Objection: Hebrews 11:39 Proves That You Can Have Faith and NOT Receive the Promises
Hebrews 11:39:
And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:
Also, Hebrews 11:13 could also be quoted as part of this objection: “These all died in faith, not having received the promises....”
These verses talk about the greats of faith not being able to partake of the New Covenant. They have nothing to do with having faith for something that God had promised. Also, the greats of faith did receive promises – just not the promises in the New Covenant, which was impossible in their day because Jesus had not yet risen from the dead. After reading Hebrews 11:39, check out verses 40 and 33 below!
Hebrews 11:40:
God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.
Hebrews 11:33:
Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,
“The promise” in verse 39 is clearly our New Covenant, because it involves US (verse 40). The greats of faith obtained the promises through faith that were theirs to obtain under the Old Covenant. They could not partake of the promise of a covenant that had not yet been ratified by blood!
The promise they did not receive in Hebrews 11:13 had to do with their eternal dwelling place. We too will die without having yet lived in this promise. This is borne out by the text which follows the part quoted: “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. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. 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.” The context is clearly not earthly promises of the kind we can receive here in this life by faith. We cannot receive our heavenly dwelling place in this life. So there are promises that even we see afar off but cannot obtain in this lifetime. But healing isn’t one of them!
By the way, the objection as it stands is actually a true statement. You can be in faith and not receive the promises. The writer of Hebrews stated that we inherit the promises through faith and patience (Hebrews 6:12). He surely did not contradict himself in Chapter 11. You can also be in faith but walk in strife with your spouse and not have your prayers answered (1 Peter 3:7). The Bible teaches that there are hindrances to faith and that faith is supposed to work by love (Galatians 5:6). You can have faith, but if you don’t walk in love, you’ll have trouble eventually and wonder why things aren’t working well for you. You do reap what you sow, whether you sow good things or bad things. While it is technically possible to receive things by faith without any semblance of a love walk, it is neither easy nor desirable.
Also, Scripture supports the idea that you can believe something in your heart and not receive it. You must not only believe it but also say it! If you’re unwilling to tell someone else what you’ve received from the Lord by faith, you really don’t have anything – you’re just kidding yourself. Faith without corresponding action is dead (James 2:14-26). The main corresponding action of faith is words that agree with what you believe in your heart. Jesus said that the mountain or the tree would move when you speak to it, not when you simply believe that it will move. The crippled man whom Paul commanded to stand upright on his feet had faith to be healed but he was not healed until he did the corresponding action of standing up (Acts 14:7-10).
So yes, you can have faith (“dead” faith without works) and not receive the promises! But that’s not the intended main point of the objection. The idea of the objection is that you can have faith and still be unable to receive the promises, and that is ridiculous and not at all what the context of the passage is about. To say that you can have faith that cannot work is the opposite of what Jesus taught. When people failed to receive something, He attributed it to unbelief. If He did, why can’t we? Sure, it might make some people mad, but Jesus wasn’t afraid to make people mad when He preached the truth. Better to admit that we need to grow in faith than to water down the Bible to match our substandard experience.