Hebrews 12 - Running the Race

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith."

When I was in my early 30s, I ran three or four, sometimes five nights a week. I never really loved running. And I was never particularly good at it.

As a kid, those of us who were a little thicker remember having to wear "husky" clothes. Husky was not a badge of honor.

As an adult, when you enter a race, they don't call you husky anymore. They call you a Clydesdale.

Clydesdales aren't exactly known for their speed. They're more known for plodding along. And that's probably a pretty good description of me as a runner. I plodded. I wasn't fast. It wasn't pretty. But I could run.

Because I was running several nights a week, I got to where I could go out and run three miles. And then somewhere along the way, I stopped running.

But for some reason, I carried around this notion that I could still run three miles. I'd done it before. I knew how to run. I should be able to go out and run three miles. Turns out I can't run three miles.

Apparently knowing how to run and being able to run aren't exactly the same thing. When I was running regularly, I could run because I had been practicing. When I stopped practicing, eventually I lost the ability to do something I used to be able to do. And I've been thinking about that as I've been thinking about Hebrews 12.

Because by the time you get to chapter 12, the writer has covered a lot of ground in the previous chapters talking about things that can get in the way.

People drift. People get discouraged. People stop listening. People pull away from each other. People struggle to trust God.

There are all kinds of things that can make it harder to keep going.

And in Hebrews 11, and there's this whole list of people who lived by faith.

The people in that list are a mess. Because people are a mess. We're all a mess.

These aren't people who had everything figured out. They're people who kept trusting God and kept moving forward. Sometimes they got it right. Sometimes they didn't.

Then this in chapter 12:

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith."

And I guess the question I've been asking is, why does the writer of Hebrews care so much about whether these people keep going?

Why does he keep telling them not to drift? Not to give up? To hold on? To keep going? Maybe it's because this race isn't just something we're supposed to do.

It's life.

I'm not running so that God will give me life if I do a good enough job.

The running is the life I've been given in Christ.

And if that's true, then continuing to run matters.

There's a scene in Elie Wiesel's Night that I've been thinking about.

Near the end of the war, the prisoners are forced out of the camp and made to run through the snow. Wiesel is exhausted. He's starving. His foot is injured. His body is failing him.

And he has to run.

This isn't a 5K. There isn't a finish line with somebody handing him a banana and a bottle of water. He has to run because if he stops, he may die.

Running is vital to life.

And suddenly the question of what's hindering you from running becomes a very different question.

For Wiesel, one of the things hindering him was his own body. His body was exhausted. His foot was injured. He didn't need somebody to tell him that he should try harder. He was already trying to stay alive.

He had to keep moving.

Now obviously my running three miles and Elie Wiesel running for his life are not remotely the same thing.

But it has made me think differently about the image in Hebrews.

What if running isn't just something Christians are supposed to do? What if running is vital to life?

And if running is vital to life, then what's hindering me matters.

Obviously, carrying an extra 30 or 40 pounds is going to hinder me. It's probably part of what makes me a Clydesdale in the first place.

But it doesn't mean I'm not running.

I'm still running.

It's just harder.

And maybe as I run, I start figuring some of that out.

Maybe if I want to run better, there are some things I need to change. There are some things I'm carrying that I don't need to carry.

And I think the things that hinder us and the things that entangle us can be different things.

But I also wonder if sometimes the things that hinder us long enough can eventually become part of what tangles us up.

And I'm not sure I figure all of that out before I start running.

I think I figure some of it out because I'm running.

I don't get healthy enough to run.

I start running.

And as I run, I start figuring out some of the things that are making running harder. And maybe that's why the writer tells us where to look.

Not first at ourselves. Not first at everything we need to fix.

Fix your eyes on Jesus.

So I run toward him.

And as I run, he begins to show me what is hindering me and what is entangling me. The Holy Spirit opens my eyes to things I might not have seen on my own. I begin to recognize what needs to be laid down - not because I have finally figured myself out, but because I am looking at Jesus.

I fix my eyes on him and I run.

And somewhere in the running, I begin to change.

Not because I have learned to fix myself, but because Christ is being formed in me.