Focal Point

Pastor Mike Fabarez: God does not want a church full of people that are giving God their leftovers. And yet we do it all the time. The Bible says, would you start risking a little more of the excellence that should be given to an excellent God? Give him some excellent gifts and do it because it affirms the greatness of God. It just affirms the greatness of God.

Dave Drewery: Welcome to Focal Point with Mike Fabarez. I'm Dave Drewery. Glad you could join us for today's study in Hebrews 11. You can think of this chapter as a Christian Hall of Fame. Around every corner is a biblical character that illustrates for us a life of ambitious faith.

The first figure in the Bible's Hall of Fame is someone who challenges us to trust God enough to give him our best. So to help us unpack the lessons learned from this hero of the faith, here's Pastor Mike and a message about a man named Abel.

Pastor Mike Fabarez: There's no doubt that we live in a culture that is obsessed with comfort and convenience. We want it easy and efficient with as little pain as possible. We love gadgets that save us time. We love gimmicks that make us money. We love methods that will allow us to live a little easier life, and we certainly love experiences that make us feel good.

So in a society like that, a society that loves the minimum requirements, it's no surprise that it's not real big on the concept of sacrifice. Culture's not really comfortable with that word. It doesn't really strike a tone with our culture. It's culture that loves to work less and play more. And so it's hard to make sense of people that are into this thing called sacrifice. We don't know what to do with them—people that'll go the extra mile, as I often say, and stay the extra hour and spend the extra dollar, particularly when you don't have to and no one's forcing you to.

That's a strange kind of person. As a matter of fact, people like that are labeled in our culture workaholics or overachievers. They're pejoratively maligned as folks that something must be wrong with them. They need some help. They need to chill out just a little bit. If you do your overachieving for the cause of Christ or for the glory of God, it's even worse. Talk about the name-calling at that point. Society doesn't get it. They don't like it.

We're not going to get any help from the world when it comes to the call to be sacrificial Christians. But yet I hope you've already learned that what God is looking for in our lives, that mediocre Christianity and lukewarm faith just won't cut it. It should be a non-option for us. God wants us to move on and to move forward and to embrace a kind of lifestyle that will, if we have ambitious faith, embrace this kind of zealous sacrifice for the good and the cause of Christ.

As a matter of fact, in 2 Chronicles, as you might remember, God is described as looking through the earth, scanning his eyes through the world. And you remember what he's looking for: people whose hearts are completely his. As D.L. Moody said, if we just had ten people in a world that could do that, we would change this world for Christ. Because he knows that if your heart is committed to Christ in a way that is whole and complete, that means we'll do whatever it takes. We'll go the extra mile. We'll go ten extra miles if that's what God calls us to do and if that's the need of the moment.

The first named example in Hebrews chapter 11 is a needed reminder of that kind of lifestyle. It is an inspiration, a motivation, a catalyst for us to say, now where are we in terms of serving Christ and giving our best for our great God? And the first one named, if you have your Bibles, you'll see in verse number four, is the Old Testament character named Abel.

Now we don't know much about Abel. Abel is kind of tucked in a bit of a mystery. He's only alive for seven verses in the Old Testament. And yet his effect is reverberated throughout the Bible. As a matter of fact, Jesus comes on the scene and he hails Abel as this great and godly man. So certainly from God's perspective, this is a great guy. And in the writer of Hebrews, as the Holy Spirit inspires him to jot down a list of heroes of ambitious faith, the first one on the list that's named is this guy Abel.

Here's a guy who is sold out for God and his life reflects it. Talk about a person with a high view of God. Here he is. Verse number four: the Bible says by faith—and it's going to take that to do what he did—he offered God a better sacrifice than Cain. Now you remember that was his brother and it didn't work out so well. Talk about being maligned or having your world scoff at your zealous gifts to God. Cain certainly did that.

And yet, from God's perspective, middle of verse four, he was commended as a righteous man when God spoke well of his offerings. And here's the good news, not only with Abel but for all these people in the book of Hebrews that are hailed as ambitious, faithful Christians. It says by faith he still speaks even though he's dead. Now let's fill in a little bit of this historically and go back in our Bibles to where this all took place. Genesis chapter 4.

Hebrews chapter 11 is just a reflection, a summation of the only thing we really know about Abel. And that was that he brought a great gift to God one day. But there are a few more facts to his life that might be helpful. It is unfortunate that we know more about his brother than we know about him. We certainly know more about his parents. And chapter three didn't get off to a good start in terms of Adam and Eve's behavior. And so in chapter four, we've got some more bad news.

But before we get the bad news, we get some good news. Good news of a guy who was keeping his flocks. Genesis chapter 4. Look at verse number one. This is about Adam and Eve. They have a child. His name is Cain. Eve is, as you can imagine, quite impressed with this whole process. With the help of Yahweh, I've brought forth a man. Later she gave birth to his brother named Abel.

And by the way, I'll just answer this because I'll get it at the door. Usually from kids, but they want to know, who did they marry? That's a whole another sermon and it is a bit icky, I realize. But if you know the rest of chapter four, Adam and Eve had lots of kids. And the good news is they grew really old. I mean, these are people that lived for hundreds of years. So I know it is icky to think about marrying your sister, but it could have been a sister that was 200 years younger and they'd never met. So not quite as icky if you're removed by two or three hundred years. Sorry about that, that's another message.

But two things we learn here about these two brothers. One is their occupation. Bottom of verse number two. Abel, he's a shepherd. He keeps the flocks. And Cain, he's a farmer. He works the soil. Now without any prompting or at least no explanation here, we don't have the Levitical priesthood, we don't have the Mosaic law. We just got two guys who are here in the course of time coming to do something that probably they learned from their parents to express to God their gratitude, to express to God their thanksgiving.

It says in the course of time, verse three, Cain brought some of the fruit of the soil as an offering to Yahweh. Verse four, but Abel, he brought fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock. Now the Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering. And on Cain and his offering, he did not look with favor. And so that kind of bummed out Cain. He was very angry and his face went into permanent frown mode. His face was downcast.

Now this has been the cause of a lot of speculation. Why is it that God is going to embrace Abel's sacrifice and discard Cain's sacrifice? And I think it's been a cause for way too much speculation because the answers are really here in this text. And yet people have said, well, maybe God's more into the animal sacrifice than the—none of that is true. Actually, in the Mosaic law as it all develops in the Old Testament, God is fine with you giving whatever the produce of your income is.

If you're a shepherd, bring the animals. If you're a farmer, bring the produce. That's not the issue. It's not the nature of what they brought. It's the quality of what they brought. Look at that comparison. It's right there for us. And we read over it and we miss it oftentimes. Bottom of verse number three, Cain brought what kind of fruit? Well, just some of it. There's no real description of it. It's just some of the soil, the fruit of the soil as an offering to the Lord.

Now here's a contrast. Verse number four, but Abel brought—now here's the thing, unfortunately, the NIV translates this fat portions, which we don't really—and people think offering and sacrifice fat portions because in Leviticus we talk about the restitutionary sacrifices and bringing fat portions. We don't have any of that yet. That's a bit anachronistic to think about fat portions and being some kind of fulfillment of a Levitical sacrifice.

Probably, as some translations translate this, we're talking about the fat or plump ones, okay? So that's like the best ones. That's the ones you want to keep if you're into that, animals and eating them. And I am. I don't mean to mention that I'm not; I'm all for that. Let's go have a steak afterwards. Verse four, Abel brought the fat portions, the plump ones, from some of the—now here's a descriptive word—firstborn of his flock.

Now the comparison here at the beginning of the verse, but Abel brought this kind—what's the difference? Well, it's the non-descript "some of" the produce. And then it's the best ones of the first. See, and that's different. The comparison that we see in the text—and I know that seems a bit out of order because isn't God more concerned with a heart? Well, we'll get to that in the passage here. But the thing that expresses their heart is that one brings a mediocre gift and one brings the best of the first.

And the other one's just bringing some. So the point is, let's just jot this down. If we're going to follow in the pattern of Abel—and I know it doesn't get to the root cause, but let's just start at the surface expression—then you and I need to do what Abel did. And Abel, here comes number one: he was willing to risk giving God excellent gifts. Because as he brought his best, he looked at his brother and his brother didn't bring his best. His brother just brought some.

And as we'll see in the New Testament, there were reasons for that in his heart. But what we know is, here comes a guy bringing his best. And let me ask you this question: do you know any Christian that you really revere as someone who has ambitious faith and is on fire for God who doesn't give God his best? Do you? I don't. So this makes sense if we're talking about ambitious faith.

I mean, we're going to see that it's going to involve necessarily you and I bringing to God the best of what we have. And if some of you are rolling your eyes right now thinking, "Okay, here we go. I came to church and they invited me, and now it’s all going to be about giving. We’re going to have a big bucket at the end and we’re going to have to—" This is not about building projects or church funds or radio ministries or anything like that, okay?

Really, though it intersects with the concept of giving what God gives us, I realize that. He gives us more than a paycheck. See, although that may be part of it, let me show you this before we get too locked into are your arms crossed a little too tightly. Let's look at Hebrews chapter 13. Keep your finger in Genesis 4 because we'll come back to that. But I just want to let you know, when we talk about bringing gifts, we're not just talking about putting extra zeros on the check when you put it in the bag, okay?

That's really not the point of this message, although it may include that. But that's not the point. And that's not why I'm preaching this message and that's not why it's here in Hebrews chapter 11. When we talk about sacrificing or giving or offering to God, the Bible's much more holistic than money or you just bringing what is produced by your trade or your occupation. Okay, and we all get paid in paychecks. I don't think anybody's still bartering for their livelihood here.

And in those days, though, I mean, if you were a farmer, what you got is you got produce. If you were a shepherd, you got more animals. Let me just show you the broader picture of all this. Look at verse number 15. Hebrews 13, verse 15. Through Jesus, he says, and this is a command after all that's been said, he says, let us continually offer—there's the idea of giving—a sacrifice—there's an idea of excellence and deprivation if I'm going to give something here—sacrifice of praise.

Not cash in this particular verse; we're talking about praise. And if you think that's code for cash, he clarifies. It's the fruit of lips that confess his name. That is a sacrifice because if my mouth is talking about praising God or confessing the greatness of God, then my mouth is not complaining about the weather or it's not talking about how I need to clean the garage or it's not criticizing my neighbor.

I'm sacrificing whatever else I might think of or talk about at that moment to think about God and to sacrifice my time and my effort to speak and confess God. It's the difference between going down the road and thinking about work on your way to work or putting all those thoughts aside, thinking about God, confessing him, giving him the fruit of my lips and praising him on the way there. You are sacrificing something to do that. And it may be that if you sacrifice the best of your time and the best of your thoughts and the best of your words for the praise of God, that's also the kind of sacrifice that the writer of Hebrews has in mind.

Keep reading, next verse. There are other things involved in this. He says, and, verse 16, do not forget to do good. Not just about money. It's not just about words. It's not just about thoughts. It's about service. It's about action. It's about doing good. It's about being involved with my life and my energy and my skills. Keep reading. And to share with others. It's not just about putting something in a bag at church.

It may be about bringing something to someone else in my neighborhood, on my block, in my apartment complex, at my school. That is something that could be the gift I give to God is to share with others. And the Bible says with such—what's the word?—sacrifices God is, he's pleased. So does it involve whatever you get paid with? Yes, it definitely will involve. If you're going to give God your best, it will involve what you earn.

It will also involve what you think. It will involve what you say. It will involve how you serve. It will involve how you actually interact with other people. And the point is, if we're giving God our best, it's going to affect all those things. And we're not going to give God the last few moments of our day to think about him or to read his book or to pray a few prayers and talk to him. We're not going to give the worst of our time to the church and the service of maybe the next generation in our youth program or in our AWANA program or in our kids ministry.

We're not going to give them the worst. We're going to move from giving him leftovers or, may I say, mediocrity, because that was Cain's problem, and we're going to bring him our best. Because we'll begin to see with our faith that God is great enough to really deserve the best from us. And I don't know anybody who I think is godly or has any kind of faith to speak of that doesn't show by his behavior, his giving, not just of his resources but of his effort, his time, his strength, his whatever, who's not showing that and demonstrating that in a clear and tactile way.

You see it because that's what faith does. It expresses itself in words, in giving, in generosity. And if all of that is given for the glory of God and for the cause of Christ, then that's what we're talking about in this text. And Abel apparently did that. Look again, verse number four: he gave a better sacrifice. The focus of the first sentence of verse four is that his sacrifice was a better one.

And so I want to say, your sacrifice and my sacrifice, if we're going to be faith-filled people, we need to stop giving God the mediocre stuff and really say it's going to be a priority for me. Why? Why should I do that? Why? What kind of faith? What is that faith focused on? Let me give you a hint. Turn to Malachi chapter one. Look at verse number six of chapter one. Here's the thing about giving God things.

It will be a measure of how I view him. It is always a measuring stick of my view of his greatness. I've thrown that out a few times today, that as we understand by faith the greatness of God, it will demand the best from us. We'll go from mediocre offerings to excellent offerings. And that's all based on how highly I view him. One of our values here at Compass is to have a high view of God. And we know that will affect everything in our lives as we seek to serve him and give our best to him.

Look at verse number six. A son honors his father. Here's God training the people, saying, listen, you guys do that. You're calling me Father. I mean, you're doing that a lot. You call me Lord. Well, you know what? A servant, he honors his master. But he says this, bottom of verse six: if I'm a father, then where's the honor due me? And if I'm a master, where's the respect due me? says Yahweh Almighty, by the way, the prophet says. It is you, oh priests, who show contempt for my name.

And that spun their heads around. What do you mean? We're professional religious leaders. How do you say we don't respect you or honor you? This is our full-time job. Of course we do. And so they protest. They throw a flag on the play. How have we shown contempt for your name? And here's his answer, verse number seven. He goes right to their gifts. He goes right to what they give. You place defiled food on my altar.

And you say, well, how have we defiled you? By saying the Lord's table is contemptible. And they're going, well, we never said that. He defines it, verse eight: when you bring blind animals for sacrifice, is that not wrong? When you sacrifice crippled or diseased animals, is that not wrong? Now underline the next six words. Here it comes: try offering them to your governor. Would he accept you? Would he be pleased with you? I don't think so, God says.

Now there's the interesting dichotomy. And if you don't think that's alive and well today, you don't know the modern church. We will do more for our next-door neighbor coming over to our house for dinner. You will do more when you have somebody that you respect coming into your sphere of influence and you'll do more to lay the red carpet out for mere fallen, sinful human beings than most of us will do for God.

If I said, you know, the president's coming over to Compass next week and we're going to have a chance to have—and as a matter of fact, I want him to come to your house for lunch. I bet you're going to work on that. It won't be paper plates and KFC, right? I mean, depending on your political leanings, maybe it will, right? I don't know. But I'm assuming he's the president. We're going to respect that. We're going to honor that.

If I said, I know the president wants some clothes, so could you go shopping this week and get him—or could you give him something when he comes to your home? Most of us would probably work hard at doing a good job with that. And yet I think back to when I was a kid, we had a barrel in the lobby of the church. Did you grow up with one of those? The missionary barrel, right? Some churches called it the Dorcas barrel because of Dorcas in the book of Acts, which is a perfect name for it because most of the stuff that got placed in it was dorky, right? We call it the dorky barrel.

What's the deal? Here we put out something and say, here, come and bring something for the service of God. Giving it to the ministry of our—come and bring your gifts, bring your clothing, bring your stuff. And what do we bring there? Stuff we can't hand-me-down anymore and stuff that won't sell at a garage sale, right? I mean, we're giving him our trash. I mean, it's one step up from the trash barrel.

And I'm thinking to myself, Christians have been doing that for as long as I've been knowing Christians. We think, well, God will understand. And that's exactly what these guys were doing. Well, you know what? It may not be the best that I've got in my closet, but hey, God will get it. We're loving him anyway. I put something in the barrel. That's better than most.

And they're going, come on. And God's response is you've lost your view of me. If you knew how majestic, how powerful, how great I was, you wouldn't be bringing me your second best. You wouldn't be bringing your leftover stuff that you can't sell at the marketplace. You'd be bringing me your best. It's wrong and your governor wouldn't have it. And if you think your governor wouldn't have it, I'm not going to have it.

Now implore God to be gracious to us. With such offerings, verse nine, from your hands, will he accept you? Verse 10, now here's an amazing commentary from God at a service of worship. He says this: "Oh, that one would shut the temple doors so that you might not light useless fires on my altar." Now think about that. This is what God was saying about the barrel in the lobby of my church when I was growing up: I wish someone would put a lid on it and seal it up. That's what God is saying.

And you know what? He's saying the same thing about church. Doesn't this sound like the New Testament commentary on Laodicea? I mean, I just want—I'm not even there. I'm outside. I'll be outside until I can become the preeminent thing in your life. And God, when we're sitting here and we're putting our little five-dollar check in the basket, and when someone says we really need some ministry here to our next generation, and you say, "Well, you know what? If I got some extra time, and maybe if things at work don't work out and if that client doesn't come through and maybe I can—yeah, okay, yeah, maybe I'll throw in a few hours here and there."

When we bring that, you know what God says? Shut the program down. Tired of the ministry. I'm not going to be—I'm not showing up. I'm not going to do it. God does not want a church full of people that are giving God their leftovers. And yet we do it all the time. And you think God's going to tolerate that because you picture him as some big fat grandpa sitting in a rocking chair going, "Oh, I love those boys. They're just beautiful little children." That's not God.

And if you don't think that's true, look at the next thing he says, verse number 11. He says emphatically and declaratively, "My name will be great among the nations, from the rising of the sun to the setting. In every place, incense and pure offerings will be brought to my name." Now you've got to get in the Old Testament mindset. You're sitting there in Jerusalem in the Old Testament and you're looking out to the east and you're looking out to the west and you're thinking beyond the Mediterranean, back over the hills here in Jerusalem to Jordan and you're thinking, which was Babylon, you're thinking, "Wow, you know what? I'm a whole lot more important than those guys. We are God's favorite chosen people. We're here to serve the living true God."

The Bible says would you start risking a little more of the excellence that should be given to an excellent God? Give him some excellent gifts and do it because it affirms the greatness of God. It just affirms the greatness of God.

Dave Drewery: Whether we have a lot or a little, we can always give our best to God. You're listening to Focal Point with Mike Fabarez and a message called Trusting God Enough to Give Him Our Best, part of a series titled Ambitious Faith. To go back and hear anything you might have missed, visit focalpointradio.org.

And while you're on our website, be sure to request our featured resource: it's the journals of Jim Elliot, a missionary made world-famous after his life was taken by the very tribe he sought to reach with the gospel. Elliot believed that God deserved more than a comfortable, carefully managed devotion, and he lived that out with everything he had.

Get your copy of the journals of Jim Elliot when you make a donation today. Call us at 888-320-5885 or donate online at focalpointradio.org. Or send your donation by mail by writing to us at Focal Point, Post Office Box 2850, Laguna Hills, California, 92654. And now Pastor Mike has a special announcement.

Pastor Mike Fabarez: Thanks, Dave. I'd like to invite you to join me September 19th through the 26th, 2026, on a Christian cruise through New England and Canada. We'll sail Holland America's Zuiderdam, known for its elegance and exceptional hospitality, to historic cities like Boston, Halifax, and Quebec City. We'll gather for devotional times in God's word followed by thought-provoking Bible teaching throughout our journey. Grammy-winning musicians Keith and Kristyn Getty will lead us in worship.

You'll enjoy the stunning autumn landscapes as we explore charming coastal villages, all while building friendships with like-minded believers. It's a unique opportunity to deepen your faith and see some of the most beautiful scenery on the eastern seaboard. Space is limited, so don't wait to sign up. Secure your cabin today at focalpointradio.org.

Dave Drewery: I'm Dave Drewery, and tomorrow we're stepping into the pastor's office to join Mike Fabarez for a special lesson on the difference between God's part and our part in sharing the good news with others. It's the next edition of Ask Pastor Mike, Friday, here on Focal Point.

Pastor Mike Fabarez: Hey there, Pastor Mike here. We're almost out of time, but before we go, I wanted to personally invite you to contact us here. Let us know how we can be praying for you. Head on over to focalpointradio.org and click the contact page, or send me a note on Facebook at facebook.com/pastormike or x.com/pastormike. Can't wait to hear from you.

Dave Drewery: Today's program was produced and sponsored by Focal Point Ministries.