I don't know about you, but I have a hard time keeping my thought's straight in posts dealing with multiple arguments. I always feel like none of them truly get the attention they deserve.
With your permission, may I suggest that we deal with one issue at a time.
As to Abraham, Romans 4 does indeed say that Abraham was justified by faith. I have been imprecise in my terminology. What I was referring to was the fact that Abraham was not perfected and did not receive the promise until Christ was raised. As my proof of this I offer the following:
Heb 11
"By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God...
...And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect."
We see from the above that Abraham was looking forward to the promise of perfection but he did not (and could not) receive it with out the fulfillment of the blessings promised to the Church age.
As a follow up proof, Jesus in the NT describes Lazarus as being in Abraham's Bosom. I believe we both know this was a paradisaical place of rest - but it was not the Heaven in which God dwells. Abraham, righteous as he was, was not allowed into God's presence before he partook of the cleansing accomplished by Jesus death on the cross.
I believe my point in this illustration was that the NT saints (i.e. believers) have a salvation that is different in quality than that which was available to those under the old covenant. The Old Testament can not always be an accurate guide as to how God handles matters under the New Covenant.
Sure.
In the OT we see all men described as going to Sheol - the saints had to go to Heaven at some point, so I think that must be what the "promise" refers to. This fits with Heb. 10:36: "For patience is necessary for you: that, doing the will of God, you may receive the promise", which seems to refer the promise to the afterlife, as it also does with Heb. 9:15: "the promise of eternal inheritance".
With this interpretation in mind, I don't think the argument, based on this passage, that OT justification (of David) is different from NT justification with regards to the question of temporal punishment can stand, since what's at issue in Heb. 11:39 is just that the OT saints didn't go to Heaven until after Christ's death.
As the Catholic Encyclopedia says:
As a result of the Fall, Heaven was closed against men. Actual possession of the beatific vision was postponed, even for those already purified from sin, until the Redemption should have been historically completed by Christ's visible ascendancy into Heaven. Consequently, the just who had lived under the Old Dispensation, and who, either at death or after a course of purgatorial discipline, had attained the perfect holiness required for entrance into glory, were obliged to await the coming of the Incarnate Son of God and the full accomplishment of His visible earthly mission.