“Becoming a follower of Christ is a lifelong process of growing, learning, and changing. It is also a process of surrender.” – Richard Stearns
Two Sundays ago I began preaching a series of messages from the New Testament writing of Hebrews called Keeping Faith. I gave the series the subtitle Sermons on the Sermon of Hebrews because most scholars think Hebrews was originally a sermon. Although we don’t know who the identity of the preacher that gave us this writing, the message is as relevant today as it was to the Christians in the first century.
Christianity is a life of faith, one in which we believe in and therefore follow Jesus Christ. Yet, as we all know, living life as a Christian is a journey that encounters challenges along the way. Hebrews understands, which is why the sermon is proclaiming a message of perseverance to Christians who are struggling with faith. We pick up on the challenge in Hebrews 12:1-3:
Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such hostility against himself from sinners, so that you may not grow weary or lose heart.1
In recognizing the challenge of growing “weary,”2 this text also offers us some needed encouragement as we seek to keep the faith.
The challenge, of course, is that when we encounter difficulties in life, such difficulties become wearisome. Such weariness opens space for struggles in keeping our faith, losing sight of Jesus Christ and sometimes just wanting to give up all together.
With the struggles and temptation to abandon faith, Hebrews calls our attention back to Jesus Christ.3 Hebrews draws our attention back to Jesus because Jesus is able to sympathize with us. In fact, earlier the preacher says, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin” (Heb 4:15).
Jesus knows the struggles we face because he’s faced his own struggles too, even the struggle of dying on the cross—Crucifixion. So Jesus knows. As we sometimes sing in the old hymn No Not One, “Jesus knows all about our struggles, He will guide till the day is done. There’s not a friend like the lowly Jesus—No, not one! no, not one!” Because Jesus knows, the writer of Hebrews wants us “looking to Jesus” or “fixing our eyes on Jesus” (NIV).
Christianity in America seems delusional, with people trying to run a spiritual race called Christianity while simultaneously running in a race of partisan politics.
Of course, we should keep our eyes on Jesus. However, keeping faith in Jesus seems unlikely if our focus is elsewhere and when we face struggles, it’s easy to lose focus of Jesus. So to keep our eyes focused on Jesus, the writer of Hebrews uses the imagery of running a race. The metaphor of running a race is easy to understand even if we’re not running in marathons.
Since the race we are talking about is a metaphor, running in the race involves looking ahead to the finish line.4 That is, we stay focused on the goal of crossing the finish line to be with both Jesus Christ and those who have already crossed the finish line. But as a pastor, I’m concerned. My concern is that more and more people who profess to be Christians and attend church services with some regularity are beginning to run a different race or are at least running way off course.
When the day comes that we draw our final breath, there will only be one thing that matters. So fix our eyes upon Jesus and run the race that matters!
Imagine trying to run two races at the same time. It’s impossible. Or imagine trying to run a race but veering off course. Both are possible when we lose focusing of the goal and miss the markers that would keep us on course because of a failure to pay attention that leads to a drift (Heb 2:1). Yet as a minister of the gospel, this is what is happening.
Christianity in America seems delusional, with people trying to run a spiritual race called Christianity while simultaneously running in a race of partisan politics. This dualistic thinking that each race can be run at the same time has taken some Christians off the course that ends at Mount Zion where the city of the living God is located (Heb 12:22). We know we have veered off course when we seem more interested in trying to convince others on how they should vote rather than doing something that would point to Jesus Christ. We know we have veered off course when our social-media posts seem more like we’ve become spokespeople for donkeys and elephants than the cross. And yet the irony is that some will still wonder why America is becoming more and more secularized as a post-Christian society.5
One of the challenges we face as Christians residing in the United States of America is living as followers of Jesus among a nation whose goal (telos) leads to a different finish line than Mount Zion. This isn’t a criticism of America, it’s just a recognition of reality that exists on both sides of aisle and in every ideological stream shaping American life. Allowing ourselves to get caught up in such political games, extolling one side while denigrating the all others, is to run another race than the race that is set before us as Christians. Jesus offered himself in death as the once-for-all sacrifice of atonement so that we could enter a different race, a race that we will win if we just keep running because Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, has already won the victory for us. We just have to keep running the race set before by Jesus Christ until we cross the finish line.
Let me end by saying that point has nothing to do with whether we, as Christians, should or shouldn’t vote in political elections. Likewise, I am not suggesting that having an opinion on various issues that society faces is wrong. What I am saying is that we can only run one race at a time. Thus as my father-in-law would say, when the day comes that we draw our final breath, there will only be one thing that matters. So fix our eyes upon Jesus and run the race that matters!
Unless otherwise noted, all scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition Bible, copyright © 1989, 2021 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A., and are used by permission. All rights reserved.
For the original recipients of Hebrews, the weariness is predicated on some persecution that included public abuse and even the plundering of their possessions (cf. Heb 10:32-34).
Patrick Gray and Amy Peeler, Hebrews, T&T Clark Study Guides to the New Testament (New York: T&T Clark, 2020), 12, “The author therefore seeks to explain the ways in which the new covenant—God’s distinctive way of dealing with humanity through Jesus—demands the utmost allegiance and remains perfectly consistent with the divine plan as disclosed under the original covenant.”
The good news is that we’re not alone in this race as we run towards the finish line. As Luke Timothy Johnson, Hebrews: A Commentary, The New Testament Library (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006), 315, “The runners begin far away from the city in some remote place with few observers, move through growing crowds and greater fatigue, and finally emerge in the stadium before a massed assembly of spectators who watch and applaud as the runners complete their final lap.”
To be fair, there are other factors that are at work in the emergence of a post-Christian society but to pretend as if Christians don’t have any culpability is nonsensical. For a discussion on some of the other factors at work, see Tara Isabella Burton, Strange Rites: New Religions for a Godless World (New York: Public Affairs, 2020, 53, which include 1) the absence of a wider demographic power, 2) the power of consumer capitalism, and 3) the rise of the internet.
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Author: K. Rex Butts
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