Hebrews 12:1-3
S-1685
The book of Hebrews was written to some Christians who were suffering for their faith. They had not yet shed blood—but it was getting close.
Don’t know who wrote the book.
SLIDE #: KJV: The letter of Paul to the Hebrews… written by Timothy to the saints in Rome
SLIDE #: Living Bible: “Love Paul” Comes to book of Hebrews, just says, “Good-Bye”
Many think it was written by a woman named Priscilla of Aquila and Priscilla fame in the Book of Acts. She and her husband were both powerful preachers of the gospel. Intellectual, sharp as tacks.
SLIDE #: If so, it is the one Bible book written by a woman.
We do know this, whoever wrote the book, certainly loved Jesus. It is perhaps the most lovely lyric portrayal of beauty of Jesus Christ to be found anywhere in the Bible.
SLIDE #: HEBREWS 12:1: Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.
SLIDE #: HEBREWS 12:2: Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Here we find one of the great moving passages of the New Testament. In it the writer of Hebrews has given us a well nigh a perfect picture of the Christian life.
SLIDE #: The Christian life is a race and every one of us can finish well!
Many people feel that the Christian life is running a race to get to Heaven and many feel that they will eventually run out of wind and will end up in Hell.
Once heard an earnest but poorly-instructed preacher who addressed his congregation as follows: “I am preaching today on a text of only four words, taken from 1 Corinthians 9:26. The text is, ‘I therefore so run.’ Three points to my sermon: (1) You’ve got to run to get the Heaven. (2) You’ve got to run awful fast to get to Heaven. (3) You’ve got to keep on running so you won’t end up in Hell.”
But, we run because we are saved – not to obtain salvation!
SLIDE #: Some of you have never trusted Jesus. Know the facts of the Gospel, but have never committed your lives to Jesus Christ. He’s imploring you to surrender to Jesus and get in the race.
You must be born again by a personal relationship with Jesus Christ to get in the race.
The Christian is not competing against other Christians!
We’re competing against Satan and against everything that he throws up in our faces to hinder our running.
SLIDE #: “Let us throw off everything that hinders.”
“weight” = “okou” = a flat blob or bulk.
Makes sense. When a guy comes to a race you don’t expect him to take off his sweat suit and then find a big pot belly hanging over his shorts. No, every racer must train to keep the weight off.
Notice that a weight is not necessarily a sin. Many things and pleasures which of themselves are quite all right may become weights and sins if they hinder our Christian growth.
Here is the test: Does it help or does it hinder you in running your Christian race? Do you run more swiftly after the party than you did before? Whatever helps, cling to it. Whatever hurt, throw it away.
Years ago in the hills of Tennessee, a man killed a great American Bald Eagle with a small charge of bird shot. Was astounded as to why this king of the air had allowed him to get close enough to kill him with a charge of bird shot! The bird was enormous – 8 feet from tip to tip. But as he looked closer he found that an old steel trap clung to one of his legs. The trap didn’t kill the eagle; didn’t even break his leg. But it held him so close to the ground that it indirectly proved to be the death of him.
What a parable that is for us! What a spread of wings some of us have – how we might soar! How grandly we might win the race! But we are weighted down. We remain so very close to the filth of the earth and thus an easy prey for Satan.
SLIDE #: Notice that we must also beware of the “sin that so easily entangles us!”
“Entangles” = “surround”. Here’s the guy who runs the race with the Harris Tweed coat on!
Now, this could perhaps refer to any sin. But he’s probably talking about something specific. If you’re trying to run the race of faith, what’s the biggest hindrance? That’s right – unbelief!
So you get some fat man who’s all weighted down and put on him the overcoat of unbelief and he’ll collapse in the middle of the track.
That’s why we Christians must also be hurdlers. Must continually keep jumping over all of the Christians who are lying exhausted in the sweat of legalism and sin and unbelief.
SLIDE #: The race mentioned here is not your morning walk, it’s not an evening saunter; it’s not a mid-day stroll. It’s a race – says so right here in the Bible.
It’s not a sprint. It’s an endurance race.
“Run with patience” – “steadfast endurance” – takes a lifetime of running with Jesus.
SLIDE #: SINCE OTHERS HAVE RUN WELL, WE CAN, TOO!
“So great a cloud of witnesses” – It’s the testimony of all the great saints mentioned in Hebrews 11.
We have before us the testimony of these great saints that the life of faith really works.
Often hear this pictures as a great stadium and all the saints peer down over the edge to see how we’re doing. See Moses and Abraham and Abel and Paul all hanging halfway out of the ramparts of Heaven to check on us. But for me, that would be more frustration than motivation just to know that they’re watching – frankly, I think that they’re more involved with Jesus Christ than with worrying about us.
Picture of verse 1 is not them looking at us in a stadium; rather, it’s us looking at them as in a testimonial that the life of faith really wins. They’ve left us a history of victory.
Now that really motivates me. To hear Enoch say, “God’s company is better than that of sinners.” To hear Abraham reveal, “I’d rather walk with God in the dark than walk alone in the light.” Moses would say, “I’d rather have Jesus than silver or gold.”
We look at those guys and see that they’ve faced things that we’ve never faced.
I’ve never been in a lion’s den. Never had lions licking their hungry chops at me. Don’t know how long my faith would last before I’d be climbing the walls.
I’ve never been in a furnace and heard a king holler to heat it up to seven times its normal heat.
Never been in a crisis position where I was tied to the stake and ready to be burned.
Nobody’s ever threatened to chop my head off with a sword – at least Julie’s never really meant it.
I’ve never been through cruel mockings and scourgings.
I’ve never been in prison for the cause of Christ.
I’ve not come close to what those guys have been through. I haven’t shed a drop of blood for the cause of Christ.
“We’ve lived the life of faith and it worked for us – we were victorious – you can be, too.”
SLIDE #: looking at jesus inspires us to run well (Hebrews 12:2).
READ HEBREWS 12:2
You say, “Well, I didn’t think that you had to keep your eyes on anything in running.” Try running full speed ahead and looking at your feet.
Story of John Albright – tackle in football – runs mile with head down – hit tennis net support pole and dropped on the spot.
We are not to undertake the Christian race looking at hypocrites in the church, or at some faulty church member!
If we look for a pattern among men we’ll fail. You may get drunk like Noah or lie like Abraham or deceive people like Jacob or lose your tempter like Moses.
SLIDE #: We must learn to spend our lives looking deeply into the eyes of Jesus.
READ HEBREWS 12:2
Ever stop to realize what Jesus Christ gave up to save us. See how high up He was. Ever think how low He stooped to come to earth, humiliated to save us.
SLIDE #: Philippians 2:6-8: Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
but made himself nothing,
Angels to wait on Him and care for Him – humbled Himself to become a man.
taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
Made Himself of no reputation – King born in a stable. A slave, a servant. See Jesus Christ. Emptied Himself of his heavenly glory to become one of us.
Got hot, tired, thirsty, hungry – agony. See Him with woman at well – Noon – disciples gone. Samaritan woman comes. “Give me a drink. I’m thirsty”. Son of God. He who made the water in the well – has to ask a women he created for a drink. Sits sweating at mercy under hot sun He made, draining His strength. “Give me a drink.”
and became obedient to death-
even death on a cross!
SLIDE #: Ladder going down
See Jesus Christ – despising the shame – ignore it!
Many men would rather die than be shamed in front of their fellow men.
Nothing can so break the human spirit as to be continually put to shame. Men hate to be ashamed.
Prayer: Asleep, “Lord, please bless her legs.”
Bless the women who have pinched their tits.
Abimelech wasn’t ashamed to murder his brothers! Philistine king. Woman dropped millstone on his head. Committed suicide rather than be killed by a woman. “Never let it be said that the great king of the Philistines was put to death at the hand of a woman.”
Saul wasn’t ashamed to try to murder his own son-in-law – but after mortally wounded in battle had servant kill him rather than suffer the shame of being killed by the enemy.
Nothing can so break human spirit as to be continually put to shame.
Look at Jesus Christ. He despised it, ignored it, endured it.
SLIDE #: SHAMEFUL REJECTION
John 1:10-12 – “He came to His own and His own received Him not.”
Came to his hometown – They kicked him out. Tried to push Him off a cliff and kill Him. The shame and embarrassment.
SLIDE #: SHAMEFUL ACCUSATION
Brought before Annas and Caiaphas – charge – blasphemy.
Blasphemy! Charged to One who never sinned – Charged with blasphemy against God.
Remember that He said, “My meat is to do the will of Him who sent Me!” Charged with taking God’s name in vain.
Charge some here with blaspheming God and would startle no one. Some have done it.
But to charge one who loved like Jesus Christ loved, obeyed as He obeyed, charge Him with blasphemy – must have caused him peculiar suffering.
SHAMEFUL MOCKING
SLIDE #: MOCKED HIS DEITY
Before Herod.
Spit on Him and blindfolded Him. Poked God’s Son with sticks. “Prophesy who hit you.”
“Do tricks”, says Herod. “Prove you’re the Son of God and I’ll let you go free.” Mocked Him, laughed at Him.
SLIDE #: MOCKED HIS KINGSHIP
Shameful mockery before Pilate. Scourged. Pilate – “Are you a king?” Here stands King of all creation. Humbled Himself.
You and I get mad. Have temper. Not Jesus Christ – Who for joy set before Him, endured cross, despised shame. Had goal in mind. Joy before Him.
SLIDE #: MOCKED HIS PRAYERS
Never read in the annals of execution that anyone would mock the prayers of a dying man. Read of villains about to die: “Give me a moment or two to pray.” Rare case when prayers disallowed.
Look at Jesus Christ. Even his prayers are objects of derision.
“Eloi, Eloi, Lama Sabbathanai: My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me!”
“He’s calling for Elijah! Let’s see if Elijah comes to rescue him!”
SLIDE #: SHAMEFUL SUFFERING
No more shameful way to die. Men devise many ways – guillotine, gas chamber, firing squad, electric chair, hanging…
Nothing worse than cross. Reserved for lowest criminals.
Old Testament says cursed is everyone who dies in a cross. Yet Jesus Christ took it.
Jesus Christ became a curse for us – bore our sins.
Placed between two thieves. Evidence that He was biggest thief of all.
See Him as He patiently endured the nails through His hands.
READ JOHN 1:10-11
Don’t you know that His tender heart bled as he was put to death by the very ones he had come to save! Looked up in love as they put the nails through His hands and loved these very folks to whom He’d given life. And now they were raking His.
Those were His men, His creation… and He held still as the creature took a hammer and drove nails through the hands of the creator.
Head fell on breast. They said, “He’ll never lift that head among the multitudes again!”
Look at those nails… hands. Those were the hands which healed, raised the dead, touched lips, made mud and opened blind eyes, lifted against the winds to calm the storm. He will never use those hands again.
SLIDE #: “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy set before Him, endured the cross, despised the shame, sat on the right hand of the throne of God.”
Why endure it? Why? Why? Because He could see the joy on the other side. Joy of saving us.
Why did He do this? Why did Jesus go through all the agony and turmoil? He had a dream in mind.
SLIDE #: One of the greatest speeches in U.S. history was enunciated by Martin Luther King: “It was his I have a Dream sermon which he delivered on numerous occasions. He had a dream for his people. And he preached it and believed it until he changed the course of this nation—even though it cost him his life.
Jesus had a dream: That dream was us. He suffered the shame for the joy of saving us.
SLIDE #: STORY OF NEW ENGLAND PREACHER AND THE BIRD CAGE
Christmas Eve, 1968. Paul Harvey
New England preacher. Bird cage. Boy caught two old cow birds. What are you going to do with them? Play with them. Get tired of playing with them, then what? Old cat, she loves cow birds. How much for the two birds in the cage?
Jesus met Satan. Bird cage. What do you have in the cage? Some human beings. Play with them. Murder, divorce, slavery, war. How much? You don’t want them. Spit on you, mock you, reject you. How much? Nothing less than your blood on the cross. Let me have the cage.
Doesn’t end with that bleak ending of death on the cross. But victory in Jesus Christ.
SLIDE #24: READ PHILIPPIANS 2:9-11: Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
SLIDE #: Ladder going up to glory of God.
SLIDE #: READ HEBREWS 12:2
Today is the day to bow before Christ and confess Him.
Communion
