All right, let's read the first
three verses. Wherefore, seeing we also are
encompassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us
lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily upset
us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before 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. For, consider him that endured
such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied
and faint or want to quit in your mind." The Apostle said, since there
are so very many, wherefore see ye we are compassed about. There
have been so many witnesses that testify of God's grace to those
who are in this walk of faith. He called it a race. So many. We've been looking at every one
of them here in Hebrews 11, going all the way back to Abel. who
died in faith, who was persecuted and killed by his brother, and
Enoch who walked seemingly alone, Noah, so few, and on and on it
went. Rahab, and on and on. A great cloud of witnesses then,
and now, he says, even we are compassed, even we now are compassed
about, surrounded by many witnesses, even in our generation. Our brothers
and sisters, it was Peter who wrote, know this, that the same
afflictions are accomplished in your brethren throughout the
world. We have brothers and sisters
all over the world who will testify, who will bear witness of God's
grace to them. He has sufficient grace in this
life of faith. We're surrounded by it. We're
not alone. We're surrounded by it. Witness
it. So he says, let us. This is an
exhortation, an encouragement to every single believer. Let
us, let each of us run this race with patience. with patience. The Apostle used this thing of
running, this thing of running a race. He used this a couple
of times. Some seem to think he might have
been a sports fan. He talked about boxing. He said,
I don't fight as one that beats the air. He talked about wrestling
as one that has the mastery, who seeks to win. He talks about running. That
was a way of life back then, a mode of transportation. walking
or running. And then it was also a sport,
you know, the ancient Greeks and Romans. But look at Philippians
3. Philippians 3 says, let us run
this race with patience. In running a race, you run to
obtain a prize. And look at Philippians chapter
3. To win a prize. So you run this race. And what is the prize? What do we seek? What are we
after? In running, you know, your goal
is to cross the finish line, to reach the end. If you're in
competition, it's to win first place. But it's a different kind
of race here. The goal, the prize here in Philippians
3 verse 14 says, Paul says, well, verse 8, The last line of verse 8, he
says, that I may win Christ. Christ is the prize. Verse 14,
I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of
God in Christ Jesus. Paul said, I'm running. And he
said, I finished my course, the race, the predetermined course
that God Almighty has put us on. And the goal and the prize
and who we are looking for and running to is the Lord Jesus
Christ. The children of Israel were going
to the promised land. That's what the Lord promised
them. Well, Christ is our promised land. He is our heaven and our
new earth. So he's the goal. And the world,
you know, The natural man, the world, seeks riches. That's what
the world is after. That's the prize. They're seeking
happiness, pleasures, and they're after all the riches they can
obtain. Well, the believer is after the
unsearchable riches of Christ. At his right hand are pleasures
forevermore. That's who we seek, not what. These things are fading. If you
look, and looking, we're going to talk about looking to the
prize. If you really see Him as the
prize, the altogether lovely one, all and in all, if God really
shows us His altogether loveliness, our all and in all, Causes us
to fall in love with Him like a bridegroom. Looking at Him
and to Him, everything else will fade. Everything else will fade. That's the only way that we will
want to win Christ. That's the only way. And the
way this is done is right here. This is how God causes His people
to fall in love with the Lord Jesus Christ. If a man's doing
his job, he's constantly holding up Christ, proclaiming Christ.
Not a doctor, but a person, so that God's people will see in
him everything and pursue him. Those people who came to Christ
one time, He said, what seek ye? And they said, Master, where
do you dwell? He said, Come and sit. I believe
they stayed with him from then on. In running, this he's talking
about, and I've dealt with this many times, and the last time
I regret, I spent a little too much time on this thing, running.
As you know, I took that up a couple years ago just because I wanted
to. And I enjoy it and feel good
by doing it, but not advocating that at all. But I spent too
much time talking about that and not talking about him, not
talking about him. But in running, I do know this,
in running, it requires a sacrifice. Things have to be given up. There's
some diligence, some diligence that has to be practiced. It's an everyday thing. It's
not just a once. You can't do it if you don't
do it diligently, can you, Wesley? And to do it, Paul says, let
us lay aside every weight and the sin which does so easily
beset us. You can't have heavy weights
upon you when you're running. You'll tire out. What are the
weights? What weight encumbers us? What is it that brings us down? What is it that keeps us from
walking by faith? Everything in this world, everything
in this world is like gravity. It pulls us down. It has down-dragging
tendency. These encumbrances. Everything
in this world has down-dragging tendencies like gravity. And
you know, every one of us live in this material world. You cannot
be a human being and not live in this world and use the things
of this world. But Scripture says, using them,
but not abusing them. It talks about riches. And every
person in this room is exceedingly rich. The poorest person in here,
and I thought about that this morning, I thought, up until
three or four hundred years ago, there was no such thing as an
automobile. Everybody rode a horse or walked
or rode in a buckboard wagon. There was no such thing as air
conditioning. There was no such thing as indoor
plumbing. There was no such thing as electricity for thousands
of years. And we talk about a bad economy.
And we talk about being poor. This generation doesn't know
anything about that. They don't know anything about
it. There's a few who went through the Depression in here, but they
were children, they were babies then, and you really didn't experience
that, did you? Your parents did. But, you know,
we're so spoiled. We're rich and increased with
goods. And Paul said to young Timothy
and to all of us, if riches increase, and oh how they have. You think
about when you were first married and you think about now. He said,
if riches increase, set not your heart upon them. Where do we
set our heart? Colossians 3.1. Set your affection
where? On things above, not on things
below. Beginning with me, we all need
this desperately, desperately, because as my pastor has said
over the years, the two most dangerous things for a believer are the things of this world
and the people of this world, and they will both bring us down,
drag us down with them. So let us lay aside, if things
start to hinder our worship, we have to use it. We use it,
and riches aren't evil in themselves. I know a lot of real rich people
who are very generous, and the church benefits greatly because
of their generosity, and the Lord made them so. But riches
are not evil in themselves, but they become evil. Things become
evil when they hinder us, when they take first place, when we
begin to think about them more than our God. That's when it
becomes idolatry. I'm talking to me. I'm not preaching
at you. I'm preaching to us. Covetousness. is idolatry, meaning
have another God, someone you seek more than God. So let us lay aside every weight. If it begins to hinder us, lay
it aside. Lay it aside. And the sin. What is the besetting sin of
all of us? The sin that's so easily beset
us. It takes very little for this
sin to rule us. Unbelief. Unbelief. And unbelief always leads to
idolatry. Let me illustrate. The children
of Israel. God Almighty came and revealed
Himself to the children of Israel. Told them, I'm taking you out
of Egypt. You're in bondage. They saw they
were in bondage, in the slime pit. They realized where they
were, how bad off they were. Why they were there? Rebelled
against God. God said, I've come down to bring
you out, to bring you up. You've got to go through a wilderness,
though, and it's going to be difficult, but keep your eye
on where I'm bringing you. All right? Okay, they believed
God. When they first heard that message,
they went out, it says, with a high hand. Every last one of
them, youngest to oldest, thought, we're going out of here. Yes!
They were just so happy. They just loved that message
of deliverance. Okay? They were heading out.
It didn't take any time at all. The slightest troubles that they
went through. Then they started thinking, I want to go back. To what? Slime pits. Why would you want to do that?
You lost sight of the prize. You forgot what that was. You
lost sight of where you're headed. Unbelief. They began to not believe
God. God said, now, I'll be with you. I'm going to give you all you
need. They had God, they had water, they had bread. What else
do you need? And at the beginning they were
happy. Weren't they? Happy. Heading out. We're marching to Zion. Beautiful,
beautiful. Everyone of them. It wasn't long. Difficulties
came up. They're traveling through the
world. Oh, look what they have. Look what they have. I don't
have that. Look what they have. And they began to perish in the
wilderness, consumed by the people and things of the world. And
some of them wanted to go back. Unbelief. And then idolatry crept
in. See, it always leads to idolatry,
unbelief. And this faith, this is why he
goes on to say, if, he said, well, in Colossians, it's a morning
message, he says, if you continue in the faith, if you continue
in the faith, if you continue in the faith, faith cometh how?
By hearing. Now, here in the Word, this is
our salvation. What we're doing right now is
our salvation. It's going to keep us from being overcome by
the world. The only thing that we have.
The only thing that we have. Well, I said that a runner, somebody
running, needs to be disciplined and dedicated, a daily regimen.
Peter wrote, give diligence. to make your calling and election
sure. How do you do that? You come, you sit, you listen,
you read it for yourself, you study for yourself, you call
on the Lord, Lord, am I yours or am I not? Lord, say unto my
soul, I am thy salvation. You come, you give diligence
to make your calling. How does he call that? By the
gospel. One time? Oh no. Over and over
and over. If you ever cease to hear the
call, we're not His. If we ever cease to hear the
call, if the gospel ever ceases to touch us, to not call us to
Christ, we're not here. And it says, Whosoever shall
call on the name of the Lord. One time? No, no. Call, and call,
and call, and call, and call, and call. Give diligence. It's a daily thing. Diligence
is daily. Giving all diligence, Peter wrote,
in everything. The walk of faith is a daily
walk. It says, Enoch walked with God.
Enoch walked with God. That's union. That's communion.
That's fellowship. Nobody can do that for you. Nobody can do that for you. Can
you? No, no. Walk. Enoch walked with God.
May it be said of me, Paul walks with God. John walked with God. May that be said. Fellowship.
Seeking the Lord. Set your affection on things
above. And if it's not, ask the Lord.
Lord, set thy affection on things above. Not on things above. And
now this is called running, isn't it? Run, not walk. It is walk. Walk by faith. But it's running
because of the urgency of it. Time is so short. It's so short. And don't you, you older people,
don't you feel like, man, this thing, man, it's like, phew,
happened so fast. It's running because of the urgency
of it. It's like running, too, to a
city of refuge. But if you're scared of something,
you'll run, won't you? We're running from sin. We're
running from the world. We're running from it. Munyon's
Pilgrim's Progress. The pilgrim. He was leaving the
city of destruction for the celestial city. And you know what he did?
He ran. Because he was afraid he'd slow
down. And he did one time. The evangelist
warned him, said, don't slow down. You're going to go through
the The enchanted ground. You've
got to go through the enchanted ground. He said, go right through,
hurry, right through, or you'll fall asleep. And he did. Lost his role, remember that?
Lost his assurance, lost the Word, he fell asleep, ended up
and died in the castle under the giant despair, remember that?
He thought it was all over, he thought he was lost. Another
play, Vanity Fair. He and his buddy were going through
this play, and the evangelist said, you're going to go through
Vanity Fair. It has everything that you want. Don't, just go
through. Don't stop. He did. He did. And we do too. Run. Run. How? Looking up to Jesus. Looking up to Jesus. He's the
only one. that will take our eyes off of every one and everything
else. He's the only one. Nothing else
will. He's called the author and the
finisher, verse 2, of our faith. He's the one that wrote our names
in his book. He's the author. And thank God
he's the finisher. He's the one that sets us in
this course. He's the one, like the shepherd
who calls his sheep and puts them behind him, and they follow
him. He's the one who wrote the names
in the book, his book, the Lamb's Book of Life, and he's thanked
the Lord. He's the finisher. He will finish. He will perfect that which concerns
them. He will make sure that we finish
this. I am so thankful. He will perfect
that. He'll finish the work. He's the
finisher. Why is he called Jesus here and not the Lord Jesus? Very few times in Scripture is
he simply referred to as Jesus, okay? And we stress that point,
don't we? I think that, and I know it is,
a distinguishing mark of God's true people is that they call
him Lord Jesus. The way they refer to him is
not by his name of humility, Jesus simply, but as the Lord
Jesus. Well, why is he looking unto
Jesus, the author and finisher? Because Jesus is the suffering
servant. Jesus, the man who is our substitute. Jesus, the witness. In Revelation 1, it says he calls
himself the faithful witness. It says, "...we are encompassed
about with so great a cloud of witnesses." He's the greatest
witness. He's the witness. He's the one
who had truly declared, no man has seen God at any time. He
did. He came back. He came here and told us about
Him. But we look to the Lord Jesus
Christ. We look to Jesus, though, first
of all, We run in this race, this walk of faith, by looking
to Him as our substitute. Look unto Jesus, who for the
joy, verse 2, that was set before Him endured the cross. And now
He's sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. He said sin shall not have dominion
over you. He paid it. He defeated it. He atoned for it. Satan, who held us captive, he
said, he hath desired you, but I'm on the throne. Look to me. Look to me. Substitute. Substitute. Now, the world, modern religion
uses these verses like this. Here's how they use it. Look
at Jesus. If He endured that, so can you.
That's how they use it as a motivational verse. That's how they use it.
Look, if He can do it, if He endured such thing, so can you. That's not what this is saying.
I mean, that's not the principle, the primary meaning of that.
Because without Him, we can do nothing. Looking unto Him means
actually look unto Him for everything, for the strength, for the faith
to walk this way, to run this way, for the patience. That is, it says, run with patience,
waiting on Him. That's what patience meant, waiting
on the Lord. Patience. Waiting on the Lord.
The Lord sent it. We'll wait and see. We don't
have patience. The Lord must give it to us.
We look Him unto Him. We don't have faith. It's not
of yourself. It's a gift of God. We look it
unto the Lord. Increase our faith. They said,
Lord, increase our faith. You gave it to me. Increase it.
We don't have any strength. We're weak. They said, my strength
is made perfect and your weakness. How's that? I can't do this. Looking unto Him. Let's wait
a minute. Looking unto Him as our substitute. The children of Israel were bitten
by serpents because of their sin, because of their unbelief,
because of their idolatry. Alright? They were bitten by
serpents and they were dying. And the Lord told Moses, Fashion
a serpent of brass and put it on a pole like unto the one that
bit them, and hold it up, and every one that's bitten that
looketh shall live." What is that? That's Jesus, the Substitute,
Jesus Christ, the Substitute, as Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness. Even so must the Son of Man be
lifted up, that whosoever believeth on Him, whoever looks, shall
not perish, but have eternal life." That's the gospel. Looking unto Him. That's what
this is saying, looking unto Him. Looking unto Him. Brother
Stan, I love how he always begins praying. Oh, doesn't he, Sherry?
Sherry, I thought you were a visitor sitting back there. It always says, let's look to
the Lord. Doesn't it? Let's look to the
Lord. And that's what we're doing.
We look to the Lord. When we come here, that's what
we're doing. Let's look to the Lord. We're looking unto Him. Looking unto Him as our everything. Our great high priest, after
the order of Melchizedek, who is seated right now, says he
sat down. The only high priest who ever
sat down. We look to him and his finished
work. Man, that's good news for a sinner. It's done. It's done. And, yes,
we do look at him as our example. Yes, we do. He says, verse 3,
Consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against
himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your mind. Yes, we do
look at him. Yes, he was our example. Yes,
He was. Yes, He is. Jesus, the man, lived
by faith. This is one of the greatest encouragements
to us, is seeing that the Son of God, who could have miraculously
provided for Himself every meal, everything, couldn't He? But
He didn't. Did He? The only time He provided
food is when His disciples ate. And yet he depended on his Heavenly
Father just like you and I need musts, didn't he? He lived by
faith as the man named Jesus, though he's the Lord Jesus, became
a man and he had to live by faith. Why? To prove God's Word, to
prove unto us God is true. He is true. Everything he said,
he said, I will not leave you forsaken. I will take care of
you. I am the Lord that feedeth thee, that girdeth thee. And
so he lived with the clothes on his back and the shoes on
his feet and not a place to lay his head. And God provided for
him. And he was not unhappy. He was
totally content, had complete peace. What about us? Surely. Consider him, and it says he
endured such contradiction of sinner. Everything they said
about him was false. There are some contradictions
that we endure, but most of them are true, aren't they? There are some false witness
against that, but Virgin once said, if people say bad things
about you, you better be thankful they don't tell it all. He said, you better be thankful
they don't really know you. But everything they said about
him was false, and he endured it. How? Peter said, he committed
himself to the Father, who judges, who said, Vengeance is mine,
I will repay. He turned the other cheek. How
can we do that? Looking unto Jesus. If he did
that, I need a good slap. David one time, shimmy I cursed
him. Remember that? David was riding
by and this fellow named Shimei came out and began to cuss him
and his friend. This is love. This is love. You're
not going to cuss my friend. He wanted to take his head off.
That's love. But David said, hold on. The Lord is sending you to cuss
me. But David knew himself. Didn't he? David knew himself.
David thought, I need cussing. I need damning. If I got what the Lord I deserve
from Him, He'd damning me right now. Let Him cuss me. I need
it. It's good for me. Let the righteous
smite me. It's good for me. It won't break
my head. Maybe it'll break my heart. Maybe
it'll break my pride. Look at this, verse 4. You have not yet resisted. We
have not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin. Oh my,
no. I tell you who did. Who sweat,
as it were, great drops of blood striving against sin. Whose sin? Ours. Not his. He didn't have to come
here, Tammy Jo. All right, verse 5, he goes on
to exhort us. He says, We have forgotten the
exhortation that speaketh unto you as unto children. My son,
despise not thou the chastening of our Lord, nor faint when thou
rebuke of him. We need rebuking, don't we? And
hopefully, I don't preach in such a way that you think I'm
rebuking you and not myself. Oh, my. But Paul did tell young
Timothy, rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise you. And in
doing so, Paul did that, didn't he? He said, but I'm less than
the least. I'm the chief of sinners. I'm not worthy to be called an
impossible. He knew that. But we need rebuking, don't we?
Every one of us as children of the Father. We're rebuked. We're
chastened. We need it. We need it. It's
good for it. A wise son will hear correction
and rebuke. Brother Coffey touched on that
last week, didn't he? Well, it says, despise not thou
the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou rebuke of him
for whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth and scourgeth every
son whom he receiveth. My pastor said so many times
that God only had one son without sin. But none of them without chastening.
All of them were chastened. Now, this chastening is not punishment.
Not punishment. Christ bore that. He hath not
dealt with us according to our sins. He dealt with Christ according
to our sins. Christ. You know, you hear people
say, I've gone through hell. I hate to hear that. That saying
belongs only to Jesus Christ. You know that? The only human
being that can ever say that is Jesus Christ. He went through
hell. Yes, He did. Oh no, He hath not
dealt with us according to our sins and iniquity. But chastening
is not punishment. It's loving instruction. It may
seem, when my father used to whip me with a cat of nine tails,
That's what I thought it was. I thought he was, you know, Sammy,
we thought our fathers were going to kill us. They weren't. They
didn't. We just, it was harder, it was
not as hard as we thought it was. It was not as hard at the
time. And often leading up to the time
is when you think you're going to die. leading up to, all right,
go to your room and I'm going to have to stop. Your whole life
passes before you. It doesn't last that long. It's
not that hard. He never brought blood. Never
brought blood. And even my father's a sinner. Well, in verse 10, it says, they
chastened us after their own pleasure, according to their
own wisdom, which is fallible. There are times, perhaps, when
we received some chastening or whatever. If you're in a family,
more than one, you've got some brothers and sisters, chances
are that you got punished for something they did, and you tried,
and they frightened you. Dad just wouldn't hear, I'm going
to whip you off. His dad would say, I'm just going
to whip you off so I can get the right one. Right? He thought that was so unfair.
But how many did you not get punished
for? So it all evens out. But our
Heavenly Father never chastens His children unwisely and undeservedly. Never. But according to His infinite
wisdom, And he says, if we endure chastening, verse 7, God deals
with us as sons. What son is he whom the Father
chasteneth not? And if you be without chastisement,
whereof all are partakers, then you're bastards, you're not sons. I never chastened other people's
children. It was always my own children. And you too. Not others. I know there have been many times
that I wanted to chase another people's children. I thought, Steve and I thought,
you just give me that boy for one week. Either he or I want
a break. Probably me. But we don't chase
another people's children. And so if we'll be without him,
God doesn't have any children without chastening, without bringing
them through trials and tribulation. Why? Why does He do this? To
wean us from this world. If we didn't have any troubles,
we'd want to stay here. And secondly, to cause us to
look to Him. To look to Him for forgiveness
for the sin we're being chastened for. to cause us to look to Him,
to trust Him through the chastening, through the trial, looking unto
Him. The Lord Jesus Christ, as the
Son of God, bore our punishment. Look at that. Would you look
at that? My, my. My, my. Surely we can endure
what the Lord sends us in love and for our good. It's for our
good. He's not taking things away from us. He's given us everything. He has to take this world of
dung away from us. He has to tear our eyes away
from perishing things of clay, born but from one brief day.
Cast from our hearts away. Set our eyes on Christ. And if we do, someday we will.
We'll look on Him and say, what did I ever see down there? What? And every now and then
we get a glimpse when the gospel is being preached. We get a glimpse,
don't we? We see dimly. And every now and then we get
a little glimpse, like the disciples up on the Mount of Transfiguration.
We get a glimpse of who He really is. And boy, you know, if you
ever look at the sun briefly, what happens? You can't see anything else very
clearly. You've got the sun before your
eyes. Every now and then, the Lord
blesses a man to preach, and we see Christ high and lifted
up, and everything else is low and worthless and vanity of vanities. Why are we after that? Well, so he says in verse 10,
they did this for our fathers, chastened us according to their
pleasure, but God for our prophet. Verse 10, for our prophet. It's all good. It's all good.
That we might be partakers of his holiness. Very simply, and I'm not going
to explain this way, and I've heard too many men do this, and
it's not good. It's not good at all. This whole
life is to conform us to the image of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what that means. That's
exactly what that means. But what was He like? Dead to
this world. Alive to God, wasn't he? He was a human being. Physical,
flesh and blood. But look, he was dead to this
world. He was dead to it. There's nothing
in it that appealed to him. Nothing. Nothing anybody said bothered
him. Why? He had his conversation
in heaven. He was here for 33 short years.
And everything is meant, sent by the Father, to do that to
us. Partakers of His holy, to be
just like Him. Isn't that what you want? David
said it, I'll awake, I'll behold His face in righteousness, and
I'll be satisfied. That's when I'll be satisfied,
when I awake with His likeness. So Lord, can we say this? Do whatever it takes. Can we
say that? Can we? Make me not cry. Okay.