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In Christ, Mark
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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
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, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the Pioneer and Perfecter of faith. For the joy set before Him, He endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider Him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
Hebrews 12:1-3
This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
As I get older and older (just turned 64 last week), I am realizing that life is a marathon and not a sprint for most people.
For example, after just revealing my age, you can do the math.
I have lived 768 months which translates to approximately 23,800 days and if you really want to get crazy with this, that means I have lived an amazing 571,392 hours.
That’s a lot of living and, given how healthy I am, it doesn’t appear like it’s going to end any time soon but that’s in the Lord’s hands. I’m ready to serve Him in every hour He blesses me with.
So why go into this exercise in calculation and micro-evaluation of life duration?
Because it shows us the critical importance of our scripture passage for today as we move from our 19 part series from Hebrews 11 (What Faith Brings) to the opening three verses of chapter 12. Here’s what we read there:
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, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the Pioneer and Perfecter of faith. For the joy set before Him, He endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider Him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
Here, we find that the analogy between life and running a race isn’t just something generated in modern times. For going back to the first century A.D., we read the author of Hebrews exhorting the Jewish Christians to “run the race” that was marked off “with perseverance”, all the while getting rid of “everything that (may hinder) and the sin that so easily entangles”.
The bottom line here is that while we each are trying to run this race God has marked out with an ambition to stay on course, we find Satan, the king of the world, trying to move us off our respective paths through matters of life that could hinder us and transgressions that entangle and hold us back from running forward.
Of note, the writer doesn’t present the problem without giving a solution for as we see in our scripture verses, the only way for us to run the race set before us properly and successfully is to fix “our eyes on Jesus” who is “the Pioneer and Perfecter of faith”.
You see, Jesus served as the ultimate role model for anyone who is in this race called life. For although He only lived until the age of 33, He was the only One who ever ran perfectly, persevering and “(enduring) the cross wile scorning its shame” before reaching “the joy set before Him” and gaining the privilege to sit “at the right hand of the throne of God”.
As we run today “surrounded by such a cloud of witnesses, namely those who kept their eyes on Jesus and made it to the finish line, we too can focus fully on the Savior of the world, considering the opposition He endured from sinners, so that we can avoid growing weary and losing heart during the worldly marathon course we run, instead keeping an unhindered stride so to one day gain the most valuable prize any runner could receive, the very glory and majesty of the Kingdom of God where we will join our God and His Son forever.
Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.
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