Alright, again a good morning to all of you and welcome. It is a joy again to be able to gather here this morning. And looks like every week as we come together, we see new, they’re not new people alright but just new faces joining us. This morning I think I see Wai Yuen, I see James alright with us. Welcome. Maybe next week other new faces will start to appear again. It is with that great sense of privilege I think we ought to have to be able to gather because as we are gathered, we continue to remember those who are not here with us yet. We have people like Ezra alright who’s not here with us, and Eden, Ern Huey, and Kok Leong and family, and so on. And we do pray that soon the Lord will gather all of us together in worship.

But we are also mindful of others who have yet to gather. Brethren in Hong Kong, Pastor Thomson’s church, they have not yet been able to gather back on the Lord’s Day to worship. And those in places like California, I can just imagine alright some of you might have been following Pastor MacArthur’s livestream or his video, or Pastor Alistair Begg’s livestream, and they’re all still doing that. Churches still unable to gather. And I understand that California, the governor has informed the people that that would be the case indefinitely. I mean they do not know yet when they would be able to regather. Now we want to pray for these brethren right in these different places, but we also want to give thanks to God for the privilege and the blessing He has given to us, and we do not want to take this for granted.

Now this morning as we are gathered here and as we continue to look to the Word of God, I want to turn your attention to Hebrews chapter 12 alright- Hebrews chapter 12, and I want to look at the first four verses. Hebrews 12:1-4. Alright, let me again read this text. Hebrews 12, beginning in verse 1: “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls. You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin.”. Now let us look to the Lord for help as we study His Word.

“Our Father in heaven, as we are gathered again this morning on this Lord’s Day, we want to thank You and praise You for making this possible. Lord, we do not want to take Your blessing for granted. We come together with joy and we come to draw near unto You and pray that You too would draw near to us, to minister to our souls, to lift us up. Grant us encouragement. Grant us faith in You and trust. Help us, that our faith may continue to grow. O Lord, we do want to pray for our brethren who are unable to come, both here as well as those churches in places where they are still unable to gather. And we commit them all unto Your care and pray Lord that they would one day be able to be gathered again physically as one body to worship You, to fellowship, to encourage one another.

Lord, we pray for Your mercy. Lord, help us, that indeed we may see that perhaps You are using this pandemic to sanctify us and to help us draw in trust in You and to grow closer to You, and grow to have greater appreciation for the things of God and for spiritual things. Lord, we pray that You’ll wean us from the things of this world. We pray that perhaps You are purging the church. And we pray Lord that You might purify Your church even through this time. But we do want to pray Lord that You might be merciful to us and leave this pandemic and that we might be able to go back to regular activities of the church and to continue to serve You and reach out to the people around us. So we commit all these unto Your loving hand, for we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.”

Now you might be thinking that why are we looking at Hebrews chapter 12 this morning. Aren’t we studying Hebrews chapter 11? Well, the reason why we are looking at Hebrews 12, these first four verses is because of the word ‘therefore’ right in verse 1. ‘Therefore’ means that there is this connection between this section and the previous section. ‘Therefore’ means that the writer is now saying that all those things I have been writing about in Hebrews chapter 11, it’s not just about them, it’s not just about these great saints in the Old Testament, but it’s about you. It’s about us. It’s for us. So he is making application. He comes to a conclusion, or we might say that he is now reaching his climax. He might be thinking as we were reading or studying through Hebrews 11, where was the high point, the climax? Now he says here is the climax. He comes to the kind of crescendo right and he’s saying something here.

So he says, therefore I’m making an application. I’m saying something to you. Now perhaps we begin by asking: Why did he actually you know, why did he write Hebrews 11 in the first place? Now I want to point out here that Hebrews 11 didn’t kind of suddenly you know appear, or he didn’t suddenly think of writing Hebrews chapter 11 you know to say that well Paul has written a chapter on love alright in First Corinthians 13, and so maybe I’ll write a chapter on faith. No, it is not like out of nowhere he suddenly writes a chapter on faith here. Now the reason alright, the reason that he wrote Hebrews 11 is because of the church that he was writing to, the Hebrew church. The reason why he wrote Hebrews 11 is to fire up a church that was getting cold, or old and cold. A church that was losing focus. A church that was getting complacent. A church that was starting to drift in their Christian life. 

Now if you turn with me for a while to chapter 2 of Hebrews alright- Hebrews chapter 2, and look at the first three verses and see what he was actually writing here. Hebrews chapter 2, beginning in verse 1, he says: “Therefore we must give the more earnest heed to these things or to the things we have heard, lest we drift away. So he has already indicated the condition of the people of the church that he was writing to, that they were indeed having in this danger of drifting away. Verse 2: “For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just reward”. Now if that can happen to the angels, then he says verse 3: “how shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation”. And so you see that from the start of this letter, he understands this: the condition of this church.

He says that you are drifting away in your Christian life. You are neglecting so great a salvation, the salvation that God has given to you, but you are not appreciating it. You are neglecting it. And also in chapter 3 verses 12 and 13, he writes: “Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God”. That was a danger that they were in, “an evil heart and they were departing from the living God”. Verse 13: “But exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through deceitfulness of sin.”. So there is this hardening of the heart of these people because of sin. Doesn’t this sound familiar? Now so often we do see this in churches, and maybe in ourselves, that there is this constant danger of growing cold, of our heart being hardened by the love of this world, and the love of sin, and love of pleasure.

Or in chapter 5, Hebrews chapter 5. Now you see he comes back to this again and again because he knows that this is the condition of the church. Chapter 5, beginning in verse 11: “of whom we have much to say”. Now we have a lot more to say, he says, about Jesus Christ “and hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing.”. Now you see the picture here that he is painting about this church? Drifting away, hardening of heart. And here he says you are dull of hearing. When I’m trying to tell you but you’re not listening! Verse 12: “For though by this time you ought to be teachers”.

In other words, these were not a group of young believers. These were a group of people who have been believers for some time. They ought to have grown in their Christian life. They ought to be teachers of the Word. But no they cannot. Why? Because you still “need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food.”. And so, it’s still a baby church. It is an old church, but it is a baby church. They cannot take solid food. They are dull of hearing. They are hardened in their heart. They have been drifting away. Now you see, that is the backdrop. That is the church that this writer was writing to. And so that’s why I say that Hebrews 11 is not out of the blue. It’s not something that he writes about this subject, but he writes to this church to motivate them by pointing them to examples in the Bible.

They are saying that look at heroes of faith. Look at these people and how they lived their Christian life. Learn from them. And that is what Hebrews 11 is about. He said think about these people. They didn’t have it easy. Think about Noah. For hundred and twenty years he had to persevere against the hostility around him and a climate of unbelief. Now he’s living a very secular world, as I said today, that people in neglect God, they do not believe in the Word of God. They taunt you when you try to live out your Christian life. That was Noah, but he perseveres and he continued on, press on building the ark. Abraham, he waited long. Or Joseph, as we study his life and what he went through- abandoned by his brothers, cast into prison. And Moses, that he chose to suffer affliction with these Hebrew slaves.

Now think about these people alright in chapter 11 verse 36. He reminds them: “Still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, of chains and imprisonment. Verse 37: “They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented”. These were our forebears! These were the kind of people who lived their Christian life. What are we by comparison? Now you see that is the reason why he was writing Hebrews 11. He’s reminding them that we are perhaps losing it. We have, we’re not living right, that is what he’s saying. We can’t compare with these great saints, these great men and women of God. Now it is an amazing thing that we often have to look back alright to the past for examples. Look far into our past and look at Abraham, and Moses, and David. 

And today, every time we speak, we want to think of an example of someone who’s really lived out his Christian life. Who are we thinking about? That we think of names like William Carey, and we think of names like Adoniram Judson, or Martin Luther, and John Calvin. Where are the John Calvin’s? Where are the John Wesley’s? Where are the Martin Luther’s today? Why is it that we often have to look back past far into history for examples of faith? Now, this is what the writer is saying that we need an Abraham today. We need a Moses today, the modern-day Moses. We need people who are prepared to give up their best for God, not in the past but today. Not just today, where we look for somewhere, someone in America or in England, or somewhere else. But we need someone in Malaysia, someone in the Klang Valley, someone in GRC that we can look to, and here is a man or a woman of faith standing beside me.

That is the reason for Hebrews chapter 11. It’s not just about them. Where do we find this here in our midst? You see they all,  these people, they all could say at the end of their life, they all could say at the end of their life with the Apostle Paul this verse as we read them in 2 Timothy 4:7-8: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Finally, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give to me on that Day, and not to me only but also to all who loved His appearing.”. Now all this, every one of this, they lived their life of faith and they all could say this verse: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race.”

And so in Hebrews chapter 12 right, back to Hebrews chapter 12- in Hebrews chapter 12, like I say that the writer is now making an application. He’s applying to his hearers as we study Hebrews 11, we cannot stop alright at verse 40 and chapter 11. We have to go on to chapter 12. They belong together alright- they belong together. The chapter division is artificial right, they belong together as one unit. Therefore. Therefore what? Listen. “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run”. Now that is our title this morning for this sermon: “Let Us Run”. Now I believe that this is what the writer here is trying to say in this passage here, in these four verses here. Let us run is the imperative that is also the controlling idea of this passage. And this is the controlling idea of this passage or the main point you might say. 

The main point is that let us run. These saints, these men and women of God, they have run, they have finished the race. They have fought the good fight. They say, now let us do the same. Let us do the same. Let us run. The life of a believer is a race alright- the life of a believer is a race. It’s not a sprint, but it is a marathon race. It is a long-distance race. That is what the Christian life is about. That is what a life of faith is about. This is so important for us to clarify this, to help people understand what the Christian life is really about. The study of Hebrews 11 and here Hebrews 12, it is to do that. It is to tell people who want to become Christians, you tell them what it means to be a Christian. Those who want to come and follow Jesus Christ to tell them not what people have heard you know from the internet or elsewhere those superficial ideas, those false ideas about what it means to be a Christian, about what it means to follow Jesus Christ.

But here is a passage kind of clarifies. It is a race, a marathon race. And I would like to now use three words right to help us understand how to run this race successfully. I think that is what the writer is wanting to say right that it is a race, we must run well alright. In fact, we find that in Paul’s letter a lot. He’s talking about a race in First Corinthians 9. He talks about, you know he uses this athletic running picture a lot. He’s talking about this finishing the course. And so three words to help us understand how to run this race successfully, and the three words are: listen, lay aside, and look. Let us begin.

Listen. The first thing the writer tells us is that if we are to run this race successfully, we must listen. We must listen to the great cloud of witnesses. So this is how he begins: “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses”. Of course, this cloud of witnesses is a reference to the people he has just mentioned in chapter 11 alright, this great cloud of witnesses. But by calling this cloud of witnesses, now witnesses here simply means testimonies. In other words, he says let us now remember that these testimonies of these people. A great cloud of them, and there’s so many of them. Testimony means they are testifying. They are saying something to us.

That is what he means. These people are saying something to us in the sense of Hebrews 11:4, where we read here: “By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, through which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts; and though he being dead still speaks.”. Now here Abel is a testimony. He is a witness. He is saying something, and I believe that the writer is not just thinking about Abel still speaking, but it just says Abel still speaking, and so are the rest of them in the Old Testament. So it was, is this Noah speaking, and Abraham speaking, and David speaking, and Moses speaking, they’re all testifying to some truth. They’re all saying something about the Christian life and how we ought to live by faith. 

They are testifying, that’s why they’re called witnesses. We are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, these heroes of faith. Listen to them. Pay attention to them. Do you know Abel? I mean he is speaking and you do not know what he’s saying to you? What is Abel saying? He’s saying what? He’s saying that there is a right way to approach God. Cain tried to approach God in his own way, according to his own terms. But Abel is saying no, there is only one way of approach that is pleasing to God. What is Noah saying to us? What is Abraham saying to us? Now, this is what the writer is saying: let us listen to them, let us study them, let us read about them. They are saying things to us.

Now for them, those were the witnesses. What about for us? Well for us, it includes them. We’re like this church where their people here, we too are required if we were to grow in our faith. If we were to walk well, it serves us well to learn from these people. Is it not? Because they are now here, they’re here, put here as examples. What is the use of having examples when we do not follow the examples? And so for us too, these are the cloud of witnesses that we are to listen to because they are speaking to us. They are teaching us things.

But we also have New Testament saints. We can write perhaps another chapter and say alright these are the saints and we’ll think about the other people in the New Testament. Can you think of some New Testament heroes of faith? I can think of some. I can think of Peter right and see what he is saying to us in Matthew 19:27. Matthew 19:27- “And Peter answered and said to Jesus, “See, we have left all and followed You. Therefore what shall we have?””. Peter is saying to us that we should leave behind everything to follow Jesus. In fact the other disciples too, they are saying the same to us. They have left their fishing net and their fishing boat. They have left their lucrative business and they have come to follow Jesus. And that is what he’s saying that we have left all to follow You. These are the heroes of faith, the disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Or we could think of another hero of faith in Acts chapter 20. Acts chapter 20, and here we read of the great man called Paul. Shouldn’t we listen to him? He is the one who said, I’ve read just now, who said to Timothy: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race”. Here is a man that has finished the race. Here is a man who has fought the good fight. Shouldn’t we pay some attention to this man and learn from him? Listen to what he said in Acts 20:24- “But none of these things move me; nor do I count myself my life dear to myself, so that I may finish my race with joy, and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to you the great gospel of the grace of God.”. Listen to this verse. I do not count my life dear to myself, but we are all counting our lives so dear to ourselves. We cling unto our lives.

Paul says no. You want to run the race well, don’t count your life dear to yourself. Focus in the ministry, focus on the gospel of the grace of God. Now you see, these are the people who are saying things to us. What about John in First John chapter 2? First John chapter 2, and listen to verse 15. This is a familiar verse but let me read it again. It’s worth reading this verse again and it’s worth memorizing this verse alright: “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world.”. Verse 17, he is saying to us: “the world is passing away”. Now we ought to be listening to these witnesses, to these people and see what they are saying to us. “The world is passing away”, he says, “and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever.”.

See, a problem with many of us in our Christian life is that we are not listening. We are not paying attention to all that the Bible is saying through these men and women of God in the past. They have fought the good fight, they have finished the race, and they have something to teach us. Let us listen and learn from them. That is what the writer to the Hebrews is saying to us, saying to the church in Hebrews then and to us now. And not just the Old Testament saints and not just the New Testament saints, thank God we have many, many others through the history of the church. We are studying the history of the church alright, I’m sure along the way we’ll learn of some of these great men. We already heard some of them already. Remember another study we heard of this man called Polycarp and let me quote him. Let’s listen to this man.

He says: “Eighty-six years have I have served Christ, nor has He done me any wrong. How then could I blaspheme my King who saved me?” That was his words before he died when he was burned at the stake. He said come what may, do what you want. I will never deny my God. Listen to this great saint called Jim Elliot: “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”. And yet we are doing the opposite. We are trying to gather and keep things that we will lose one day and not trying to gather those things that we will never lose. He listened to his Lord who said lay up treasures in heaven, not treasures on the earth. But how many of us are really listening? How many of us are really paying attention to what Jesus said?

Or what this man said, or C.T. Studd: “Some want to live within the sound of church or chapel bell; I want to run a rescue shop, within a yard of hell.” You see these men in the past. Now I have a book that journals of Samuel Wilberforce now given to me by someone. These are the books, journals of some of these great men and see what they write there. It inspires you. And often you might be moved to tears for simple facts that these men and some women of God, they lived such a life. We shed tears because you’re put the shame. What kind of life am I living compared with these people? Compared with these people, what kind of life am I living? What kind of Christian am I?

Now you see that is what Hebrews 11 is about. That is what the writer is now coming to you know here in chapter 12, he says, therefore. Therefore, listen to this great cloud of witnesses. You are being surrounded by them. It’s not that you know there is no one to look to. There is no lack of models, no lack of examples. Many of them he said, look to them. Listen to them. So that is the first thing if we were to live our Christian life well right, we want to run the race successfully, we must learn to pause and listen to these people, both in the Scriptures as well as in history.

Second, lay. Lay aside. The second thing we must do is that we must lay aside. Back to Hebrews 12, and he says here again in verse 1: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of” testimonies, or “witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and sin”. Now if you were to live your Christian life well, you must give up things. You must lay aside. Lay aside here is a picture of stripping. Stripping. Take out. Take out, okay the idea of taking out your clothing. I think the picture here is that of again a race right, that is what the writer is having in mind. He’s talking about a race. Let us run and let us run successfully.

And maybe the idea of running in the Olympic. And we know that in ancient Olympic alright, the people run. And if they were to win the race, they make sure that there is no hindrance. And they actually stripped themselves. They run naked because they don’t want to have all the clothing up and then the hindrance in their race, in running the race. That is a picture. You want to win, you want to get the medal, make sure that there’s nothing that hinders you from winning. Strip everything that is an obstacle to you. So that is the picture here. And the question is: What are we to strip ourselves off? So what are we to strip ourselves in our Christian life? Our clothing, literally? Maybe for some alright, you have some of the clothing really an obstacle in your Christian life.

But no. We see what the writer has in mind are two things, are two things. Number one, he says let us lay aside or strip ourselves out of every weight. And the second one is the sin that so easily entangles or besets us. Two things. First, the weight. Now, these are not the same. Weight here does not refer to things that are sinful, otherwise, he will mention the second thing about sinful things alright. So the first one is non-sinful things by themselves, not inherently sinful things. Now get that into our mind. Some of the things that are hindering our Christian life are not sinful things. These are good things. These are legitimate things, but yet or still they can be things that are hindering our Christian life. Now you see, a lot of times we think that so long that these are legitimate activities or legitimate things, they are okay alright, they are okay. But the writer is saying that no! They are not necessarily okay.

So the first thing we have to pay attention to are the legitimate things in our lives. What are these legitimate things in our lives? Well even if you look at the earlier chapter, in chapter 11, we can think of some of them alright. I can think for example alright in verse 9, he says: “By faith Abraham dwelt in the land of promise as in a foreign land, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise”. Now, what is their focus? What is the thing that you should pay attention to in verse 9? Tents. And that’s what the writer is saying that these people didn’t live in houses. They lived in tents. Why? Because it was a deliberate thing. It was a deliberate thing because what? He says, they lived in this place as in a foreign land alright- they live in the land of promise as in foreign land because they do not want, because they know that they don’t ultimately finally belong there.

In other words, we ought to live in this world as foreigners because our citizenship is in heaven, not the earth. And so we do not grow roots in this world, we are only a passing through. So the idea of tents means they are temporary. They lived life knowing full well consciously that they are only here for a while. And so they don’t live like they’re going to be here forever alright. And so many of us, I’m not talking about people outside the church, the Christians, living a life as if we are going to be here forever. We invest things as if we are here forever. But no, he says. So it’s a deliberate thing that they give up. There’s nothing wrong with houses, nothing wrong. But if it becomes a hindrance, if your car becomes a hindrance, if your education becomes a hindrance. It’s not sinful to go for education, it’s not sinful to buy a car, but if they become a hindrance.

That’s what the author is saying: lay them aside. Strip yourself of these things. What else? Chapter 11 and verse 17. Verse 17: “By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac”. Nothing wrong with Isaac. Nothing wrong with the gift of a son. Nothing wrong with a gift of a wife or a husband. Nothing wrong with this, but they should not be a hindrance in your Christian life. Your children cannot be a hindrance in your Christian life. That is what weight means. They are weighing you down. They’re slowing you in your race, in your Christian life. Let us run, and let us run successfully, and let us run to the finishing line. And let us lay aside every weight, whether it is a relationship, whether it is a possession, whatever it might be, but if it is a hindrance I will lay it down. That’s why Paul said all things are lawful but not all things are helpful. They may be lawful things, but they are not helpful things.

I’ll put them aside. I’ll throw them away. I’ll cast them away. That is what this writer is saying here. So we have to ask ourselves. Maybe for some of us, it is education. For others, it is sports. For others, it is some kind of entertainment or music. Nothing wrong with these things, but they can weigh us down. They can weigh us down in our Christian life. So that’s the first thing, every weight. Second, and the sin alright- and the sin. So in other words, apart from those legitimate things that might weigh us down, there are also sinful things, sinful things that can also weigh us down in our race.

Now he says that the sin, he seems to not just talk about sin generally, all sins that are weighing down. In a sense, all sins weigh us down, but he has some particular kind of sin in mind because he says and the sin which so easily ensnares. The word ‘ensnares’ simply means it attaches us or it clings. I think the other word is it ‘clings’ onto us. A sin that we find it very hard to get rid of, it’s stuck to us like a leech alright this sin. Sometimes we call, I think in the old King James it’s that a besetting sin. A sin that is stuck to us, that refuses to. Is there a sin that is clinging on to you, that you find it so difficult to remove from your life? Now then he says that that is going to cause you to fail right in your race, that you will not be able to run successfully.

We can think of many such sins in the life of people in the Bible. We think of Bathsheba in the life of David. We can think of Delilah in the life of Samson, cling onto them right and becomes you know the trap that they walk into and they get stuck there and it cost them to fall alright in their walk of faith. And here is the warning here. And so Paul when he writes to Timothy alright- when he writes to Timothy, he has these words to say to him, and same words saying to us in 2 Timothy 2:3-4, saying perhaps a similar thing here. And this is what he says: “You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier.”. So there’s another picture, but again is an idea, don’t allow anything alright to entangle us so that we cannot function properly. 

And so that is the second thing the writer here is saying about running a successful race. Let us run. Let us finish the race. And in order to do so, listen to the cloud of witnesses. Number two lay aside every weight and the sin that so easily beset us. Thirdly, look. Look. So back to Hebrews chapter 12. Hebrews 12:2- “looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.”. The third thing is we must look, not to this side, not to that side, not to things. We must look to Jesus. In other, this in the sense the ultimate, he said look to Jesus. Look to Jesus.

I like the NASB’s rendering of this. I think in the NASB it says, “fixing our eyes on Jesus”. Now look seems like a temporary thing, just look and then you look away. No, the idea of this look is not just look and then look away, but idea is fixing. Fixing our eyes on Jesus. Look intently on the Lord Jesus Christ. Look to Him. Look to Him. Fix your eyes on Jesus. Never take your eyes off. It’s almost like it is saying you know here is that we ought to look away from the things of this world, those things that weigh us down, the sin that so easily beset us. Look away from these things and look to Jesus.

Now that is in a sense ultimate. Sometimes we might ask: Why is it that so often we are sinking in our Christian life? Why is it that we are sinking in our Christian life? Perhaps for the same reason as we find in Matthew chapter 14. In Matthew chapter 14 here in verse 29- in verse 29, we read about Jesus saying to the Apostle Peter: “He said, “Come.” And when Peter had come down out of the boat, he walked on the water to go to Jesus.”. Verse 30: “And when he saw that the wind was boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink he cried out, saying, “Lord, save me!” And immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and caught him, and said to him, “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?””.

Maybe the reason why we sink is the same reason why Peter sank when he took his eyes off Jesus and see the boisterous wave all around him, and he feared and sank. How often do we fix our eyes on Jesus? Fix our eyes on Jesus. The question is: Why look to Jesus? Why fix our eyes on Jesus? Reason? Because again back to Hebrews 12:2, now here’s the reason he tells us. He says: “looking unto Jesus”, or fixing our eyes on Jesus. The reason is because he is “the author and finisher of our faith”. He is the author and finisher of our faith. Now let us try to understand these two words here, then you’ll understand what he is saying and why he is asking us to fix our eyes on Jesus. 

The word author means the founder. I think in other translation is translated as the ‘founder’. Founder in what sense? I think a word that helps us understand is the word ‘pioneer’. He’s the pioneer. We say the founder of that movement alright, or the founder of the country, or the founder of that party, means what? He’s the originator. He’s the pioneer of that movement. That is the idea here. And finishing or finisher of our faith., the others translation is the word ‘perfecter’ alright- the perfecter of our faith. Now, this is the meaning. Now the writer to the Hebrews is now saying let us fix our eyes on Jesus. Why? Because he is the pioneer and the perfecter. Pioneer in the sense of Abraham being called the father of faith. Something we look to faith, he’s like he’s the pioneer of faith, but Abraham is the pioneer of faith only in the secondary sense. But Jesus is the pioneer of faith right in the ultimate sense. 

If you looked at Abraham as the great example right, the great model of faith, then we look to Jesus as the ultimate model of faith. Now that is what the author is saying. In other words, as he brings up example after example in Hebrews chapter 11, he said look at Abel, and look at Enoch, and look at Noah, and look at Abraham, and look at Joseph, and so-and-so forth, and say there is so many others I have no time to write them all. But I want to tell you one more, the greatest example of all is Jesus Christ. That is what he’s saying here in Hebrews 12, he said I’ll look to the ultimate- Jesus, the author, and the perfecter. Perfecter means that He is the one who lived it out in the most perfect way. The others live well, but not perfect. Not perfect. 

Here is in other words, the perfect. The others are imperfect examples, but this is the perfect, the supreme example of what it means to live by faith, what it means to run the race. Let us run. Let us run like Abraham, like Moses. But above all, most of all, let us run like Jesus Christ. That is what he is saying here. Look to Jesus Christ. He is our greatest, perfect, supreme example of what it means to run the race, to finish right, to fight the good fight and finish the race. And so look to Jesus. Look to Jesus. You want a model right, a perfect model. Here is one. 

Then he says alright in verse 3: “and consider Him”. Now looking to Jesus or fixing your eyes on Jesus as the perfect, supreme example. And then think, that is the meaning of ‘consider’ alright, “And to consider Him who endured such hostility”. In other words, now the writer is saying let me now give you just as in all the other examples I have given. We think of Enoch, we think of Abel, we think of Abraham, he was thinking of a particular action of theirs that kind of makes them shine so clearly what it means to live by faith. We think of Abraham, we think of him sacrificing Isaac. That’s why he mentioned that. When we think of Moses, we think of him that point when he says that he refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. We think of him the point where he chose to suffer affliction with the people of God. We think of the time when he gave up all the treasures of Egypt. 

You see, at every one of these people, the writer thinks of a particular incident, a particular point in their life where their faith shines. And then when he thinks of Jesus Christ, almost everything in His life shines. But there is one high point, one thing that shines so brightly. What is that? The cross. The cross. And that’s why he mentioned now let’s think of Jesus Christ. Verse 3: “For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself”. We have said that before alright in verse 2 that here is an example “who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of God.”.

So he says, think of this supreme, perfect example. And then he said: think of that moment in His life when this shines so brightly. Remember that time when He ought to go to the cross. The garden of Gethsemane. We see that. We see Jesus shining brightly as an example of what it means to finish the race at the garden. He could have failed, you might say. He has to make up His mind, just like Moses when he was grown, whether he would still want to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. He has to make up his mind. He has to consider if I say no, I’ll kill the Egyptian and side with the Hebrews, what is the implication of that? What is the implication of that move? The same thing with Jesus.

Now it’s a moment of you know decision for Him. This momentous moment in the garden of Gethsemane. Will I take it up, or will I not? What does it mean to take and drink the cup? What does it mean to go straight to the cross? He has to, you know, He was praying until He sweated blood. But He is our supreme example because He says, no. It’s not about Me. Not My will be done, but Your will be done. I will go, I will go to the cross. And so the Hebrew says, look at this man. Look at our Lord Jesus Christ who “endured the cross, despising the shame”. Consider Him, “consider Him who suffered such hostility”, Jesus. What get Him going? We might ask, what made these people behave like that? What made these people you know make such kind of decision? The writer tells us, he says in verse 2: “who for the joy that was set before Him”.

He saw something beyond. Same thing, you see. Same thing with the patriarch in the past. Verse 13 of Hebrew 11, he said: “These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off were assured of them, and embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.”. They saw something beyond. They saw something far away that people without faith cannot see. What did Moses see that he was prepared to cast aside all these, all these things? Verse 26: esteeming, “esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt; for he looked to the reward.”. Verse 27: “By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king; for he endured as seeing Him who is invisible.”. You see these people, they can see something that others cannot see. That is the reason why they make the kind of decision they make in life. 

Maybe we cannot see or you cannot see. What did Jesus see? “The joy that was set before Him”. The joy that was set before Him. As I read earlier on about Paul at the end of his life when he wrote to Timothy, he said exactly the same thing: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.”. Finally, that is what he saw. He says: “there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness”. 

What are we living for? We’re living for small little things on earth, that is here a while and gone tomorrow. They may look great in the eyes of the people of this world, gold and treasures in Egypt. Moses sees beyond. He sees the far greater treasure, far greater treasure, that is joy before us. That is crown of righteousness. And Paul says, I’m waiting for that, that is “laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me on that Day”. And then he said and not to me only. “And not to me only but also to all who loved His appearing.”, but also to every one of us who believed. Let us pray.

“Our Father in heaven, we want to thank You again for this time that we have together. We thank You for salvation through Your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And we want to thank You also for instruction of how to live out this life of faith as Your people. We pray that the lesson that we learned throughout this series may be embedded in our hearts. And help us to be like these men and women who demonstrate great trust in You, moment when they had to make important and critical decisions, they made it by faith. Help us to do the same, for we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.”

This transcript has been lightly edited for readability.