Sunday Morning Service 10:30 AM - Run the Race ~ Hebrews 12:1-11 ~ Pastor Ryan Nichols

Hebrews chapter 12. Hebrews chapter 12. As we move into this chapter, we start a new series because there's a theme that I noticed in Hebrews chapter 12, and the theme that I've noticed is running the race. And so there's several different studies that we'll look at under this heading, and the one that we'll look at this morning is running with endurance. As you can tell, I originally intended, oh, they changed it for me.

I originally intended to make it through verse 11, but the Lord kind of slowed me down this morning as I was putting things together, and so we're only going to make it through verse 4. And so, picking up in Hebrews chapter 12, verse 1, it says this. Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which

himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin. Now, as we look at these first four verses this morning under the heading of running with endurance, there are three things that I want to point out to you that he tells us about what it looks like to run with endurance. Number one, he's going to tell us what to lay aside. Number two, he's going to tell us where to fix our eyes.

And then number three, he's going to tell us to consider Jesus. So we pick up with the first one, lay aside. He starts off by saying, therefore, since we have been surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, the word therefore is always a linking word. In other words, it draws to our attention what we have read previously, leading us to the conclusion that he's about to bring us to here. So what he does is he links together, ultimately, directly

that he talked about in Hebrews chapter 11. All of the heroes of the face of Hebrews 11 that he shared with us, but indirectly he goes even further than that, because what he's about to share with us is not only based upon all of the people that we discussed in Hebrews chapter 11, but ultimately the full body of work of the book of Hebrews, that Jesus is so much better. He is so much better than the law to try to make us holy, but he is also so much better than the sin that we might want to fall back into. Therefore, since we have a great group of witnesses from Hebrews chapter 11, and since Jesus is so much better, let us run with endurance. Of course, he then goes on to say, therefore, since we have so

great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us. What does he mean by that? Well, I don't think what he's saying is that all of the great heroes of the faith are in heaven right now watching us from on high. They're just staring at us trying to figure out what we're going to do. Quite frankly, every now and then wondering why we would make the decisions that we're

making. Throughout scripture, we pretty well see that the heavenly kingdom and those that are there are not really observing the things that are on earth other than the angels themselves. We know that they watch, but I think the people that are in heaven are pretty well encapsulated and captured by the fact that they are worshiping God. So if that's not what he means, then what does he mean by this? Well, I think what he is telling us is that we are surrounded

by an incredible number of people throughout the history of the Bible and the history of the church who have lived great lives of faith, who have run their races with endurance. And those stories should be inspirations to us. Those stories should be the encouragement that pushes us to run our race with endurance. As a matter of fact, I think one of the greatest things you can do is get more familiar with the stories of faith, with the stories that we talked about in Hebrews chapter 11. I hope as we went through that chapter and you and you

wrote down the references for all of those different verses, that you've gone back and looked some of those up, that you've gone back and read some of those stories and maybe spent some time with the text of some of those stories, because as you do so, it builds faith. But I hope that you don't just read the stories of people in Scripture, although it's one of the best things that you can read. I hope that you continue to read the stories of great men and women of faith throughout history. There's some great books that you can read. I would highly recommend to you

Fox's Book of Martyrs, because it tells the stories of those first and second century saints who gave their lives for Jesus Christ in their pursuit of God and in their standing for the faith. There's an even more modern day one, it's called Jesus Freaks. I don't remember who the writer of that one is, but it tells stories of the last 150 years of martyrs of Jesus Christ. I hope that you pick up biographies of great men and women of God that have been used over the years, because all of those stories are that great cloud of witnesses that surround us and bring us inspiration for what God has called for us to do. Inspiration to live as He has called

for us to live, because you're not the only one seeking to live by faith. Men and women throughout history have been doing so. But I do think there's something interesting to pay attention to about this aspect of the great cloud of witnesses. While I don't think that they're in heaven watching us right now necessarily, I do think that there's something about that entrance into eternity that we make that involves this great cloud of witnesses. I'll give you two illustrations.

There's a guy, and I came across this on the internet, and you know you can't always believe everything that you read on the internet, but I think I'm led to believe that this is true. There's a guy who does paintings of walk-off home runs, and he puts stories of faith with it, because in his mind this is exactly what it's going to be like when we enter heaven. If you've ever seen a walk-off home run, you know it's the guy rounds third. The whole team is there at home plate to greet him, because he's the one who ultimately just won the game for them.

There's this picture of perhaps what it will be like when we arrive in heaven, to the cheers of all of those who have gone before us and have said, I'm so glad you finally made it home. But I can also give you an illustration from my own life. About 10 years ago I ran a half marathon, and it's the only long race I've ever run, and quite frankly my body won't hold up to too many long races anymore, so this is the only one I've got stories from. But I signed up to run the Oklahoma City half marathon, and actually Pastor Jared and I ran it together, and it was fascinating to go through. If you don't know how long a half marathon is, it's 13.1 miles. And so for the first

12, 11 and a half, 12 miles, you're kind of on your own, right? I mean you're running with other people, and there's occasionally drink stops along the way, and sometimes there'll be people holding sometimes sarcastic signs, sometimes fun signs, sometimes there's signs that cheer you on, things along those lines. But ultimately it's pretty sparse for those first 10 or 11 miles, until you get to about the last mile and a half, maybe two, and something fascinating happens. All of the people who showed up to watch their loved one run this race, to be there at the finish line, they're all lining the finish line. Just tons and tons of people all lining the

finish line, and they're all doing the same thing. They are just cheering you on. They are just hooting and hollering and clapping and cheering for you, because they know that you just did something really, really difficult. You are finishing an incredibly difficult race, and it's amazing. I couldn't have picked a face out of the crowd. I knew like three people in the entire place,

and I couldn't find any of them. But all I knew was I could hear all of the cheers of the people, and it's amazing what that does to improve the way that you run your race. I think my last mile was almost as fast as my first, because all of the energy of the crowd that kind of kept you going. And I do think, and I don't feel like I'm outside of biblical balance when I say this, I do think that when we arrive home, it will be just like that. I think that the streets of heaven will be

lined with people who are cheering for the fact that another one who has finished their race has just arrived home. He says, therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, he tells us what we need to do. He says, let us lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us. He tells us two things that we need to lay aside. One he defines

as an encumbrance, and one he defines as sin. It's important that we know that these are two very different words. We'll take the first one, the encumbrances. Some of your translations may say, lay aside the weight and the sin which so easily entangles us. Well, the idea of weight there is that it is an unnecessary weight. An unnecessary weight to carry. Again,

I'm not really a good runner, but I do like to run, and I've appreciated what technology has done for us over the years. Because when I first started running, if you wanted to run with music, and by the way, that's the only way I can run. If you wanted to run with music, when I very first started, you had to carry a Walkman, right? There's only like the first year that I ran, but you put the cassette tape inside of the Walkman, and it's just cumbersome and big. It's

this giant thing that you have to carry, and usually fuzzy earphones, and it wasn't very easy to run with. Well, then it moved into CD players, and when you first started running with a CD player, that thing skipped on you all the time. So it wasn't easy to run with, and you know, your song was just skipping over and over again, and you're like, oh my gosh. But then they came up with this great CD player that was sport-proof. If there's anything I need in my life, it's

something that's sport-proof, right? And so it's a giant CD player with a handle on it over here, and these headphones that didn't really work very well, but they kind of stayed in your ears, and you ran with that thing. And here's the problem. Did it make life a little bit better? Yeah, but it was still an encumbrance. It was still a weight, right? So here's what would

happen to you as you're running, and those of you that used to run back in the late 90s, early 2000s, you know what I'm talking about. You would be running, and your hand would catch the cord, because there were no cordless headphones. That's right, kids. No cordless headphones at this point in time in life. There's no cordless headphones. Your hand would catch the cord. It

would pull the thing out of your hand. It would hit the deck. The CD would go rolling out, and you'd have to collect your CD, put it back into the thing, hope it worked, close it up, put it back on your hand, plug it back in, and then you could go back to running. This was life before technology, right? Well, now I get to run with this thing, right? Like all I run with now is a

pair of headphones and this watch, and they're not even connected to each other. And all of a sudden, all of the encumbrances are gone, and it's so much easier to run that way. That's the idea that's created for us. And what he tells us right here is you need to lay aside the unnecessary weights of life so that you can run unencumbered in your walk with Jesus Christ. Listen, we need to

understand the things that he's talking about in this first word are not necessarily sinful, but they're not helpful. There are things on this side of eternity that can be put in a category of it's not sinful, it is not directly opposed to the will of God, but listen, it's also not helpful in your walk. This requires a great deal of discernment on our part is to understand what's not sinful, but it's also not helpful for us. If you talk to any athlete that reaches any kind of an elite level, they will tell you that their lifestyle and their life has to change. And the

reason their lifestyle has to change is because in order for them to continue to excel to the next level, they have to determine the difference between what is good and what is best. Is it okay for them to go stay out late at night? Sure, there's no law against it, but that might make a 6am workout really, really hard. And so they start making choices in their life. It's not unlawful,

but it's also not helpful for me. And so we have to determine those things. This is what he says. He says, you have to lay aside the encumbrances of life. You have to lay aside the weight that will prevent you from going further in your walk with Jesus Christ. But then he goes a little bit deeper. He goes a little bit, a little bit more difficult. He says, and you have to lay aside

the sin which entangles us. Of course, these things are opposed by God and his word. These are the things that it's very distinct in God's word. This is sin. And you've got to deal with sin because sin will prevent you from running. It's interesting because this word that's used here, it says, lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us. That word entangle

means to wrap itself around. And that's exactly what sin does for us, doesn't it? Sin wraps itself around us and makes it impossible for us to run. It makes it impossible for us to move forward because that sin has my legs in a chokehold. And now I can't run forward anymore because my legs just got wrapped up and, and now it has entangled me and I'm unable to continue on in my race

because I've been entangled with sin until I deal with the entanglement of sin, until I deal with what's wrapped up around me. I cannot move forward in my life. And it's interesting because it says, which so easily entangles us or, or, or easily ensnares us. The amplified Bible translates it this way, which so easily and cleverly entangles us. And isn't it interesting that sin is very

clever in our lives. Have you ever noticed that sin cleverly lies to us in the biggest lie? It tells us it's not that big of a deal. This is not that big of a deal. And listen, it both can, both can take place together. You can follow Jesus and have this sin. Why are you being so difficult on yourself? And it entangles us. It wraps itself around us. This is exactly what happened to Eve

when she gave into the sin, right? Remember, Satan did not present it as this is sin. Satan presented it as this is really good to eat. And it's really good looking to the eyes. And honestly, it's going to make you wise. God's been holding something back from you. And that sin is so clever in your life. And then we give into it. And then what we found is what we thought was clever and innocent

becomes the thing that destroys us in our walk with Jesus Christ. It's not that you're not still a believer. It's that you stopped running your race. He says, you need to, first of all, lay aside the encumbrance. Second of all, you need to lay aside the sin that easily entangles us. Well, of course, I always ask myself a question at this point in time. How do you do that? Because

I don't want you to walk away from here just inspired. I want you to walk away from here with a plan of action. How do we become those who can lay aside the encumbrances and the sins of this world? Number one, you have to identify them in your life. You have to identify the sin. That's usually the first step. And then you need to identify the things that entangle you. The things

that maybe are not necessarily sinful, but they are certainly not helpful in your life. And the only way that we can identify these is if we are sensitive to the working of the Holy Spirit in our life. Because the Holy Spirit is the best one to do this work inside of you. I would love to give you a list right now. Well, you should avoid these things because these are the things that are going

to keep you from falling into sin. The only problem is, number one, that becomes a list of rules. Number two, your thing may not be on that list. This is where the Holy Spirit comes in clutch because he starts to minister to us those things that he wants laid aside in our lives. But you know what the problem is? We can't always hear what the Holy Spirit has to say, can we? We can't

always hear what the Holy Spirit has to say for two reasons. Number one, because we've already decided that we know what the Holy Spirit has to say. Number two, because there's too many distractions. There's too many distractions. There are too many things that we're trying to listen to while we're also listening to the Holy Spirit. Let me tell you a little story. We went to a restaurant last night.

Got family in town. It's great. Have a little dinner together. We go in this restaurant. Great food. Wonderful. But we sit down. And here's what you need to know about me. I'm an incredibly auditory human being. I'm an anomaly like this. My wife tells me this all the time. I take a lot in through my ear gates. I think it's because I was raised by a blind man and we listen to things

all the time. Or it's just how God made me. But I take in an incredible amount through my ears. Now that is both good because I can listen to a book and retain an incredible amount of everything that I listen to, but it's also bad because I hear everything. So we go inside of this restaurant and there's like 3,000 people screaming in there. 3,000 people don't fit in this restaurant, but

it's what it felt like in the moment. We walk in and my brain just immediately goes, because there's so much going on, right? And all of these noises that I'm sitting across from someone and they're trying to talk to me and I'm like, I got nothing right now. All I can hear is some kid going, that's all I picked up in the entire conversation. Listen, you need to know this sidebar. If you ever have a conversation with me,

I don't mean to get distracted. Okay. I just hear a lot of things. I love you with all of my heart. I want to hear everything that you had to say. And if you ever see me start to, you know, lose my focus and be like, right, right here. We're here. Okay. Be here. And that's okay. It doesn't mean I don't love you. It just means I'm easily distractible. And so, so we're in this restaurant. Finally, everything calms down and I'm like, oh,

I can finally hear. But how many times when we're trying to hear the Holy Spirit, is it like we're in that restaurant? And there's all of these noises and there's all of these things that are competing for our attention. And then the Holy Spirit is trying to talk to us and your brain says, I can't hear anything. We have got to learn to shut some noises out of our life.

We've got to learn to turn some things off so that we can hear what the Holy Spirit has to say. I'll deal with this again in just a moment. We also can't decide ahead of time what the Holy, why now the Holy Spirit's not going to say no to that. I know it's fine. Give him a moment. Be sensitive to what the Holy Spirit has to say. So number one, you got to identify,

but number two, you then have to take action. If the Holy Spirit says, cut it off, you can't say, okay, so I'm going to make sure that this is really what the Holy Spirit wants me to do, right? Like, do you, do you really, do you really want me to cut it off? And usually when he does, like 75,000 people after that will be like, hey, you know what? And they'll share this exact thing

that God ministered to you. And you're like, man, it's probably coincidence. No, it's the Holy Spirit saying, deal with it. And you eventually have to take action and deal with it. And brothers and sisters, I'm here to tell you right now, if you don't take action in your life, then you will be entangled with the things of this world and you will not be able to run your race with endurance.

So number one, you got to lay aside. Number two, we have to fix our eyes, fix our eyes. I want you to notice what it says. End of verse one. Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and the perfecter of our faith. As he tells us to fix our eyes, the first thing he tells us is that we need to run our race with endurance.

I wanna point something out to you. From what I understand in the Greek construction of him saying, run your race, the idea is that we each have a race. Each of us individually has a race that we run. Don't get me wrong. We're all running the race of faith. Your race looks different than someone else's. Let me give you another little bit of an illustration.

When I signed up to run the Oklahoma City half marathon, you had to put your goal time on there. And all I'd ever done at that point in time was like the Arcalala run, right? Our goal is all the same finish, right? Like we just, and maybe you'll do good. Maybe you won't, but you know, there's two or 300 people. It's no big deal. This is a huge race with thousands of people.

So you gotta put a goal time. And so I didn't understand why we had to do that until I showed up and I see this sea of people and a sign with my time on it. Now I signed up, I wanted to be done in two hours. That was my goal time, right? Sidebar, I meant that and surpassed it is all I'm saying. Anyway, that was my goal time, it was two hours. And so I show up and I'm like, oh, okay, yeah.

I'm with all of the other 35 year olds and our goal is all pretty much the same. And then all the way at the front are all of these young track kids, right? Or cross country kids or whatever they are. And they're just like gazelles. There's nothing to them and they are made to run. And I'm like, I can't keep up with any of those guys. That's not my race. The guy that won the race didn't like an hour and 20 minutes

or something dumb like that, I don't know. It was really, really fast. And I was just like, if I tried to keep up with him, if I tried to run his race, I would die in the first mile. Like mile one and I'm just like, well, I'm done. That's just all that there is to it. Catch me in, somebody call the ambulance because I didn't make it. That's not my race. My race was back here with the two hour people.

And I pretty well stayed in that pack of people throughout the whole thing. And that's the way it is in our lives. We each have a race that we have to run and your race is gonna look different than somebody else's. Your race doesn't like the guy next to you. God has different paces for everybody. And that does two things for us. Number one is it encourages us

because sometimes we compare ourselves to the people around us. Lord, I wanna be like him. Lord, I want his race. I wanna do what he's doing in life right now. And God's like, not your race, you run yours. And so number one, he gives us encouragement. It's okay that my race looks different than his. But number two, it takes out judgment. I can't now look at somebody else and say,

why are they doing what they're doing? What? I don't understand. Why does their race look so much different than mine? I think I'm better than them. No, the race just looks different. It reminds me of the very end of the gospels, end of the gospel of John, when Jesus restores Peter and he tells Peter, you've always gone the way that you wanna go, but there's gonna come a time when you're led

somewhere you don't wanna go, ultimately leading to his death. Peter goes, what about John, right? Like, what is it for him? And Jesus says, if I want him to live forever, what's that for you, right? You follow me. His race is different than yours. You run yours and you follow me. And so number one, we gotta run our race. Second of all, he says, you have to run it with endurance, endurance.

That word endurance means patience and it means to remain under, to remain under. And the idea is this, we are not at a sprint, we are in a long distance run. We're not in a sprint, we're in a long distance run. And it's important to know that because if you know what to expect, it's easier to handle the fact that it's a long run, right? Anybody ever taken a trip with kids before in here?

And when you take a trip with kids, you have to prepare them ahead of time. Like, listen, we're going to be in the car for 10 hours, okay, you need to know that. Just go in it, there's a really, really long car ride. If you get into the car and you say, it's gonna be a short trip, one and one half hours in, they wanna know why we're not done yet, right? And you're going, oh, that's great

because we have eight and one half hours left. So this is gonna be an interesting eight and a half hours. But if you get into the car and you tell them we have an incredibly long trip, I'm just telling you right now, you make it to lunch. And at that point in time, they start going, are we there yet? But otherwise, you got problems. I still have to do this, I have to prepare.

I look at the little phone, I'm like 10 hours. Okay, we can do this. If I don't look and know what the time is, then two hours in, I'm like, surely we're there already, right? Like, I have not grown out of that in my life yet. So if you know that it's a long distance run, if you know that you're in it for the long haul, it's easier to remain under. It's easier to keep going.

And listen, here's the thing about running a race. You just have to keep going. He says, run your race with endurance. And this is how he tells us to do it. This is the only way that you can run an endurance race and be patient in it, by fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and the perfecter of our faith. By fixing our eyes on Jesus. Some of your translations say, looking unto Jesus,

the author and the finisher of our faith. Again, I wanna tell you something about the Greek construction of that phrase, looking unto or fixing our eyes. The idea is this, taking your eyes off of everything else and putting them solely on Jesus. That's the idea. You know what the problem we have in this culture today? We all wanna multitask. We wanna have our focus

on lots of different things at one time. You know what the problem with having our focus on lots of different things at one time is? We are never fully focused on Jesus. We are never fully focused on the goal that we have in front of us. And so he says, you have to lay all other things, you have to take your eyes off everything else and focus only on me. I don't know if you've ever noticed this or not,

but hanging on the wall behind me is a dove. Did you know that was a dove? Not everybody knows that's a dove, because it's kind of interestingly constructed, but it's a dove. And the whole reason why we have the dove here is because it's representative of the Holy Spirit, the power of the Holy Spirit working in the church. But there's an interesting fact about doves.

Doves are unable to focus on more than one thing at a time. Doves can only focus on one thing at a time. It's just the truth of who they are, right? Some of you shot them over the weekend, and that's probably why, it's because they couldn't, they were focused on the wrong thing, and then your shotgun shell just took them out, right? I know what happens opening weekend.

But they can only focus on one thing at a time. We're to be just like that. Because if we take our focus off of Jesus, we have a tendency to sink. Let me tell you a story that goes along with that from scripture. So Jesus, his disciples, Jesus had just fed the 5,000, and he puts his disciples in a boat and says, "'You guys go to the other side of the sea. "'You guys go to the other side of the lake.'"

So they get in the boat. He goes, "'I'm gonna go up on the mountain and pray.'" So they get in the boat, they're going across the lake, and in the middle of the lake, this huge storm comes up. And the storm, I believe it calls it a tempestuous storm. This tempestuous storm comes up. Their boat's being tossed about, and they're totally freaked out. And right before dawn,

Jesus comes to them walking on the water. Again, I wanna know what that, I have lots of questions, I don't have time to get into them right now. Jesus comes walking to them on the water. And of course, they see him kind of off in the distance. And what makes the most sense to them is that it's a ghost, right? Because they're very spiritual men. And so they look at, they're like,

"'It's a ghost!' And Jesus goes, "'It's me, guys.'" And Peter doesn't fully believe him. And Peter says, "'If that's you, "'then call me to come out to you walking on the water.'" And Jesus says, "'Pete, bring it out.'" And so Pete gets out of the boat, starts walking to him on the water. You can just imagine the amazing moment for Peter as he's walking on water and he's looking at Jesus. Now, one thing we have to remember is, I don't care how calm the water is, you can't walk on water under the best circumstances.

It is impossible to walk on water. I've tried, it doesn't work. And so he starts to look at the wind and the waves around him, and he starts to sink. And he cries out the shortest prayer in the Bible, "'Lord, help me.'" Jesus pulls him up and says, "'Oh, you have little faith.'" Takes him to the boat, right? What we have to remember is that under the best circumstances,

it's impossible to walk with Jesus apart from the work of Jesus in our lives. But what happens to us when the wind and the waves in our lives start to erupt? We start looking all over the place. We get focused on the difficulties of life. We take our eyes off of Jesus. And when we do, we start to sink. The good thing is it just takes one prayer to get ourselves pulled back out of the water.

But we've got to stay focused on him. He says, run the race with endurance by fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and the perfecter of our faith. And that's the last part I want to point out to you on this is he is the author of our faith and he is the perfecter of our faith. He's the author in that our faith comes from him. He is the originator, the beginning of our faith.

But he's not just the beginning of our faith. He is the perfecter. That word perfect means complete. He's the one who completes our faith. Philippians 1.6 puts it like this. And this is actually one of the verses that keeps my eyes focused on Jesus in difficult times. It says, and being confident of this very thing that he who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it

until the day of Christ Jesus. But again, how do we keep our eyes focused on Jesus? It's one thing for me to inspire you and tell you, but I want to give you a plan of action. How do we keep our eyes focused on Jesus? Well, I think it takes three things. Number one, these aren't original things, but number one, you got to be in the word because this reveals Jesus to us.

All of scripture is a revelation of Jesus Christ. And so it is the revealer of Jesus to us. So if I want to keep my eyes focused on Jesus, I'm going to read the words that point me to Jesus. And as I get into God's word, it's that thing that nudges me to get me back on track. Right? Let me give you an example. How many of you, maybe I should ask you wives, how many of your husbands like to look at deer

when they're driving down the road? They're looking for deer always. We're never watching the road. We're looking for deer off in the woods, right? And yeah, 17 wives are pointing right now. I love it. I love telling you dudes out. I love you guys because I'm one of you, right? And the problem is you start to see the deer and what do you do? Your hands do this, right?

We don't mean to do it. It's just what we do. We're like, oh, because wherever we're looking, that's where we're driving, right? And then what does your wife, fellows do to you in that moment? Watch the road, not the deer, right? We need that nudge to get our eyes focused back where they need to be. That's what God's word is for us. God's word is a gentle, sometimes not gentle nudge

to get our eyes back on the road, to get our eyes back where they need to be. So you gotta be in the word. Number two, you should memorize the word. You should memorize the word. Why? Because you need a storehouse, a database of God's word for the Holy Spirit to pull up when you need it. Not only that, memorizing God's word changes the way that you think. It changes your perspective on life

because it puts truth into your mind where lies are always wanting to be told. And it keeps you focused on Jesus. I will tell you this, it's really hard to not be focused on Jesus while you're also trying to memorize the Bible. Number three, you need to believe God's word. I know that sounds incredibly basic, but listen, many of us quote it. Few of us believe it

and believe it to where it's at the core of our being. Like I believe this, not because someone told me, but I believe it because this is what God said. And I'm gonna choose to believe it over the lies. I'm gonna choose to believe this over anything else. And it's a conscious choice that we make to believe what God's word has to say. And that fixes our eyes on Jesus

because faith fixes everything. And so he tells us to fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and the perfecter of our faith. So he's told us what to lay aside. He's told us where to fix our eyes. Number three, he's gonna tell us to consider Jesus. Once you notice what it says in the middle of verse two there it says, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, despising the shame

and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him who has endured such hostility by sinners against himself so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin. He says, consider Jesus. That word consider means to think or to ponder. It means to think or to ponder.

And you know, one of the greatest things we can do is just to stop and take time to really consider, to think and to ponder about Jesus. Can I ask you a question that I just want you to answer kind of in the quietness of your heart. Do you ever take a Sabbath day? Now, listen, I know we're not bound to the law of the Sabbath. I understand that. And I'm not saying that we are.

I am saying that taking one day is a really godly thing to do. I don't care what day you take that day. But I think that we, I think that we as a culture have glorified busyness so much. We have glorified constant action. And that's not what God intended, right? I was teaching some kids about creation this week. How many days does it take God to create the heavens and the earth?

Six days. What'd he do on the seventh day? He rested, right? What, do you think God rested because he was tired? Was God like, whoo, uh, uh. Somebody, Gabe, bring the easy chair because I am worn out. No, no, he rested because he was giving us a pattern to follow. That one of the most important things for us was physical rest, which also pointed to the fact

that the most important things for us is spiritual rest found in Christ. But brothers and sisters, why do we not take a day? Why do we not do that? I, back in the spring, we had our SDA spring conference and one of the most popular breakout sessions at the spring conference is just a Q and A. And so I got to be on the panel of this Q and A and kids submit all these questions,

do some intense questions. But one question came up, it said, how do you balance faith or walking with Jesus in school and sports? How do you balance that in your life? And I was like, that's a good one. So I held this, I said, I'm gonna answer this one. I said, but first I wanna ask everybody in here a question. This was a group of, I was, I'm gonna give them

the range of 15 to 19 year olds. It's usually the high school kids that come to this and sometimes the huddle leaders that are college age kids. I said, I just, I just wanna ask you guys a question. How many of you live your lives exhausted because you never stop? Every single one put their hand up. I don't care what age it was, they all put their hand up. I said, this is kind of what I thought you were gonna say.

I said, we live in a culture right now that is so glorified busyness that we don't even know what rest looks like. We don't even know what it looks like to take a day where there's just nothing. And the taking of the day was not just to be for our physical wellbeing, but it's for our spiritual wellbeing so that you can meditate a little bit on the things of God so that you can actually take that time to soak in the truth of God. I said, honestly, if you wanna find that balance, first learn to take a day.

You gotta honor your parents, I told them. I mean, if your parents are keeping you busy, but maybe just every now and then say, could we just take an evening where there's nothing going on? When I go to ministerial alliance meetings, they're always trying to do another thing. And they're like, how do we get young families to show up? And finally, I raised my hand, I'm like,

you're not going to because young families are so busy that they have something going every single night of the week. And sometimes on the one night of the week that they don't have something going, they wanna be home with their families, which is actually the most godly thing for them to do. So let's not be too hard on young families right now because they're rolling and they're rolling through life just hard right now, okay? But do you ever just take a day to ponder and consider?

A day to just rest, I think is one of the most godly things that we can do. He says, consider Jesus. And he tells us several things to consider about Jesus. He says, number one, consider that Jesus is the one who endured the cross, despising the shame. Again, middle of verse two, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, despising the shame. We have to understand that the cross

was one of the most despised ways that someone could be put to death, and he endured that cross, and he hated the shamefulness of it, but he went through it anyway. Why? It says, for the joy that was set before him. What was the joy that was set before Jesus? If you had a mirror right now and say, hold up a mirror, you, you are the joy that was set before Jesus.

You are the reason he endured the cross, despising the shame. And I don't think we always appreciate that about who we are. We forget that our worth is found not in our ability to perform, but in the fact that we have been created in the image of God, and we forget that we are the greatest joy in the life of Jesus. Is that when sinners come home, heaven celebrates it.

Because you are the joy that is set before him. And when your life gets right with God, when you get back into fellowship with him, there's a celebration because your purpose has just been restored in Christ. This, for the, consider Jesus who, because of you, endured the cross, despising the shame. And he goes on from there to say, consider Jesus who not only endured the cross, despising the shame, but he sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

In other words, his work is done. His work is finished. And he says, for consider him who has endured such hostility against, by sinners against himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. The entire life of Jesus was an enduring of the hostility of sinners. Almost from the word go in his life. Do you remember what happened within the first two years of his life?

So the wise men show up, right? Probably in those first couple of years, probably they didn't show up day one, but in those first two years, they show up. And they show up to Herod, because they're looking for the king of the Jews. And as they show up, he says, a king of the Jews, you say, okay, let's figure this one out. So they figure out that that's in Bethlehem.

He said, okay, when you're done, you come talk to me, because I want to worship him. When really all we want to do is kill him. And so when they didn't return, because the Holy Spirit had warned them in a dream not to go back, when they didn't return, Herod sends henchmen, if you will, executioners to go and kill all of the baby boys. And Jesus had to flee, Jesus' family had to flee for his life.

From the very beginning, he endured hostility from sinners. And then when you look at the ministry of Jesus, you find that for those three years, there was constant hostility against him, which finally boiled over into his execution, which we know he was a sacrifice, a willing sacrifice, but it was still hostility from sinners. He says, consider Jesus, who endured all of this hostility for sinners. Why do we need to consider that?

So that you won't grow weary and lose heart. So that you won't grow weary and lose heart, because Jesus knows what you're going through. Remember, he's writing to a group of people who are facing persecution, and they are wanting to give up because it's hard, because the life in front of them is looking very difficult, because the race looks difficult to endure. And so he says, consider Jesus, who has been through so many things already on your behalf.

He has endured so much on your behalf. Consider him so that you don't lose heart. I love going and talk to groups of athletes. I love all of them, but one of my favorite groups to talk to are wrestlers. And here's the reason why. I know their world. And when I go talk to them, I tell them this, I'm like, listen, I understand your world. I know the workouts that you go through.

I know what it's like to stress about whether or not you're going to make weight. I know what it's like to have to fight literally for your position on the team every single week against the same guy. I know what it's like to battle through injuries. I know what it's like to have your day rise and set on how you perform on a mat with no one else to take the credit and no one else to take the blame.

I know what your world is like. And when I explain that to them, they're willing to share some things with me. You know why? Because they go, consider him because he understands our world. He knows what we've been through. He knows what we're going through. And that's what it is with Jesus. We can understand that, that he's been through what we're going through.

You say, you say, well, life is hard, right? You don't understand the things I've been through. You're right. I might not. But Jesus does. Jesus understands what it's like to grow up in a, in a home where mom and dad are probably going through some stuff sometimes. Remember, Joseph was his earthly father, not his actual father. Jesus knows what it's like to have, to have rumors that were spread about him.

Jesus knows what it's like to lose people that he loved, that he loves. His father wasn't around when, when he was crucified and most historians believe because his father had died probably when Jesus was at an early age, he lost one of his coworkers and family members and John the Baptist early on in his ministry. Jesus understands what it's like. Jesus knows what it's like to be tortured for your faith and listen, whatever you're going through in life, we got to consider Jesus because he endured so much hostility from sinners.

And that's why we do that is so that we won't grow weary and lose heart that in the most difficult of days we go, but at least Jesus understands, at least he knows what I've been through. He says, consider Jesus who endured the cross because of the joy that was set before him, who endured hostility from sinners so that you won't grow weary and lose heart. And then he closes in verse four with this, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood and you're striving against sin. This has got to be one of those statements that sort of makes you sit back and go, oof, you're right.

You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your resistance against sin. Do you remember the story of Jesus right before the cross? The story of the cross begins in the garden of Gethsemane. And while he's in the garden of Gethsemane, he tells his friends, he says, I want you guys to wait here, pray so that you don't enter into temptation. I'm going to go a little further and I'm going to pray as well.

And Jesus begins to pray. And as he prays, it's so intense that science teaches us that basically capillaries were bursting because of the anxiety that he was going through in his struggle, ultimately against sin. Because what was Jesus's prayer? Lord, if there's any other way, then work that out for me, because I'm open for options right now. Nevertheless, not my will, but your will be done.

What was the sin he was battling against? The sin he was battling against was not fulfilling the will of the father and dying for our sins. And he did so to the point of great drops of blood coming from his brow. That's the resisting of sin that he took. And it says you haven't even started doing that yet. And then Jesus goes on from there, after he had won the battle in the garden to resist

against sin by shedding his own blood. We have not done that yet, brothers and sisters, especially in the culture that we're living in today. We think some little law that gets made, oh my gosh, we're facing persecution. No, we're not. We don't know what it's like just yet, but it doesn't mean, it doesn't mean it's not coming. He says you have not yet resisted to the point of bloodshed in your battle against sin.

But I'll remind you of this, Jesus' blood was shed to win the battle against sin. Jesus' blood was shed to win the battle against sin. And we can find great hope in who Jesus is and what he's done for us because of the battle that he won. Amen? Well, this morning is Communion Sunday, and so I'll invite the worship team to come on up. And hopefully, I see ushers scurrying.

So I'll take time to share exactly what takes place with communion.

So if you will, this, this bread was sinless. But the second thing that's true about this bread is, is the way that they baked it, this bread was pierced. And so it had all these little holes all over it. And then the third thing that's interesting about the bread is, is that the way it was baked, it would leave stripes on the bread. And so as he held up this piece of bread, it was sinless and it was pierced and it was

striped. And he would take that bread and he would break it. And he said, take and eat.

And so as the worship team sings this last song, just let the Lord do in your heart what

And like a flood, His mercy rains. Unending love, amazing grace.

Unending love, amazing grace. My sins are gone, I've been set free. My God, my Savior, has ransomed me. And like a flood, His mercy rains. Unending love, amazing grace.

The earth shall soon dissolve like so. The sun forbear to shine. But God who called me here below. Will be forever mine. Will be forever mine. You are forever mine.

My sins are gone, I've been set free. My God, my Savior, has ransomed me. And like a flood, His mercy rains. Unending love, amazing grace. Unending love, amazing grace. Did you bow with me?

Father, we come before you. Lord, I thank you for the body of Jesus that was broken for us. Lord, that you were wounded for our transgressions. Bruised for our iniquities. Lord, and by your stripes we're healed. Father, I thank you for the blood of Jesus Christ. That is enough to cover our sins. Lord, the blood of Jesus Christ that does away with them and makes us brand new in you.

And so, Lord, as we partake, I pray that we would ever keep in mind, Lord, the body and the blood of Jesus. That grants us our communion with you. And our communion with each other. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Let's partake.

And if you'd bow with me one last time. Father, we thank you for your word. And God, I just pray that you would continue to use it in our lives to keep us focused on you. Lord, I pray for steps of action, Lord, that go with hearts of response. And so, Father, move in our hearts, we pray. In Jesus' name, amen. Be blessed.