Apostles Church

What to Run: The race marked out for us. It is the race that others have run (ch 11). It is a race that he has marked out for us. It is the same race: the race of faith – a life of radical obedience God rooted in a deep trust that all that is in his heart for us is good. It is a life of radical obedience because all of our suspicions of God have been overcome by the Gospel and we are convinced that he is for us. Yield to the good that is in his heart for you. It is one race, but each of us has a different course. He has ordained this course for you. In Ch 11 this race of faith meant some experienced the sword fail and some experience the sword fall. Your course, your story is going to be different from others. 

How to Run: With endurance. This race is not an easy one: agona.  “Long obedience in the same direction.” Faith is not a phase or a fad, but an unbending course of life. Endurance is the theme of this book. It is the evidence of genuine faith. Without endurance you will not inherit the promise of eternal life. Heb 10:39. (Five warning passages: These warnings clearly teach us that we are saved by grace through faith, but that the faith that saves us is a persevering faith; only those who persevere in faithful love and loyalty to Jesus will be saved in the end. So, stay the course; your soul and eternity is riding on this. This means you have to run with intentional focus; not lazy, or flippant; we can’t dabble in the things of God or take a casual approach to Jesus. Run with the intent of finishing your race well. Can you envision your life 30 years from now – faithful to Jesus, serving his purposes, loving his people? If you are going to run well and finish:  Laying aside encumbrances and sin. Stripping away anything that will hinder and hold back. Illus: Greeks typically would compete in races naked so as to have zero resistance. This stripping away meant the removal of clothes and excessive body fat. The pastor mentions sin that entangles us. The picture is running a race with something clinging to you so tightly it encumbers you; it trips you up. We cannot run this race and finish it without actively ridding our life of the things that would cripple us. Sin - Lust, greed, lies, pride, hypocrisy, self-focus. Small things that overcome us and remove us from the race. Call is to eradicate these things before the eliminate you. Be done with them before they do you in. Jesus said if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off. Weight: some things are not sin, but they are distractions. They weigh us down. Not sinful; just excessive. Take up too much space/ push Jesus to the margins of our thinking and feeling. Masters that compete with Jesus for mastery over our lives. The volume on Jesus' voice in our life is drowned out by the volume of these others things. Rid our lives of distraction. Illus: Wasting lots of time looking for a productivity apps. Questions: What do you need to lay aside? What is it that you find yourself most preoccupied with? Most attentive to? What needs to be moderated, moved toward the margin as much as possible so that Christ can take the center?

This changes the question from, “is this permissible” to “is this helpful?” Will this help me become all that God is calling me to be? Will this help me run the race he has marked out for me? Will this encourage me, inspire me, make me more like Christ?” The call is to eradicate or moderate.

Looking to Jesus. Continually direct our attention toward him to the exclusion of everything else; v3 consider him (give careful thought and reflection toward Jesus), think about him. Simplicity of Christian faith - our gaze continually fixed on Jesus. Founder and perfecter of our faith: Founder = trail blazer – he has set the course for us – the one who has run this race perfectly; perfecter  - the one who finishes our faith. In other words, the one who brought us into this race, blazed the trail to follow, and helps and strengthens us stay the course and finish it. // Our Hope: Endured the cross for us. Looking to Jesus is the only way to keep from being content with your sin and failure and at the same time from feeling condemned by it; it is the only way you can despise your sin and not feel contempt toward yourself the sinner. Our Hero: He is the ultimate example of faith – radical obedience to all that was in God’s heart for him; wanting God’s will over everything; trust in God that resulted in radical costly obedience. What you behold most is what you will become. As I focus on Jesus, the Holy Spirit brings him into clear focus and awakens aspirations in me for his character and likeness and leading. Illus: The importance of developing devotional patterns and rhythms.

Why to Run. Jesus is our ultimate example: for the JOY set before him. Prize at the end of his race – exalted at the Father’s right hand, enemies under his feet, rescuing us, leading us to glory. Because of this joy, he despised the shame. Despise: “to consider something not important enough to be an object of concern when evaluated against something else; care nothing for, disregard” (BDAG). Not that he hated the shame of the cross, but that when measured up against the gain of the cross, the joy at the end, the shame and agony of the cross seems unimportant, insignificant, of little concern. There is a promised joy that enables you to regard a cross/crucifixion as insignificant. The promise of eternal life with Christ; “Life after life after death” in what the Hebrews writer calls the “the world to come” where all that is broken will be healed; what is ruined will be restored; wrongs will be righted; the fallen will be lifted up and everything that opposes God’s beautiful vision for the new heavens and new earth will be banished; and “all the sad things come untrue,” and that ending will be all the more joyful because the story was so sad in many places. The problem is we live in a culture that exalts the visible and immediate and has killed its capacity to imagine and dream about what is unseen and future. This will not be like reading a long book only to get cheated by the ending. The resurrection tells us that there is life after life after death. Witnesses of Chapter 11; there is a gain that makes all the losses seem insignificant. Faith enables you to see that unseen joy. Paul: 2Tim 4:6-8. Phil 2:21 To live is Christ; to die is gain. We run out of love for the Lord Jesus (gratitude), but we also run motivated by the promise. 2Cor 4:16-18 hope fuels endurance and helps us to despise these present sufferings – not despise in the sense of hate (which we do), but despise in the sense of mock them, (your days are numbered and you are small and trivial when measured up against what awaits me; so do your worst). All that God is for me in this, and all that God has for me at the end of this will make all that I experience in the midst of this seem light and momentary.

Conclusion: Run with intentional focus and faith in what is not seen.