Hebrews 11:4-16

⁴By faith …. without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. …

⁸By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. ⁹By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. ¹⁰For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. …  ¹²And 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.¹³All 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. … Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

Seeing with Night Vision

What is more important here – the faith of these people so long ago or the result: that God prepared a city for them? I am going to focus on just one of these great pillars of faith and think about it. In Genesis 15:1-5 God and Abraham have a conversation. Abraham is childless and quite old and yet God said, “look at the stars and number them” and promised that Abraham would have as many offspring as the stars. When you add the number of Jews to all the Christians, this prophecy has been fulfilled. Abraham believed this promise of God, even though it was humanly impossible, and it was “credited to him as righteousness”.

Have you realized that night skies allow us to see more? We can see Andromeda which is 2.5 million light years away whereas we can only see about 62 miles / 100km, during the day. Nighttime is when we can focus on other things without what might distract us (busy-ness) during the day, yet it can also bring us to a difficult place of introspection. This is often when we can change and when we can hear God better. Maybe God is calling us to look at the stars and see what he might have for us this Lenten season. What has he promised you that you have either forgotten or “put on the back burner” because it seems humanly impossible?

What for sure is promised to us all, is the city described in the verses above. The pillars of faith believed in that city, and we believe, too. As N.T. Wright puts it, “heaven and earth will one day come together and be transparent to each other.” (Simply Jesus p. 202) Imagine!

Maybe you feel like you do not have much faith today, or most days. Ask for some (or some more) and, like Abraham, move in the direction of The Promise as if it has already happened. Live like Jesus came to earth, lived, died and rose and is seated with the Father and that he is coming again. That is faith!

Prayer: Lord, I hold on to your promises, even though I may be weary in waiting, perhaps heart-sick with deferred hope. Capture my imagination. Give me faith to believe you. Today I sit in the dark and search for the stars.*  Amen.

* Ideas and prayer taken from a Lectio 365 Devotional on Dec. 5, 2023