Now faith is the assurance[a] of things hoped for, the conviction[b] of things not seen. Indeed, by faith[c] our ancestors received approval.
Faith is the reality of what we hope for, the proof of what we don’t see. The elders in the past were approved because they showed faith.
There is the fantasy world of fairy tales and make believe. Such mirrors something of the world we live in, but always seems to have what we might call a magical element to it. In some sense that actually does approximate Biblical faith. After all, something is factored in which we can’t see or explain or can just be ignored altogether.
Make believe carries with it the world of pretend and play which children readily enter into. The Disney phenomena is compelling evidence of that. And fairy tales of the past continue to be treasured in the present. It is a world in which imagination can take over, and in which dreams come true.
There’s actually correlation between what we might call make believe faith and the faith we find in the Bible which is referred to in the above quotations at the beginning of what’s called the faith chapter. Faith itself seems to indicate something behind it. Why do people persist in faith when so much seems contrary to such faith? Why do they continue on in faith when so many don’t?
The point in the above passage is that faith itself indicates something that is not seen, yet not make believe. It’s not something we’re pretending exists when we know it doesn’t. We go on and keep going on in the face of a world that has no such faith. We believe in spite of appearances and all that seems to contradict such faith. We act in that faith in ways which without it, we would not. And as we see in what follows that faith chapter, in a Jesus-like way.
Jesus community 