And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets—who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Women received back their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated—of whom the world was not worthy—wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.
And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.
Hebrews 11:32-40 ESV
As we come to the conclusion of Hebrews 11 and its marvelous survey of the Old Testament saints who lived and died by faith, we ought to once again ground ourselves in context. Again, the key verse of chapter 11 is actually found at the end of chapter 10, where after citing Habakkuk 2:3-4, the author exhorts: “But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls” (10:39). Chapters 3-4 already gave us an example of those who shrank back in fear and were destroyed. The exodus generation of Israelites rebelled against the Yahweh, who proved His might and provision to them over and over again, because they were afraid of the giants within the land of Canaan. On this side of the sermon-letter’s central focus upon the priestly work of Christ, the preacher has been giving us example after example of those who have faith and preserve their souls. He wants to flood his readers with these heroes of the faith because their own faith shall be tested by the crucible of persecution. These were all regular men and women, not superhuman demigods like the pagan heroes, who by looking by faith for the heavenly city that is to come received the greatest prize in all the cosmos: the commendation of their Creator.
And the question that this chapter and the entire sermon-letter sets before us is: Will we do likewise? When push comes to shove, will we shrink back in fear like the exodus generation, or will we have faith and receive the commendation of our Father?
OF JUDGES, KINGS, & PROPHETS // VERSE 32
As we have already seen in 9:5, the author of Hebrews is fully aware of his time constraints. Although he would have enjoyed working through every piece of furnishing in the tabernacle to show how each pointed forward to the coming of Christ, he kept his focus on the goal of his sermon-letter and continued on. A similar point has now been reached in our present chapter. After working his way from Abel to Rahab (skipping already many more examples of faithfulness that could have been told), the author now seems to catch himself from going further, realizing his need to wrap up this discourse on faith:
And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets–
Moving on from Joshua, which recorded the events described in verses 30-31, the author now gives a list of six names, four from Judges and two from 1-2 Samuel. He then ends by saying “and the prophets,” which was large number of men who served from the time of David onward.
By faith, Gideon, Barak, Samson, and Jephthah were each judges of Israel after the conquest of Canaan and before there was a king in Israel. The Book of Judges is an unpleasant book because it describes the gradual descent of Israel into wickedness as great or even greater than the nations around them. That descent is recorded through downward cycles of sin and rescue. In each cycle, Israel worships false gods, God gives Israel into the hand of an enemy, Israel cries out for rescue, God raises up a judge to deliver them, and the cycle repeats. Thus, each of these men were raised up by God during a time of great crisis and defeat in Israel, and all were given victory over their enemies through the strength of the LORD.
Gideon is probably the best example. He prepared to fight the Midianites with 32,000 men, but Yahweh commanded him to let those who were afraid go home. So 22,000 left. Yet God further whittled those 10,000 down to only 300 so that all would have to confess that victory came from the hand of Yahweh. By faith, Gideon obeyed the commands of God and delivered God’s people from their enemy. The same was also true of Barak, Samson, and Jephthah. They each obtained victories in battle because they believed God’s words to them and responded in obedience.
Of course, the examples of the faith of David and Samuel would be a lengthy list in itself. Samuel was faithful to God’s command even when it meant defying the highly unstable King Saul. David’s devotion to the LORD earned Him the distinction of being called a man after God’s own heart.
Yet as with everyone else in this chapter, these six men were not always faithful. After his victory over the Midianites and after rejecting the people’s demand for him to rule over them, Gideon made a ephod of gold, “and all Israel whored after it there, and it became a snare to Gideon and to his family” (Judges 8:27).
Although Barak did conquer kingdoms and put armies to flight by faith, his was a weak faith that was dependent upon Deborah, who was the actual judge of Israel at that time. And because of his wavering faith, the glory of his victory was given to another woman named Jael.
Jephthah was not any better. After his victory, he made a vow to offer whatever greeted him upon returning home to the Yahweh, but his daughter came to him rather than any of his animals. Rather than repent of his foolish vow, he offered his daughter as a burnt offering to the LORD, which revealed that he did not know God’s law or else he would have remembered Deuteronomy 12:29-32:
When the LORD your God cuts off before you the nations whom you go in to dispossess, and you dispossess them and dwell in their land, take care that you be not ensnared to follow them, after they have been destroyed before you, and that you do not inquire about their gods, saying, ‘How did these nations serve their gods?–that I also may do the same.’ You shall not worship the LORD your God in that way, for every abominable thing that the LORD hates they have done for their gods, for they even burn their sons and their daughters in the fire to their gods. Everything that I command you, you shall be careful to do. You shall not add to it or take from it.
Samson is perhaps the weakest in faith of the bunch. Although he was used by the LORD to fight back the mighty Philistines, he mostly seems to fight for his own self-interest. Even as he made his final prayer for renewed strength after having his eyes gouged out, he prayed, “O Lord GOD, please remember me and please strengthen me only this once, O God, that I may be avenged on the Philistines for my two eyes” (Judges 16:28).
David succeeded were Saul failed, both in good and in evil. The LORD was his chief glory and delight, yet the great king still sinned. He committed adultery with the wife of one of his most faithful servants and attempted to cover up his sin by sending Uriah on a suicide mission, just as Saul once tried to do to David.
While we are not told of any explicit sins on Samuel’s part, we do read about his sons that they “did not walk in his ways but turned aside after gain. They took bribes and perverted justice” (1 Samuel 8:3). Thus, for all of Samuel’s faithfulness, the overt wickedness of his sons would have likely left him unqualified to serve as an elder of a church under the new covenant.
What are we to make of such broken examples of faith?
If the author had intended to convey the impression that God commended OT figures who were stalwart in trust and spotless in character, he might have selected judges described so briefly that their flaws remain unmentioned (such as Othniel, Ehud, and Shamgar; Judges 3) or a king such as Josiah, distinguished for his righteous reforms (2 Kings 22-23; but see 2 Chron. 35:20-22). Instead our preacher calls us to listen to God as he testifies on behalf of patriarchs, politicians, prophets, and prostitutes who had fluctuating faith and questionable morality but who continued to trust God to be faithful to his promises. If they could act in faith and see God work, so could the sermon-letter’s first hearers, some of whom had “drooping hands” and “weak knees” (Heb. 12:12-13)– and so can we in our trials and frailty.[1]
Thus, God’s commendation of such broken and faulty people should an encouragement rather than a stumbling block. You and I are no better than any of the Old Testament saints presented in this chapter. If anything, though we may commit less grievous sins, we also very likely have less faith. We ought to consider their examples and rejoice that God can also use sinners like us to accomplish His purposes.
THROUGH FAITH // VERSES 33-38
The author goes on to give us an avalanche of what those who lived before Christ achieved through faith. They conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises. These three can specifically be seen within the lives of the six men previously listed. All but Samuel conquered kingdoms, which interestingly seems to be the easiest item on this list to achieve. Through sheer strength of arms, many wicked nations have conquered others, but of course God’s people never rely upon strength of arms but upon the Lord. To greater and lesser degrees, they all enforced justice. David was probably the most successful at that endeavor. Indeed, because justice is most fundamentally an attribute of God, it cannot be enforced without some degree of faith. Justice, after all, is a thing unseen. David is also notable has having received God’s promises by faith, specifically the Davidic Covenant that God made with him.
The next three ought to make us think of Daniel and his friends. Daniel was saved from the mouths of lions. Of course, David and Samson both prevailed against lions as well. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were delivered from the fiery furnace. In Daniel 2, all four of them escaped the king’s sword whenever Daniel was able to tell him his dream and its meaning.
They were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Although Israel was never a mighty nation like Assyria or Babylon, God indeed made them strong through weakness and often drove back foreign armies. Let us remember the example of Hezekiah under whose reign Jerusalem was besieged by Assyria. The king cried out to God for salvation, and “the angel of the LORD went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians” (2 Kings 19:35). By faith, a lowly shepherd like David became a mighty king.
Women received back their dead by resurrection. This most likely refers to two instances during the ministries of Elijah and Elisha. The first occurred during a famine, where Elijah stayed in the home of a widowed Gentile woman and her son and ate bread from a little bit of flour and oil that did not run out until the famine was over. When the widow’s son died, Elijah cried out for God to bring him to life again, and God answered his prayer. In the second incident, Elisha frequently passed through Shumen, where a wealthy women urged her husband to make a guestroom in their house specifically for the prophet. In thankfulness, Elisha prophesied that she would have a son, but when the son had grown, he fell dead suddenly. As with Elijah, Elisha prayed, and the LORD raised the boy back to life. Just as Abraham figuratively received Isaac back from the dead, these women literally received their sons back from the dead. For all the valor of faith seen in defeating physical foes, these women saw a glimpse of humanity’s great enemy being beaten back, even if for only a moment.
In the midst of this verse, the author shifts our viewpoint. After giving us examples of triumphs of faith, he now gives us examples of endurances of faith. The first is connected with women who received back their dead: Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. These chose to lose their lives because their eyes were set upon the great resurrection to come, the heavenly city that has foundations. Most commentators note that the specific example in the author of Hebrew’s mind is likely “the account of the torture and martyrdom of the aged scribe Eleazar and a family of seven brothers at the hands of the Syrian tyrant Antiochus IV Epiphanes, reported the apocryphal book of 2 Maccabees. This account mentions the rack as an instrument of torture, and the brothers’ mother encourages them to endure suffering faithfully, expressing to the youngest her hope that ‘in God’s mercy I may get you back again along with your brothers’ (2 Macc. 7:29).”[2]
The author then gives us a flurry of various afflictions that God’s people endured:
Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated,–of whom the world was not worthy–wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.
There is a strain of Christianity often called the Word of Faith movement, also called the prosperity gospel, that views any kind of suffering or affliction as being evidence of a lack of faith. Sadly, there are multitudes of Christians who have been deceived by this New Age spirituality in a Christian costume. These verses before us should dismantle that false teaching. According to Hebrews, those who were killed by the sword did not have less faith than those who escaped the edge of the sword. Neither did those who were destitute have less faith than those who became mighty in war. William Tyndale was no less faithful than Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, yet they passed through the fire unharmed while Tyndale became a martyr. Even in Acts, we find an angel rescuing Peter from prison, but James was put to death with the sword. Indeed, most in Jesus’ day would have lauded the faith of the Pharisees and scorned the poor widow, yet by her offering, Jesus commended her above all others who were giving.
Of course, Jesus Himself is our greatest example. Although He alone lived with perfect, unflinching faith, “He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not” (Isaiah 53:3). Jesus said of Himself, “Foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head” (Luke 9:58). And He says to us:
A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master. It is enough for the disciple to be like his teacher, and the servant like his master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household.
Matthew 10:24-25
We should not expect to have pleasant, easy, and comfortable lives through faith, and suffering is not a sign of little faith. Indeed, to be like our Lord, we are called to take up our cross and follow Him. But in so doing, we ought to rejoice because just as Christ triumphed through the cross so now does He lead His church to triumph through suffering.
Notice that in the midst of recounting these afflictions, the author bursts out this description: of whom the world was not worthy. One commentator says, “They were fitter to be set as stars in heaven, and be before the Lord in his glory. The world was not worthy of their presence, and yet they were not thought worthy to live in the world.”[3] Let us frequently remind ourselves that God’s judgment is not the same as man’s judgment. The world values pride, power, and fame; God values humility, meekness, and contentment. Many have been scorned by the world because in their longing for the world to come, they rejected the fleeting pleasures of this world. They are like Faithful in the Pilgrim’s Progress, put to death for renouncing the trinkets of Vanity Fair. Though they were, like the apostles, the refuse of the world, the scum of the earth, they are the very jewels of heaven.
SOMETHING BETTER FOR US // VERSES 39-40
The author closes this great chapter with these words:
And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God has provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.
Every person mentioned or alluded to in this chapter died without receiving what God promised to them. The author also binds us to them by saying that they should not be made perfect without us. What does he mean by this?
The idea seems not to be simply that the OT saints did not receive their eternal inheritance until Christ’s appearing but that they have now done so. The truth is that they still have not received that inheritance in its fulness, nor will they until they receive it with us (who also much wait for it) at Christ’s second appearing (Heb. 9:28).[4]
Martin also quotes another commentator who writes:
The redeemed whose probation on earth is over are indeed, in one sense, said to be already “perfected” (cf. Heb. 10:14; 12:23); but still the “perfect consummation and bliss both in the body and soul” is nowhere in the New Testament contemplated till “the end.” In the meantime, even the saints under the heavenly altar still cry, “Lord, how long?” and the Spirit and the bride say, “Come, Lord Jesus.” The full idea, then, of verse 40 may be that, according to the eternal Divine purpose, the promise of redemption should not be fully realized till the number of the elect shall be accomplished, and all the redeemed of all ages since the world began shall be gathered together through Christ in one, and God shall be all in all.[5]
I think that that is the meaning here. Of course, God has indeed provided something far better for us. We have the full revelation of God at our fingertips. We know the name of mankind’s Redeemer. The mystery of the gospel, which was hidden in God before the foundations of the world, is now known to us. Thus, Richard Phillips is right to exhort:
If these Old Testament saints could believe not seeing Christ–knowing only shadows and not the reality–not seeing with anything like our clarity the purchase price of our redemption by the cross–then who much more faith ought we to have than they, we who are called by his very name? Calvin writes, “A tiny spark of light led them to heaven, but now that the Sun of righteousness shines on us what excuse shall we offer if we still cling to the earth?”[6]
Yet even though we know Christ and have the complete text of Scripture before us in our own language, we still have not received the fullness of God’s promised inheritance. Otherwise, why would the author have said in 10:26, “For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised.” We do indeed have a far greater revelation, but we must live by faith just as much as the Old Testament saints did. Perhaps Jesus’ own words in John 16:33 best encapsulate this: “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” Our Lord has not promised us comfort and ease. If anything, He has promised us the exact opposite. Yet He has already triumphed over sin and death through His crucifixion and resurrection. Like the Old Testament saints, we will still long for the fulfillment of all God’s promises, for Christ to return to save those who eagerly wait for Him.
As we come to our King’s Table, let us rejoice that our Savior who has cleansed us of our sins once for all through His blood is also the One who will give us the strength to endure until the end. Just as our baptism testifies to our justification, when Christ redeemed us from all our sin, so does the Lord’s Supper testify to our continual need of His grace. As surely as we need food to eat, water to drink, and air to breathe, even more do we need our Savior’s sustaining hand to keep us faithful to Him. This bread and cup are both visible and tangible reminders of God’s daily grace upon us. As we eat and drink, let us therefore taste and see the goodness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
[1][1] ESV Expository Commentary Vol 12, 179.
[2] ESV Expository Commentary Vol 12, 180-181.
[3] Cited in Wilson, New Testament Commentaries Vol 2, 441.
[4] Robert Paul Martin, Hebrews, 623.
[5] Cited in Martin, Hebrews, 624-625.
B. C. Newton 