Hebrews 12:1-2

Song of Praise

Call to Worship - Psalm 147:1

“Praise the Lord!

For it is good to sing praises to our God;

for it is pleasant,

and a song of praise is fitting.”

Song of Lament

Reading of the Law - 1 John 15:9–12

“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.”

Silent Confession

Confession of Sin - Augustine

Cleanse me from my secret faults, O Lord, and forgive those offenses to your servant which he has caused in others. I contend not in judgement with you, who are truth. I fear to deceive myself, lest my sin should make me think that I am not sinful. Therefore I contend not in judgement with you; for if you, Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall abide it? Amen.

Assurance of Pardon - Psalm 34:8

Psalm 34:8 ESV

Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!

The Lords Supper

Song of Praise

Scripture Reading

English Standard Version (Chapter 12)

12 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, 2 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.

Preaching of the Word -

Holy & Determined

When Olivia and I started our premarital counseling with my friend and mentor, Matt Massey, challenged us to create a document that would stand as the foundation for our marriage. In it we set out to define the purpose of our marriage, along with the principles that we would live by. Every year we on our anniversary we come back to it, reread the principles and discuss how we can live them out in the following year, as well as ask if anything should be added or removed. In four years, we haven’t found it necessary to add or remove anything. We actually find the original document included a fervor and zeal that it is easy to lose, and it ends up inspiring us to get moving again. And as we put that together, we also chose a marriage verse. A piece of scripture that we would strive to live by, that would define our marriage. Matt read it at our wedding, and every year on our anniversary we reread it. It is Hebrew 12:1-2.

12 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, 2 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.

First word: Therefore.

I’m sure some of you have heard the phrase “anytime you see a ‘therefore’ in scripture you must ask ‘what is it there, for?’” In this case, the “there for” is pretty epic.

Read portions of Hebrews 11, ending w/ last paragraph

AND 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, 2 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.

The author here is making a couple of massive statements here. First, he is saying that all of those people can see us! They’re all around us like clouds in the sky are, witnessing everything we are doing and cheering us on - encouraging us to carry on what they started - to be bold like they were!

Secondly, he says because they were so bold and courageous, because we can look back at their stories and be encouraged by them - lets do the same things! Lets take on enemies, lets go to new places that no one has gone before to preach the gospel, lets even SUFFER for the Gospel like they did! What did they do? They fixed their eyes on the Lord - They may not have seen Jesus face to face just yet, but they had Faith that he was coming!

English Standard Version (Chapter 11)

1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 2 For by it the people of old received their commendation. 3 By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.

But how do we do this? How do we do great things like them? I think the author very clearly lays it out right here in the verse. 3 things:

let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely,

If you were at the christmas party you heard me start to flesh out the idea of Christian communities of the future being defined by their holiness above all else. I believe that is God’s call for CTR - to be a holy christian community. So, lets pursue holiness.

Leonard Ravenhill once said, “The tragedy of today is that the church is pursuing happiness, not holiness.” “If you want to be popular, preach happiness. If you want to be unpopular, preach holiness.” “I think one of the tragedies of modern christianity is this; That we’re more afraid of holiness than we are of sinfulness. We can tolerate sin, but boy, we get our hackles up when you talk about holiness.”

Let’s lay aside every weight and sin that clings onto us. I think of this like ankle weights - we’re trying to run! But we have these big old clunky rusty ankle weights on us preventing us from moving, from doing the things God would call us to. What are your weights? What are your sins? Weights could be all sorts of things - doubts, inconsistent applications of scripture, time wasted on social media, an overly busy schedule, old friends that are pulling you away from holiness, etc, etc, etc.

And your sin - name it! What is it? What exists in your life that is taking you away from Jesus?

Right now, recently for me, my sin has looked like anger and despair.

What in your life have you said isn’t a sin, but every christian around you clearly I.D.’s it as sin - but you have decided it is fine?

Me? my language. Boy, I have a bit of a sailors vocabulary.

These things entangle us - as we pursue Jesus, attempt to chase after him, these things hold us back, trip us up, convince us to stop running or even convince us that something else is Jesus. Or something else is more worthy of being pursued than the almighty God of the universe.

How little people know who think that holiness is dull. When one meets the real thing … it is irresistible. If even 10% of the world’s population had it, would not the whole world be converted and happy before a year’s end? - CS Lewis

and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,

Once we have started the long, hard process of laying aside weights and sin, we run. Note: I said started the process, not completed it. If we all wait until we’re sinless to start serving the Lord, we won’t start serving him until we meet him (are dead). And note he said “RUN”. “WITH ENDURANCE”. “THE RACE”. Who is the last person in here who ran a race? Did you walk? Did you go really really fast right at the beginning just to get exhausted and quit? Was it competitive? In other words, did you try to win?

Now it’s easy to mess this passage up. Perhaps Olivia and I have at times. You can hyper fixate on “RUN” and just GO GO GO as hard as you can until you exhaust yourself. I’ve seen it, I’ve done it. Or, you could over emphasize the “endurance” and become spiritually lazy! I’ve seen this error sweeping through the church over the last few years, people saying nonsense like “Jesus never ran, why should I?” 2 things here: 1. Jesus was the SON OF GOD. He wanted something to happen - HE MADE IT HAPPEN. He wants to get to the other side of a sea before his boys do but they have his boat? He goes for a stroll across the water! Jesus = God, you and I are not him. 2. Paul and the author of Hebrews tell us to run over and over again! Friends, lets run - but lets do it sustainably - or with endurance. Lets pursue others for christ without neglecting our families. Lets give our lives to the church fully without exhausting ourselves to the point that we cry “church hurt” and abandon our faith.

We must hold this all in tension. Lets run! Lets be radically generous! Lets give our lives to missions! To bringing people to the saving knowledge of the Gospel! A church planter I admire has a talk called “Waste your life for the church” - do that! Pour out your life for the thing Jesus poured his life out for. But do it in a way that is sustainable. Make no mistake - we are running in a race - seek to do it well.

looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith,

Can you imagine looking at Jesus? The Bible seems to teach that Jesus wasn’t much to look at during his first time on earth, but it is clear, when he comes back he will be AMAZING. Fully glorified, blazing with glory - he will be the most beautiful thing we have ever seen. While you & I cannot quite comprehend seeing him right now, we can look at some pictures of what it might be like.

Magicians Nephew, page 62 - explain

LWW page 168 - explain

So how do we do all of this? It sounds hard, right? Pursuing holiness, running a race well, with the right speed, it is a lot! How do we do it? why do we do it? We do it by looking up to Jesus, the founder & perfecter of our faith. We fix our eyes on him, like a carrot on a string and we RUN. We throw off sin, we throw off the weights and we RUN towards him. We run into our broken families, we run into our broken world with our eyes fixed on him! Because he is worth it, because he is of ultimate worth - because nothing in this world could ever be greater or more valuable than him! We run into westwood, an area that many have run away from because it’s too hard to reach. Some of you will be called to start ministries, to start churches, to join the mission field like my friends Barret & Karlie who were going to become missionaries in South America but decided it wasn’t hard enough so now they live in Jordan - where they filmed Iranian missiles over their apartment complex a couple months ago and their end goal is to make it to Saudi Arabia. Why do they do this? Because their eyes are FIXED on Jesus.

And what makes Jesus so beautiful?

LWW pg 169 - explain.

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.

Jesus, knowing Joy was ahead of the cross, endured it, and its vicious shame. For us. So we could live with him, give him glory, and enjoy him forever and ever.

I was struck recently as I read through John by this verse:

John 19:16–17 ESV

So he delivered him over to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called The Place of a Skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha.

Usually I would never be willing to say the Bible was wrong about anything. And while it isn’t technically WRONG, I was struck by the phrase “Bearing his own cross”. Because I know he wasn’t carrying a cross meant for him, it was meant for you and for me. He endured the cross and its shame on our behalf. So if we would place our faith in him, recognize his cross as the sole source of our salvation, we will be restored into relationship with him RIGHT NOW, filled with his Spirit, and invited into the mission of restoring the world to be GOOD again.

And this verse will be the verse of Christ The Redeemer. In light of the amazing people who have come before us, “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, 2 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.”

Lets Pray

Pastoral Prayer

Response/Song

Benediction

English Standard Version (Hebrews Chapter 13)

Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, 21 equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.