CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 11
The importance of faith, as presented here, is that it brought in the light of the world to come. It is this that Hebrews has in view all through. The practical working of it is that when saints got the light of another world, they gave up this world and were pilgrims and strangers in it. Then we get faith in perfection in chapter 12. There is a world to come, and a city. Abraham looked for a city, he dwelt in a tent, but he looked for what pledged a fixed established order of things — a city. It is an important principle: the moment sin came in, this world was rejected, and what God had before Him was another world in view of which He has been working, although He has gone on patiently with this world for six thousand years. “The world to come” is in full view to us, we have full light on it now. Wherever faith has been, saints have always had a glimpse of light as to the world to come.
Creation is brought in first in chapter 11 to show its connection with the word of God, that God has created the universe as a theatre for the display of His ways. Scientists are in their thought of things too material. ‘Framed’ does not give the idea of a system of evolution. “Things that are seen were [p. 474] not made of things which do appear”. Its present form was given to the earth in the beginning of Genesis. What is called the six days of creation was not strictly creation. It was the moulding of what had been created into its present form. Perhaps there was some modification of it after the flood. The earth was set in relation to the sun and moon on the fourth day. The great point to me is that it was framed by the word of God to be the theatre for the display of His ways. His word here is His utterance.
The ‘elders’ are the men who are referred to throughout this chapter as illustrating the principle of faith. What came out through Abel was acceptance on the ground of sacrifice. All the blessing in the world to come is based on sacrifice. It would not have been suitable, I think, to bring in Adam in this chapter. He was before God on the ground of innocence, and the ruin came in through him, and recovery does not come in by the same one. It was through the Seed of the woman that recovery came in.
It has been the pleasure of God all along to give insight into the principles of the world to come. ‘World to come’ takes in, I think, the heavenly and the earthly, for we get the heavenly city. The world to come is put under the Son of man, He who tasted death for everything. As to what Abel had or knew, that is not the point — the principle goes beyond this.
Enoch gives the heavenly part of the world to come — the church, and Noah the earthly — the Jews saved through the judgment. ‘Ark’ is derived from a word meaning ‘covering’. No flesh was seen in the flood; it was either drowned, or covered in the ark. You must not be seen in your nakedness before God, but God has provided a covering. Noah preached righteousness, for God never brings judgment in without first giving a testimony — it is not His way.†
†See Introduction for further remarks on chapter 11.