LIVING THE LIFE THAT COUNTS

Heb. 11:4 ... "By faith Abel offered to God a better sacrifice than Cain, through which he obtained the testimony that he was righteous ... and through faith, though he is dead, he still speaks."

      For what does a person's life count? A baby is born into the world, one of millions in a given year. He learns to walk, talk, and play. Then at age five or six he begins his education, which he continues for the next dozen or more years. Marrying and having a family, he enters upon some line of work whereby to support his dependents. He buys a house, furnishes it, and owns a car or two. Beyond his job and domestic life he interacts with several friends, indulges in leisure time activities, and may give a little of his time to some civic groups. Finally, he grows old and retires from work. By now his family has disintegrated and reformed as two or three other families with the marriage of his children.  At last he dies and disappears from the earth. For what has his life counted? His place is taken by someone else, and within a generation he is well nigh forgotten.

      Sadly, it appears that most people accomplish little in life beyond occupying space, reproducing their kind, consuming products to others' profit, and helping to produce or market those products with no reward other than financial.  Is it necessary that a person's life should be so routine, so bland, and so anonymous? Is it meant for the human condition to be little more than existential, with little to raise it from a state of being flat, or color its characteristic paleness, or give any permanence to its transience? There are those who say not, who see life as essentially meaningless, and who interpret the human condition as being absurd. Mark Twain, the noted American humorist, also had a dark view of life which he expressed in the statement that death is "the only unpoisoned gift" that earth ever gives to anyone. When the psalmist contemplated the vastness of the sky above him, he exclaimed, "What is man that You take thought of him?" (Psa. 8:4). And Job in his misery saw only hopelessness in his future and said, "Why did I not die at birth? ... For now I would have lain down and been quiet; I would have slept then, I would have been at rest," (Job 3:11,13).

      Hebrews 11:4 points our thinking away from the pessimism that is easily produced by the inequity, failure, and suffering which life deals out to all of us. A life that is lived by faith in God counts for something that endures and does not lose its power at death. It can turn inequity into advantage, failure into success, and suffering into joyful comfort. Having first been established within God's grace, it shall continue forever within that grace. We are told in Eph. 2:8 that "by grace you have been saved through faith." The name of such a person is recorded in the "Book of Life" in heaven to be remembered in the Final Judgment, (Rev. 3:5; 20:15). But, even during the course of this world, the faith directed life continues to exert a beneficial influence even after the mortal body is destroyed. Abel, who lived by faith, has been dead since the dawn of human existence, yet his name is remembered with praise, and his deeds still serve as a good example.

      The chapter giving tribute to Abel, the first martyr for righteousness, testifies to the enduring impact for good of those who lived by faith in ancient times. Such people give back to society by trying to uplift the lives of people through noble thinking, pure speech, and virtuous behavior. They enrich human experience by emanating the glory of love, peace, good will, kindness, altruism, courage and hope. As they pass through the lives of others, they leave behind an influence for good that lives and acts for a long time after they themselves are gone. The places they have been are better because they were in them, and the people who shared life with them are better because of the association.

HOLD FAST WITHOUT WAVERING

Heb. 10:23a ... "Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering."

      It would be a most wonderful and encouraging thing if everyone who obeyed the gospel would remain true to his spiritual commitment. But it is more common for large numbers of those who profess allegiance to Christ to lose their sense of identification with Him at some point along the way, grow cold in their "first love," become inactive in works of service, and finally go on their way as they were before their conversion. This was no less a problem in the days of Jesus and His apostles than it is now, for the New Testament makes numerous references to the sad defection of some. In fact, in the Parable of the Sower, (Mat. 13:3-8, 18-23), Jesus indicated that this would be a persistent problem throughout the Christian age. In picturing four types of people who would receive His word, He showed that three of them would eventually turn away from it. In John 6, Jesus experienced the disheartening situation reported in v. 66, "Many of His disciples withdrew and were not walking with Him anymore."

      One of the main objectives in the epistle to the Hebrews is the attempt to prevent large numbers of those addressed from deserting Christ. In 2:1 there is a solemn warning not to let ourselves "drift away." Following in v.3 is a sobering question to the drifting disciples, "How will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation?" And in the second verse following the lead text above, the inspired writer reveals that it was already the "habit of some" to be "forsaking our own assembling together." Then, in the last verse of this chapter, he declares that some of the Hebrew Christians had even then begun to "shrink back to destruction." 

      Why is it that so many who once submitted allegiance to Christ defect later and let themselves drift back into the pollution and rebellion of sin? A very detailed answer to this question would take into consideration the myriad situations which arise in the lives of the defectors. Jesus, however, has already summarized them in the Parable of the Sower into three basic categories:

      1. The lives of many people are so shallow that the gospel never penetrates far enough into their thinking and affections to transform them fundamentally.

      2. It is the experience of many others to expose themselves carelessly to the seduction of evil, which, through its unrelenting power, eventually reclaims their souls in its vicious grip.

      3.  A third and very large group are those who involve themselves in the cares and pleasures of worldly affairs which gradually paralyze their spiritul activity and then sear their conscience until they are past being sensitive to religious stimuli, (see I Tim. 4:1-2).

      The remedy to spiritual defection also has many specific applications, but the main ingredient is the individual's own will to persevere in his allegiance to Christ. Jesus points our attention to this when He says, "If anyone is willing to do His will," (John 7:17). One might call it resolution, fixed purpose, firm commitment, or something similar. But the basic idea is that of an unretractable decision to follow Jesus all the way to the end of life. None of the particular measures available to negate apostasy will be effective if the subject does not have the will to maintain loyalty to Christ. A complexity of mental entities correlate to establish such a will, including knowledge, hope, faith, love, conviction, humility, appreciation, and reverence. Any approach toward dealing with the problem of religion desertion that does not address the state of the individual's will and those concomitant mental factors is largely a symptomatic operation that has a very low rate of success, and one that is short-lived in the few limited successes it might manage to achieve.