Heb 11 Expectation & Endurance

And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. — Hebrews 11:6

 

How do we have faith that is both expecting and enduring? The analogy to a race highlights how these two aspects of faith seem to be in opposition, especially when they are applied to having faith in God for a particular outcome in our lives. Expectant faith is anticipating that God will reward us with what we are seeking from Him, what we are trusting Him for in our lives. This could be what we need for our own welfare, or it could be what we need to be effective for His kingdom in our place of work. It is a faith that expects to experience God's power in answered prayer. It is a faith that is focused on a finish line of the provision from God that we are seeking.

Enduring faith is needed when what we are seeking from God is not forthcoming. It is because the finish line is further off that we need to endure. It is a faith that is focused on the rest of the race before the finish line.

Last blog I looked at the problem if we overemphasize expectant faith and do not take into account the need for enduring faith. One response to this problem is to swing the other way and camp out on enduring faith. This would be when you do not trust God to operate in the circumstances of your life (including your work life), but rather trust Him for a future in heaven. Your faith in God, His goodness, sovereignty and power, endures, but you do not expect to experience His goodness, sovereignty and power in your work life. This protects you from the disappointment and disillusionment of anticipating a finish line that does not happen. But if the finish line of experiencing God's power is only in the future of heaven, then is your life a race at all? Or are you just out for a jog?

It is difficult to understand how to run a race when we do not know where the finish line is. And that seems to be our situation when it comes to trusting God for actual outcomes. Hebrews 11 highlights this with its list of people of faith who triumph in extraordinary ways by the power of God (11:32-35a) followed by a list of people who suffer and are afflicted (11:35b-38) who "though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised" (11:39). And we see this elsewhere in the New Testament. In Luke 7 the story of the widow receiving her son back from the dead is followed by the scene with John the Baptist languishing in prison where he will eventually be executed.

Somehow we need to operate with both aspects of faith, expectation and endurance. Perhaps this is one of those areas of the Christian life where we are not clear on what the path looks like, but we have more clarity on the ditches to avoid on either side. In this case, the ditches would be an over-emphasis on either expectation or endurance, to the neglect of the other. A key consideration of this path between two ditches image…it is when we are only focused on the danger of one ditch that we are more likely to fall into the other ditch.

Are you walking by faith about something related to your work? What does it look like to walk by expectant faith and enduring faith?