Run.
As a Christian, run.
Now please don't physically.
We all just had lunch and we don't want a bunch of cramps.
But as a Christian, run.
First Corinthians 9, 24 and 25.
Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receive with a prize?
So run that ye may obtain.
Now.
Every man that strives for the mastery is temperate in all things.
They do it for a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible.
Run as a Christian and run for a crown.
Now this is a spiritual crown.
Those that are in races today, whatever kind of race it is, are going for a temporary crown or a temporary trophy, whether it be NASCAR, whether it be the Olympics.
Races today...
are for a physical prize.
In that day they would get a crown that was like a tiara made of leaves.
It was a crown that wouldn't even last a week.
But we go for something that lasts beyond time.
Run for a crown, but also run from the enemy.
1 Peter 5, 8 through 10, be sober, be vigilant.
For your adversary the devil walketh about as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour, whom resist steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in
your brethren that are in the world.
We not only run.
for crown we run from an enemy.
It is interesting in this verse it doesn't say to run, it says to stand.
So when we run this race we are also to stand our ground against this enemy.
There is a devil who wants our lives.
We are to flee the things that can hurt us.
The Bible says flee fornication.
Go away from these things that are going to hurt you.
Go away from these things that will result in you being separated from God for eternity.
We are to run
for a prize run from sin, but also we run to a finish line.
First Timothy 4, 7 through 8, I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith.
Now it is henceforth laid up to me a crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give me at that day.
Paul had lived a life serving his Lord.
He had gone through being beaten, he had gone through shipwreck.
Trial after trial, trouble after trouble, but at the very end he could say, I've done my part.
Now he did not earn his salvation, but he did live his life to the best of his ability paying an unpayable debt.
Let's live like Paul.
Let's run to the finish line.
Now we are to run, and that's why we can run, but how do we know we can run?
Hebrews chapter 12 answers that.
Hebrews chapter 12 verse 1, wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight in the sin which doth so easily beset
us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.
Now,
Chapter 12 verse 1 starts with the word wherefore.
Whenever you see wherefore or therefore, it is there for a reason.
We are told to run with patience the race that is set before us, but that's because of this cloud of witnesses that is around, this cloud of witnesses.
Now Hebrews chapter 11 shows this cloud of witnesses.
These are not a crowd in the bleachers.
These are not people in a stadium.
These are witnesses, not in the fact that they're looking at us.
Those that are in heaven have no part in what's happening on this earth.
The point here is that they can attest to the fact that living in this life, we can run for the Lord.
We can live by faith.
Hebrews 11 is the hall of faith.
Our names will not be written in scripture like this, but they can be written in the book of life at the very end after we run our race.
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 run with patience the
race that is set before us.
Keep that word patience in mind.
But also, we talked about the fact that there is this cloud of witnesses.
There are those who ran before us.
But also remember the one who ran for us, 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.
Not only were there those that lived on this world,
and serve God.
God came down to this world and served man in that he died for us.
Christ finished his race so that we could be with him.
He is the author and finisher of our faith.
Now there are two words here.
We have patience and we have endurance.
And both of them are very similar words in the Greek.
We have huppomenno and we have huppomane.
One's a noun, one's a verb.
One's a thing or an idea.
One's an action word, something you do.
The huppamane is this patience.
It is the character, it is the personality trait of enduring.
And that's what these people had in this cloud of witnesses.
And that is what we are to have.
Let us run with patience, huppamane, the race that is set before us.
Then we have this next word, huppomeno, which describes how Christ ran.
He endured the cross, despising the shame.
When we choose to walk the Christian life, we must start it with a personality trait, with the character of patience, but we must also continue that patience.
Patience is no good if it doesn't keep going on.
Endurance only lasts as long as it endures.
Let's keep going in this run.
Now we've looked at why we run.
We've looked at why we know we can run, because there were those who ran before us, and there is the one who ran for us.
Now there's a final question here.
How do we run?
Turning back, I turn to James, there we go.
Hebrews 11, Hebrews 12, verse one, wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight in the sin which doth so easily
beset us.
To run this race, to make it to where at the end we can say we have fought the good fight, finished the course, and kept the faith, first lay aside what besets you.
There are two things described here.
We have the weight and we have the sin.
Lay aside the weight.
Now again, this is not a physical race, but there is something that is weighing down the people the Hebrew's writer is speaking to.
There are things in our lives that can weigh us down, whether it be the time we spend on the phone, whether it be...
working longer than we have to.
Now there are times we have to work and that cannot be avoided.
That's not what we're talking about.
But when we allow things in this world that are not necessarily sin to weigh on the time we could spend for the Lord in other aspects, are we taking weight that we don't need?
Can we run faster for the Lord without that weight?
Now lay aside the weight, but also lay aside the sin.
There are things in this world
that are inherently wrong, inherently against God's nature.
Sin is that which is against God's nature, against His law.
It is breaking one's conscience.
It's things that are inherently evil.
Those things have no place in the lives of a Christian.
Just like you can't walk through a door holding a 10 foot 2 by 4, you can't get into heaven holding onto sin.
And you cannot run this race with the weight of sin.
We must lay aside what besets us.
Think about John 8, 32.
And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
So this truth is what what Christ says makes us free.
Now, verse 34.
Verily, I say unto you, whosoever commiteth sin is the servant of sin.
So we have this contrast here.
We have whoever does sin is the servant of sin, and we have the truth shall make you free.
There's two options here, and we can choose to have one of them, but if we choose sin, there is no way to run for God when we are chained to sin, and there is no way
There's no way to run to God when chained to sin, and there is no way to run for God when we serve another master.
There is no way to hold on to those things and still walk in God's way.
Repentance requires giving up all those things that are against how God would have us to live.
Now, when one is baptized, when one becomes a Christian, there can be things they don't realize that are wrong.
But as time moves forward and there's opportunity to learn those things, that repentance must say, okay, I see what I need to do and I'm going to give it up.
We must constantly be willing to lay aside those things because if we are not willing to lay it aside, we are actually enslaved to it.
If we are not strong enough to make the decision to stay away from it, it has ensnared us and there is no way to run for the Lord.
lay aside what besets us.
Now also, turn to Matthew 16.
Christ shows an example of laying aside what was besetting him.
Verse 22, after Christ had spoke about the fact that he would die, that he would suffer of the chief priests and scribes and be killed and raised again the third day, verse 22, then
Peter took him and began to rebuke him, saying, be it far from thee, Lord, this shall not be unto thee.
Peter is one of Christ's closest friends.
He hears Christ say that he is going to die, and he doesn't want that.
That doesn't make sense in his mind, but look at how Christ responds.
But he turned and said unto Peter, get thee behind me, Satan.
Thou art an offense unto me, for thou savors not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.
Remember, Jesus is very close to Peter.
Later on he would say, ye are my friends to the apostles.
This relationship was special.
But Jesus was willing to say something that would hurt Peter's feelings so that Christ could continue doing what the Lord sent him to do.
In life today we have those who would rather us not do God's way, who would speak against us walking in God's path.
Remember Christ's example.
He suffered everything like we have.
No, he didn't have social media.
No, he didn't have some of the modern things, but he suffered every general temptation, and he suffered the temptation of the words of his friends trying to keep him from God's
way, but he did not let that beset him.
He did not let that keep him from his purpose.
He said, get thee behind me, Satan.
Our relationship with God, our race for God comes before everything else.
Christ laid aside what besets him and we are to lay aside the weight and the sin.
But not only are we to let go of those things that are not to be a part of our lives, we are to look to the Savior.
Turning back to Hebrews 12, verse 1, we mention the fact that there is that great cloud of witnesses.
but then 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.
Verse two starts with that word, looking.
So not only are those things that we must put down, we look unto Jesus who made our race.
He is the author and finisher of our faith.
If you have a race and everybody starts at the starting line and then they just go all in general directions, one goes left, one goes right, one goes backward, that's not a race.
A race requires direction.
Christ authored and finished a race for us.
John 14, 6, I am the way, the truth, and the life.
No man cometh to the Father, but by me." Christ made a very specific way for us to walk.
It is straight, it is narrow, and walking in that way is the only way to walk to Him.
Christ made this one way.
There are not many paths going to heaven.
There is one race.
There is one faith.
Just as there is one God and Father of all, there is one baptism.
There is one way to start this race and one way to live it.
Let's start at the proper starting line.
The one that Christ set for us.
He is the author and finisher of our faith.
Let's follow him because he made the race, but also because
He endured His.
Verse 2 again, 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.
We mention that word endure, this huppomeno.
This word also carries the idea of standing your ground when everyone else has departed.
Standing your ground
when everyone else has departed.
Remember what Jesus did in Gethsemane.
All the apostles forsook him and fled, but he still stood there.
He was still taken by the scribes, by the Pharisees, by this mob that came to him that night.
And he went and suffered on that cross.
At any period of time, he could have said, I'm done with this.
and changed it all, but he endured it because there was something that he wanted.
Now, he also finished his race.
He is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
But look at the reason that he did it.
Who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross?
Not only did he endure, there was a very specific reason, this joy.
What was Christ's joy?
On John 3, 16, for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
The reason for Christ coming to this world was for our salvation.
The joy that was set before Him was He would be back by God's throne.
He would have that glory again.
But also, He would have us with Him in eternity.
Christ could see that the fact
that the cross was coming, but he looked past the cross and realized that we could be with him in heaven.
And he lived for that fact.
He lived for that eternity in our lives.
when we face trials and temptations, when those things come and they want to snare us, when there are times we always are supposed to die daily, we are supposed to always carry
our cross, but when those moments come where we feel the fact that we are supposed to die daily, do we look past?
the difficulty, past that situation and see the cross or see Christ on the other side.
He was looking to the joy set before Him.
Do we look to the same joy, being with our God and Father, being with the other Christians, other servants of God from before?
Jesus endured His race and He finished His race because there was a goal.
Any runner has a goal and we have a goal very similar to Christ's.
Will you run to eternity with Him?
We run this race laying aside what besets us.
We run this race looking to who saves us.
But finally, we run this race loving Him who chases us.
Before going further into that, verse 4, ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin.
All of us sitting in this room have not passed away yet.
We are here.
We have not resisted unto blood.
Not only have we not passed away, we have not been killed in persecution.
Therefore,
We have every reason and every right to continue going and running this same race.
We have not resisted unto blood striving against sin.
It's almost like Paul says, you get killed, walk it off.
You are able to keep going.
You are able to keep running.
Now, verse five.
loving him who chastens us, and ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children.
My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him.
For whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth." Whenever someone prepares for a race, they are not able to just eat whatever they want.
able to go and not exercise at all.
Preparing for such a competition requires discipline.
You have a coach who tells you, you need to be at practice at this time.
You need to be eating this kind of food.
You need to have this certain weight so that you can run to your optimal capacity.
Now, God does not say, eat this and that.
There are things that we are not supposed to put in our bodies.
But God gave us a spiritual instruction, but also not only has He given us this word, He can chase in us in our lives today.
The Hebrews writer makes a shift here.
Earlier we were talking about the persecution and the things that we face because we are living God's way.
But the Hebrews writer shifts and says that there are things we suffer so that we do live the right way.
two sides of a very similar, two sides of the same coin.
Now there are things in this life that we face that are not our fault, that are not persecution either.
But when those things do occur, when there are those sufferings, are we willing to ask ourselves, okay, am I being chastened?
Is this some kind of consequence for how I'm living?
It is not always going to be that.
More often than not, it might not be that.
but are we willing to ask the question, looking and trying to see what God could be doing in our lives?
And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of Him.
For whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
Correction, no matter what the modern world says, is good.
Now,
Exodus 34 shows the kind of God that we have.
Exodus 34, 5 through 7, the Lord, the Lord God, merciful, gracious, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin.
But we'll by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and to the fourth generation.
Our Lord is one of mercy.
When God described His personality to Moses, Moses asked the Lord, show me Your glory.
And then it says that God declared His name.
He declared His identity to Moses.
This passage shows who God is, and God is first merciful, but He is then just.
This is the kind of God we serve.
This is the kind of God that will chase in us.
But we must remember that this chasing is a part of who he has said he is.
Today there are those who say any kind of correction, any kind of negative consequence is bad, is going to lead to trauma.
There are things that are wrong that a child should never face, that no one should ever have to look back and have that memory.
But the Lord has very clearly stated that a spanking has its place.
That is the truth from God, the undeniable Word of the Lord, and He has wisdom above any psychologist today.
Follow the Lord's way.
It will do better than anything else.
The Lord chastens us.
As a child can be chastened by a father, the Lord can chasten us today.
Love Him who chastens us.
but also realize that the chastening is worth it.
Verse 9, Furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence.
Shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits and live?
For they have verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure, but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness.
This correction is not just because he is angry, not just because he is mad.
That is not the purpose of correction.
It is for a goal, that we might be
partakers of His holiness.
Verse 11, now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous.
Nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.
There is a goal with this correction.
It might hurt for now, but it's going to be worth it.
Psalm 30 verse 5 talks about this idea as well.
Weeping may endure for the night, but joy cometh in the morning.
God has a plan and He loves you more than anyone else.
And even if there is suffering, even if there is pain, God does not send all suffering our way.
There are things that He allows in our lives, just as Job faced his suffering even though he did nothing wrong.
But God can still use any suffering.
He is so powerful that He can take what comes to us.
for good, even if he is not the one that caused it.
That is the wisdom of the Lord.
Let us appreciate his chastening, not ask him, Lord, why in the world are you doing this?
God will be patient and he understands that we are human and that we will have emotions regarding these things.
But the Lord is there.
He doesn't hate us when that suffering comes.
It shows...
If it is not correction, the Lord is going to comfort us and He is going to be with us in the end.
But if it is correction, the Lord is doing it for our betterment.
In this race, we have a coach, we have a father, and we might face chastisement, but it has a purpose and a goal.
And it is so that we can run that race, finish the course, keep the faith as Paul did, and finally be with the Lord, partakers of His holiness for eternity.
Lay aside what besets us, putting that wicked sin away.
Look to who saves us, looking to the one who gave us a standard, gave us a word, gave us the church that we are a part of today.
And finally, loving him who chastens us, realizing that the things that we can suffer, realizing that the punishments that can come, they are a part of God's love, not some kind
of hatred that he has against us.
This is the Lord that we serve and this is the race that we get to run.
Now today, if you have not started that race, the Lord has given uh clearly how we are to run it.
We are to hear His Word, we are to believe it, Romans 10, 17.
We are to confess Christ as our Lord, Romans 10, verse 10.
And if you don't believe that Christ is Lord, please give the opportunity for the evidence to be shown that He is, that God is real and that He really is the one God.
But also we must repent and be baptized, Acts 2, 38.
Baptism, literally an immersion, repentance being changed from the way we used to live, to walk.
newness of life.
This race requires a new way to live.
First John 1, 7 through 9, if you already have obeyed this gospel, the one that confesses his sin will be forgiven.
If you are in any need of what God can do when it comes to your sin today, would you please come forward as we stand and as we sing.