Hebrews 11 | Crossroads Daily

Hey, I'm Chuck. I'm Kirsten. I'm Caleb. I'm Chris. And today is Hebrews 11. Can we just do a celebration? Woo! Yes! Come on, Hebrews 11. Stories, understandable, names that I can pronounce. I mean, there's a lot of stuff to celebrate in Hebrews 11, right? Oh my God. Abraham. Oh, I've heard of that dude. I know that guy. That's a good one. Exactly. So well done. And this is a classic chapter in the Bible. Probably one of the, I don't know, maybe most popular chapters if you've read the New Testament for sure. This is the faith chapter, sometimes called the hall of faith, right? Because we hear all these stories of people who were faithful. And there's a repeated phrase here, by faith, right? By faith, Abraham, by faith, Noah, by faith, you name it, you know, Joseph, all those things. And so I love that we are reading this in their rear view mirror, right? It didn't feel like that to them in the moment, right? Abraham spent decades by faith without anything being realized. And that's probably where we are in some place in our life. And so why don't we just start there, right? Just level setting, like, hey, where's a place in your life where you're trusting God for something, but you have not reached the finish line yet. You're kind of in the middle. What's that look like in your life right now? This one feels embarrassing, but it's fresh for me. I have a one-year-old daughter. She's the best. I feel like I, there's a lot of me that wrestles with enjoying spending time with her right now. And if you would have told, like, pre-baby me, if you would have said that, I'd be like, you're insane. I get to have a daughter one day. Like that's, I'm going to love every minute. Yes. I'm going to stare at her every single second of the day and just love all parts of being with her. And I don't know if it's a, like a male thing of like, I like to see outcomes of things. And, you know, it's like, we're reading a story at night and I'm like, she doesn't know we're doing this. She's just sitting there pointing like she won't remember this. No one else knows I'm doing this. Like I'm not getting credit elsewhere. And I feel like it's really been a shot to like my pride and ego of like, I thought this would come very naturally like that. I would just want to every single second. But I found myself getting distracted because I'm like, well, when she gets older and can actually like play, then I'll like lock in. And I just know that when that day comes, I won't be ready if that's the mindset. And so all this to say that my prayer has been recently like, God, give me a heart that would love these moments because

I'm going to miss them. And also I want to have this heart that like longs to be with her, even when it's just picking her up. Like, don't put that in the outlet. Don't like eat this. Like even if it's just the tedious things that I yeah, and so it's like, it's humbling, but I trust that like God is going to work in my heart because I've seen that happen. Like I'm like, God, please change my heart in this way. I've seen that historically in my life. And right now it just feels like, man, this is kind of a grind. And I feel like weird saying that out loud. No, man. Hey, thank you for sharing that. And you're not going to hear them. But if you're a dad who has been in that, can you just say, Chris, I see you. I just hope you know right now there are thousands of dads and I see you. I see you. I think that is a very real and honest place for a dad to be. There's a guy, he's in our church, PJ. PJ Widener, if you're out there, shout out to PJ. I'm still thinking when I was having my first kid, he was, he was just a guy. Guy gave me a gift to some guys that was just willing to be honest with me. And he was like, hey, Chuck, I'm gonna tell you something if you've not heard it before. He said, you are going to have this baby. And when you first see this baby, your world's going to change. And he said, and then about two, three weeks later, it's just going to suck. I thought you were going to say you're going to look at this baby and say, dang, that is an ugly baby. But you did not go that direction. Well, I am biased. I think we had beautiful babies. I really do. But I remember like, how many diapers do I need to change? Like what? And I remember the thing and I still talk about this, like, man, there's only so many times I can roll the ball back and forth again and again and again. So that's a real place. And I love that you would name that, though, because that's totally a faith step, right? Because there is something for you in that. There is a slowing down in that. There's a, you know, you said she won't remember it. She may not cognitively remember it, but her nervous system will. That's right. Her nervous system will remember that dad was present. That's right. And that has more impact than we know. So just encouragement that, yeah, dude, I see

No, I appreciate that. That's so real, man. And it's been a challenge, too, of like doing something and not just being like, God, give me a heart that would like this. And then and then just like, and it's like, no, put myself in a position, like be present and trust that God is going to work in that, like move along with asking for the prayer. So that's right. Yeah, that's good. That's good. How about you guys? A place where you are in the middle of the by faith? Journey right now. I don't have a simple answer. So I'm gonna try and talk my way through it, but from the way that you described this of like Looking back. I even wonder we went through kovat. I think everyone here and how there's been jokes around how we lived through kovat and and I personally didn't have any like when you hear the word pandemic it sounds so like You're on Lockdown and bunkers under the ground type pandemic and it'll be written maybe in history books I don't know but telling our kids like yeah, we live through kovat the pandemic right and they're gonna have this picture that is probably very different than than our picture and I imagine if like how Abraham lived through his faith journey with God is it was It was probably Magnificent and miraculous and all the things but I have a wonder of like was it just the little moments of his? Yes that built into this Legendary story that they're looking back on and so I think of I was just processing this with my husband I'm like, I think God wants me. I think I will look back at the end of my life I'll be like dang Look at this miraculous Insane story that he used and in my life to impact his kingdom on on a mega level and I can't help but think like there's

something coming at the end of my life that I'm genuinely gonna look back on and be like This is huge. Yeah, but it's just as little yeses And so it's not a simple like this is what I'm waiting for. But I have this deep And I don't think it's a prideful belief I have a true belief that he's gonna use my life and impact here on earth to do something Incredible that I might not even see I mean it says in here like so many of them were promised something that they never got to see or experience and and I and I believe in that in my Life, and I'm so curious and anticipating what that is but it's just those little yeses like I even think of people that changed history like in like the The wars and like the people that have statues It's like I don't know if they necessarily like it's all themselves being remembered to statues But there's little yeses that they just like kept saying like changed changed everything. So that's what I'm That's the only thing that came to my mind right now. Um, that's good. Yeah, that's great. Yeah, that's great. Yeah the last like six months I've been Obsessed with Ernest Shackleton. You guys know who this guy is, but go read anything about Shackleton. You can is unbelievable It's probably the greatest survival story in history. Yeah, dude took I'm gonna get the numbers wrong Okay, but he took like 30 people with him trying to reach trying to cross Antarctica link to length they didn't even make it their ship got stuck in the ice. It's sunk These 30 guys lived on ice on ice flows for two years And he had to do everything to get them rescued like no one was coming for them, right? Dude sailed 400 miles in a dinghy to a boat to a to an island where no one lived So we had to get that dinghy again sell 800 miles to another island where people were Bring people back. Listen, none of his men died Unbelievable And he named his boat the endurance before they left before they left Because his family had a motto by endurance we conquer by endurance we conquer Wow, he had pretty much failed at everything else in his life Which is why he wanted to be an explorer all his he had other plans to be like rich and famous and they all like Crapped out even his plan to be an explorer failed because he didn't actually cross Antarctica. He just didn't die, right?

But dude like that is best part of me so much because I I'm in the middle of a lot of flux With my job with where I live. I'm 40 years old is I don't think it was like a midlife crisis But it is it is a time of like what do I want to do with the rest of my time? Yeah, where do I want to live what I want to focus on like what is actually important instead of just grinding and grinding and Grinding and I don't have all the answers. Yeah, but what I've been telling my kids and family is like We conquer by enduring, you know, we one more day like let's just go one more day people might run faster than us They might be better than us at whatever thing. That's what they're not gonna outlast So Yeah, that's what I'm focusing on is just trying to be faithful today and keep hanging on to the handlebars. Yeah Yeah, I love it. I think I got a t-shirt for you when you run that marathon. Come on now We conquer by indoor. Let's go. Come on Absolutely wicking wicking unless you want more suffering. No, I don't That'll make sense to all the runners out there, right? Wicking material. Man, you know, I love that. I love what you said, Caleb, because, like, that is by faith. Here's what I believe. I believe, right now, we are all living a by faith story. One of the things, we were talking about this, we're gonna be having a series on the Hall of Faith, actually. That's gonna be an upcoming series. And one of the things I was talking with the teaching team about is, like, you know, if you think about this as a Hall of Fame, right? You know, if you go in a Hall of Fame, everybody has a bust, right? You know, or they have their records and stuff. I almost would love in the series to have, like, empty busts on the stage that say, like, your name here. Because if you are following Jesus, you are called to a journey of faith. You're called to a Shackleton-like experience. And that Shackleton journey of faith might show up in the way you faithfully raise kids for 20 plus years, right? You know, they keep coming back, I hear, for their whole life. That might be some vocational thing that you know God has put in your heart, but you've never stepped into it. It might be a health journey. It might be the restoration of a relationship journey. You know, I'm thinking about my brothers and sisters who are behind bars. It might be like, man, how do I live this reality in a way that is faithful? We're all called to that. And here's the beautiful thing. Think about all we've been reading in Hebrews. We all have the high priest Jesus. You know, in chapter 12, it's gonna say he's also our champion, right? He's the author and the perfecter of our faith. So we all have an opportunity to have it said of us in the annals of heaven. By faith, Caleb. By faith, Kirsten. By faith, Chris. By faith, Chuck. By faith, you. Fulfill whatever it is that God is calling you to do. So man, let's be people who conquer by enduring.

And thanks for hanging with us.