making the highlight reel

faith fills the space between believing and receiving...

Wide receivers... are among the fastest and most agile players in the game, and they are frequent highlight-reel favourites. (Wikipedia)

God’s biblical highlight reel begins with some words on faith... all that stuff about 'the essence of things unseen, the substance of things hoped for...' then, as example or evidence to be considered, the writer of the letter reminds his readers of their faith history, giving particular attention to the great patriarch, abraham... the one to whom God made the big promise: to make of him a great nation of descendants of greater number than the sands of the seashore, through whom the hope of the world would be realized.

abraham receives this promise from God, and is required to act upon it, leaving his home and his people with very little direction as to how it is all going to play out.

this whole thing can, perhaps, be compared to the work of the wide receiver in a football game. i mean, this player is required to do the ridiculous- to leave the rest of the team brawling at the line of scrimmage and run as hard as he can down the field as if he already has the ball. having run the designated distance, he angles slightly inward or outward, depending on the play called, and turns his head a bit in expectation: he has been told that he will receive the ball here somewhere and resume his run with it in his possession towards the goal line.

abraham seems to have been one of God's wide receivers- a man of significant faith. faith fills the space between believing and receiving.

just looking at one particular play in the sequence God is calling at the time is fairly telling (genesis 18.1-18)

this is the 5th time God appears to abraham. each time the ball moves further down the field, and each time momentum builds. however, there is a problem. the clock is running and the team is getting tired. abraham is now a really old guy, with his wife sarah not far behind him in years, and they still don't have children... a fairly large pushback on the whole 'descendants too numerous to count' bit of the promise.

in their passion to get the ball moving, team 'ben-Terah' has even tried calling a running play of their own involving a handoff to hagar, one of sarah's servants, but this is whistled down on a technical and results not only in a loss of yards but a fairly significant break in morale and momentum.

so when three heavenly representatives of Almighty God appear through the heathaze as abraham is in a time out, they are a welcome sight.

in the huddle, abraham humbly offers some refreshment to them, for he recognizes who has just appeared on the field. sarah, having not yet encountered God in this way, acts out of natural disbelief, laughing out loud (just like Abraham a couple plays back in genesis 17.17)

however, the play is called, the huddle breaks and faith fills the space between believing and receiving.

the ball is snapped and the 100 year-old wide receiver bursts off the line once again, as if he has the ball the whole time. of course we know how the play ends because we've seen the glorious catch on God's highlight reel.

faith is the reason the wide receiver makes the big catch, time after time. he runs as though he already has the ball... he acts upon his belief that there is a point to his running. every step is marked with expectancy as he executes his part of the larger play with speed and agility... and because his belief in and commitment to the plan is demonstrated in these steps, he is exactly where he needs to be in order to receive the ball and carry it to the goal...

okay... all football analogizing aside:
Q: what are we doing with the promises of God in our own lives and relationships? are we walking blamelessly, doing what is right and speaking the truth from our hearts? (psalm 15.1-2) or are we testifying with our inner laughter and our cynical perspective that we have either never encountered God, or have forgotten what it was like because it was so long ago?