Finish the Race

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Want to invite you now to take out your Bible Open them with me to the book of Hebrews want to Ask your pardon on the Mistake in the the bulletin that was my mistake I put Hebrews chapter 11 and it actually says it on my notes, but I promise we are not starting Hebrews 11 over Took about a year and a half to get through it I think we I said I don't think we want to start over so right now.
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I would like for us to Go to Hebrews chapter 12 Hebrews chapter 12, and we're going to look at the first three verses We'll read those in just a moment to that Portion I encourage anytime you study an entire book of the Bible You begin to pick up on the major themes that are contained within that particular writing Such as when you read Romans Which has the theme of God's being just and making unrighteous sinners holy When you go to James and you notice that he focuses on the theme of ensuring that our faith is accompanied by works of righteousness Likewise the Gospels all have themes Each one focuses on a different aspect of Christ's life Matthew shows that Jesus was the king of the Jews mark that he was a suffering servant Luke that he was Truly human and John that he was truly divine And these are the great overarching themes which are found within each one of the books Then when you begin to read through the books you see that not only does the book have an overarching theme But they also have major thrusts within the book for instance often the writers of the New Testament begin with a very Theological and doctrinal thrust and then at some point in the book After they have expressed this Tremendous doctrinal truth that will begin to change that for us and switch it over to focus on practicality and application This is where we are in our study of Hebrews so far in the text of Hebrews We have been focused on some of the most weighty aspects of Christian doctrine the writer of Hebrew Hebrews has eloquently Displayed Jesus Christ as the spotless Lamb of God who came to take away the sins of his people He has demonstrated how the Old Testament prophecies and in particularly in particular the sacrifices pointed to Jesus Christ and his work on the cross Along the way he has stopped to address practical issues But this has not been his major thrust his major thrust so far has been to focus on doctrine and focus on How the Old Testament sacrifices folk point towards the sacrifice of Christ however now? Beginning in chapter 12 he begins to focus his sights on the issue of Christian living He begins to focus on what we might call our Christian walk It's as if he's saying now that I've told you this Here is how you are to live in light of what I said Now that I've explained the theology here is how you are supposed to live it out And what's interesting is that mirrors the writing of the Apostle Paul most closely as an almost exact Parallel can be found in the book of Romans the book of Romans the first eleven chapters is almost all Doctrine and then when you come to chapter 12 it shifts to a focus on application It's interesting that since the same thing is here in the book of Hebrews chapter 12 we find ourselves dealing with application in fact Even the first metaphor which is used here in fact as well the metaphor of running a race is one that we're very familiar with Because of the writing of Paul Paul is the one who often uses sports as a metaphor He talks about boxing his body talks about all these different things Sports metaphors are very big in the writing of Paul and Paul is one who used the metaphor of a race and in the book of Second Timothy So we understand that Why people would assume that Paul is the writer of Hebrews because there is so much that is a cut akin to what we already know That Paul wrote Yet at the same time I do want to tell you I don't think Paul wrote Hebrews I can't tell you for certain because the Bible doesn't tell us for certain anything the Bible doesn't say for certain We can't stand up and dogmatically declare But yet at the same time I think that we have ample evidence to believe that Paul did not write Hebrews in the book of Hebrews Chapter 2 and verse 3 all says it was declared as first talking about the gospel.
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He says it was declared at first By the Lord and it was attested to us by those who heard Well Paul is saying there There are the writer of Hebrews is saying there that that the gospel was attested first by by the Lord and then by those who heard to us Including the writers including himself with one who but yet the Apostle Paul in Galatians chapter 1 verses 11 12 Makes it very clear.
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He didn't hear the gospel from other people.
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He heard it directly from Jesus Christ So I think it's at least apparent to me that when we look at the Hebrews Hebrews is written by someone that wasn't the Apostle Paul But that was likely closely Associated with him someone that would have understood his ministry would have understood his way of writing and would have used similar Metaphors and later in the book even talks about Timothy someone who we know the Apostle Paul was close with So like in Romans and in other books of the New Testament We here in the book of Hebrews have come to the point where the writer whoever it is is going to take us down the road of application And the question is this how do we apply the first 11 chapters of Jim walk? And that's the thrust that begins here in the beginning of chapter 12 with that let's stand and read the first three verses a pulpit translation actually makes a Paragraph distinction between the second and third verse, but I think they go together.
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So this was as a whole starting in verse 1 Therefore since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses Let us also lay aside every weight and sin Which click 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 Deceited at the right hand of the throne of God consider him Who endured from sinners such hostility against himself? So that you may not grow weary Father as we seek today to examine this text and to understand it and to apply it that it might apply to our walk and Encourage us the way we live for you we pray First for guidance from your Holy Spirit and Lord God, I do pray that you would keep me from error reach your word Under the power of the Spirit you would help me to stay focused on it and I pray Lord that you would open the hearts of the congregation to hear it and Change hearts Lord as they and Lord we do pray that you would just move move among us and use the preaching of your word To encourage us Towards righteousness when I looked at the passage and I noticed that the right was using a a running metaphor I Realized immediately that I was going to not I wasn't going to be able to associate myself with such a metaphor Because I I do not like to run I Do not like to run at all however, I do have a similar Situation from my own life that I can sort of account for what he's trying to say I never was much of an athlete, but as most of you know from a very young age I did karate and I still today we have our outreach program here at the church where we teach And when I was a young man, I used to compete in these competitions I would go all over the city and I would go to various gymnasiums various schools And it was pretty pretty regular thing for a couple years of my life there and because of my dad's work schedule There were times when he could be there at times when he couldn't he had a rotating schedule And sometimes he'd be off on the weekend.
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Sometimes he'd be working on the weekend so so there were times when he was there and times when he wasn't and Sometimes I wouldn't know if he was going to be there until the very moment that I stood up to compete because I would stand up And get ready to to do whatever I was doing that day whether it was forms or whether it was sparring or what have you? And I would get ready to compete and when I got ready And I would look out to the audience and I would see him and when that happened out very moment Because I'd look out I'd see it.
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I would know at least at least I had one person in the audience One person in the in the stands who would if I didn't have anyone else who was there to encourage I knew I had that one person and because I had that one person who was encouraging me in that direction I would push just a little bit harder because I knew that that person was watching Likewise there are times today when similar situations arise You know as I hope most of you know I always try to ensure that when I preach I preach a solid theological Sound message so I do that every Sunday I know ultimately that when I preach my my my audience is not necessarily you all my audience has got it preaching to the Lord I'm preaching for the Lord, and I try to do my best every week However, I would be dishonest if I were to if I were to lie and say that if R.C.
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Small was sitting right there That it might not be just a little bit more encourages.
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Here's this great witness to the gospel Here is this great person who's had all of this wonderful? Experience and preaching the gospel it might give me just a little bit more encouragement that morning to to make sure my my eyes are Dotted and my teeth are crossed.
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I mean just being honest if I can't be honest with you Who are sitting right here it might it might it might just a little bit It would only be natural for such a drive to well up inside You all have your own things in your life that if you were sitting there Maybe you're a card, maybe you fancy yourself to be a race And and who's your favorite whoever you're out of us, but let us say you know when you're when you're surrounded by that type of Encouragement those who've gone before those who have mentored you those who have encouraged you those who have lifted you up And then you're there in their presence often times just having them There is a great encouragement to your spirit to want to rise to the occasion and just do that Little bit better To go a little harder.
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I Specifically those who have mentored us We tend to perform Better and beloved.
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That's the focus of Hebrews chapter 12 of verse because this is what it says Therefore and remember what the word therefore means it's a transitional word and indicates that what came before Necessarily results in what is coming after that's all it's just a transitional word.
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It's just therefore Since we are Surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses Let us lay aside every weight and sandwich claims so closely and let us run with endurance The race that is set before us Now what is it that he has just said what has come before what we said? Therefore is a transitional place.
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What is it that just came before that now is resulting in this? Or whatever what is chapter 11 chapter 11 provides us with an entire list of people who were considered to have genuine faith An entire list of people that we can look to and say here are our spiritual ancestors Spiritual mentors these are the people that came before whose lives we look at Whose lives encourage us whose lives we can say we want to emulate these are our spiritual faithful forefathers now the writer wants us to look back at them and see them as a reason to be encouraged in the future as if our life is a Demonstration of faith and all of these people are sitting in the audience of our life as the encouragement To our living a life of faith And it's interesting the way he uses the language here when he calls them the great cloud of witnesses I want to read to you from Marvin Vincent on that word witnesses.
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It's the word Marturian It's where we get the word martyr the word martyr Would later become synonymous with people dying for something because so many Christians died for their faith But that's not what the word originally meant The word Marturian just originally meant somebody who witnessed something somebody who bared witness to something or bore witness to the truth They just like I said became so synonymous with death that the word martyr would later be known the way we use it Someone who dies for something, but this is what Marvin Vincent wrote He said witnesses does not mean spectators but those who have borne witness to the truth as those enumerated in chapter 11 yet the idea of Spectators is implied and it's really the principal idea The writer's picture is that an arena is out of an arena in which the Christians whom he is addressing are contending in a race While the vast host of heroes of faith who after having borne witness to the truth have entered into their heavenly rests Watches the contest from the encircling tiers of the arena Cut encompassing and overhanging it like a cloud filled with lively interest and sympathy and Lending and that's the picture the writer of Hebrews is giving us When we stand to race the Christian race We call it the Christian walk But in this instance will call it the Christian race when we are running the marathon of the Christian life We do not run it alone But we run it having had all of these people who have gone before us this great cloud of witnesses Encouraging us to keep on Going their attitude towards us is we made it So can you? We finish the race So can you? We were able by the power of God to not give up and so The writer of Hebrews wants us to realize that the Christian life Is not a sprint which one enters and exits quickly But the Christian life is a marathon It is a life-long pursuit of godliness and Christ likeness And because of the length of the pursuit it is easily to get weighted down and for us to begin picking up things That hold us back But we have these faithful forefathers whose lives should be an encouragement to us to continue This great cloud of witnesses stands as an encouragement to us to never give up Now once you look very quickly just at this Metaphor of the race because I want to show you two other verses where this same metaphor is used in the New Testament Hold your place in Hebrews chapter 12 and turn with me back over to 1st Corinthians 9 1st Corinthians chapter 9 in verse 24 verse 24 says Do you not know? That in a race all the runners run But only one receives the prize So run that you may obtain it and he goes on to say this in verse 25 every athlete Exercises self-control in all things they do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable So I do not run aimlessly.
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I do not box is one beating the air again.
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There's that that again sports metaphor using boxing But I discipline my body.
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I keep it under control That's after preaching to others on myself should be disqualified here.
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Paul is talking about ministry not salvation That's important to remember because some people have read this and say well I can become disqualified from my salvation if I don't run the race properly.
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Well, that's not what Paul's talking about here He's talking specifically about the race of ministry but yet it can still have an application to our Christian walk because just as a minister's life is a marathon of Ministry and we have to continue continue moving forward and seeking not to be disqualified So to as Christians we are to walk through our Christian life remembering that every day.
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We're still in this marathon of faith It's not a sprint and this is why I keep saying it's not a sprint because Jesus used the same Similar metaphor when he talked about the sower Drop seeds along the path and they didn't grow up and he dropped some along the weeds and they sprouted up for a time But what happened because they didn't have a root they went away And you see that's the way the Christian life is for many people.
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They come in for a moment.
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They get excited They get baptized they take communion.
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They sing songs They hear the word preached and they do that with great intensity for about six and then it becomes extra Retiring to get up on Sunday morning and then it becomes extra difficult to want to share Christ with others and then it becomes more and more difficult as the cares and worries and trials of this world begin to grow up around them and they Realize that the Christian life is a marathon.
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It's not a sprint.
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That's what Paul is talking about here He's basically referring to ministers in 1st Corinthians chapter chapter 9 here, but turn over to 2nd Timothy 4 And in 2nd Timothy 4, yes, Timothy is a pastoral apostle.
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In 2nd Timothy 4, he's addressing here his own situation And again, listen to the metaphor.
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He says, I've fought the good fight.
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I have finished the race.
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I have kept the faith.
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Beloved, such a wonderful thing to have etched in all of our tombstones.
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I have finished the race.
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The picture of the race is one that is easily understood by us all.
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That the writer of Hebrews is giving to us here used by the Apostle Paul elsewhere.
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It's easy for us to wrap our minds around and it's one of the wonderful things about Scripture is so many times Scripture just paints such a glorious Illustrative picture that we don't even have to go out and you know on my shelf I have all these illustration books that are supposed to help ministers write sermons, give stories and things that are supposed to help to put meat on the bones is what some of them are called, meat on the bones stories.
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But the reality is, the reality is that the Scripture itself provides us with the absolute best because that's what our life is like.
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And you know what? It's not racing towards our salvation.
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It's racing towards the goal of godliness.
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Because salvation is paid for by Christ.
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Salvation is done.
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Justification has been completed.
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We cannot add to our salvation.
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We cannot add to our sanctification but by our desire for godliness.
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Salvation is the part of salvation which we are actively involved in.
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We are not actively involved in our salvation.
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That is what God does on His own by His work through Christ on the cross.
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But we are involved in our seeking after godliness.
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And the writer here says, back in Hebrews now, Hebrews chapter 12.
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He says, let us lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely.
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And what he's talking about there, he's using the marathon, he's continuing to use the marathon as an example.
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Because when a person would run a marathon, when a person would run one of these races that the writer is talking about, he would strip down, not totally bare, but he would strip down to the absolute bare essentials just to cover himself.
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He would not wear, at that time they would wear heavy robes and they would wear sandals.
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He would cut all of those things away.
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He would take all of those things away because, and again I would not know this from experience, but from what I understand a marathon is real hard.
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Again, we all can understand running so many miles, you wouldn't want to have any hindrance on you at all.
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You would want to take all of those things off and that's what the writer of Hebrews is here conveying.
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There are weights that are in this life which make walking a consistent Christian path very difficult.
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And we need to seek to identify what those weights are so that we can remove them and continue the race.
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The most powerful thing that clings to us and makes our Christian walk difficult is, as such, we should identify these sins which cling to us and seek to do away with them.
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We should identify these things which are holding us back and seek to put them behind us.
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This is why the cloud of witnesses is such an encouragement to us.
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We know that every one of the people in that list, and we went through them, we spent over a year going through that list, every one of the people in chapter 11 of Hebrews had faults, they had foibles, they had failings.
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But yet, they also had a faith which persevered.
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They finished the race.
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Even old Samson, who was listed, Samson of all people to be listed in the series of people of faith.
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Why? Because right before his last great act of victory in destroying the columns, he did what? He cried out to the Lord.
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He realized his failing.
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He realized his faults.
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And he realized what needed to be done.
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As such, we walk in our Christian life surrounded by a tradition of faith that has been passed down by generation after generation after generation of faithful believers.
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We look back at them, we see their faith, and we see their faults, and we understand here is our encouragement to continue on.
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And what's great for us is that the writer of Hebrews is talking to the first century church.
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The first century church had the Old Testament saints to look to.
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We have those too.
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But guess who else we have in our cloud of witnesses? We also have everybody in our cloud of witnesses.
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So when he says you're surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, he's talking about the list in chapter 11, but you know what, we could go back and we could add to that list.
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We could say in our cloud of witnesses, there's Augustine.
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In our cloud of witnesses, there's Luther.
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In our cloud of witnesses, there's Calvin.
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In our cloud of witnesses, there's Zwingli.
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In our cloud of witnesses, there's Edwards, there's Knox, there's Whitfield, there's Spurgeon.
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And even today, there's MacArthur, and Sproul, and White, and great men of God who continue to stand up and continue to be examples of the faith to us.
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They continue to expand the cloud of witnesses who stand behind us and say, keep going.
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Now at this point, the writer stays on the focus of our encouragement.
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He changes just slightly the focus of who is the encourager.
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Because he's talked already about the fact that we have this great cloud of witnesses there to encourage us to keep going.
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And then in verse 2, he switches to someone who's even a greater encouragement to us, and that is Jesus Christ himself.
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Look at verse 2.
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He says, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith.
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And I may end up spending some time on that phrase in the weeks to come.
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I haven't decided yet, but I want to tell you, just that phrase alone would be enough for much time spent in the Word.
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We're talking about Christ as being the one who not only established our faith, but He sustains our faith.
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All of those things we can see there.
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Author and finisher, I think that's how the King James uses it, founder and perfecter.
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But it goes on to say, 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.
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You see, Christ has already focused on the fact, or excuse me, the writer has already focused on the fact that we should run keeping in mind all the faithful ones who have gone before us.
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Now he is stressing that the most faithful one should be our greatest encouragement, because He is the very reason for our faith in the first place.
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He is the founder and perfecter of our faith.
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This means that He was the one responsible for it coming about, and for its continued sustainability.
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It is Christ who gives us something to believe in, and something to continue striving for.
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Christ gives us both salvation and the picture of sanctification.
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But how did He do this? He did it by first enduring the cross.
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As the text says, He endured the cross.
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It was at the cross where Christ became sin for us.
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He gave us His righteousness.
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He endured God's wrath, not just the wrath of men, but the wrath of God, and as such, He gave us a focal point for our faith.
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He endured the cross.
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That was the first thing.
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The second thing, He despised the shame.
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Now what does that mean, He despised the shame? It means simply that He did not consider the shame of the cross to be worthy of keeping Him from doing the work of salvation.
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The shame of the cross did not keep Him from moving forward with it.
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Because, beloved, the cross is a shameful thing.
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The cross is not a place of glory for a person who is undergoing it.
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It is a place of shame.
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They would strip the person down to nothing.
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They would nail him to a tree and put him up so that he would be put to shame before His people, and used as a way of telling other people, you don't want to be here.
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Even the Bible itself says, cursed is the one who is hanged on a tree.
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Christ underwent the curse and the shame of the cross, but He didn't consider the shame.
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This is why the Carmen Christi, Philippians chapter 2 verse 5 says, Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though He was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself.
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By taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death.
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Even death.
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Christ, who was God in heaven, came to earth as a man to go to that cross, to take that shame.
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And because of that, He is now exalted at the right hand of God.
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Which is why the Carmen Christi goes on to say, Therefore God has highly exalted Him and bestowed on Him the name that is above every name, so that in the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
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And beloved, likewise we too will share in His glory.
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We who, by faith.
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Christ is the ultimate encouragement for us to strive for godliness.
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Which is why the text goes on in verse 3 to say, Consider Him who endured from sinners such hostility against Himself, so that you may not grow weary and fainthearted.
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Again, He's still on the same thrust.
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This is why I don't like the fact that the ESV breaks up the paragraph there.
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Because I don't think the thought was over.
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I don't think the intent of the thrust was over.
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I think that verse 3 hangs onto verse 2 very tightly.
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Because verse 2 is talking about Jesus and what He did.
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He went to the cross.
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He despised the shame.
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He's seated at the right hand of the Father.
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And because of that, we need to consider His endurance and the hostility He received, so that we, when we face endurance, when we face times of struggle, when we face hostility, we will not grow fainthearted.
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This whole section is an encouragement to keep going.
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And remember who the original audience was.
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The original audience of this text is Hebrew believers who are in fear of their lives, they're in fear of persecution, and they're considering going back to Judaism.
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But the writer is saying, look at Jesus! He came down from heaven.
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He died for your soul.
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He did not consider the shame to be enough to keep Him from His sacred task.
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Neither should we shake back from our duty to strive towards godliness just because we are faced with adversity.
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And ultimately, that is the reality we all need to remember.
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When we are faced with adversity, we can look to Christians of the past to give us encouragement and strength, but the ultimate one we are to look to is Jesus.
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He is the reason for our hope.
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He is the author and sustainer of our faith.
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A few years ago, I say a few years, I'm getting older, a film came out, I believe it was in the late 70s.
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I'm sure most of you have seen it called Rocky.
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Remember that movie? With Sylvester Stallone and Burgess Meredith.
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One of the most interesting things that I find about the movie Rocky, at least I find this interesting to me, and those of you who saw it in the theater way back when, you may remember this.
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One of the most interesting things about that movie is in the first movie, I know it went on to spawn 11,000 sequels, but in the very first movie, Rocky didn't, you guys remember that? You remember how it was, he didn't win the fight.
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Because the film wasn't about winning, it was about endurance.
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It was about a regular guy who had an opportunity to go toe-to-toe with the heavyweight champion of the world, and he was able to remain standing for 15 rounds.
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No one had ever done that prior, according to the movie plot.
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And the reason why the film resonated with so many people is because it was about not giving up.
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It wasn't about winning.
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You see, that's what we need to think about this morning.
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Sometimes we, when we get thinking about our Christian life, we think about the fact, well, we've already won.
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We're in Christ.
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We've already won.
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But you know what? We have something else to consider.
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We have something else to consider, and that is how, to this day, many athletes look at that movie and they consider it to be one of the greatest sports movies of all time.
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And the soundtrack itself is synonymous with hard training, and it's all because it's all about endurance.
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And beloved, much like Rocky has inspired people towards sports, the writer of Hebrews here is trying to inspire us towards godly living.
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He's using the example of this list of people, these spiritual Rocky Balboas.
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I know that might sound funny.
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But this spiritual list of people who didn't give up.
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And he's saying, look at them and know the same God who saw them through their struggles, the same God who strengthened them and towards godliness as well.
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Fight the good fight.
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Finish the race.
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That is our admonition.
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Father God, we thank you for your word.
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Just how relevant it is to our lives.
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How easy it is, oh Lord, to give up in the faith.
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That apart from your spirit, we would not have the power to conceive.
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We would not have the strength to move forward.
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So Lord, we just pray.
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Lord, I pray for all the believers this morning.
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I pray for all of us, God, that you would encourage us in our walk to good fight.
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Lord God, use us, oh Lord, to minister the gospel.
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We thank you, we love you, we pray.
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Amen.