… ³³ who by faith conquered kingdoms, performed acts of righteousness, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, ³⁴ quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight.

Faithful people do great things for God. To be sure, with our New Testament sensibilities, we recognize that it is God working through their faith. Indeed, the apostle Paul asserted, “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me” (1 Cor 15:10). Yet, at the same time, Paul was faithful and he acts on his faith (“labored”).

The heroes of the faith, if we may call them that, acted on their faith; theirs was not an armchair, pew-sitting faith. It was no esoteric, otherworldly faith. It was a here and now, “show me” kind of faith, the kind the book of James speaks of. “But someone may well say, ‘You have faith and I have works; show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works.’ ” (James 2:18). “But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless?” (James 2:20). The writer of Hebrews includes the evidence of faith produced in and through the lives of those who dared to believe God’s Word to them. Theirs was a real, productive faith.

Look again at the evidence given in our verses for today. Think, for example, of David and his great conquests against the Philistines and other surrounding nations. Remember Daniel in the lion’s den, Gideon’s defeat of the Midianites with only 300 men and Samuel’s willingness to stand up to King Saul.

The emphasis on salvation by grace through faith is absolutely central to the gospel message. In the early part of the 20^th century, the liberal movement in Christianity came to the fore emphasizing the need for a “working” faith, but in the process minimized or undermined the purity of the gospel. The reaction, or pendulum swing, resulted in the fundamentalist movement, which emphasized faith and grace over against good works, and de-emphasized good works. In time, this evolved into the so-called evangelical movement, which slowly moved the pendulum back to include good works, not as a cause for salvation but a result of it. “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them” (Eph 2:10). We must keep the pendulum from swinging back to the liberal error. We are saved by grace, through faith, so that we can produce good works, so that God’s character would be made known to our world.

Lord, help me to live out my faith in real, tangible ways for your Glory!