HEBREWS 12:1-2 [LEAVING A LEGACY SERIES]
THE AUTHOR AND FINISHER OF FAITH
[1 Corinthians 9:24-27; 2 Timothy 4:7-8]
This passage is a moving exhortation that motivates believers to Christian living. In it our writer links those who have previously lived by faith with the believer’s present responsibility to run by faith toward the high calling of God. The believer’s calling is high indeed. The verses just prior to our text have taught that the goal toward which the people of faith are moving is perfection.
We know that the attainment of perfection will only come about when Jesus appears, and we become like Him. As it says in 1 Jn. 3:2; "Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we shall be. We know that, when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him just as He is." If the goal is perfection and perfection is to be like Jesus, then it is understandable that God is seeking now to move us toward that ultimate goal while we pilgrimage on this earth. But how is God seeking to get us to mature in Him toward the culmination, "the summing up of all things in Christ?”
Here is given the secret of parting from the old life and entering into and progressing with endurance in the new life. The secret is (CIT) fixing our attention upon Jesus and following the path of faith that His obedience created for us. This obedience and discipline will free us from all that would hinder the development of our faith and deliver us from all the sin that seeks to entangle us. Then we can know the joy that comes from being obedient to God's will for our life.
I. RUNNING OUR RACE, 1.
II. FINISHING OUR FAITH, 2.
Given the past examples of faith and Jesus’ own endurance on the cross believers are called in verse 1 to run with endurance the race of faith. The exhortation finds its encouragement in that we are not alone but surrounded by a cloud of heroic witnesses. “Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us,”
“Therefore” (emphatic position) is an appeal based on the argument previously given in chapter 11, which is known as God's heroes of faith. A Chinese proverb says: "To forget one's ancestors is to be a brook without a source, a tree without a root." As a believer, the men and women mentioned in chapter eleven of Hebrews (a roll call of the faithful) are your spiritual ancestors. Reading these verses should provide you with role models galore.
Some received God's hand of protection in this life. Others realized God had a different plan for them and were faithful unto death. All were like the man described as "a guy who would go after Moby Dick with a row boat, a harpoon, and a jar of tartar sauce."
The author of Hebrews now urges us to resemble our spiritual ancestors: live with a dynamic faith; attempt great things for a great God; and, if necessary, die in faithfulness with the Christ who died for you. Make those who follow you as proud of your actions as you are of the faithful who have going before you.
In the Christian life “we have” an inspiration. We have the encouragement of the unseen “cloud of witnesses.” The word “cloud” (?ef???, Latin for nubes) is a vast cloud. This vast cloud is made up of not mere spectators, but “witnesses” who testify from their own experience (11:2,4,5,33,34) to God fulfilling His promises as illustrated in chapter 11. Their life bears witness that, no matter what, God will see us through.
They are also witnesses in a double sense - they have been witnesses to us by their life of faith and they are now witnesses of the performance of our faith. They have run the race of life with loyalty and endurance by faith in God and they watch to see how we are running ours.
There is a suggestion here that the present heaven has a stadium-like place where those in heaven can watch us as we run the race of life. What an incentive it is to know that others have successfully finished their given tasks and that the loved ones who have gone on before have opportunity to cheer us on from heaven.
With this encouragement verse 1 continues with a command: “Let us also lay aside every encumbrance (burden) and the sin which so easily entangles us.”
If we would travel far with God we must travel light. Sin is pictured as a weight or impediment to be discarded. In the life of faith there is an essential duty of discarding or “laying aside” encumbrances because they hinder or “entangle us.”
In her remarkable book Teaching a Stone to Talk, Annie Dillard tells about the ill-fated Franklin Expedition of 1845. The explorers sailed from England to find the Northwest Passage across the Arctic Ocean.
They put aboard their two sailing ships a lot of things they didn't need: a 1,200-volume library, fine china, crystal goblets, and sterling silverware for each officer with his initials engraved on the handles. Amazingly, each ship took only a 12-day supply of coal for their auxiliary steam engines.
The ships became trapped in vast frozen plains of Arctic ice. After several months, Lord Franklin died. The men decided to trek to safety in small groups but none survived.
One story is especially heartbreaking. Two officers pulled a large sled more than 65 miles across the treacherous ice. When rescuers found their bodies, they discovered that the sled was filled with "a great deal of table silver."
By carrying what they didn't need, these men contributed to their own failure. But don't we do the same? Don't we drag baggage through life that we don't need? Evil thoughts that hinder us? Bad habits that drag us down? Grudges and unforgiveness that we won't let go? Let's determine to "lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us.”
Do you have “burdens” that are keeping you from serving the Lord as you know you should? Worries, anxieties? Are there habits, pleasures, self-indulgences, associations which hold us back? We must shed “encumbrances” as an athlete sheds his street clothes for his track clothes and even his warm-up suit when he goes to the starting blocks.
What about “besetting” or ensnaring sins - the sin that stalks around and seeks to pull you down. The verbal adjective reminds one of a wild beast encircling the campfire at night - ready to pounce upon the careless traveler who lets the fire go out.
A runner must discipline himself and he must divest himself of all superfluous weight, not only of heavy objects, carried about the body but of excess bodily weight. There are many things which may be perfectly all right in their own way, but which hinder a competitor in the race of faith; they are "weights which must be laid aside." It may well be that what is an encumbrance to one participant in this spiritual contest is not a hindrance to another. Each must learn for himself what is hindering him in his spiritual race. But there are other things which are not right in their own way. These are “the sins which so easily entangles us."
In the New York Times Barnaby J. Feder reports that in 1994 the Quaker Oats Company, which had posted strong financial earnings for several years, purchased the Snapple drinks business. Although in late 1994 Snapple had been the leader in beverages like fruit drinks and iced teas, the purchase turned out to be a debacle for Quaker Oats and for numerous executives in the company.
In late 1994 Quaker paid $1.7 billion to buy Snapple. A few years later they could sell the company for only $300 million - a loss of $1.4 billion! In the first quarter of 1997 Quaker announced an overall net loss of $1.1 billion owing to its sale of Snapple. In April 1997 the chairman and chief executive of Quaker, who had promoted the purchase of Snapple, resigned.
Like large corporations choosing what business to buy, Christians need to choose their commitments and involvements wisely. Some activities are nothing but a drain.
[During the Christmas season of 1996, a bizarre story came over the news about a HAIR-EATING DOLL. The main feature of the doll in question, according to the Associated Press, was a mechanical mouth that chewed on plastic carrots and french fries. Unfortunately the doll couldn't tell the difference between plastic vegetables and children's hair. During the first five months the doll was on the market, the Consumer Product Safety Commission received thirty-five complaints from parents whose children had their hair caught in the mouth of the doll. One woman in Campbell, Ohio, had to cut off a shank of her daughter's hair after it became snarled in gears in the doll's throat.
Some things that appear quite harmless can entangle and hurt us. Most of us know what it's like to get involved innocently in a relationship or a pastime only to eventually find that we were caught up in something hurtful from which we could not break away. Temptation can come in an attractive package.]
The encouragement of faith which we have received in knowing that others have faced obstacles in the Christian life and have gloriously triumphed should lead us to “cast aside” every hindrance and besetting sin.
Verse 1 closes with another exhortation. “Let us run with endurance the race which is being set before us.”
Rejecting sin’s entanglements lets us run our race with staying power. Perseverance calls for stamina or staying power. The race is the path which God has marked out for each of us individually. We cannot select our own program. We must faithfully follow the route God Himself has marked for us.
[According to Jeff Gammage in the Chicago Tribune, in the summer of 1996 several thoroughbred racehorses in Kentucky developed foul nasal odors and bloody noses followed by infections in their nostrils. When veterinarians examined the horses, to their astonishment they found small egg-shaped sponges deep in the horses' nasal passages.
Where did the sponges come from?
Authorities determined that someone wanting to fix races had tampered with the horses, inserting the sponges to interfere with the horses' breathing, cut down their oxygen intake, and slow them down. Ten instances of such "sponging" were reported within a nine-month period, and the FBI was called in to investigate.
Like sponges in a thoroughbred's nostrils, sins and distractions weaken a Christian. They take away from what God wants us to be and do. They diminish our ability to breathe of the Holy Spirit.]
If we will lay aside the hindrances to our Christian life and turn from those besetting sins, then we can “run the race with endurance.” What a blessed trade-off - from depression and failure to endurance and victory.
If you like to jog, play tennis, walk or participate in another sport, try this experiment. Next time you participate put a full pack of books on your back -don’t recommend this if you’re a swimmer. Then, every time you are conscious of that backpack’s hindrances to your performance, remind yourself, “This is the effect sin has on my Christian life.”
Historian Shelby Foote tells of a soldier who was wounded at the battle of Shiloh during the American Civil War and was ordered to go to the rear. The fighting was fierce and within minutes he returned to his commanding officer. "Captain, give me a gun!" he shouted. "THIS FIGHT AIN'T GOT ANY REAR!"
Have you ever felt that way as a Christian - pressured from every side? You want to stay true to Christ, but you constantly feel the allurement of the world from without and the almost irresistible pull of sinful inclinations from within. It seems that there is no rear - no rest from the battle.
II. FINISHING OUR FAITH, 2.
In Hebrews 12:1, the Greek word translated “ensnares” literally refers to being surrounded or hemmed in. When we feel pressured to give in to the sin that surrounds us, verse 2 encourages us to look to Jesus, the author (literally "captain") of our faith. “Looking to Jesus, the Author (Pioneer) and Finisher of our faith,”
Jesus is our example. As He approached the hour of His crucifixion, Jesus was encircled by the most powerful forces of darkness known to any human, yet He came through to victory.
Wounded? Looking for relief? Stay close to the Captain. Trust Him. He'll turn the tide of battle so that you won't be destroyed when you're caught in the squeeze.
Scripture says that if we would run well we must run light. If we would run light we must look to Christ. The only way to run with endurance is to lay aside all weights and sins and the only way of laying aside the weights and sins is "looking unto Jesus".
How did you get saved? By looking to Jesus and receiving the free gift of life. That is the same way we are sanctified or finish the Christian marathon also. Christian athletes in God’s race must fix their life on the goal. That calls for us to focus our attention on Jesus. Everything that would encumber the athlete or contestant, whatever would divert his attention must be put away. Then he must focus his eye on the goal toward which he is pressing. Our Lord’s steadfast faith and obedience provided a perfect example of commitment for believers.
A salesman demonstrating a color TV set to a prospective customer was explaining the best method of adjusting the color. "Concentrate on THE FACE," he said. "Once you have the flesh tones of the face in natural color, everything else will automatically be correct. Don't worry about the color of the trees, the sky, the flowers. Concentrate on getting the face right. That is the key."
The Apostle Paul said, "For to me to live is Christ." Everything in his life was colored by his relationship to Christ. When Christ is given preeminence in our life, all other circumstances and conditions are harmonized. We see His hand in everything that happens to us. We recognize His presence in our home, our job, our relationships. Life becomes like a wheel with Christ as the hub and our experiences as the spokes radiating from and to the one center.
When we put the Lord first we need not worry about our circumstances. Since He is at the controls of our life, all things will be made to work together for our good. Our whole outlook on life is harmonized when we are in tune with Him.
Jesus is not only the goal of our journey He is our companion on our way. The One who we go to meet and the One with whom we travel. We must keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, on whom faith depends from start to finish. He is faith's Author and Finisher. Jesus is the one who blazed the trail of faith and He Himself ran the race of faith to its triumphant finish. His path of faith is the trail-blazed to God and we must follow the path He blazed to find God (JN 14:6) and while we are on the path of faith, Christ perfects our faith till at trails end we reach the celestial city.
"THE DEVIL tries to make the children of God live uncomfortable and unholy lives." These words of Robert Murray McCheyne, the 19th-century Scottish preacher, are still relevant today. He explained the subtle way that Satan trips up Christians. Instead of mentioning sin or evil, McCheyne said that Satan "beguiles them from looking to Jesus."
A Christian who falls victim to his tactics is a little like the pastor who was visiting a popular amusement park. He decided to ride a barrel-like contraption that tilted and turned. The preacher said to a friend, "I'll show you how to walk through without falling." When he entered the barrel, it started turning from side to side. Before long, he lost his balance, fell, and began to roll around in the barrel. When it finally stopped and he emerged somewhat embarrassed, the operator of the ride said, "Mister, do you see that shiny object suspended at the far end of the barrel? If you had kept your eye on that instead of looking at your feet, you could have walked right through."
Similarly, as we tread life's topsy-turvy pathway, we can easily be tossed around and made to stumble. But the author of Hebrews told us how to avoid a fall. He said to keep "looking unto Jesus." With our eyes on Him, we can stay on our feet.
Many a Christian has almost lost his spiritual footing by getting his eyes FOCUSED ON other people instead of fixing them on the Lord Jesus. All human idols have feet of clay, and sooner or later they may fall and seriously disappoint us. Until we also give our full love and devotion to Jesus, we too will stumble and be a disappointment to ourselves and others, and especially to the Lord.
John McNeil tells the story of a young eagle he raised with a flock of chickens. The out-of-place bird had never learned to fly. One day McNeil thought he would teach this bird how, so he tried throwing it up in the air. But each time the bird would look down and fall to the ground. Then he had an idea. Lifting the eagle's head, he made it catch a glimpse of the bright sunlight above. That did it! The eagle pushed out its wings. Then, lifting its head with a shriek, it jumped from his hand and began to soar higher and higher until it was lost to sight in the light of the sun.
Many Christians find themselves in a similar state. If they could just get their eyes off the things of this earth and off other people and on the Son of God, they would soar on the wings of the Spirit to higher levels of spiritual maturity and blessing.
How can Christ-likeness occur? We must look to Jesus.
Verse 2 continues by revealing a motivation for our faith. “Who for (against) the joy set before Him endured the cross having disregarded (covered up) the shame.”
“The cross” of Christ represents the greatest suffering in history, for Jesus not only suffered physically but also experienced the wrath of God in talking upon Himself the sin of the world. [Bible. P 2614] In enduring all this suffering Jesus found His strength in the promise of future reward and joy. We to can find our strength to endure suffering in the promise of future reward and joy.
Several years ago a hydroelectric dam was to be built across a valley in Maine. The people in the town there were going to be moved to another location. All their homes, businesses, and parks were destined to be entirely submerged.
While the people waited for the dam to be completed, an interesting thing happened. Their surroundings changed drastically before they moved. Their well-kept town became dilapidated since the townspeople didn't see any need to continue to maintain it as they always had before. As one resident concluded, "Where there is no faith in the future, there is no work in the present."
Before we fulfill any service, especially for God, we need one essential thing: a goal for the future, a purpose, a desired result. A goal moves us to action and the action helps us to reach our goal.
Jesus had a goal. His was “the joy” of giving us eternal life. Jesus proved that even the hardest task can be done if we believe God has a purpose for it. When we seek God and find good reason for doing what we're to do, we will not only be motivated, but we'll also have satisfaction in our labor.
The Christian life has a goal, Christ-likeness. The Christian is not an unconcerned stroller along the by-ways of life. He is a pilgrim on the high road, the road less traveled. He is not a tourist who returns each night to the place from which he began. He is a pilgrim who is every moving onward. His goal is nothing less than Christ, to be conformed to the image of Christ, the Author, the Pioneer of personal faith that takes people all the way to heaven.
Jesus “endured the cross for the joy set before Him” because He had been perfectly obedient to the Father's will for His life. He always wanted not His will but the Father's will. Even in Gethsemane. He prayed "Not My will but Thy will be done." This shows that we have Christ's joy made full in us (Jn 17:13) by enduring in the will of God for our lives just as Jesus did. Those joyful Christians, those full of the joy of Christ, are those who have endured in obedience to the will of God. For only those who have known the sufferings of Christ, experience the joy of Christ. There is the joy of Christ set before you, but joy doesn’t continually nor fully come until we mature in our faith and obedience.
[One of the great triumphs in American sports history took place in the 1988 Olympics when the United States volleyball team beat the Russians for the gold medal. During the championship game the television cameras focused on the United States team captain and his father who was high above the court in the stands. The captain would periodically check the stands for his father who was always waving his American flag as an inspiration. Looking at his father kept his spirits high.
We all need an encourager. We all need a friend to remind us of who we are and what we can do with the potential God has provided.
We all lose our enthusiasm at one time or another. Adversity shakes our confidence. Someone has suggested that confidence and enthusiasm are not welded to our spirit. They are glued together, and the adhesive that bonds them can easily lose its power if we let thoughts of adversity and defeat come into our minds.
Looking to Jesus will keep our spirits high. Looking to Jesus will provide us with the encouragement we need.]
The word “endurance” (?p?µ??e) does not mean the patience which sits down and accepts things, but the patience which masters them. It is a determination, unhurrying and yet undelaying which goes steadily on and refuses to be deflected. Obstacles do not deter it and discouragements do not take away its hope. It is steadfast endurance which carries on until in the end it gets there. In the Christian life we have an example. That example is Jesus Himself. For the goal that was set before Him, He endured all things. To win His goal meant the way of the cross.
It was a way of “shame.” He was taunted, spat upon, whipped. He endured the bitter agony of rejection and desertion by His followers. He endured the shame of being mocked. While dying in nakedness for the sin of the world it asked Him how much good His life of faith was doing Him then. Yet we today know the infinite measure of good His faith did for Him and for us.
He also experienced the shame caused by our shameful deeds. It was our shame He bore. A cross was a humiliating thing. It was for criminals and sinless Jesus accepted it. To die by crucifixion was to plummet to the lowest depths of disgrace. It was a punishment reserved for those who were deemed most unfit to live, a punishment for sub-men. But Jesus disregarded shame, not considering it worthy to take into account when it must occur for Him to follow His Father's will (MK 14:36).
Follow Jesus and all the shameful things you would have been involved in will not occur. Yes, people are going to try and put shame on you, but He will give you joy instead.
Let us look at the result of Jesus being faithful to God's will for His life in the last part of verse 2. “And He has sat down at (in) the right hand of the throne of God.”
Christ through pain and agony had brought faith and the faithful to perfection by His enduring the cross and then He received the place of highest exaltation, “the right hand of the throne of God.” And it is rightfully His for this establisher of man's way to Heaven, the way to God, the way of salvation, has been made perfect by His obedience and faithful endurance of the cross. This is His joy eternal; His exaltation and the salvation it means for His people and the triumph of God's purposes throughout eternity!
In CLOSING
According to the Chicago Tribune, [on March 3, 1995,] a thirty-eight-year-old man who was walking to his temporary job at a warehouse in Rosemount, Illinois, tried to get there by cutting across eight lanes of the Tri-State Tollway. After he crossed the four northbound lanes, however, the wind blew off his hat. The hat flew back across the northbound lanes, and he chased it. There a semi-trailer truck struck and killed him.
A person can lose everything by chasing after what is really nothing. What are you chasing after instead of looking to JC?
The enthroned Christ and His already victorious faithful followers are our encouraging spectators. Christ has asked us to turn our eyes upon Him and He will enable us to lay aside all hindrances and ensnaring sins so that we might run and not grow weary on the path of faith that He has planned for us. And He that is exalted to the supreme position of the Eternal world offers us His help and strength in the perfecting of our faith. Do you trust Him? If you trust Him you will heed His commands and lay aside every hindrance, and the sin which so easily ensnares us and run with endurance the course God has for you. And God will give you joy as you are obedient to His will for your life.
Will you make Christ your goal today? Will your goal for your future be the same one God would have for you, to be Christ-like?
Maybe you are here and you have never accepted Christ, we invite you to come now. Or if you have felt God's leadership in joining us here and serving the Lord with us, come forward now. Perhaps, you have another decision, and you want to come share or simply come to the altar and commit yourself to listen anew to His voice. If He speaks, you come.
Invitation Hymn, Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus.
