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Saving faith is not a mere single act of receiving Jesus. Saving faith receives Jesus in order to go on trusting him. Saving faith is a life of faith. That faith is what this chapter is trying to teach us. You can see that most clearly if you look at the verse that leads into the chapter, Hebrews 10:39, "But we are not of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the preserving of the soul." Do you see what is at stake: shrinking back to destruction; or pressing on in faith to preserve the soul. In other words, the evidence of authentic saving faith is its pressing on. Faith that saves from destruction is faith that lives day by day. That is what Chapter 11 is meant to illustrate. What does saving faith look like?
So the next verse, 11:1, defines the faith that presses on to preserve the soul as "The assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things not seen." Faith that saves from destruction and preserves the soul is future oriented. It doesn't just look back to what God did in the past, but mainly looks forward to what God promises to do in the future. It gains a lot of its confidence from God's past faithfulness, but what it believes is mainly promises. That is not add-on, second-stage, super-Christian faith. That is basic, ever-growing, ordinary Christian faith.
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