Remember Cliff Notes?

Times have changed. I remember feeling guilty when I resorted to reading the Cliff Note version of a novel rather than finishing the real book. As a lit major, I never stayed on top of the overwhelming reading assignments. If I bought Cliff Notes, I kept them hidden from my Old Eagle Eye English teacher. They saved me many times.

Fast-forward thirty years. As a high school English teacher, I was okay with my students reading Cliff Notes. It was better than not reading anything. Besides, they are written by literary scholars and represent a fairly high level of understanding. It made students think about digging out themes in a piece of writing; it made them think about strong characterization; it made them think about effective settings; it even introduced them to denoument (what the heck is that?)

Yes, Cliff Notes are valuable. I sometimes used them as a teacher to discover pertinent information about whatever literature I was teaching. My cheater notes, I called them.

Hebrews, chapter eleven, is a "Cliff Notes" version of the Old Testament. The key words of this chapter are, "...by faith..."

• By faith, we understand...
• By faith, Abel offered...
• By faith, Enoch was taken...
• By faith, Noah...
• By faith, Abraham...
• By faith, Isaac...Jacob...Joseph
• By faith, Moses' parents...
• By faith, the people of Israel...
• By faith, Rahab...

Find a quiet spot and a few free minutes to read this amazing chapter in the New Testament. Then complete this sentence:


By faith, _______________[your name] ___________________________.