Turn with me to Hebrews 12 and look at the last part of verse one: “… let us run with patience the race that is set before us.”
Each one of us is running a race. And many of us don’t know it. Whether we are sons of God on our way to an eternity with our Father, or whether we are sons of Adam with a sin nature, who are on their way to the lake of fire. All of us are in a race.
Think about the term “race” as living out your life. We are either going to live out our lives for Jesus or we are not. Living a life for Jesus means we have accepted Him as Lord and Savior of our lives and are willingly and obediently serving Him. And ladies and gentlemen, this is truly the race that matters. Any other race will lead to eternal separation from Jesus, His Father and the Holy Spirit.
But many Christians – dare I say most – are not running the race that God has planned for them from before the foundations of the world. While they are not in sin, they are running races of their own choosing – races that will not bring them into the fullness of what their Father has prepared for them.
They are running races that will keep them “in a wilderness” that’s within reach of their “Promise Land,” just like the children of Israel, who were in the wilderness for 40 years and were literally just miles away from the land the Lord had promised to them through Abraham.
What is the Christian’s promised land? It’s everything that’s included as being a son or daughter of God. Our material and financial needs being met. Healing for our bodies and minds. Prayers answered.
Some of us are running the race that our Father specifically designed for us and some of us are not. For those who are not, how can they know that they are not?
And most importantly, how can they get into the race their Father has designed for them?
We find the answer to the second question in Hebrews 12. But, let’s begin with the first question, shall we?
How can we know we are not in the race our Father has designed for us? Are there standards, mile markers, that can help us? Yes sir. Yes ma’am.
Let’s begin with what I call “mile markers” that will help us see if we are running the race our Father has designed for us to run. I’m going to talk about four of them and they are only examples. There are so many mile markers for the person running the race his or her Father has designed for them.
Let’s begin with John 14:12.
In John 14:12, Jesus says “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on Me, the works that I do shall he do also and greater works than these shall he do, because I go unto My Father.” Most read this verse and think about Jesus opening blind eyes, healing the sick, restoring lame legs, casting out devils, etc. And all of these are part of the “works” that He did.
But the key to doing the works is found in the phrase “He that believeth on Me.” In verse six, Jesus says “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life: no man (without exception) cometh unto the Father, but by Me.”
Jesus says He is the only way to God. Jesus says He is the truth of God. And Jesus says He is the life that God sent to save the lost. If we aren’t willing to accept and believe that “only Jesus” is the way, the truth and the life, and are willing to sacrifice everything for Him, we are not in the race our Father has designed for us to run.
Mile Marker #1: We have an unmovable belief in Jesus and who He says He is.
The first verse of John 14 also identifies another mile marker for those who are running the race designed for them by their Father. Verse one says “Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in Me.” Now jump down to verse 27. Jesus repeats “Let not your heart be troubled” and adds “neither let it be afraid.”
The word troubled means “to stir up, trouble, disturb with various emotions such as fear” and the word afraid means “to be fearful”. If our minds are in turmoil, unrest or fear then we are not in the race our Father has designed for us to run because Jesus left us with complete access to His peace.
Mile Marker #2: Jesus’ peace is a constant in our lives
Turn with me to Luke 19. In Luke 19:10, Jesus says “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which is lost.” Jesus’ sole purpose for leaving heaven was to give the dead – those living in darkness because of the sin nature – an opportunity to say “yes” to the life of light that removes the darkness and leads to an eternity with Him. And He did this knowing that most of the world would reject Him and the gospel of the kingdom.
We see in the gospels that when Jesus shared the truth of the kingdom, He stirred up hornets whose stingers were filled with reputation destroying poison. “ … Then said they (the Pharisees) to him, We be not born of fornication; we have one Father, even God.” (John 8:41) If we are not willing to suffer the same treatment as Jesus in order to see the “dead” raised to “life”, then we are not in the race our Father has designed for us to run.
Mile Marker #3: Saving the lost is our heart’s desire.
We’re going to look at one more mile marker. First Timothy 2 instructs us to pray for our leaders and those who hold positions of authority in our lives. For some Christians, asking them to pray for an administration’s whose policies and positions are in diametric opposition to the Bible, can be a challenge. But it shouldn’t be, especially in light of verses 3 and 4.
1 I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; 2 for kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. 3 For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; 4 Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.
We must be obedient and willing to get on our knees for those who, based on what they are saying and what they are doing, are headed to the lake of fire for all eternity. Ladies and gentlemen, our prayers – our authority here on earth – can keep a door open, ever so slightly, that will give them an opportunity to come face to face with their sins and God’s truth about their sins. If we are not willing to do this, we are not in the race our Father has designed for us to run.
Mile Marker #4: We pray for those in positions of authority who speak and act contrary to the gospel of the kingdom.
Now let’s turn our attention to Hebrews 11 and 12 and answer the question:
“If we are not in the race our Father has designed for us to rub, how can we get into it?”
In five of the last six verses of Hebrews 11, leading up to verse one of Hebrews 12, we read about the elders who “obtained a good report” because of their faith – because of their absolute trust in God. We also read about the trials and hardships that resulted from that trust. Let’s begin reading with verse 35.
(35) Women received their dead raised to life again: and others were tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection:
(36) and others had trial of cruel mocking and scourging, yea, moreover bonds and imprisonment;
(37) they were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented;
(38) (of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth 39 And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise. (Hebrews 11:35-39)
The writer reminds the Jewish believers that it was their faith in God that enabled those recorded in Hebrews 11 to endure the hardships they faced. So he begins chapter 12 with “Wherefore” or “Therefore” or “Consequently.”
(1) Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race set before us,
(2) looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
To help the believers understand how the men and women in Hebrews 11 endured the trials, sufferings and humiliations, the writer compares their endurance to running a race. And it’s in these two verses, that we see how we can get back into the race our Father has designed for us if we have veered away from it.
Running our race
In order to run our face, we must first “lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us.” The “weight and sin” – those things that anchor us to a race that is different from the one our Father has planned for us, we must lay aside. This is something the Father can’t do for us.
I like the way the Amplified Bible expresses this: “… let us strip off and throw aside every encumbrance (unnecessary weight) and that sin which so readily (deftly and cleverly) clings to and entangles us …”
The word sin means “an offense in relation to God with an emphasis on guilt.” For some Christians, when they commit sin, it weighs them down with so much anger and guilt that they seem to put their spiritual lives on hold. They stop praying. They stop worshiping. They stop reading their Bibles. Hebrews says we cannot carry this weight and run the race ur Father has designed for us to run. It’s impossible.
The second thing we must do is We “run with patience the race that is set before us.” I find it interesting that we are told to “run with patience.” The word patience means “that quality of character which does not allow one to surrender to circumstances or succumb under trial.” What an apt description of the Hebrews 11 saints! They didn’t allow the sufferings and hardships to nullify their uncompromising belief in God. Neither should we. We must commit ourselves to knowing, understanding and finishing our race.
In those times when guilt weighs us down because of sin, we must draw on the quality of character that now lives inside of us and continue to run our race. We have on the inside of us the character to endure any set back and we see this in the latter part of Colossians 1:27 which says “ … which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.” The quality of character in our new nature is the same quality of character that was in Jesus! Praise God!
The third thing that we see in this is that we must keep our eyes squarely on Jesus and everything He accomplished for us – “looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith.” The verse says it was because of “the joy set before Him that He endured the cross.” Ladies and gentlemen, the joy He saw – it was us! Jesus ran His race with patience, He didn’t surrender to the circumstances, and He didn’t succumb under trial because He saw us! What a savior!
The last part of verse one says “the race set before us” and verse two says the “joy set before Jesus.” Now follow me closely. The joy set before Jesus was souls for the kingdom. The race set before us? Ultimately, winning souls for the kingdom!
Ladies and gentlemen, when we accepted Jesus as our Lord and Savior, our Father released in to us everything we needed, not only to run our race, but to successfully run it and fulfill it. Our Father needs us to run the race He has set before us and He has equipped us to do so.
What are we running to obtain?
Although our Father has given each of us an individual race to complete, our individual races are designed to bring us to the same destination.
“Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before …” (Philippians 3:13-14)
Why did Paul say he has not apprehended? He was still running his race. But he knew that in order to apprehend, he had to forget about his past and focus only on what was before him. Sounds a lot like “the race set before us” in Hebrews 12:1 doesn’t it?
As we are running our race, Satan will try to stop us by disrupting our peace with “cup running over” injections of emotional upheaval. And if he can’t stop us, he will slow us down so that our running becomes a walk and our walk becomes a crawl. Paul reminds us that one of the ways Satan accomplishes this is by bringing up our past and the things that we enjoyed – things that did not require of us what the Gospel requires of us.
“I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 3:14)
As he purposefully forgets his past, Paul purposefully presses toward his destination – “the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” The word press is a powerful word for the “race runners”! It means “to follow or press hard after, to pursue with earnestness and diligence in order to obtain, to go after with the desire of obtaining.” It conveys the same truth as patience, which we looked at earlier – “that quality of character which does not allow one to surrender to circumstances or succumb under trial.”
If we are going to defeat the enemy’s attempts to put us in one emotional tailspin after another – things that distract us as we run our race – our mindset has to be one where we are constantly pressing and constantly tapped into patience.
Paul says he was pressing toward the mark, the end of the race, and that’s where he would receive the prize. Metaphorically, the word prize refers to “the rewards of virtue in the future life.” But ladies and gentlemen, there is a more immediate prize to obtain and for me, that prize is the reason why I press toward the mark.
The prize that Paul talks about in Philippians – we will receive on our day of judgment. I’m looking forward to that prize. But there’s a prize Barry needs to obtain now if he is to fulfill “the race set before him” – winning souls for the kingdom.
Ladies and gentlemen, that prize is 2 Corinthians 3:18.
“But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.”
The more we resemble Jesus, the more of the works He did, we will do. Spiritually, when we look in the mirror, the world needs us to look exactly like Jesus. When this happens, ladies and gentlemen, people will know that we “have been with Jesus” (Acts 4:13).
But, if we are running our own race, if we are determining the path and identifying the prizes, we need to stop and listen to our Father: “Come back home and start over.” It’s okay with Him if we start our race again. He’ll gladly take us by the hand and help us get back in the race He knows we can win. Isn’t that what loving Fathers do?
Are God’s plans your plans?
In closing, I want to share with you a word that the Lord gave to me during my quiet time that flows with what I’ve shared in this teaching. I’ve given it the title “Are God’s plans your plans?”
“When you come to Me and your heart is open, I can fill it with everything that I am. I can fill you up with all My grace, all My power, all My love. But so many of My people don’t come to Me with hearts that are accessible to Me. They come to Me hoping that I will agree with their plans instead of them coming to Me and agreeing with My plans. But the agreement has to be with My plans and My desires. And then there has to be a willingness to follow through on seeing My plans and desires become a reality in your life. I can’t do the follow through. You have to do the follow through. I can give the plan. I can provide the way. But you have to walk the path.”
The more we conform to image of Jesus (2 Corinthians 3:18), the more we will become a thorn in the side of the enemy of the soul. And the more successful we will be as part of the kingdom “search and rescue team” that invades the enemy’s camp and sets the captives free. And, in the process, we are laying up treasures in heaven “where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal.” (Matthew 6:20)
But it all starts with us doing one simple thing: running the race our Father has designed for us to run. I hope you have on your running shoes!
