Run With Endurance
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| Photo by Jordan Whitt on Unsplash |
The minivan had a huge dent in the back where the trunk had to be slammed shut, from when I backed into a city bus. The driver's side window didn't work, and neither did the air conditioning. One day while driving in the rain, a puddle claimed the majority of my muffler. The minivan was the loudest car on the road everywhere we went, and conversation was a struggle. I barely had money to get oil changes, so there was no way I could afford a muffler fix.
All of these car troubles were happening while I was doing Reading Corps and was flat broke. It seemed to me that at any given point, this minivan was going to crap out on me, and then I'd be screwed. However, at the time I was working three jobs that took me all around the metro, and I couldn't stand to lose my ride. In as rough shape as she was, I still needed that minivan.
Then one day, we walk outside, where I was parked on the street, to find my minivan's bumper on top of the roof. The entire back side was smashed in, and it was moved about 6 feet forward from my original parking spot. Someone had rear-ended me during the night, and fled the scene. The thing was totaled. What was I going to do without a car? It seemed like a nightmare hit-and-run scenario that would leave me broke and without a car to get to work!
The next two weeks resolved that problem. With my check from insurance for my car and help from my parents, I was able to get a much nicer (and more street legal) car. My new Toyota Camry was my dream car as a kid, and it had a muffler and all kinds of other awesome features. I could have never afforded Stella had my minivan never been hit. The immediacy and anxiety of the car situation resolved itself and truly ended up working out for my good.
Many situations in life are about perspective. I used the car accident story because that is a great example. Car accidents suck. We immediately start focusing on costs and insurance and repairs -- all of the immediate things that stress us out. How often do we stop and take a bigger perspective on an accident? Car accidents, like so many situations in life, seem so immediate that we can't focus on anything else. Our line of sight becomes narrow and we lose focus of the bigger picture in life.
STRUGGLING WITH PERSPECTIVE
One of the biggest struggles I notice in my own Christian life is that my focus become narrow and I start to look at the immediate struggles I'm facing. When this happens, I take my eyes off Jesus and start to get overwhelmed and anxious about what is right before me.
In the letter to the Hebrews, the writer is encouraging his Christian brothers and sisters to endure and persevere in light of life's immediate struggles and stressors. In the text, his encouragement comes in the form of advice that helps us keep perspective.
"Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. (Hebrews 12:1-2 ESV)
The writer refers to the great saints of the faith as a great "cloud of witnesses." These are the people chronicled in Hebrews chapter 11 who have lived great lives of trust in the living God. He is referring back to people like Abraham, Isaac, and Moses whose lives reflect their faith through their actions and their words. He describes this faith as "the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." (Heb. 11:1)
The great titans of the Christian faith are weak and flawed individuals who have, by the Holy Spirit's power, placed great confidence in God to fulfill His promises. This is extremely encouraging to hard-luck, stumbling sinners like me. God is able to do what He promises. My successes don't depend on how great I will myself forward or run, but on Him who has mercy. (cf. Romans 9:16)
I love the way Paul describes Abraham's faith in Romans 4, "No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised." (Romans 4:20-21 ESV)
Faith is conviction that God is able to do, and will do, what He has promised. Faith is living and acting in accordance with that conviction and assurance.
The author reminds us of the greats who have accomplished marvelous things through their steadfast faith in the LORD. He encourages us with a sports metaphor. We are called to "lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely, and to run with endurance the race that is set before us."
In the Christian life, sin is the great hindrance. Have you ever tried running with those little hand weights? Even 2.5 lbs. hand weights in each hand make a light jog an intense struggle!
Sin wants to trip us up, like a root sticking up on the trail, to watch us fall down in the dirt. Sin wants to entangle us like vines growing up a tall tree, suffocating us and cutting us off from our light source. Sin wants us to get caught as if our foot stepped into a snare. I love the way the Aramaic Plain English Bible translates this idea of sin: "Sin which is always ready for us."
FAITH AND FOCUS
The Christian life is a great endurance race. It is the race of faith. Our sin is always trying to get us to dwell on how hard the race is and how unable we are to finish it. The writer tells us, the Christian race of faith is all about perspective. We have to keep our eyes off the immediacy of our struggles by fixing our gaze upon Jesus. He tells us, "KEEP YOUR EYES ON JESUS."
"looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God." (Hebrews 12:2 ESV)
This is the great victory of Abraham, of course. He was an 100 year old man with a barren wife, and yet he didn't consider his impossible circumstances, but "grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised."
The idea of looking to Jesus is to turn our eyes away from other things and fix our gaze upon him. But why does looking to him encourage us to run the race with endurance?
Jesus is the founder of our faith. Jesus is the perfecter of our faith. He is our great shining light, he is our beacon in the darkness. He is the one who accomplished in his obedient life and death what we could not. He is the sinless and worthy lamb. He has done it, perfecting us by his faith! (Cf. Hebrews 10:14)
THE ULTIMATE PERSPECTIVE
We see that Jesus had the ultimate perspective. Jesus kept even the shame, humiliation, scorn, and dishonor of going to the cross in perspective!
Jesus, "for the joy set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame"
Jesus looked ahead to the joy of God's promise. Jesus set the eternal glory and reward ahead of his suffering and dishonor on the cross. It was this perspective that led him to endure. He didn't look at his immediate circumstances but at his eternal hope. By this he is the perfecter of our faith.
He despised the shame, the dishonor that he experienced. The holy and sinless Savior, the righteous man who in himself was undeserving of death, bore our shame on the cross. The crucifixion wasn't only a horrific physical death, but it was intended to take an emotional and humiliating toll. Jesus was humiliated, scorned, shunned, despised on the cross. He was reviled. He was shamed. The cross is horror and shame and scandal!
Yet in perfected endurance, Jesus looked ahead to the joy set before him.
Jesus considered the joy set before him, the joy of being reunited with the Father, the joy of being the great high priest and savior of sinners, the joy of the feast with his bride the church that is to come, and he endured. He endured and now look at him.
He is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. The promise of God to make Jesus his King has been fulfilled. His dishonor has turned to honor, as he is seated at the right hand, ruling as God's Messiah.
How do we run our race with endurance?
It's all about perspective. We have to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus. When we get too focused on our circumstances or our inabilities, we are losing sight of the power at work within us and the Savior at work for us.
With our eyes fixed on our founder and perfecter, we will be empowered to lay aside the weight of sin. We will grow in ever-increasing measures into people who are convinced that God is able to fulfill His promises. As we live the life of faith, we get to see God come through for us more and more! We become more able to face dishonor and bear shame for the gospel's sake, because we live for the joy set before us! We become a people who aren't defined by their circumstances, but by their joy in their Savior. And as we look more and more to Jesus, we will grow strong in our faith as we give glory to God!
And by faith, we will be victorious in the race!
For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. (1 John 5:4 ESV)
To God be the glory! Amen.
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