THE FAITH OF JESUS

THE FAITH OF THE SUPREME WITNESS

HEBREWS 2:5-13; 11:39—12:1

"Looking unto Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith." —HEBREWS 12:2

            Having illustrated the power of faith from the past Patriarchal and Hebrew economies, the writer of this letter did not urge these Hebrew Christians to take any of those he had mentioned as an example. Their wit­ness is to serve as inspiration, but not as perfect pat­tern.           Seeing the cloud of witnesses the race is to be run; and he wrote to Hebrew Christians, and indeed to all Christians, urging them to run in this self-same race. How is it to be run? "Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of faith." The reason is that only in Him has faith had its full and final interpretation in human history. I am speaking from the standpoint of His human life for the moment.

            Our versions say, "Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher or Perfecter of our faith." I did not read it like that. I missed out one word when I read the lesson and the text. The word our is not in the Greek, and the writer did not say He is the Author and Fin­isher or Perfecter of our faith. I am quite willing to admit that it is wonderfully true that He is the Author of my faith, and I believe by grace He will be the Perfecter of my faith, but that is not what the writer says here. He says He is the Author and Perfecter of faith. He is talking of the principle of faith, and de­claring that is seen in Jesus. I resolutely use the name that the writer of the letter uses, in spite of the view held by some that we ought never to use the name in that way. That is a view with which I have no sym­pathy at all. This writer does not say the Lord Jesus Christ. All that is true, and true of Him. It has re­cently been said when we think of Him we should think with all reverence, and we cannot do so if we say Jesus. I do not understand that conception. I am speaking of Him as this writer does so constantly, Jesus; and in my thinking of Him is everything of awe and reverence.

            The writer of the letter says, "Looking unto Jesus," and the human name is very significant in its interpre­tation in this writing, and especially in this phrase. "Looking unto Jesus, the Author." What is the mean­ing of "Author"? What is the real meaning of the word that the writer used here? It does not mean originator. I will give his word in a literal English translation. It may seem to lose something for the mo­ment. "Looking unto Jesus the File-Leader," that is to say, the One Who takes precedence; the One Who is Head of the great procession, leading it in revelation. As we have tried to follow through this wonderful sec­tion, beginning in the tenth chapter, running through the eleventh, and culminating in the twelfth, we have seen marvelous illustrations of faith. Yes, says the writer, it is a wonderful procession that spans the ages from Abel down, coming to Jesus; but look, and you will see one Personality Who moves past all of them and stands at the head. He is the File-Leader; He is the Author in that sense. He is the File-Leader, the One Who has pre-eminence. And Vindicator, Per­fecter; yes, but the word means the One Who vindicates the principle, the One Who completely reveals it in its working. He is the File-Leader and the One Whose revelation of it in its working is the final vindication of the principle in all human life. These are the techni­calities to which I referred.

            But now glance back with me for a moment. In every illustration mentioned by Paul we see that fear results in failure at certain times and in certain places. Take all those he names and go through those he deals with more particularly, and you will find that there is no single illustration that is perfect. In Abel there is no account of sin or failure, but his blood sacrifice sug­gests his consciousness of failure and imperfection, while at the same time it cancelled it.     Enoch walked with God, but he did not live the perfect life of faith, for the first sixty years he lived on the ordinary and mediocre level of his times. Noah fell into actual sin. Abraham more than once turned aside from the simple pathway of faith. Isaac became degenerate and fleshly. Jacob had to be crippled in order to be finally vic­torious. Joseph was unable to accomplish the deliver­ance he foresaw, and was buried in a coffin in Egypt. Moses was excluded from the land of promise because he spake unadvisedly with his lips. The nation utterly broke down in its testimony to God. Rahab had a past of paganism, so that her life was not wholly complete. Each of the judges named, and all judges, were guilty of faltering, to say the least, at certain points. David committed sin of the deepest dye. The prophets, those wonderful men, faltered often for lack of perfect sym­pathy with God and man; and for the rest, no absolute victory was ever won in individual life, and through all suffering the deepest depth was never reached.

            Therefore, because there has been no perfect illus­tration of the principle, the writer draws attention to One which is perfect and complete and final. "Look­ing unto Jesus." Notice this picture of our Lord occurs in the midst of an injunction.

            "Therefore, let us also, seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses."

            That does not mean people who are watching us, in spite of popular and long continued exposition. When a boy in a small Presbyterian church in Plymouth, Ohio I well remember hearing sermons on that text, and wonderful sermons they would have been if they had been true that it meant this, that we are running a race, and if it does not vulgarize the account, they are stretching over the battlements of heaven, and are watching to see how we do. But they are not watching us. They are witnessing to us, talking to us. The ex­amples of the past are eloquent with force and the fertility of faith.

            "Therefore, . . . seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin that is in good standing around, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us."

            We are not to do so, keeping our eye upon Abel and Enoch and Noah and Abraham! What then are we to do? "Looking unto Jesus." We are to see the wit­nesses; we are to listen to them. We are to listen to the testimony of their lives which gives force and fertility to faith, but we are to look to Him.

            "Looking," to stay again with a technicality. The Greek word is very remarkable. It occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. There are so many words that speak of vision, but this word is peculiar. It has a quantity in it that is in no other word. It has an ad­verbial prefix. I am not familiar with every translation, and only know one—there may be others—that really gives the effect of the Greek word. It is not the Au­thorized or Revised, nor the American Revision. It is not Moffatt, but it is Weymouth's, which, from the standpoint of personal and individual translation, I hold to be the greatest ever done by an individual of the New Testament. How does Weymouth translate? "Looking off unto Jesus." It is a curious thing that little word "off," which is the translation of the prefix. "Looking off," what does it mean? The root idea of the word is one that expresses the fact that there is a vision which will surprise, a vision which will capture, a vision that will master; and it emphasizes what I am trying to say here. We are not to fix our eyes upon the saints of the past either in the old economy or the new. We are to look off from them, "looking off unto Jesus."

            That word is enough to hold us for a long time. I am not going to stay, but there have been times when I have wished that the lives of the saints had never been written. They are often very discouraging. They are not helpful always. They have their values. I have read with great delight the account of Madame Guyon and others of the mystic saints; but they are very disappointing and discouraging. Look off, quit looking at these saints of the past. Quit looking at the saints of the Christian era. Quit looking at the saints that you know. Look off; there is one point where the vision may be perfectly satisfied, "Looking off unto Jesus."

            Now, I am not concerned with the whole of the con­text. The picture occurs in the midst of a great in­junction. We have only to do with the picture itself. "Looking off unto Jesus." He is presented definitely, but He is qualified. Our vision has to be limited. We are to look at Him in a certain way. How? We are to see Him as the File-Leader of faith; and we are to see Him as the Vindicator of faith. Already I feel that this marvelous page, with Abel and Enoch and Noah and Abraham and David, and all of them, fades into in­significance. Let us try to do three things quite briefly; first of all ponder this description of Jesus, then consider in the context the consciousness of Jesus which produces the picture; and finally note—not staying with it—the victory of Jesus resulting from the facts revealed in the picture and the consciousness.

            Of faith He is the File-Leader. I need hardly stay longer with that, but it is the arresting fact. If we glance back again at the others, we see Abel worship­ping, and Enoch walking, and Noah working by faith in God. Now look at Jesus as Worshipper, as the One Who walked with God, as One Who worked with God; and we see at once how He moves to the head of the procession. He is the File-Leader.

            We looked at Abraham, that great figure, and we noticed as we did his obedience, his obtaining, and his offering; and then we turn our eyes off, and look at Jesus, marking His obedience, His obtaining and His offering. We looked at Isaac, and at the highest mo­ments his faith was passive. The faith of Jesus was peaceful but never passive, but active. We looked at Jacob. He was restless, and he had to be pulled up again and again. Never so with Jesus. He was always active, but never restless. Joseph at last is embalmed and put in a coffin. So is Jesus buried, but the grave could not hold Him because of what He had been in life, and what He had wrought in life, by faith. Moses was exiled from the land. Jesus entered into full pos­session, and even brought Moses to

"Stand with glory wrapt around On the hills he never trod,

And speak of the strife that won our life

With the Incarnate Son of God."

            The judges were, dictators, but how incompetent they were. The king, the one named, stands out great in many ways in leadership and as a shepherd: but when we begin to compare him with "great David's greater Son!" The prophets were forth-tellers, but not one of them, or the whole of them could speak the whole truth of God. Jesus did, He was the File-Leader of faith.

            But take the other statement, not only the File-Leader, but the Perfecter, which I prefer to render Vindicator. By all that has been seen in the contrast between Him and those named; by all that has been seen He is pre-eminent in His vindication of faith as a principle. There we might stay for a long time. Faith in Jesus moved from a center out into the circumfer­ence as it always must, and as it always does in measure. But let us confine ourselves to this thought first of all, faith in God. I am not going to argue that. Read the whole account of Jesus, and we find His faith never wavered, and was characterized by true depend­ence upon God. What My Father gives Me that I do. His faith in God never wavered for a moment.

            And that meant faith in man. Faith in man? I do not know what your opinion of man is. I do not ask for your opinion of yourself, or even of your friends, but your general conception of man. What do you think of man? I will not ask you to tell me. I will ask you to ask yourself, and answer it. Whatever you think of man, Jesus thought he was worth dying for. The cross forevermore is the interpretation of Jesus of the value of man. What does God see in me? What does Christ see in me? The hallmark of the Divine, the possibility of human nature. He saw it beneath all the ruin and sin and shame and pollution. He be­lieved in man. Believing in God, He believed in man. He believed in final perfection brought about by His threefold work.

            And His faith finally was not only in God and man; it was faith in the future. He asked us to pray that God’s Kingdom should come. You cannot find me any­thing, not a single note in all the sayings of Jesus, or in His outlook, which reveals pessimism. He believed in the future. With august dignity in His final discourses, His prophetic discourses, He looked forward to that day when He would be the Judge, and the nations should be gathered before Him. He was not going to the Cross to fail but to win. "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto myself."

            Faith in the future, the Vindicator of faith. How did we start our articles? With the confident declara­tion of the principle of life in the words, "My righteous one shall live by faith." Faith that He shall bring you to that point when you shall see Him as He is. He vindicated that principle, vindicated it in every way.

            Let us press this a little, and ask how do we account for such a victory of faith? That is why I said before we need a little of the context.

            "Looking unto Jesus, the author and Perfecter of faith, who"—now he is going to tell us the secret of His victory—"who for the joy that was set before him." That is the first thing. What is the next?

            "Endured the Cross, despising the shame." What is the last thing? "And hath sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." What an unveiling of the inner consciousness of Jesus, and what faith meant to Him.

            First of all, "For the joy that was set before him." Faith, as we saw at the very beginning, is confidence in things hoped for. Jesus had the clear vision of things the triune Godhead hoped for; and the joy that was set before Him to bring it about, what was it? The joy that filled the heart of Abraham when he left Ur of Chaldea, and went to seek a city, a coun­try, the establishment of the city of God. Jesus went to win back the earth in its sin and wandering, and the joy set before Him was not His return to Heaven, but the fact that His return would be one of triumph, hav­ing accomplished the divine purpose. "The joy set before him."

            Yes, but there is the shining of the ultimate glory, and the deep and profound assurance filling His heart of the final victory, there is a pathway to be trodden. “I have a baptism to be baptized with," He said, "and how am I straitened till it be accomplished." He en­dured the Cross, and perhaps the more reverently we leave that and say little about it the better. He endured the Cross. The Cross was a dreadful thing, a shameful thing. It was the death of a felon. It was a disgrace. "Despising the shame," do you know any phrase taken in its setting, more full of infinite majesty and splendor than that? "Despising the shame." Too often we perhaps have endured the shame, and I do not say, despised the Cross, but forgotten it. He en­dured the Cross, despising the shame. That was His consciousness; faith, things hoped for; the promise, faith in things unseen, God. He endured as seeing Him Who is invisible, and as the Rewarder of those who seek after Him; and in the strength of the former He endured the Cross and despised the shame.

            So we reach the culminating word, "He sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." His task was finished perfectly. Try to write that sentence at the close of the sentences of any of those names. Take the finest and the outstanding, Abraham. He sat down at the right hand of the throne of God? He could not do it. It would be impossible to do it. That can only be said of Jesus. Of no other could it be declared as the issue of personal triumph. In Him seated there faith has its last and unanswerable argument in a world such as this, and for pilgrims such as we are.

            "Looking off." That is where I finish. "Looking off." God turn our eyes away from beholding man and men, the highest and the noblest and the best. If we look there we shall sooner or later be disappointed. If we look at ourselves we shall be worse than disap­pointed. "Looking off," see the witnesses. Yes, they are there, they are talking to us, they are speaking to us. See them, and then stop looking at them. "Look­ing off unto Jesus."

            Well, if we do that, then what? I go back where I read at the beginning, "We see not yet all things sub­jected to him." That does not mean to Jesus. That means to man. The writer is quoting from the Psalm on the glory and dignity of man, that God had put all things under the foot of man. That is his place in the cosmic order. The writer says we do not see that yet. We do not see all things put under him.

            Well, is not that disappointing? No. Why not? We see Jesus, "we behold him." We behold the One Who is "crowned with glory and honor, that he should taste death for every man." That is the guarantee of the ultimate victory. That life of faith led Him all the way to Calvary; and in the mystery of that dying, faith is forevermore vindicated, His faith in God, in man, and in the future; and our faith in Him. "Looking off."

            I hope our articles in these great illustrations have not been without value, but do not stay with them, do not linger with them. Hear their message, and quit the business of looking at them. "Looking off unto Jesus." The Despot is not yet acknowledged but He shall be. Every knee shall bow.