Hebrews chapter 12, I'd like
for us to look at the first four verses in this chapter today. Wherefore seeing we also are
compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us
lay aside every weight and the sand which does so easily beset
us. 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 on the throne of God. For consider him that
endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest
you be wearied and faint in your minds. You have not yet resisted
unto blood, striving against sin. In these verses, the apostle
uses the analogy of a race to picture the life of every child
of God in this world. Now in a race, it is not unusual
for the runner to grow weary And while a child of God never
grows weary of the race, we recognize that we may become weary in the
race. Now, to help God's children,
lest, notice that, if you will, in verse three, lest you be wearied
and faint in your minds, the apostle mentions four things
that we should do. That's the outline of the message
this morning. Four things that we as children
of God, those of us who know him today, that we should do. Number one, let us lay some things
aside. We see that in the first verse. 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 beset
us. Just as runners in a race would
dress, they would dress accordingly. If they were in a race, they
would not show up in brogands and heavy clothing. If they were going to run a race,
they would use the right kind of shoes and the right kind of
clothes. We are to lay aside every weight. I listened to an interview of
a jockey recently. I hadn't thought about this,
but they are required to be down to a certain weight. Their body
to be down to a certain weight. And it was interesting hearing
him tell the things that he did, really harming his body, in my
opinion, just so he would qualify to be light enough to ride the
horse. And I thought to myself, now,
in that case, that was okay because it wasn't his strength that was
going to run the race. It would be the horse's strength.
But we're talking about running a race today as believers. And runners may often train with
weights. I thought about basketball players,
especially young high school boys, how that they will put
weights on their ankles, you know, so they can jump higher. But they take those weights off
when the game begins. When the race starts, the weights
are off. And that's what the Apostle is
saying here to you and I. Let us lay aside every weight. Now let's remind ourselves of
some things about this race. First of all, who put us in the
race? If you are a child of God this
morning, you are in the race. Who put you in the race? Now
we know we did not put ourselves in the race. For the scripture
says, we were by nature children of wrath. We were dead in trespasses
and sins. We were in a race, no doubt. We were in a race, but not toward
heaven. We were in a race toward hell,
towards eternal darkness and separation from God. To be in
this race, we needed life. And the only one who is able
to give a sinner who is spiritually dead life is the Lord Jesus Christ
himself. Only God can give us life. Who put us in this race? If you're
in the race this morning, and you are, you are if you are a
child of God, but who put you in this race? Well, the scripture
says, but God. who is rich in mercy, for his
great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in
sins, hath quickened us together with Christ. By grace are you
saved." And then the Apostle Paul writing to believers in
Colossae said, put off the old man with his deeds. The old man, the man who has
not experienced the saving grace of God. We have the old man lives
a certain way. He practices certain things which
are just as common to him as drinking water. But those deeds
were to put those deeds of the old man off. And that's what
Paul has reference to here when he says, let us lay aside every
weight. The deeds, the sins of the old
man are to be put off through the Spirit. And this is not the
work of one day. When a man shows up to run a
race, a woman shows up to run a race, the race is going to
begin, it's going to end that same day. This work of putting
off, laying aside every weight, is not the work of one day, but
it is the work of a lifetime. Because as long as we are in
this world, we still have that old nature, that old man called
the flesh, and we are exhorted to walk in the Spirit, that is,
the new man, that which is created in us by the Spirit of God giving
us life. A new principle of life that
is put in us when we are regenerated, when we are quickened by the
Spirit of God, when we are put into this race, in other words.
And so we are, as we go through life running the race, all times
we are to put off the deeds of the old man. Every weight that
does so easily beset us. In Ephesians chapter 4, the Apostle
Paul mentions many things that are common to the old man, such
as lying, and all kinds of stealing, and anger, and those things. We're to put those things off.
Lay aside every weight. And as long as we live in this
world, we're going to have cares. We're going to have legitimate
cares. We need to eat. We need to drink. We need to be clothed. We need
a house, shelter. As long as we are in this world,
we are going to have legitimate cares. But we are to lay aside
even the anxiousness concerning these legitimate cares. God as
our Father has promised to meet every need that we have. So we
are to lay aside these weights. And then he says, lay aside the
sin that does so easily beset us. And he's speaking of one
sin there. First he said lay aside every
weight, different weights, deeds, sins of the old man. But then
he said let us and the sin rather, and the sin which does so easily
beset us. Now most of the old writers,
they were all of the opinion that every man, every woman,
every child of God has one particular sin which they called his or
her constitution sin. A sin that that particular person
is more inclined to and more easily drawn into. Well, my observation after years
of being a pastor and speaking with believers is to believe
that that no doubt is true. That most people do have a particular
sin. Some people it may be covetousness. And for others, that's not a
problem at all. And then others, their particular
sin may be lust of the flesh. And with others, maybe they don't
have that same problem. But at the same time, as I said,
those old writers believed that every believer has what they
called a constitution sin. That believer, that individual
is more inclined, more tempted toward that evil than anything
else. And I agree, that's no doubt
true, but at the same time, I cannot turn away from my belief that
the sin that does so easily beset us is that most ugly, ugly, ugly
sin of unbelief. Unbelief. Who is not tempted
to unbelief? Who does not have doubts or thoughts,
I should say, not doubts, but thoughts that come into your
mind to question God, to question the providence of God, to question
the Word of God? Unbelief, tempted, that sin that
does so easily beset each and every one of God's children. Now, how do we lay it aside? Well, the Apostle Paul says,
wherefore seeing we also are encompassed about with so great
a cloud of witnesses. We would believe that he's talking
about all of those men and women that he named in chapter 11. And what was it in them that
set them apart? It was faith. By faith, everyone
that's mentioned there, everyone that's named there, by faith. In other words, they believe
God. They believe God in that particular instance that is mentioned. And the way to lay aside the
sin of unbelief is to crowd it out. To push it out by faith. The more we increase our faith,
the more With God's blessing will the sin of unbelief be pushed
out. Look over a few pages to the
letter of Jude. Just this one small letter of
Jude, right before the book of Revelation. And there's only one chapter,
but in verse 20, Jude said, But you, beloved, Building up yourselves
on your most holy faith. Praying in the Holy Ghost. Building up yourself on your
most holy faith. We are to build up our faith. You say, well, how in the world
can you build up your faith? Well, if you want to build up
your body, there are three things that are necessary. You've got
to have a good diet. You've got to have exercise and
you need to be in a good environment. Now to build up our faith, if
we take those three things and remember that our faith is built
upon the Word of God. It's not built upon feelings.
Feelings come, feelings go, feelings are deceiving. Isn't that true? Amen, it is true. My faith is
built upon the infallible, unchangeable Word of God. God said it, it's
true. The way we are to build up our
faith is to be in a good environment like we are here today. You're
not going to build up your faith out in some place where you shouldn't
be, with people that you shouldn't associate with. That's not the
place to build up your faith. And you're not going to build
up your faith if you feed on the husk of this world. The prodigal,
he tried that, didn't he? He tried to satisfy his hunger
with the husk that the swine eat. We're not going to build
up our faith if our diet consists mainly of the husk of this world
and exercise. Trust God. Believe God. Believe
God day by day. Call upon Him and especially
pray. That's what he says there in
that text, praying in the Holy Spirit. You remember The disciples
of our Lord, they said unto Him one day, Lord, increase our faith. Amen? Increase. Pray. Ask Him. The Scripture says we
know if we ask according to His will, we have what we ask. Well, this is His will that we
increase in faith so we can pray in faith, believe in God, ask
Him. One verse of scripture that I
quote quite often in prayer is the words of the Lord Jesus Christ
that he told his disciples. He said, if you, being evil, know how to give good gifts to
your children, how much more, how much more shall your heavenly
Father give good things to them that ask him? So first of all,
let us lay aside every weight and the sin that does so easily
beset us. Now the second thing, let us
run with patience the race that is set before us. Now some translations
of the scripture have instead of patience, endurance. Let us run with endurance the
race that is set before us. For most of God's children, the
race is not over in a day. Now we know of one man. We know
of one man whose race was ended in a day. And I'm sure there
have been others. His race began one afternoon
when he was being executed upon a cross. And God granted unto
him repentance and faith. And he looked towards Jesus Christ,
our Lord, and he said, Lord, remember me when thou comest
into thy kingdom. And his race began. And before the sun set, his race
was ended. But that's not true of most of
God's children. Our race is marked out for us
in His Word and all the difficulties. You know, if you're running cross-country,
for instance, and the track that you're running on is out there
and going through woods and here, there, and everywhere, over hill
and over dale. You don't know what's out there
on the trail. There may be a tree falling over
the trail. There may be a big rock in the
trail. But let me tell you something.
Our race is marked out for us in His Word, and all the difficulties,
every difficulty that we are going to meet with in this race,
has all been appointed to us by Him who is infinite in wisdom. He's too wise to make a mistake. He didn't lay anything in your
lane that you're to run in that His infinite wisdom did not see
is best for you and best for me. His wisdom is too great,
and let me say this as well, His love, His love is too great
that He would lay anything in the lane that you are to run
in that would not be for your good, for your salvation. As time goes by, my life has
gone by, I've come to appreciate more and more those words of
Solomon in Ecclesiastes chapter 3, when he said to everything,
there is a season and a time for every purpose under heaven. A time for every purpose under
heaven. Do you know what God's purpose
is? It is the salvation of His people. That's His purpose. He makes all things to work together
for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according
to His purpose. That's His purpose. And His purpose shall be accomplished. Because He said, I have spoken
it. God said this, the God and Father
of the Lord Jesus Christ, the God who is the creator of all
things. He created you. He made you.
You're not here today by accident. You just didn't happen to be
here. Before the foundation of the
world, God had determined that you be in this place today, and
that goes for tomorrow and all the days of your life. He works
all things after the counsel of His will. That's what the
Scriptures reveal. He said, I have spoken it. I
will also bring it to pass. I have purposed it. I will do
it. What a God, right? Wow. That's all you can say,
right? Wow. What a God. I have spoken it. I will also
bring it to pass. I have purposed it. I will do
it. And He has purposed the salvation
of His people. He put us in the race, and He
is the one who has set the race before us. We don't choose the lane in which
we're going to run. He chose that for us. And I'm
thankful that he did, aren't you? I'm so thankful. He who
is infinite in wisdom, that he has set the race before me, he
sets your race before you, and he did it because he purposed
to do it for your salvation. Now third, we are to lay aside
every weight and the sin which does so easily beset us. Second,
we are to run with patience, with endurance this race. It's
not going to be ended for most of us in a day, but it is a life. And third, let us keep looking
unto Jesus. Verse 2, looking unto Jesus. We do not know who wrote the
letter of Hebrews, and men like to debate. Most people think
it was Paul. Makes no difference. It was written
by God the Holy Spirit, whoever he used to write it. But you
read the officials of Paul, and I'm not saying he didn't write
this letter. But he very seldom ever refers to just Jesus. It's always the Lord Jesus Christ. And you read in some of those
first chapters, like of Colossians, I mean, he just says it over
and over and over. And each time, it is always the
Lord Jesus Christ. But here, the Holy Spirit inspired
this man to say, Jesus. Looking unto Jesus. Now, that's significant. It's significant because the
name Jesus is the name that God, through the angel, gave to Joseph,
to whom Mary was his spouse. And he said, don't be afraid
to take Mary to be thy wife. For the child that she's going
to bring forth, you shall call Jesus. And you read in the scripture
there, every letter is capitalized. Call his name Jesus, J-E-S-U-S,
each letter in capitals. And we know when we see that
in the Scriptures, it refers us to Jehovah. The name Jehovah. And the name
Jesus is the name that was given to Him as Savior. Jehovah saves. Thou shalt call His name Jesus,
for He shall save His people. Did He have a people? You know
He did. A people which were chosen and
given unto Him by the Father. A people that were espoused to
Him as His bride, as His sheep, as members of His body. You call
His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sin. looking unto Jesus. Now, it's interesting, after
naming all of those individuals in that chapter before this,
and remember the Bible wasn't written in verses and chapters,
he doesn't tell us to look to one of those men. Not to Abraham,
not to Noah, not to Moses, not to Isaac, not to David, All those
various men and women too, Sarah, it's named there. He doesn't
say looking under any one of them. Looking under Jesus. And I looked at that and thought,
first of all, it's obvious that only Jesus is perfect. He's the
perfect Savior. He's the God Son who came into
this world as a man. But listen, another reason. If you look at someone else,
and this is where we get into trouble as believers, we are
to run the race that God set before us. One of our problems
sometimes is we look over here at another believer and we see
the race that God set before them and we want to be running
their race. Isn't that true? And he hasn't
called us to run the race that Abraham had to run, to leave
earth the Chaldees, to offer up his only son Isaac as a sacrifice. He hasn't called us to run that
race or to run the race that Moses ran, refusing to be called
the son of Pharaoh's daughter, esteeming the reproach of Christ's
greater riches than the riches of Egypt. No, we are to run the
race that He has set before us, looking unto Jesus. We are to keep our eyes upon
Him, and when we look to Him, we look away. We look away from
ourselves. We look away from our self-sufficiency. I can't run this race. I don't
have the strength. We look away from our self-righteousness. My righteousness is all as filthy
rags. We look away from our self-confidence. I can do nothing without Him. Looking unto Jesus, who is the
author and the finisher of our faith. By nature, We didn't have
faith. The scripture very clearly teaches
us that all men have not faith. He works faith in his people. He's the author, he's the sustainer,
and he's the finisher of our faith. He maintains it, he strengthens
it, And yes, we can take from the example of Peter. He said,
Peter, I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not. What is he doing now? He's in
heaven making intercession for us, isn't he? He's the author,
the sustainer, the finisher of our faith. The faith which is
of the operation of God. He's the object of our faith.
looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. Now
here's the last thing. Fourth, let us consider Him. Let us consider Him. And we are
to consider Him in these two ways. First, consider Him upon
the cross. Now remember, the whole point
is, lest we grow weary and faint in our mind. The race is hard. The way is hard. We meet with
difficulties. We're tempted to give up. We're
tempted to turn back. Consider Him. Consider Him. Consider Him, first of all, upon
the cross. The scripture here says, who
for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising
the shame. The Lord Jesus Christ, His death
upon the cross was a shameful death. It was a shameful death. I thought about how it was shameful
and I thought of these ways. First of all, it was shameful
because it was reserved for only slaves. who were guilty of the
worst crimes. They didn't execute most people,
even in that day, by crucifixion. It was reserved for slaves, not
free men, for slaves, and they who had committed the worst of
sins. And here we have the one who
is Lord of all. He's Lord of all, and yet he
is dying the death that was reserved for slaves. And doesn't that
remind us of that picture in the Old Testament of the servant
who became a servant forever by having his ear bored? And what was the reason? I love
my master. I love my wife. I love my children. He endured the cross, despising
the shame. Death reserved for only slaves
and those guilty of the worst of crimes. And you think of the
sins of God's people that were laid upon Him. Your sins, my
sins. Oh, the shame. The shame of sin. Every foul heinous, wicked sin
that any of his children have committed. I tell you, if he
only had to bear my sin, it was shameful. It was shameful. He endured the cross, despising
the shame. And second, it was shameful because
it exposed him to the worst humiliation. He was subjected to the taunts
and the jeers of the crowd. The scripture said, they that
pass by reviled him, wagging their heads and saying, thou
that destroyest the temple and buildest it in three days, save
thyself. If thou be the son of God, come
down from the cross. It was shameful. And number three,
it was shameful for he suffered and died alone. even the position,
the physical position of the cross. Hanging, as it were, between
heaven and earth. As though earth said, away with
him. Away with him. Crucify him. Crucify
him. We will not have this man to
reign over us. And even heaven, somehow mysteriously,
he cried out. My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me? Consider him. When you get discouraged
and downcast and things seem awfully hard, and I know they
are, consider him. Take a trip and
go to Mount Calvary and just sit down in your mind and look
up. into the face of the Lord Jesus
Christ. You have not yet resisted unto
blood. But don't only consider him on
the cross, but consider him on the throne. This is what he says, who is set down at the right
hand of the throne of God. He is set down at the right hand
of the throne of God, and this tells us that His one sacrifice
for sins. And that's what He was. Make
no mistake about it. He was not an example. Don't
fall for that lie of Satan that tells you His death was just
an example. No, no, my friends, His death
was a sacrifice. It was a payment for the sins
of his people. And to show that God accepted
that sacrifice and is well pleased, he sat down. He sat down. The debt is paid. He sat down
on the right hand of the throne of God. God's justice is satisfied. And this tells us that He sat
down, He took the reins of sovereignty. As God the Son, He has always
reigned over all things. But as the God-man mediator,
He has sat down on the throne of God. The scepter of universal,
of universal rule is in the hands of the man, Christ Jesus, our
Lord and our God. He reigns over all, and he promises
those who overcome that we will sit down with him on his throne,
even as he overcame and sat down on his father's throne. Now let
me close with this. The word which is translated
in our text, let us run, let us run with patience,
is the same word that Paul used in his statement at the end of
his life, near the end of his life, when he said, I have finished
my course. Remember he said, I fought a
good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for
me a crown of righteousness, and not for me only, but for
all them that love His appearing. May God enable you and I to finish
our race, and let us consider Him, let us consider Him, lest
we grow weary and faint in our minds. Let us at the end of our
life, by the grace of God, be able to say, I fought a good
fight. I have finished my course. I
have kept the faith. Amen. Let us sing a hymn. I ask that we sing this hymn.
Am I a soldier of the cross, a follower of the Lamb? Number
414. Let's stand as we sing.