 A funny thing happened when looking at Abraham's faith. We find out that sometimes Abraham's great faith isn't so great. We are told that we are children of Abraham because of our faith, because he, after all, it was accounted to him righteousness because of his faith. When we look at his faith, something interesting shows up and it gives us encouragement and even kind of teaches us how to build our faith and really the kind of faith that God is looking for. So what I want to do is I want to go first to Hebrews 11 what we call the Faith Hall of Fame. Let me type this in and notice what it says. Now, faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction or evidence of things not seen for by it the men of old gain approval. Okay, so by faith, you gain approval. Okay, fine, we get that. By faith, we understand that the words were prepared. We weren't there, so by faith, we have to take what the book tells us that God was the one that prepared the world. By faith, Abel offered a good and better sacrifice than Cain. Okay, so far, so good. We also go down to verse five. By faith, Enoch was taken up so that he would not see death. So so far, we're seeing some great men who according to their faith. Now, we don't want the faith of Abel or the result of it because hey, he was killed as a result of it, right? But do I want that kind of faith? Well, sure, I want that kind of faith. The same sort of faith that Enoch had. What sort of faith is that? Well, let's continue reading. If we drop down to let's go to verse seven. By faith, Noah being warned by God. Well, by faith, Noah begins building an ark because it's going to rain. He didn't even had never even seen rain, didn't know what rain was. But he takes all of these years to build a boat, by the way, never being a boat builder, but he doesn't. Why by faith? That's the kind of faith that we want. But then we get to verse eight, Abraham. By faith, Abraham, when he was called, obeyed by going out to a place which he was to receive for inheritance, and he went out not knowing where he was going. So by faith, Abraham, again, we're seeing Abraham's faith. Of course, verse six says that it's impossible to please God without faith. You must have faith to please God. By faith, Abraham lived as an alien in the land of promise, as in foreign land. So we talk about his faith. But how much faith should we actually attribute to Abraham? That's an interesting point. So let's go and look at Abraham's faith. Let's go to Genesis chapter 15. Now in verse two, God has already told Abraham what he's going to do with him. He's going to bless him, make him a great nation, make his name great, and so forth, and that he's going to have an heir. But then in chapter 15 verse two, Abraham doesn't seem to be as confident or as faithful as you would think. He says, oh Lord God, what will you give me since I am childless and the heir of my house is Eleazar of Damascus. Abraham said, since you have given me no offspring, one born of my house is my heir. Then behold, the word of the Lord came to him saying, this man will not be your heir. So Abraham is a little concerned. He's a little worried, even though God's word have come to him. And so at this point in time, let's look down to verse five. He says, he took him outside and said, now look toward the heaven and count the stars. If you are able to count them, and he said to them, said to him, so shall your descendants be. Look what it says. Verse six, then at that moment, then he believed the Lord and he got reckoned it to him as righteousness. So at that moment, that's when God reckons his righteousness or his faith as righteousness. Well, the problem with that is that previous to this, Abraham was told by God what he was going to do. But then what does Abraham do? Demonstrate great faith? Not so much because remember, Pharaoh the king comes to him and takes Sarah, his wife, not because he was doing it by force, but because Abraham was afraid of the king, not the God who had been speaking to him and told him what he's going to do, the one whom he should have faith in because he's literally hearing from the voice of God, not faith in him, but he's got more faith in his fear. He tells Sarah, you know the story, and does it twice as a matter of fact, that pretend like, tell everyone that you're my sister, not you're my wife, because then they'll kill me and take you. Yeah, great faith Abraham. Well, what can we get from that? Well, what we can get from that is maybe us thinking that we need this superior level of faith is what God is after. Maybe it's not what he's after after all. When we start looking at the faith of other people, we're going to start saying that there was some chinks in their faith armors. As a matter of fact, go to verse 30. We see that by faith the walls of Jericho fell down after they had been encircled for seven days. True, but Joshua wasn't as completely faithful as one might think. As a matter of fact, by faith, Rahab the harlot, do we want that kind of faith? Well, enough faith to recognize that God is God. And I think we're starting to get to the point. Enough faith to recognize what God is doing. Verse 32, he says, And what more shall I say? For time will fail me if I tell of Gideon or Barak or Samuel and the prophets. Now, I'm sorry, in Samson, well, think about this. I want you to think about those names that were just mentioned, some of those names. For example, Gideon. God goes to him, the angel of the Lord comes to him and calls him mighty man of valor. And Gideon doesn't think anything. Wait a second, you got the right guy. And a couple of times, Gideon shows a lack of faith. As a matter of fact, he's not sure if God has called him. He's the one that says, can you give me a sign? God shows him a sign with the fleece. Can you do it again? I need some more. He does it again. And even still, he says, if you are not sure that these people will be given your hand, then take this guy, Pua, take him with you and go to the camp. So what does he do to demonstrate that he's still not faithful? That he's a little afraid? He takes Pua and then he gets, he hears a dream about someone else. And so even Gideon demonstrated a lack of faith. He was not as faithful as they, but the Bible says, or speaks of his faith, what about Barak? You all may not remember who Barak is, but you certainly remember the woman who, to his shame, ends up leading the men of Israel. The prophet is Deborah. She convinces Barak to go with him. But what does the Bible say? The Bible isn't speaking of Deborah. The Bible is speaking of Barak. Well, why is that? Well, maybe some things may ought to start clicking. Even Samson. Was Samson the most faithful of the Jews that you could remember? Not really. As a matter of fact, it's almost as though he really didn't think too highly of what God was doing with him. At the very end, he demonstrated great faith by putting his hands on the two pillars and bringing down the temple on top of these, on top of these pagan people. But still, his faith is not something that's really exemplary and therein lies the key. Maybe what God is after isn't the most supreme faith, but as he says, just even faith the size of a what? You've heard it before, the size of muscle. He says, because of your littleness of your faith, for I say to you, if you have faith, the size of a muscle seed, you will say to this mountain, be removed from here. Now, has that ever happened in the Bible? Do we ever see a time where someone moves a mountain and cast into the sea? What's never happened, but God's point is that even that sort of faith is good enough. Why? Because it's not your faith, it's not looking at you, it's looking at him. That's what you've got to remember when Jesus was in the boat and the wind in a ways began rocking back and forth and the disciples became afraid. And they say, Mass, don't you care that we're going to perish? Literally, Jesus is in the boat with them. And so, you know the story, he gets up, he rebukes the winds and waves and what happens? They are an amazement. Who was this who even can control the winds and wave? Jesus rebukes them though and he says to them, why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith? Or as though you have no faith? How is that? Well, because the object of your faith is literally there before you. So with us, there are going to be times we might waver in our faith. We're not totally sure. Do not let people tell you that doubt is a sin. That's not, there's nowhere in the scripture where it's a sin. We're encouraged not to doubt, but you're going to have some times where you're going to not be totally sure. That's going to happen. But this is where you put your focus on the Lord. If you just get even in spite of what has happened in the past, you're not going to be judged by your doubt. What you're going to be looked at though is the time that you do show faith. And what happens is, when you show that little bit of faith in God, not yourself, or in the circumstances, because all of these at one point in time gave too much credence to what was happening, if they can see, versus not putting enough credence in what God and who God is and what he's done. And so it's that faith that God is going to count as rights and as faith in what, because we didn't see Christ on the cross. None of us have seen that, but we trust it. We believe it. And because, like he said at the time, it's a blessing to you, a time because you have seen and believed, but a blessing for those who have not seen and yet still believe. And so we are those. Yeah, there's going to be some time where I'm not totally sure, but because I demonstrate some faith, it gives me something that God can build off of and to develop my faith. And so no, no one's going to write a book and put me in the latter part of Hebrews 11, put me in the Faith Hall of Fame, but I demonstrate my faith, even in spite of all the times in the past where I did not show enough faith, but right now I'm showing it. How am I showing it? By following him. And that's the point. That's how you please God, even with a little faith. Amen.