Hebrews 11:8-12 | WBF - The Faith of Abraham

Sunday Morning | August 2, 2026 | McCoy Young | Louisville, KY

The fourth and final sermon in the Walk By Faith series, Boyce graduate and Valley View member McCoy Young teaches on "The Faith of Abraham."

You can join us on Sunday mornings at 11 AM for worship.  We are located at 8911 3rd Street Road, Louisville KY 40272.

Transcript

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Good morning. How's everyone today? You sound great. It's good to have you here anyway. We've been going through a series this summer on Walk by Faith. That's our theme for the year. This is our last week in that series. So if you stick around to the very end. I'll tell you what we're going to go into next week. But it's been a great summer of focusing on that theme. We've had a number of different folks, both from within and without, who are presenting, and this morning I'm very excited to to have our speaker today who you've seen up here a number of times. You've seen him leading us in worship, you've seen him on the keys and on the guitar. But if you would., go ahead, welcome up McCoy. Well, good morning, Valley View. First want to say, wow, it's a huge honor to be speaking to you this morning. It's been a dream of mine for many years to preach here. I've been going here since 2021, when I was right out of high school, when I had no idea what I was doing with my life, and I was just going into college at Boyce. And in that time, since I have went and graduated from college just this past May, and I'm starting an exciting new job at Beth Haven Christian School tomorrow, and perhaps like the most life changing thing. The most life changing thing God has done for me this year is that last month I was engaged. Well, I guess two months ago now I was engaged to my lovely fiancée, Sophia. So. But I just want to be. I'm very thankful for the staff for giving me this opportunity to preach this morning, and. It's just an honor to share the word. It's an honor to share the word. And so if you want to open up your Bible this morning to Hebrews chapter 11, and while you're turning there, I want to tell you a little bit of a story. And this story is about something that's very near and dear to my heart. Music. So the year is 1962, and 1962 was a time when now I was obviously wasn't alive. I think you can probably tell that, but it was a time when rock and roll was kind of the exciting new thing. And, you know, Elvis Presley in the 50s kind of helped usher in this new era of music, and a lot of bands were looking to emulate that success in their pursuit of stardom. And so there was one particular band that was whose manager was looking every single day for new for a label to sign this band, because he believed that they had the ability to break through and become a one of the biggest bands in the world. And apparently the manager at Decca Records didn't think so because he said something crazy. He said, and I quote, guitar groups are on the way out. In 1962. Guitar groups are on the way out. If you think guitar groups are on the way out in 1962, wait till you get a load of what's happened in the 70s, the 80s and 90s and 2000. It was just getting started back then. But he also said the band was bland and had no future in show business, no future in show business, and guitar groups are on the way out. But these guys were they were like other rock bands at the time. They played guitar. They were really, really good. They were a bunch of young guys, but they had an edge. They were willing to experiment with their sound, and I guess some people in the industry didn't want to take the risk on that. They didn't want to to take the risk and maybe have people not like them for experimenting with their sound. But one label did sign them later that year, and shortly into their career, they became a massive success, selling tens of millions and of records in that day in that decade alone. And that doesn't even include all of the young chaps like myself who still love their music decades later. And you may know what this band does. The band is the Beatles, maybe the most famous band. Most of you probably knew that, but they're the most famous band in all of history. They'd go on to pioneer a new sounds and blazed the trails for pop and rock music for decades. Complex structures, concept albums, guitar feedback and music and even a couple of new would not have existed if somebody had not taken a risk on them to allow them to pioneer a new style. You see, sometimes people that are most significant in the world are the people who are willing to go into uncharted territory and become a pioneer of something new. And we're going to talk about a man named Abraham who went into to uncharted territory and pioneered a new kind of faith that hadn't been demonstrated yet. So if you have your Bible open to Hebrews chapter 11, we'll read starting with verse eight. Here's what it says. By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance, and he went out not knowing where he was going. By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive even when she was past the age, said she considered him faithful, who had promised therefore, from one man, and him as good as dead were born descendants, as many as the stars of heaven, and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore. If you remember, last week Jeff Prosser spoke, and he did an excellent job opening up the first couple of verses here and talking about the definition of faith. We learned it's the substance of things hoped for. It's the evidence of of things unseen. Now, I don't know if that's like a dictionary definition of the word, but it is a description of what faith it is. It is the substance of things hoped for. It is the evidence of things unseen. It's trusting in something, even when you don't have all of the necessary knowledge to accept it. And I don't think that's any more clear that definition of faith than it is with Abraham. And so the author goes on in Hebrews 11, and he talks about Abel, and he talks about Enoch, and he talks about Noah, but then he talks about Abraham, and he actually brings up two different scenarios with Abraham. Abraham is the only person that he brings up twice in this chapter. And we read about him because he's such a significant character in Scripture. He's brought up over and over and over again. And one really helpful tip that I suggest to you when you read the New Testament is that whenever you find a passage where they reference or quote the Old Testament, you should go back and at least skim or hopefully maybe read a little bit of what that is talking about. Now, the problem is that if you do this in the book of Hebrews, if you've noticed so far, then it will take you about three years to finish the book. Because the author of Hebrews was fond of quoting the Old Testament. In fact, I used to have a journaling Bible. I hopefully still have it, but I would highlight every time in the New Testament where the the author quoted the Old Testament in blue. Now you go through Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. There's some blue there. And then you turn to the book of Romans and it's like all blue. Everything is blue. Everything in Galatians is blue. Everything in Hebrews is blue. Because these guys were engaging in some serious plagiarism. I mean, like, not to accuse the authors of scripture, not. The great thing about it is, is that the Holy Spirit is really the author of Scripture, so he can't plagiarize himself, you see. But that's why a lot of people think that Paul is the author of Hebrews. I won't go into that there. I'll leave that to Pastor John. He's going to be explaining that next week. Actually, he's going to be unpacking who the author of Hebrews is, where they're thankful for that. But yeah, the the author of Hebrews is very fond of quoting the Old Testament. But I want to go back and read from Genesis 12. So you're probably towards the end of your Bible. I want you to turn all the way back toward the beginning of your Bible. We're going to go to Genesis 12, verses one through three. You guys weren't ready for a sword drill this morning, were you? A sore drill because ever do those growing up a sword drill where you raise up your Bible? Some of you don't even have a physical Bible. That's right. I'm calling you out. Those of you, those of you who are using your phone. Some of you. I'm just kidding. That's okay. But let's read from verses one through three. Now the Lord said to Abraham, go from your country and your kindred and your father's house, to the land that I will show you, and I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great and so so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all families of the earth will be blessed. Now, mind you, we don't know anything about Abraham. Before we read about this, we know about his ancestry. And that's it. We don't know who he is. We don't know where he's from, really. We just know that he was a great, great, great, great great grandson of Noah. That's it. Now, I want to I want you to understand how crazy this would have sounded to Abraham. Okay. He's being asked to travel. What in modern day would be 400 miles to a place he had never been to in his life? Now, I just want to put you to put that in perspective. 400 miles is about the distance from here to Atlanta, Georgia. And fun fact, there were no cars or trucks and airplanes in the time that Abraham lived. I know this is news to many of you. I don't think Abraham was cashing in his free credit card reward points for a free southwest flight. I don't think he did that mostly because they didn't have credit cards back then and airplanes in southwest. I don't think that they were established yet. And -1800 years ago. But Abraham did something crazy. Now, if God came to you and said, I want you to travel 400 miles, I want you to travel to Atlanta on foot. You'd probably say, I must have hallucinated something. And who wants to go to Atlanta anyway? Who doesn't absolutely despise the Georgia Bulldogs? I cannot wait to watch them lose again, just like they did last year. I absolutely hate the Georgia Bulldogs. In case you haven't noticed, I have a grudge against them. I have an absolute grudge. But Abraham did it. He believed in the promise because the promise was so extraordinary. All the nations worshiping the one true God of Israel and the promise of descendants as numerous as the stars. Just a few chapters later, we get that promise. In Genesis 15 five through six it says, he, God brought Abraham outside and said, look toward heaven and number the stars if you're able to number them. Then he said to him, so shall your offspring be. And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness. And so we see that Abraham took an extraordinary leap of faith, because he believed in an extraordinary promise from an extraordinary God. And that's what it says in our passage in Hebrews. It says he obeyed God when he was called, even though he didn't know where he was going, because he was looking forward to the city whose designer and builder is God. Now, you have to understand that Abraham lived in a nation that didn't know God and worshiped other gods, and Abraham obeyed anyway, and he didn't have the benefit of reading about Moses or David or Elijah or Jesus, but he obeyed anyway. In fact, at the time, the Bible had not even begun to have been written yet. Moses didn't start writing the Bible until about 400 years after this. And so we had the benefit of opening up the Bible and reading about God's faithfulness. But Abraham lived at a time when this wasn't the case. He probably had some oral traditions about Noah and others who had been faithful before, but he didn't even argue with God. You remember the story of Moses about the burning bush. God comes to him and he says, oh, but God, I don't speak. Well, who am I to do this? Can't you choose my brother instead? That's what I used to say when my parents would ask me to do something. Can't you choose my brother instead? He never does anything. He never did anything. Just one. Just want to point that out. I was always asked to do the chores and if my brother was asked, then he would somehow just wiggle his way out of it and say, I have to go to the bathroom. That was always what happened. Every single time. Every time. Yeah. So what this tells us, and this is my first point for you this morning, is that faith sometimes requires doing what no one else has done. Faith sometimes requires doing what no one else has done. You know, I read about an apologist named Bill Qureshi. Some of you may have heard of him. He's the author of the book Seeking Allah Finding Jesus. He was a muslim man of Pakistani heritage. His parents were from Pakistan and his story is incredible. If you've never read it before. He was an incredible apologist, but he talked about the culture shock his family got when they moved to America, and they said that one of the saddest things for them was that none of their Christian neighbors, you know, they believe America's a Christian nation. None of their Christian neighbors invited them over for dinner when they moved in. That's because it's a common gesture in eastern culture to invite someone to the community, or to welcome somebody to the community by making food for them, but for us, we don't even know our neighbor's names. Half the time we don't care to find out. But how great of a witness would it have been if someone had invited that family over for dinner when no one else would? It would break cultural norms, but it would be worth it. Sometimes breaking cultural norms to do something that's a great witness to somebody is absolutely worth. And in fact, we think about putting a Bible verse in our Instagram bio. I'm someone that does that, having a Christian bumper sticker on your car, maybe even having a cross necklace. These are good things, but what about the things that no one else will do? What about being hospitable to people? What about caring for the poor beggars in our community? Sometimes real faith requires doing what no one else will do. In fact, people might even think you're crazy. But being obedient is far more important than being liked. Let's continue in the passage now. In verse 11, it says, by faith Sarah herself received power to conceive even when she was past the age. And back in Hebrews 11, now since she considered him faithful, who had promised therefore from one man, and him as good as dead were born descendants, as many as the stars of heaven, and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore. So we see here there was an even more significant work accomplished by faith than even entering the Promised Land. We have Sarah conceiving and bearing a son, and she was over a hundred years old at the time. And I don't know about you, but I've never even met someone who's over 100 years old. But most of them aren't having kids. Most 100 year olds are not having kids, mostly because it's impossible, and it probably would be a little bit dangerous if they did at that age. But Sarah gets told she's going to have a son now. If somebody told you about 100 years old that you were going to have a son, you would probably laugh in their face. And interestingly enough, that's exactly what Sarah does, which is why her son was named Isaac, which means to laugh in Hebrew. And I always find it funny how Hebrews decided to name their children. They named their children like full sentences worth of things like Isaac, Isaac, and Rebecca see their son grabbing their twins heel on the way out, and they decide to name him. Heel Grabber, which is what the name Jacob means. If you know somebody named Jacob or James, their name means heel grabber. So that's just there's a fun fact there, but I love that they call him Isaac because it teaches us something about God that we know, but we don't always believe. And Jesus said it, didn't he? Remember the story of the rich young ruler where a man, a rich man, comes to Jesus and he says, good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus says, you know the commandments. He goes through the commandments. And the man says, I've kept all of these from my youth. And Jesus says, one thing you still lack. Go sell all you have and come follow me. And then he goes on, the rich young man walks away in shame because he has great possessions. He doesn't want to give them up. And Jesus says, how hard it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. And then the people say, the disciples say, well, who can be saved? And Jesus said, with man that says, this is possible, this this is impossible. But with God all things are possible. Even something we consider laughable is possible with God. And how does it come about? How does this happen? How do we how does God accomplish these things? Well, he accomplishes it through faith. Look what verse 11 says. Sarah considered him faithful, who had promised. She considered him faithful. She trusted that he was able to accomplish what he had promised. That's my second point for you this morning. God works powerfully through faith. He works powerfully through faith. Faith enabled Abraham to become the father of a multitude. That's why his name was changed from Abram, which means Mighty Father to Abraham, which means father of a multitude. Two people far past the age of parenthood were able to become the starting point for God's people, and this accomplished an even more incredible promise. Now, I'm a huge fan of apologetics, the study of defending the faith. I've learned a lot from my good friend and mentor, Chad Greathouse, and what I really love about it is that you get to see proofs of the faith. You get to see how archeology and how prophecies, and how evidence for the resurrection all points to the truth of Christianity. But honestly, I think the most astonishing, fulfilled prophecy in all of Scripture happens right here in Genesis. And it's recorded in the book of Hebrews. Israel, this tiny nation relative to the rest of the world, is saying that their God is going to be worshiped by the entire world. How arrogant! How do they think this is going to happen? Well, God said it in Genesis to Abraham. He said, all people will be blessed through him. What does that mean? What does it mean that all people will be blessed through Abraham? Well, Abraham had a son named Isaac who had a son named Jacob, who had a son named Judah. And there was a lion from the tribe of Judah who came. And his name was Jesus of Nazareth. And so Christ came from the lion of Abraham, and brought all people from all the world to faith in him. All kinds of people now worship the God of Israel because of Jesus, who was a descendant of Abraham. And look at us. We live on almost the entire opposite side of the world from Israel. And here we are worshiping that same God of Abraham. And why? Because God worked powerfully through Abraham's faith to make him the father of a multitude, and to bring us to Jesus, who was his plan all along to bring us to salvation. And it's just incredible to see how that prophecy came true. All people from all the world worship the God of Israel. You see, God can do incredible things if we just trust him. Jesus said the same when a man came to him in Mark nine. It's one of my favorite stories. He said, Lord, my, my son is being tormented by a demon. And if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us. And Jesus replies, if you can. All things are possible for the one who believes. Faith is such a powerful thing. It changes absolutely everything. Now look what it says in verse 11 again it says by faith Sarah herself received power to conceive even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful, who had promised she received power to conceive even when she was past the age of parenthood. And what does this teach us? It teaches us that God is the one who makes faith powerful. You may know the famous verse in Ephesians two eight through nine. It says, for you are saved by grace through faith. It is the gift of God. It doesn't say you are saved by faith. It is the gift of God. You're saved by grace through faith. That's because faith in the wrong thing accomplishes nothing. Faith. If I put my faith in my car, I put it on cruise control and I decided I'm going to fall asleep, and I'm going to trust that it's going to take me wherever I want to go, then I'm going to crash, probably, or I'm going to end up in a ditch somewhere. If I put my faith in Penn State football to win the national championship, and then they go on to not even make the playoffs and fire their coach in the middle of the season, then I'm going to be very disappointed, which is why I am now a new convert to Tennessee Volunteers. Football courtesy of my fiancée, Sophia. That's right, I jumped. I jumped ship, deal with it. Faith in the wrong thing accomplishes nothing, but faith in God, the perfect creator, accomplishes everything. This isn't because faith is some miraculous, meritorious thing. In fact, faith by definition, is not doing the work but trusting in God's work. Romans 4 or 5 says this. It says to the one who doesn't work, but believes in the one who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness, and so do we believe that God is going to do the things that he says he's going to do. Tim Keller puts it this way. Now, I know you probably thought that since Pastor John is not speaking, that you were safe from a Tim Keller quote for just one week, and I am so sorry to tell you that I have a Tim Keller quote as well. He says this it's not the strength of your faith, but the object of your faith that actually saves you. Strong faith in a weak branch is fatally inferior to weak faith in a strong branch. Now, this brings to mind a moment in the Gospel of Luke, where the disciples come to Jesus and say, increase our faith. Now what a great thing to ask, we think. Of course God wants to increase our faith. Shouldn't he want to do that? And the way Jesus respond to this used to trouble me. He said, if you had faith as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, be uprooted and planted in the sea, and it would obey you. Now that always confused me because I was like, well, shouldn't God want to increase our faith? Is he not answering that prayer? Well, of course God does want to increase our faith. He does want to do these things for us. But what Jesus was doing was not saying that he wasn't going to do that. He was saying that the point of what he was saying is that it's not the object. It's not the the strength of your faith that matters. It's the object of your faith that matters. So place your faith in God, knowing that even if it's just a small amount of faith, Jesus says that's enough to move a mountain. That small amount of faith is enough to do something incredible. And so maybe this whole time you've been thinking about this passage and we've been reading through Hebrews 11, even like me, and you're thinking, I feel like my faith is so weak, so brittle. And what I want to tell you this morning is that even if your faith is brittle, we serve a powerful God that works powerfully through small faith, so powerfully that he raises a dead soul to life. He sanctifies and forgives sinners. He leads us to everlasting life. He makes us new. He makes us born again by faith. Abraham was called and he obeyed. Sarah conceived a child or sorry he was called and he obeyed. I have a comma in a really weird spot. It says, here's what it says on my manuscript. It says, oh, Abraham was called, and he obeyed. Sarah, comma conceived a child. Abraham did not conceive the child. Sarah conceived the child. Okay, I know it's 2026. But Abraham did not conceive any child. Sarah conceived a child. Wow. I really messed that up. Abraham was called and he obeyed. Sarah conceived a child, and their descendants gave us Christ. According to Romans nine five, Is God over all? Blessed forever. Amen. Faith is the means that God uses to work powerfully in his people. It's not something we can boast or brag about, but it's something lowly and humble. It's we. And we learn from Abraham that it can accomplish great things, not because it's powerful in and of itself, because God works powerfully through it. Look what he did. Abraham left everything he was inspired to do, what no one else would do. And he brought us. God brought us his beloved son, Jesus, through the children of Abraham. Abraham left everything behind, and that is what eventually led to the birth of Jesus. And if we believe and confess that Jesus is Lord and believe in our hearts that God raised him from the dead, we receive that eternal salvation the same way Abraham received it, the same way that Moses received it. David, Paul, Peter, everyone. It's all the same. It's by faith and we receive that grace through faith. Now, I want to ask you this morning, have you received grace? Do you trust Christ for your eternal salvation? I want you to think about that for a moment. Do you trust Christ for your eternal salvation? Now, listen, it doesn't take some amazing act of faith. It doesn't take some amazing. I'm not. We're not asking you to walk to Atlanta on foot. We're not asking you to do that. But we're asking you to do is that you'd humble yourself knowing that you need a savior. That your sin is so heavy and you weren't meant to carry it on your own. Would you come to the foot of the cross? Would you believe and confess in Jesus as Lord, and that God raised him from the dead? Would you receive that salvation today, and you, if you have already received it? Are you prepared to make sacrifices for the sake of God's faithfulness to be shown in your life? Are you willing to take great steps, maybe steps that no one else will take so that God can be glorified so that God can accomplish his plan in you? Because that's all that's required, is that you believe trust in God because it's by grace through faith that God accomplishes everything. Let's pray. Father, we thank you that it's by faith that you do so many incredible things. And we thank you for the faithfulness of Abraham that serves as an example for us, and that you brought us Christ our Savior. And we thank you for his faithfulness all the way to the cross. And that when we place our faith in him, we receive salvation. We pray that we would work out our salvation with fear and trembling. Today and this week and forevermore, we ask us all in Jesus name. Amen.