The year is 1810. You are one of the parents of four daughters; your youngest, Ann, nicknamed Nancy, is 21. One day you receive a letter from a young man you met only one month previously, asking to begin a courtship of Ann.

That’s not surprising – she is attractive, outgoing, and highly intelligent. But no parent has ever received a request for courtship quite like this one. Let me quote:

I have now to ask, whether you can consent to part with your daughter early next Spring, to see her no more in this world; whether you can consent to her departure for a heathen land, and her subjection to the hardships and sufferings of missionary life; whether you can consent to her exposure to the dangers of the ocean; to the fatal influence of the southern climate of India; to every kind of want and distress; to degradation, insult, persecution, and perhaps a violent death. Can you consent to all this, for the sake of Him who left His heavenly home and died for her and for you; for the sake of perishing, immortal souls; for the sake of Zion, and the glory of God? Can you consent to all this, in hope of soon meeting your daughter in the world of glory with a crown of righteousness, brightened by the acclamations of praise which shall redound to her Savior from the heathens saved, through her means, from eternal woe and despair? (emphasis added)

The request came from Adoniram Judson. Ann’s parents were John and Rebecca Hasseltine.

If you were John or Rebecca: How would you respond? Would you say no? Why? Would you say yes? Why?

How does faith in God – the God of the promises – influence your answer?

Every day we make decisions – on big, important matters, like marriage, and on small, seemingly trivial matters, like what to say to the checkout clerk at the grocery store.

Scripture tells us:

• Make every decision, even trivial ones, to the glory of God.
• Make every decision, even trivial ones, on the basis of faith in the promise-keeping God.
• Make every decision, even trivial ones, by faith and not by sight.

So following Scripture – by faith, not by sight, to the glory of God – what answer would you give Adoniram?

This is our fourth sermon on this great eleventh chapter of the book of Hebrews. This chapter highlights how God has worked through the centuries to fulfill His promises, how He has raised up men and women of faith to trust in Him, to trust in those promises; how He has used them to advance His great plan of redemption, all culminating in Jesus – who Himself is the supreme man of faith. If we have faith in Him, we will join all these mentioned in Hebrews 11 at the culmination of God’s plans when Jesus reigns over His eternal kingdom.

Last week, we began discussing Abraham and Sarah. God calls Abraham to leave comfort, security, and family, to go he knows not where. God promises Him that in his offspring, all the families of the earth will be blessed. Later God elaborates: Abraham’s descendants will be as many as the stars in the heavens. God had earlier promised the first woman, Eve, that her descendant would crush the head of the serpent, Satan. Abraham’s descendant will fulfill both promises.

So, by faith in God, trusting in God’s promises, Abraham goes out – and never has a permanent dwelling again.

But He has promises of God – and he makes sure those around him know: the world not his home. God will bring him to a homeland, an eternal city – with foundations!

As time goes on, Abraham and Sarah must believe the seemingly impossible promise that a 90 year old woman way past the possibility of getting pregnant will give birth to a son.

God does give them their son Isaac in their old age. And God does fulfill the promise to Abraham and the promise to Eve through Isaac. For Jesus is Isaac’s physical descendant. Satan’s power is broken at the cross and the empty tomb, and Jesus will crush that serpent’s head on the last day. God is bringing those from every tribe and tongue and people and nation to His family by faith in Jesus. All those in Christ are Abraham’s children through that faith. Isaac is the child of the promise.

Today we consider an event that takes place when Isaac is about 13. God tells Abraham once again to leave his home and go where He will show him – but the problem this time is not in what he must leave; it is in what he must do. “Offer as a burnt offering your son, your only son, whom you love.” John and Rebecca Hasseltine were asked to say goodbye to their precious daughter, knowing they likely would never see her again. But Abraham had to raise the knife to kill his beloved son: “By faith, Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac” (Hebrews 11:17).

We’ll consider our text – Hebrews 11:17-22 – under three headings:

Faith in God’s Promised Future (verses 20-22)

Radical Obedience that Comes from Faith (verses 17-19)

Five Exhortations

Faith in God’s Promised Future

By faith Isaac invoked future blessings on Jacob and Esau. By faith Jacob, when dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, bowing in worship over the head of his staff. By faith Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones. (Hebrews 11:20-22)

Isaac blesses his twin sons Jacob and Esau in weird circumstances, as recorded in Genesis 27; Jacob in turn blesses his grandsons through Joseph after worshiping God, as recorded in Genesis 47 and 48; the dying Joseph speaks of the exodus from Egypt, asking that the Israelites take his bones with them when they leave.

We see clearly that Abraham can only offer Isaac as a sacrifice by faith. But in what sense are these acts by faith?

We all wish our children to be blessed. We all pray for our children to be blessed. Some of us make requests for what becomes of our bodies, or our ashes, after we die.

So what’s unusual or different about what Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph do? Why does the author of Hebrews mention them here, in this way?

Because they are not just stating wishes. They are not just making requests. They are not simply praying. They are trusting in the God who has promised!

Remember, God reiterated his promise to Abraham to both Isaac and Jacob: God promises Isaac: “I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and will give to your offspring all these lands. And in your offspring all the nations of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 26:4). So by faith Isaac entrusted that promise to Jacob. God promises Jacob: “Your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed” (Genesis 28:14). By faith, Jacob entrusted part of that promise to Joseph’s sons.

And what about Joseph? Remember, the entire family want to Egypt during Joseph’s day. Joseph says to his brothers:

“I am about to die, but God will visit you and bring you up out of this land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” Then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here.” (Genesis 50:24-25)

How did Joseph know that the Israelites will leave Egypt?

Back in Genesis 15, God had said to Abraham: “Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out” (Genesis 15:13-14)

Abraham undoubtedly had passed that promise down from generation to generation. So Joseph knows that though he is the second most powerful ruler in Egypt, his descendants will be oppressed. And one day, hundreds of years in the future, God will bring them out. So he – the one who brought the family to Egypt – wants his remains to leave Egypt. God has promised. The exodus will come about.

Recall Hebrews 11:1 and 6:

“Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen” (CSB). “Whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.”

Furthermore, “It is impossible for God to lie” (Hebrews 6:18).

So: Isaac could bless Jacob, Jacob could bless Joseph’s sons, and Joseph could speak of the exodus and his bones because God had promised. They had faith in the God Who promises, Who fulfills every promise.

What is equivalent for us? What does this type of faith look like for us?

We can hold just so surely to the promises God gives us. Indeed, we can bless children and grandchildren in a similar way. Sure, we can pray for health, for marriage, for happiness, for career success for them. But we don’t trust in those by faith, for God does not promise anyone healthy, successful lives.

But what does God promise?

• He promises that In Christ, He will provide everything needed for them to fulfil His purposes and to become like Jesus.
• He promises that in Christ, He will be our shepherd –we need fear no evil, for He will be with us
• He promises that In Christ, He is our strength and our shield –men who will die can do nothing against Him
• He promises that In Christ – He will work all things together to glorify Himself through us, to conform us to His image, and to bring us safely to His eternal Kingdom

As the Apostle Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 1:20, by faith, we know that all the promises of God are yes in Christ Jesus. So we can pray for these and other promises to be fulfilled in our children, by faith confident that God will fulfill them all if those children are in Christ.

God controls the future. His promises reveal how He will act in the future. Nothing can divert Him from fulfilling those promises. So we can speak to others of these promises with confidence.

Let’s now see how these ideas inform our understanding of Abraham’s offering of Isaac as a sacrifice.

Radical Obedience that Comes from Faith

By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son, of whom it was said, “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.” He considered (or “reckoned” or “reasoned”) that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back. (Hebrews 11:17-19)

Abraham not only received the promises (verse 17), he “embraced” them (NIV). He loved them. He reminded himself of them. They were most precious to Him.

Like Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph in verses 20-22, Abraham knows that God controls the future and that He has spoken of the future. Abraham trusts in the promise of the promiser.

Furthermore, God has proven Himself faithful to Abraham. God has already done the impossible, granting new life in a dead womb, just as He had promised. And God had told Abraham in Genesis 17:19, “I will establish my covenant with [Isaac] as an everlasting covenant for his offspring after him.” So when God says: “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you” (Genesis 22:2), Abraham “considered,” “reckoned,” or “reasoned” thus: God brought Isaac into being when there was no human hope for a child; He can bring Isaac back to life when he is dead. We see this confidence in Genesis 22:5, when Abraham says to his servants, “I and the boy will … come again to you” (emphasis added).

You see? There is no way that the God who controls the future, the God who is faithful to His every promise, will let Isaac remain dead. He has promised Abraham as many descendants as the stars through Isaac; He has promised to bless all the families of the nations through Isaac. So Isaac must have descendants. Isaac must live.

God’s promise to Abraham was that certain. So Abraham displays this radical obedience

What about you and me? How do we display similar radical obedience by faith?

Five Exhortations

The first provides the foundation for the other four:

1) Know God’s promises

Know what God has promised. Know what He has not promised.

Many in the worldwide church think God has promised what He has not. When He then does not fulfill what He has not promised, many lose their faith in what He has promised.

Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph knew what God had truly promised; by faith, they acted on those promises. We must do the same: Know the promises from Scripture; memorize the promises; hold fast to the promises; act, trusting in those promises.

2) Trust God’s promises

We can know God’s promises and yet not trust them. We can say, “Yes, God works all things together for the good of those who love Him,” and the next minute get angry and upset because someone cuts us off in traffic.

So trust – that God is my shepherd; I shall not lack anything pertaining to life and godliness. I need fear no evil, for He is with me. Goodness and lovingkindness will pursue me all the days of my life. I will dwell in house of Lord forever. God will supply all my needs in accordance with His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

3) Help one another to trust God’s promises

This is one key purpose of the church, one key way we spur one another on to love and good works (Hebrews 10:24-25). Remind one another of the promises; encourage one another with the promises; tell one another of God’s faithfulness to His promises.

4) Like Abraham: Follow God even when it makes no earthly sense– because you can trust in His promises

That’s the radical obedience that comes from faith.

5) Follow God, trusting in His promises today

If we look ahead to next week and next year and future decades, trusting God can seem overwhelming. We can imagine all sorts of problems, dangers, and disappointments that might occur.

But God doesn’t give us the grace today to trust Him tomorrow. He gives us grace today to trust Him today. Indeed, we can’t trust Him for tomorrow today; we can only trust Him for today today.

So Jesus tells us – don’t worry. Ask God for what you need for that day. His mercies are new every morning. Seek first His Kingdom, and know that all you need for that Kingdom will be added to you. Don’t be anxious for tomorrow; trust God today for today’s troubles (see Matthew 6:24-34, Lamentations 3:22-24).

Conclusion

We left John and Rebecca Hasseltine with the decision: Do they allow Adoniram Judson to court their youngest daughter Ann?

They gave their consent. Adoniram and Ann were married about 18 months later, and almost immediately sailed for India, eventually ending up in Burma.

Ann never returned. She never saw her family again. Indeed, during the next 13 years, Ann and Adoniram suffered horrible hardships. They were blessed with children, but all of them died in infancy. Ann and Adoniram were separated almost as much as they were together, frequently not knowing if the other was still alive. Adoniram suffered a lengthy imprisonment in terrible conditions; he would have died had Ann not come and ministered to him in the prison.

Then, during one of their lengthy separations, Ann became ill and died. She had not seen her husband for 3 1/2 months. Four weeks passed before news of her death reached Adoniram.

Was God faithful to His promises?

Adoniram and Ann knew that He was.

Go back to Adoniram’s letter asking for permission to court her. He didn’t downplay the dangers and hardships – rather he enumerated them. He asked for John and Rebecca’s consent for the sake of Jesus, who sacrificed Himself, for the sake of immortal souls, who would come to faith in Jesus, for the glory of God, in the hope of their meeting Ann again in that promised Kingdom, after she had been used by God to bring others to faith.

God fulfilled those promises.

Ann Judson’s life was hard – exceptionally hard. And God glorified His Name through her. He remained her ever present help in trouble. He fulfilled His purposes in her. He brought her safely to His heavenly Kingdom.

God works the same way today – for all those in Christ Jesus.

So believe in Jesus. Believe in the God who promises. Believe – and, trusting, step out in radical obedience.

For He controls the future.

[This sermon was preached November 8, 2020. The audio of the sermon and video of the entire service are available at this link. The recorded service is available via Youtube at this link. For more on Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac, listen to these two sermons from 2004 on Genesis 22: first, second.]