Faith (that believes) in the Not-Yet
Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16, Luke 12: 32-34
BELIEVE. Seven big blue letters, all caps. Handwritten on a piece of yellow construction paper and taped in the locker room with athletic tape. The sign has been a symbol of the show, Ted Lasso, since it began. One of the first things Coach Lasso did when he took over at AFC Richmond (an English football club on the outskirts of London), was tape that sign over the door to his office. The team at AFC Richmond had a hard transition when Ted came on as coach. He didn’t know much about English football having been a college coach of what we know as football. The Richmond football club had very little confidence in him. But he did know there was more to understand about being on a team than X’s and O’s and fundamentals. So, he put the sign above his office door to say, if we’re going to work together and be successful, it starts here. BELIEVE.
Have you been on a team, a faculty, a group project that didn’t believe in what they were doing? Or didn’t have faith to believe they could pull off a win, or get the job done successfully? Those are hard seasons. We call them “rebuilding years" which means it’s a not-yet season. Might be a winning team one day, but not yet. Might impress someone with the outcome of this project eventually, but not yet.
Ever had a personal rebuilding year? The life I was hoping for has not unfolded as I expected. Not yet. “Not yet” means there is some hope. IN each “not yet” uttered, there is possibility, there is at least a smidge of belief.
Today, I want us to acknowledge the places in our lives, families, minds, hearts that are shut down and closed off to the possibility that God is at work. What hope have you long given up on? What idea have you postponed trying so many times, you’ve nearly forgotten it? What vision needs resuscitating? What is the dream that you can’t make yourself believe in (anymore)?[1]
The heroes and heroines named in the Hebrews text today are championed for their faith that has upheld them through the not-yet seasons of their lives. Chapter 11 reads like a sermon[2]. I’m going to borrow Thom Long’s title for the writer of this passage. He calls him The Preacher. But the truth is, we don’t know who wrote Hebrews. There is more certainly about who it’s not that who it is. It is not believed to have been written by the apostle Paul. Only God knows for sure. That being said, scholars are also unsure exactly to whom it has been written.
This kind of uncertainty bothers people who read the bible in order to form a set of “correct” beliefs (with an F). But if you read the bible in order to find “meaning” then there is plenty of that in store for you in this passage. Believe me: God desires our TRUST more than our correct beliefs.[3] Moving on…
The Preacher knows his audience. His listeners are longing to be in a better place. They desire something more, something better. They have grown weary in the faith, caught up in the challenges of their day. They’ve endured intimidation, duress from external sources. Their property has been confiscated (ch. 10:32-34).[4] So, they live as migrants not settling anywhere. They seem to feel less confident and lack conviction to keep going.
So, the Preacher reminds them of their wayfaring ancestors who were much like them: Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Jacob, Abel, Enoch and Noah. The Preacher is reminding them that like our Weatherly forbears who we celebrated earlier this summer at our 60th anniversary, the generations who came before us also had to face and overcome threats to peace, civil unrest, political divisions. Sixty years ago the Viet Nam war was escalating and Bloody Sunday happened in Selma. There was plenty to agonize over in the parking lots and hallways of the church. Our human tendency is to believe the challenges of our time are particularly difficult or momentous. But the truth is, every community goes through seasons of hardship, conflict, discouragement. The letter to the Hebrews was written to people going through that kind of season. So, the Preacher reminds his hearers they are not alone. That’s the living word for us, too.
Hebrews is a call to faith and a word of encouragement to all of us who may not feel like we are winning at Christianity, right now.
When the preacher says, “By faith Abraham and Sarah… obeyed and set out, not knowing where they were going.” Well, the hearers also recall God’s promises to Abraham that they knew from reading the Torah:
The word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” But Abram said, “O Lord God, what will you give me, for I continue childless, so a servant born in my house is to be my heir?” But the Lord brought him outside and said, “Look…at the stars, if you are able to count them – So shall your descendants be.” And Abram believed the Lord…[5]
Abraham believed. The Lord promised a very old man and his very old wife that they would still have children. Abraham believed–not simply that God was able to pull it off, but he trusted God to pull it off. He was sure that God would fulfill this promise. Peter Enns says it this way, “It’s absolutely fine to say that Abraham “believed,” but only if we control our reflex to push that word into the “what/that” category of our thinking about God and remember it is a WHO word of trust in God.”[6]
“Believing that God is x, y, or z has its place, but it is so easy even a demon can do it. (James 2:19)” The challenge is “moving from your head to your whole self, where your belief is ALL IN – where you trust God.” That is the part we cannot lose sight of when we talk about believing. Believing is a “who” word. It’s about trusting God like Abraham did when he looked to the stars.
Abraham has faith that endures even when all signs are to the contrary.[7] Life with God demands on our part a certain openness and trust - not that God will act, but that God IS already acting.[8] That’s what’s different about the way Abraham lives his life with God. That’s the point the Preacher is trying to make in Hebrews.
Remember how the Preacher started this sermon? Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, and the conviction of things not seen. (11:1)
Abraham’s and Sarah’s story helps us remember and reclaim the miracles of life out of death, of procreation, of the vastness of the cosmos when there was barrenness and emptiness before them both. They made the best of the world they had, even while they longed for a better one. Abraham believed that God was making it happen even before he could see it.
Faith in the Not Yet. Faith that believes in the not yet.
I heard someone say this week, “Faith is not a round-trip.” It’s not a completed journey. It’s open-ended. Some might say faith is an unfinished journey, or unfolding. All of these ancestors the Preacher named were “stirred by the forward look” (THE NOT YET). Abraham and Sarah, Cain, Enoch and Noah. has a forward looking faith. “True faith,” James Earl Massey says, “is characterized by a forward look and an openness to the pull of the future that God has planned.” [9]
Many of us are accustomed to living the not-yet versions of our lives.
A job, or career, not yet realized.
A family that doesn’t look like what you expected quite yet.
A sure plan for the future… not yet.
Comfortable in your own skin… not yet.
A society that functions without discrimination… not yet.
Neighbors who can rise above political division… not yet.
All those unfulfilled dreams and plans… Those are the tender not-yet places of our lives. And the scary not yet places in our world.
Jamie Lee the writer of episode 5, season 3 of Ted Lasso puts one of the best written descriptions of believing in the mouth of Coach Lasso. In a discouraging moment, after the BELIEVE sign had come down and actually been ripped apart, he looks at the team and says,
Belief doesn’t just happen because you hang something up on a wall. All right? It comes from in here (heart). You know? And up here (brain). Down here (gut).
What matters is… Believing that things can get better. That I can get better. That we will get better.
Oh man. To believe in yourself. To believe in one another. Man, that’s fundamental to being alive. And look, if you can do that, if each of you can truly do that, can’t nobody rip that apart.[10]
I invite you – In the tender not-yet places of our lives, can you trust that God is already acting? Glance up at the stars, as Abraham did, and ask God to give you the eyes to see what God sees: Vast numbers of blessings that cannot YET be counted. What we might call unfulfilled dreams, God may call unfolding dreams.
By faith, God has brought us this far. Go now in the blessing of the God who goes before you and behind you, surrounding you on all sides with grace as we journey onward/forward, together. Amen.
[1] Homesick, Noah Kahan
[2] Long, Thomas G. Interpretation Series, Hebrews
[3] Enns, Peter, The Sin of Certainty p. 97
[4] Foskett, Mary Working Preacher commentary Hebrews 11, 2025
[5] Genesis 15:1-6 NRSVUE
[6] Enns, Peter, The Sin of Certainty p. 97
[7] Massey, James Earl, True to Our Native Land An African American New Testament Commentary, Hebrews
[8] Garnaas-Holmes, Steve, Unfolding Light Worship Resources 9th Sunday after Pentecost
[9] Massey, James Earl, True to Our Native Land An African American New Testament Commentary, Hebrews
[10] https://joeiovino.com/2023/04/17/believe-is-more-than-a-sign-ted-lasso-s3-e5/