Originally Posted by
jmdrake
Actually all along faith and works were together. The very first mention of Abraham is when he obeyed God and left his homeland in search for the promised land.
Please read:
Genesis 15 King James Version (KJV)
15 After these things the word of the Lord came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward.
2 And Abram said, Lord God, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus?
3 And Abram said, Behold, to me thou hast given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir.
4 And, behold, the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir.
5 And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be.
6 And he believed in the Lord; and he counted it to him for righteousness.
7 And he said unto him, I am the Lord that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it.
So, by the time Abraham was declared righteous through his faith, he had already acted on it. Compare with Hebrews 11.
8 By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.
9 By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise:
10 For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.
11 Through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged him faithful who had promised.
12 Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by the sea shore innumerable.
13 These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.
14 For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country.
15 And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.
16 But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.
17 By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac: and he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten son,
18 Of whom it was said, That in Isaac shall thy seed be called:
Note that in Hebrews 11:8 the evidence of Abraham's faith was that he was willing to leave his homeland. So it's a mistake to pretend that there were no works of faith until Abraham was willing to sacrifice Isaac. But check out what God, through His angel, had to say when Abraham was willing to sacrificing Isaac.
Genesis 15
11 And the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I.
12 And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me.
Now isn't that an odd thing for God to say? Or even for an angel of the Lord to say? "For now I know that thou fearsest God". Wasn't that already known? Here is something to consider. While Abraham had shown faith by leaving his homeland, his faith was not complete. Note that when he was "declared righteous" what was he having faith in? Genesis 15 is where Abraham told God that he would leave his property to his servant because he and his wife were childless. God promised Abraham a son. Abraham had faith in that promise. But that faith wavered. It wavered twice when Abraham told two different kings that his wife was his sister. (Half truth. She was his half sister. But he was not up front about the fact that she was his wife.) Why is this showing a lack of faith in God's promise that he would have a son? Well obviously if you are childless and God has promised you a son, that must mean that you're going to live long enough to impregnate someone. His faith also wavered with the choice of Hagar to bear him a son. God didn't tell Abraham to "help him out." So in a way, the call to sacrifice Isaac was the ultimate test of Abraham's faith in that promise. After all, God didn't just promise Abraham a son, but promised him that all the nations would be blessed through that son. Like the test Abraham failed when he sought to spare his own life, would he fail and put more stock in his love for his son than in his faith in God?
Interestingly enough, I keep hearing people saith that works of faith are for "justification before men." Really? Where is that in the Bible? Who man was Abraham "justified" in front of? And why did the angel of the Lord say "Now I know" as opposed to "Now some man knows"?
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