Let's try again--with facts with this time?

Here is Matthew W. Bates on Hebrews 11:1:

"The author of the Letter to the Hebrews defines pistis, saying, 'Now faith [pistis] is the underlying substance [hypostasis] toward which hope is directed, the conviction of things not seen' (Heb. 11:1). The point of this definition—as is made clear by examples in the rest of Hebrews 11—is that by means of pistis, the true people of God are willing to act decisively in the visible world not for reasons that are immediately apparent but because an unseen yet even more genuine underlying substance (hypostasis), God's reality, compels the action."

The examples supplied in Hebrews 11 to understand the "faith" concept do not involve accepting concepts without facts. They involve actions when you don't know the reason why.

The message is: **Loyalty** to God leads you to act even when the effects won't be seen by you. That's the concept being evoked in Hebrews 11. The message is: you don't need to see the effects.