Most people know Hebrews 11 as the “Heroes of the Faith” passage, and their stories evoke the broad-sweep re-tellings of their adventures, conveyed as though they were spiritual superheroes.  Their faith seems inaccessible for us lowly humans who grow hopeless over far less than floods, wars, and martyrdom.

In my book Encouragement for Foolish Christians I push against that notion, exploring such stories through the lens of who they were: broken humans like us.  They did not always feel strong or wise, and often wrestled with hope; they made mistakes and even disobeyed God.  However, ultimately their stories were marked by faithfulness: first of God choosing and remaining with them, and second of them staying at the table despite the invitation to foolishness.

That is what we are called to here: foolishness.  We want our paths forward to be marked by confidence and assurance, preferably based on concrete, stable information; this passage says it is instead a result of faith.  “Confidence in what we hope for” is faith, not God laying out the details.  The ESV goes so far as to use “conviction”, not just knowing but boldly acting upon what seems unknown to others.

How do we live this when we ourselves feel far from convinced?  We humbly say like the man in Mark 9:24, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”