It always is today. Today is the day of salvation. Yesterday's manna is not acceptable food for man or God. "The just shall live by faith" means we are to be seeking God with diligence today.

Hope is an important component of faith. We are saved by hope. Hope requires much patience on our part. Today we hear the self-centered believers claiming we do not have to wait for God. "If we have faith," they say, "we can get what we want now." This is the opposite of faith. This is human presumption combined with the working of metaphysical principles. It is the False Prophet of Revelation, Chapter 13. Faith deals constantly with the invisible. The Gospel of the Kingdom is a glorious hope for the future, not the means of becoming happy and wealthy in the world, as some are teaching. The true saint lays hold on the invisible. He sets aside his life, his hopes, his ambitions, so he may seek without distraction the invisible Kingdom of God. He lives for the Day when Christ will appear and establish righteousness in the earth. This is what it means to live by faith.

We are not suggesting God does not give us joy or fulfill some of our hopes in the present world. We would faint if we did not believe to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. But for those who are walking in stern obedience to God there often are long periods of waiting in which we must cling in faith to the promise of God.

For by it the elders obtained a good report. (Hebrews 11:2)

Hebrews 11:2 shows us that God never has changed and His ways of working with His creatures never have changed. The only difference between Moses and the Christian is that the Christian has been given more Divine grace, more spiritual provisions, more opportunities for Divine Glory.

Moses could please God only by faith and the Christian can please God only by faith. This is why the Holy Spirit, in the Book of Hebrews, is using the "elders," the patriarchs, to teach the Christian the necessity for living by faith.

Through faith we understand the worlds were framed by the word of God, so things which are seen were not made of things which do appear. (Hebrews 11:3)

The man who is walking by faith is not impressed or oppressed by modern "science." He understands and appreciates the spiritual basis of all that exists.

By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh. (Hebrews 11:4)

Notice that Abel, the second son of Adam, was declared to be righteous (justified) by faith. Justification by faith has been with us from the time of Adam.

Notice also it was what Abel did that obtained righteousness for him. True faith always lives in works. Faith without works is dead. There is no such thing as an abstract faith, a faith not expressed in some kind of behavior.

The eleventh chapter of the Book of Hebrews, the "faith chapter," is a record of works, of what people did.

To be continued.