Hebrews 12:1-11—Run and Do Not Faint, For We Serve A Lovingly Limitless God

INTRO |

When I first moved to Charleston I learned about the CRBR. I met a man in his mid thirties who ran the race, and I thought “he is crazy!” But over the next year I met some people my age who were runners, and they did the race too. So, after living here three years I decided I could do it. So, I started a disciplined routine and was determined to be ready by race day to run and finish the race.

In our text today we are invited into a colosseum, as it were, to a race being ran. The stands are full, but not with spectators who bought tickets, they are full with encouragers who actually ran and finished the race successfully.

This “great cloud of witnesses” was mentioned in chapter 11 for running the race by faith.

This list is given to be an encouragement to every Christian to Run and Do Not Faint in the Christian life, For We Serve A Lovingly Limitless God.

CLARIFY!

(9x throughout) discipline - to raise a child rightly

(v.11) train - to excercise as an athlete

1. The Christian life is doable, but it takes discipline and determination to reach the end (vv. 1-2).

As the recipients of this sermon were facing persecution and hardship they were encouraged to remember the OT christians who lived by faith, and to look to Jesus who did so as well.

If they could do it, so can you! Facing cultural abandonment, religious isolation, and physical pain; the recipients of this letter are encouraged to think about the great cloud, those who ran the race of faith by:

Being Disciplined—laying aside every weight and sin that clings closely.

To carry weight when running is a difficult task, but if you want to carry it, it needs to be close to your body.

Here a call to lay aside the sins that are obviously weighing us down and those that may not be as obvious. They cling so closely that we may have forgotten they are even there.

It takes discipline to to lay these aside, but it is work worth doing.

Being Determined— “let us run with endurance”

Running doesn’t just happen—you have to commit to it, be determined to run, and even more so, to run with endurance.

This is not easy, so the writer of Hebrews says “looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of your faith.”

Mohler—”No Christian runs with endurance by his own strength. We are beset with weakness. What endurance we run with is entirely of Christ.”

After the long list of faith given in chp. 11, we are told to look to Christ!

Mohler goes on to say, that the great crowd of witnesses inspires us, but Christ is the one who paid our entrance fee and keeps us in the race until the end.

He is our founder (author) or source of your ability to even be in the race. He paid the entry fee.

He is the perfecter—meaning just as perfect as Jesus’ work was to save us, it is perfect to sustain us to the end too.

In fact, his resurrection and ascension give warrant to his ability to carry out the work of salvation to the end.

So, when he declared “it is finished” he was saying that salvation had fully been accomplished for all those he died for.

Have you ever considered that your glorification is just as sure as your justification, so don’t grow weary or faint hearted— run with endurance—the race has been won!

2. The Christian life is often painful, but the gains are worth it. (vv.2,3,4,&10).

The metaphor of a race is used here to show the discipline and determination needed to live the Christian life, and to show that there is pain involved.

(v.2)—We are told to run with “endurance,” to look to Jesus who “endured the cross,” and to consider him who endured from sinners such hostility.”

This is pain-filled language.

In fact , in v.4, the writer refers to their current situation as a “struggle against sin.”

The race is painful because we have personal sin and sinners to deal with as God trains us.

The writer of Hebrews wanted his audience to consider the sufferings of Christ at the hands of sinners as they faced their own trials from the hands of sinners.

With Jesus as their example, he believed they would not grow weary and faint under the pressures around and within them.

So, in these verses they are called to move from OT examples, and consider Christ their calling.

Heb 12:5 “And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him.”

Don’t miss this! These Jewish believers were being instructed to see their persecution, at the hands of sinners, as an instrument of training/discipline in the hands of God their loving father.

Jesus the Son faced persecution at the hands of sinners and he did not grow weary and faint. But the persecution of these early Jewish Christians, unlike his, was “the discipline of the Lord, so don’t be weary when reproved by him” (v.5).

John Piper, “what adversaries are doing out of sinful hostility, God is doing to you as discipline from a loving father.”

This may push against your view of God as loving, caring, and good, but should it?

Acts 2:23 “This Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.”

God has never been a passive observer in human history. He has/is sovereignly working in all things good to those who love him and judgement on those who don’t.

He was at work in the fall of Sodom and Gomorra, in the flood and the salvation of Noah, he freed Israel from Egypt, delivered them at the Red Sea, and led them into Babylonian captivity. He was at work in Peter being called as a disciple and his denial of Christ, even the crucifixion of Jesus, so surely he is at work in your moments of pressure, persecution, and pain—training you to endure!

3. The Christian life is formed by God, and he knows what is best (vv.5-9).

This is a sticking point for many of us. We want to form our own lives. We want to determine the path we take to our desired outcomes.

I went to this college so I could get this job, marry this type of person, live in this house, go on these vacations, send my children to these schools, and on and on the story goes.

However, when we submit to Jesus Christ as Lord we have to also submit to the fact that he rules and reigns over all things.

Now, don’t get me wrong, it is true of everyone, but we, as Christians, should live in light of what is true.

When we understand this, we can see the Christian life as training leading to true life.

Every scenario is disciplining us to run the race rightly, to endure to the end, to finish as we started—by faith!

But, pastor, I thought my life would get better once I became a Christian?

I get it, and it does, but your idea of better may be off, it may not necessarily be God’s.

For too long, we have viewed Christianity as a good luck charm, and as long as we do what is right God will bless me.

Retribution Theology/Prosperity Gospel

No, as long as you are God’s he is training you, disciplining you, to live as he intends for mankind to live.

The writer of Hebrews points out in v.9, that we have earthly fathers who discipline us, Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live?”

Heb. 12:7 “It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline?”

So when you question your circumstances, maybe they seem out of control, remember that God is disciplining you so that you may live!

4. The Christian life has a purpose! (vv.6&7,9-11).

So, why were the recipients of this letter facing persecution?

Well, because they, like us, lived in a sinful world.

But, also, they were being trained/ disciplined by God their loving father that they might know true life.

We have ideas about what our lives should be like, but God uses the situations, even the sinfulness of this world, to conform us to the likeness of Jesus!

(vv. 10-11) This results in your being able to share in his holiness, and yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.

This newly converted Jewish audience would have been very familiar with the wisdom literature of the OT, specifically the Proverbs.

That is why the writer references Prov. 3:11-12, and calls them to become subject to the Father and live.

The purpose of God’s discipline is for us to know his love.

Heb. 12:7 “It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons.

For discipline to reach it’s full effect, it must be completed.

When a child is growing up they should experience loving discipline, but they may not understand the loving side of it.

Mohler— “If children did, they would not have done whatever it was that required the discipline. Certain lessons can only be learned through training/discipline.”

When our girls were growing up, I knew it would not serve them well in life to throw their food while eating at the table, so we disciplined them.

This was necessary, they would not have learned it any other way.

1 Peter 1:6 “In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials,”

Our training, our discipline, for God to show us his love, and to teach us how to truly live.

John 14:6 “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

So, how are you responding to God the Father’s loving training for you in the way, the truth, and unto life?

To the neighbor who blows their leaves into your yard year after year, the teacher who seems to be making class harder than it needs to be, to the broken relationships, to the difficulties in your marriage, and in the church, to the anxiety you face, and the sickness in your life.

Are you defiantly looking God’s word and ways in the face and continuing to do what you want (Judas)?

This response leads to a hard heart, and the potential of falling away.

Are you kicking and screaming against his loving hand.

This response leads to weariness, and the potential of becoming fainthearted (Peter).

Or, are you learning, growing, and embracing the Father’s loving correction by adjusting your life, attitude and behaviors so that you grow in holiness and righteousness.

This response leads to life, it leads to Christ—for in him the true wisdom, discipline, and training of God is found! So...

CONCLUSION |

1 Tim 6:12-15 “Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. I charge you in the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, to keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he will display at the proper time—he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords...”