FOREIGNERS AND STRANGERS

And by faith even Sarah, who was past childbearing age, was enabled to bear children because she considered Him faithful who had made the promise. And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore. All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own (Heb. 11: 11-14).

Although the heroes of faith obeyed God and received many promises while they were still on earth, the writer implied that their faith held onto something even bigger than earthly things. The promises they inherited here were only temporal and passing away.  Something better awaited them when they passed from this life.

Their salvation rested on the sacrifice of Jesus as surely as it does for those who have lived on this side of the cross but they knew that there were promises awaiting them and died trusting that God would honour His promises beyond death.

If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country – a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them (Heb. 11: 15-16).

This was the crux of their faith in God – the long look – a sense of eternity that saw the bigger picture. They were willing to endure the hardships of this life because they knew that death was not the end. Solomon also recognised that there was something more to man than just physical life.

He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from the beginning (Eccl. 3: 11)

In spite of people’s desire to escape accountability to God by denying His existence or by denying an afterlife, we cannot snuff out what God has written into us from the beginning. He created Adam for eternal fellowship with Himself. Adam’s sin disrupted our unity with God but He was not finished with us. He had already set in motion His solution before He blew life into Adam’s inert form.

Both Abraham and Sarah came out of their pagan origins to trust in the one true God as He spoke to them and led them from Ur to Canaan. He drew out their faith by His faithfulness to them so that it became easier and easier to follow His instructions and entrust themselves and their future to Him.

But they knew that not even Canaan was their final home. Just as they lived in tents as nomads in the land of promise, so they also understood that they were nomads in this life. They had no permanent dwelling here. Their permanent home with God awaited their relocation to a better place, where the sin and suffering of this world would be no more. Had their permanent home been back in Ur, said the writer, they could have returned, but they didn’t.

How important it is for us the hold on to God’s promise as well! If we only live for this life, we will wake up with a shock when we leave these mortal tents behind to find that we have made no preparation for the life to come. This life is an apprenticeship for the next. God has given us many clues regarding what He expects of us here. One of them, and we miss this one, is how we exercise our stewardship of the resources God has lent to us in this life. Jesus gives us a clear directive for this one:

Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much; and whoever is dishonest with very little will be dishonest with much. So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else’s property, who will give you property of your own? (Luke 16: 10-12).

Like Abraham and Sarah, the proof of our faith is obedience to God’s instructions. When we do what He says, we declare our love for Him. We confirm our confidence in His promises and we await with anticipation the fullness of life in His kingdom forever, beyond the grave. Like Abraham, we know that God has prepared a dwelling place for us with Him that far outstrips any city or mansion here on earth.

For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling because, when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life (2 Cor. 5: 1-4).

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

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