Good morning. Now we get
to Abraham – he describes what Abraham went through, which we have already
talked about. He was looking for the city which has foundations, whose
architect and builder is God. Then he talks about Sarah. By faith even Sarah herself
received ability to conceive, even beyond the proper time of life, since she
considered Him faithful who had promised. If you read Genesis, that's not what
it looked like. Sarah laughed when she overheard that she was to have a baby.
Then again maybe he was talking about Abraham's faith and not Sarah's. There
was born of one man, and him (I love this part) as good as dead at that, as
many descendants as the stars of heaven. Remember we said earlier that he only
had Isaac as far as the promise was concerned, and Isaac only had Jacob and
Esau. It was not an auspicious beginning to having descendants as many as the
stars of heaven. All of these that he has talked about in this chapter died in
faith, without receiving the promises, but having seeing them and having
welcomed them from a distance, and having confessed that they were strangers
and exiles on the earth. Even though they did not see the fulfillment of the
promises, the promises were kept alive through their faith. That tells us that
when God promises us something, He will fulfill it, even if we don't see the
fulfillment in our lifetime. Father thank You that the reader continues to
believe the promises You have made to him/her, even when he/she does not see
the possibly of them being fulfilled.
Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me
Good morning. Paul then gives a list of a lot of things that he has gone through as an apostle. I do not write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For if you were to have countless tutors in Christ, yet you would not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. There could be many people that you listen to either in church or through the Internet or other means; but there was only one person (as a general rule it was a person) that lead you to Christ. Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me. He was saying that just like a child imitates his or her father, they were to imitate him. He says that again seven chapters later. Since it is easy to forget some things about people we have not seen in a while, Paul says that he sent Timothy to them to remind them of his ways which are in Christ, just as he taught everywhere in every church. Some have become arrogant, as though I were not coming to you. I shall find ou...
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