Who Through Faith Conquered Kingdoms

Scripture — Hebrews 11:32-12:2 (NRSV)

And what more should 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, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Women received their dead by resurrection. Others were tortured, refusing to accept release, in order to obtain a better resurrection. Others suffered mocking and flogging and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned to death; they were sawn in two; they were killed by the sword; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, persecuted, tormented—of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains and in caves and holes in the ground. Yet all these, though they were commended for their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better so that they would not, apart from us, be made perfect.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.

Devotion

I’ve been at this devotion-writing long enough now (my first devotionals for the De Pree Center were written in June 2019), and I’ve been using the lectionary to do it for long enough now, that I sometimes meet myself coming and going—arriving at passages which I’ve talked about with you before. Such is the case this Thursday and Friday, as we consider an Epistle and Gospel lesson both of which I wrote about in 2022.

I like to go back and see what I had to say a few years ago, and in my writings on Hebrews 11-12 in 2022 I was fascinated by the end of this passage: the great cloud of witnesses that accompany us as we face forward into the future (Hebrews 12:1-2). This is certainly the most famous part of this passage—the image of these great saints of the past, in the Scriptures and by extrapolation in our own life, cheering us up as we take up the baton in the relay race and carry the life of faith to the finish line.

What I only touched on lightly three years ago, though, were those witnesses themselves and their mighty deeds. Right in the middle of this passage, in 11:33-34, is the most amazing list of what they accomplished:

who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. . .

And in fact, the list goes on all the way through verse 38, ending with those “of whom the world was not worthy.” Now these are human beings, not angels, and if we went back into their Old Testament stories (and all those stories of heroes mentioned by name throughout Hebrews 11)—we would find evidence that they were sometimes all too human. And yet. With the strength of God, they ruled and reigned and won and wept and persevered.

We can look forward too quickly in this passage, I think. To some degree, the author of Hebrews encourages us to do so in 11:39, with the reminder that these heroes of the faith, mighty as they were, did not obtain everything that awaits us in the Lord Jesus Christ. But before we look forward too far and start thinking of ourselves as the last leg of the relay race, as those who have achieved even more than our forebears, we need to go really slowly through this list.

See, this passage isn’t about them getting there by their own power and it isn’t about us going on by our own power, and it also isn’t about us being some kind of qualitatively different kind of people than they were and hence somehow more deserving of the promises. (Remember, these saints are those “of whom the world was not worthy.”) It is about us being made perfect together. It’s all grace.

And someday, we are going to pass that baton on down the line and become part of that cloud of witnesses ourselves.

Find all Life for Leaders devotions here. Explore what the Bible has to say about work at the High Calling archive, hosted by the unique website of our partners, the Theology of Work Project. Reflection on today’s Life for Leaders theme can be found here: Did Jesus Come to Bring Peace or Division?.