thoughts, insights, or understandings— anything that is not based on your personal relationship with God. These are all things that compete with and hinder obedience to God.

Abraham did not choose what the sacrifice would be. Always guard against self-chosen service for God. Self-sacrifice may be a disease that impairs your service. If God has made your cup sweet, drink it with grace; or even if He has made it bitter, drink it in communion with Him. If the providential will of God means a hard and difficult time for you, go through it. But never decide the place of your own martyrdom, as if to say, “I will only go to there, but no farther.” God chose the test for Abraham, and Abraham neither delayed nor protested, but steadily obeyed. If you are not living in touch with God, it is easy to blame Him or pass judgment on Him. You must go through the trial before you have any right to pronounce a verdict, because by going through the trial you learn to know God better. God is working in us to reach His highest goals until His purpose and our purpose become one.

my utmost for his highest

The Unrivaled Power of Prayer

We do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered —Romans 8:26

We realize that we are energized by the Holy Spirit for prayer; and we know what it is to pray in accordance with the Spirit; but we don’t often realize that the Holy Spirit Himself prays prayers in us which we cannot utter ourselves. When we are born again of God and are indwelt by the Spirit of God, He expresses for us the unutterable.

“He,” the Holy Spirit in you, “makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God” (Romans 8:27). And God searches your heart, not to know what your conscious prayers are, but to find out what the prayer of the Holy Spirit is.

The Spirit of God uses the nature of the believer as a temple in which to offer His prayers of intercession. “. . . your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit . . .” (1 Corinthians 6:19). When Jesus Christ cleansed the temple, “. . . He would not allow anyone to carry wares through the temple” (Mark 11:16). The Spirit of God will not allow you to use your body for your own convenience. Jesus ruthlessly cast out everyone who bought and sold in the temple, and said, “My house shall be called a house of prayer . . . . But you have made it a ’den of thieves’ ” (Mark 11:17).

Have we come to realize that our “body is the temple of the Holy Spirit”? If so, we must be careful to keep it undefiled for Him. We have to remember that our conscious life, even though only a small part of our total person, is to be regarded by us as a “temple of the Holy Spirit.” He will be responsible for the unconscious part which we don’t know, but we must pay careful attention to and guard the conscious part for which we are responsible.

my utmost for his highest

Is faith in God a blind leap into the unknown?

Hebrews 11

IDEA: Faith is often misunderstood as being much less than a dynamic trust in the living God.

PURPOSE: To help listeners identify false definitions of faith that can trip them up.

Christians can stumble over Hebrews 11 because they have some misconceptions of what faith is. George Guthrie examines some misconceptions about faith which can trip us up. He notes two that are often found in the broader non-Christian culture.

I. Some misunderstand faith as “a blind leap into the unknown.”

Some Christians and those who are hostile to religion may think that faith is the antithesis of scientific endeavor.

They reason that a true scientist cannot be a person of faith because scientists are grounded in facts.

Even people in the broader culture who are sympathetic to religious belief often see faith as a warm-hearted step into the black cavernous hole of our hopes and dreams.

“You’ve just got to have faith” often means “you’ve got to act contrary to all that you know to be true and trust that things are going to work out the way you want them to.”

II. Others understand faith as “a life of reflective devotion to any god one happens to follow.”
The statement “She is a person of deep faith” is often applied equally to a follower of Buddha, Krishna, or Christ. Thus faith is synonymous with a generalized “spirituality.”

In contrast to the Christian misconception of faith as equaling creed, this definition of faith suggests that a particular set of beliefs is unimportant. What matters is sincerity and maybe a commitment that transforms the person into a more purposeful, loving individual.

Conclusion:
None of these approaches to faith does justice to the dynamic, challenging portrait of authentic Christian faith as we find it in Hebrews 11. This chapter, when we read it carefully, eclipses the false visions of faith, showing their inadequacy.

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