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Faith That Saw it Afar Off · 5-Minutes of Good News

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: Hello, Christians.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: This is Dallas Beecham.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: Stand by for good news.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: There's a strange kind of seeing that belongs only to faith.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Natural eyes can see the road beneath your feet, the house across the street, the storm clouds gathering in the sky.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: But faith can see something farther.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: Faith can see a promise before it arrives.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Hebrews 11 says, Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: Then the writer begins calling names from the old world Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, different lives, different generations, different troubles, but one thing tied them together.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: They believed God before they held the fullness of the promise in their hands.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: Abel came first.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: He brought an offering to God by faith, and though his own brother rose up against him, Hebrew says, He being dead yet speaketh, his life was short, but his faith kept preaching.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: Abel tells us that faith is not wasted just because the world does not applaud it.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: Then came Enoch.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: The Bible does not give us a long biography.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: It simply says he walked with God.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: In a world growing darker, Enoch kept walking, step after step, day after day he lived as though God was real, near, and worth pleasing.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: And Hebrews says before his translation he had this testimony that he pleased God.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: Then Noah heard a warning from things not yet seen.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: No flood had arrived, no rain had fallen like judgment.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: The sky may have looked ordinary, the neighbors may have laughed, but Noah picked up his tools and built a boat.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: Faith is building on God's warning before the weather changes.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: And then God called Abram, Get thee out of thy country.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: God said unto a land that I will show you.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: Abram did not have a map.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: He did not have every answer, but he had God's word.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: So he went out, not knowing where he was going.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: That is faith, taking the next step because God has spoken, even when the destination is still hidden.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: Then God took Abraham outside beneath the stars and said, So shall thy seed be.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: Abraham looked up at a sky full of lights and believed a promise bigger than his present condition.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: The Bible says he believed in the Lord, and he counted it to him for righteousness.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: Sarah also received strength by faith.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: Her body, according to nature, said the time had passed.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: Her circumstances said it was too late, but God's promise said otherwise, and faith learns to let God's word have the final say over age, weakness, delay, and impossibility.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: Now listen to what Hebrews says about them.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: These all died in the faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: They saw it from a distance.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: They were persuaded of it.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: They embraced it.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: They confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: What did they see afar off?
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: They saw more than land.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: They saw more than descendants.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: They saw God's redemption moving through the promise.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: When God told Abraham, In thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed, the gospel was already shining in the seed form.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: Paul later said that God preached before the gospel unto Abraham, and Paul opened that promise even wider in Galatians, saying that the blessing of Abraham comes to the Gentiles through Jesus Christ, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: There it is, the old promise and the new promise meeting together.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: The promise to Abraham was walking toward Christ, and Christ opened the door to the promise of the Holy Ghost.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: So Abel's sacrifice, Enoch's walk, Noah's Ark, Abraham's journey, and Sarah's miracle were not separate stories.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: Searching across history, they were mile markers on one road.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: They were witnesses standing along the way, pointing toward Jesus Christ and the promise that would be preached on the day of Pentecost.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: One Old Testament saint saw the promise afar off, but on this side of Calvary, the promise has come near.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: Through repentance, baptism in Jesus' name, and the gift of the Holy Ghost, God is still bringing people into fellowship.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: He planned this from the beginning.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: So if you cannot see the whole road today, keep walking.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: If the rain has not yet come, keep building.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: If the promise seems far away, keep believing.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: Faith sees farther than eyesight, and the God who kept his word to them will keep his word to us.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: The Bible is our faith.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: Believe the word, not tradition.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: Believe the scriptures, not church counsels.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: Your faith comes from believing God's word.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: This has been five minutes of good news.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: I hope today's message has touched your heart and causes you to have a good day.