S30 || How to Endure a Life of Faith || Hebrews 12:1-7 || Session 30

What if the secret to finishing well isn’t trying harder but traveling lighter? We open Hebrews chapter 12 with a vivid race metaphor and get practical about how to lay down every weight and the sin that so easily clings. The “cloud of witnesses” aren’t distant spectators; they are living case studies that God keeps his promises, and their stories invite us to keep moving when life feels heavy.

We talk about the difference between overt sin and subtle weights—those time-sucking habits, crowded calendars, and misaligned priorities that quietly choke our joy and our service. Endurance grows when our eyes are fixed on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith. His path ran through the cross, but his focus was the joy set before him: redeemed people, the Father’s glory, the completion of his mission. That future focus gives us a model for pressing through our own “wall” moments with resilient hope, not hype.

We also tackle the honest reality that striving against sin is normal and ongoing. Hebrews doesn’t shame the fight; it dignifies it. Instead of pretending perfection, we cultivate habits, boundaries, and confession that keep us moving forward. And when the text turns to divine discipline, we discover it as love in action—God training, correcting, and pruning us for fruit that lasts. Discipline may feel painful in the moment, but it is proof of belonging and a path to maturity.

If you’ve felt weighed down, distracted, or discouraged, this conversation will help you name the weights, see the finish line, and run with endurance. Listen, share it with a friend who needs courage today, and if it helps you, subscribe and leave a review so others can find the show.

Chapters

• 0:00 Race Metaphor And Hebrews 12 Setup
• 1:04 Faith, Hope, Love Framework Review
• 2:19 Cloud Of Witnesses Clarified
• 4:52 Laying Aside Sin And Weights
• 8:17 Endurance And Fixing Eyes On Jesus
• 12:30 Joy Set Before Him Explained
• 16:20 Ongoing Struggle Against Sin
• 20:12 Discipline As Proof Of God’s Love
• 24:20 Training, Pruning, And Practical Hope
• 33:23 Closing And Next Episode Tease

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:20

Well, Steve, I've got an idea what we could do. Let's run a race. Only one of us gets to run with running shoes and running clothes. The other one wears big heavy boots and a big heavy backpack. Which one would you like to be?

SPEAKER_00: 0:35

Well, because I'm obviously bigger than you are, and let me have the uh running shoes and you take the boots.

SPEAKER_01: 0:42

Well, today in Hebrews, we're going to talk about running a race. We're going to talk about not weighing ourselves down when we run a race. No one that runs a race would purposely lay on big heavy things because they want to win the race. They want to run. That's where we are today. For our guest, welcome. We are reasoning through the Bible. We are reasoning through the book of Hebrews. Today we are in Hebrews chapter 12. Bit of review. Back in chapter 9, it goes into a lot of detail about how Christ is superior to the Old Testament sacrificial system. Chapter 10 explained that Christ's sacrifice was once for all sufficient for all people's sin. And chapter 11 gave us a long list of individual people from the Old Testament that had been examples of people that believed God and had acted in faith. With chapter 11, 12, and 13, the Bible teacher J. Vernon McGee organized it this way. Chapter 11 is the faith chapter, chapter 12 is the hope chapter, and chapter 13 is the love chapter, faith, hope, and love. And we're right in the middle of that trilogy here with chapter 12. And we're going to see some great things. Again, he opens up giving advice on how to live. This is the chapter on how to live with an eye towards hope, how to live with an eye towards the horizon. Steve, can you read the first three verses of Hebrews chapter 12?

SPEAKER_00: 2:19

Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy 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 has endured such hostility by sinners against himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.

SPEAKER_01: 3:00

The first verse of Hebrews 12 opens up with this statement about there being this great cloud of witnesses surrounding us. So it raises the question: who are these people? Who are these witnesses? The first people that come to mind are the ones that were just talked about, the great list of people in the previous chapter, Hebrews 11. These witnesses are people giving witness to the faithfulness of God. It's not the case that there's a group of people around us watching us. That's not the witness that it's talking about. The witness is this list of faithful people that can tell about the faithfulness of God, the people that lived their lives and gave action and shoe leather to their belief, where they actually acted upon their faith. That's the people that are witnessed, people that are giving witness to the faithfulness of God. They're not observing us. Rather, the witnesses are examples to us about how to be faithful. With that, I think it includes not only the people in chapter 11 that were this list of people from the Old Testament, but even people today as well. We are surrounded by people even today that could stand up like Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and David from the Old Testament. There are people today that could stand up and say, I believe God and I've acted upon it, and here's the benefit that it's brought to my life. Steve, wouldn't you agree that the witnesses here are people that are giving witness to the faithfulness of God?

SPEAKER_00: 4:34

Yes, I do think it goes back to chapter 11. He just went through all of these people of faith from what we would determine to be the Old Testament or the Old Covenant area. And he changes the theme a little bit as we get into chapter 12 and the latter part of verse 1 there. He talks about let us run with endurance the race set before us. I think he's pulls in the vivid picture of somebody that's in an arena running the race with these witnesses around cheering them on. But they're to be in our mind. The ones that he just got through talking about, those should be present in our mind. Their stories. They should give us inspiration. Just like somebody that's running a race, they dig within themselves the inspiration to run and do their best. They have coaches that have coached them. They have family members that are there hoping that they're going to do their best and wanting them to do their best. A little bit later in the first part of verse two, he says, fixing our eyes on Jesus. Well, what do people do whenever they're running races? They have their eyes fixed upon the finish line. I do believe, Glenn, that you're absolutely correct that the witnesses that he's talking about here in this verse one goes right in line with the listing of the faithful ones that he talked about in verse 11. Those are the ones that should be giving inspiration to these people that he is writing to the Hebrews as to this is all the great things they did. You're now running a race yourself. Look to them for inspiration as you run this race of life and set your eyes on Jesus, the something that's ahead of us.

SPEAKER_01: 6:23

He's saying in verse one that because we have this great cloud of people that are giving testimony or witnessing to the faithfulness of God. Therefore, the middle of the verse, we should lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us. The picture here is that, again, running a race, you wouldn't want to put on heavy boots and a heavy backpack and go run a race because that's going to drag you down. You should lay those things aside. The language there is talking about lightening our load and staying away from things that would drag us down and entangle us in things that doesn't have to do with running or winning the race. Sin here is described as a hindrance, a weight, it clings or entangles us. The race here is the Christian life that we go through life. Why would sin hinder us in our Christian life?

SPEAKER_00: 7:19

Because even though we have eternal life, and even though we are citizens of heaven, such the things that we talked about in our last session, we're still here on this earth. We're still have this earthly, fleshly body, and it's connected to this world, and we have the temptations of this world. Even though we're in Christ and we get all of the attributes that are talked about famously in the book of Colossians, that we've been transferred from dark to light, we've been presented as perfect or complete in front of God, all those different things, we're still living here on the earth in a fleshly body. I think that this is what it's talking about. Sin can still encumber us and entangle us in the world today. So we need to be conscious of that. We need to be aware of that, and we need to distance ourselves from that, but yet we still have the temptations to go back to it. This verse here, or part of this verse, Glenn, I think, talks about that, that we're still susceptible to the temptation of sin. And also over in 1 John 1.19, where it says, go daily and confess your sins so that they can be forgiven daily. That doesn't have anything to do with salvation, but that does have to do with staying in a right relationship with God. If we could live a sinless life, I don't think this verse and that verse in 1 John, along with others, would exist talking about how do we deal with sin that comes in our life, even though we are now saved and we have eternal life. Those are the things that come to my mind in relation to it, that we can't live a sinless life, but we do the best we can to distance ourselves from it.

SPEAKER_01: 9:14

The language that uses here is that the sin which so easily entangles us, I think that's a perfect description simply because sin does just that. It very easily clings to us, it very easily drags us down. As we're trying to get through this Christian life, the sin just sticks to us. It finds us. Sin will destroy your testimony, it will distract you from the things of God, it will put a stain on your ministry so that it is not effective. That's why we need to get rid of the sin, is because we need to be a good witness to the world. We need to be an example for other Christians, and we need to be able to have the time to do work for the Lord. Where the sin distracts us from all those things. Notice in the verse what it says, let us lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us. He's listing two things there: the sin and a second thing, which is encumbrances. Is it possible, Steve, that there are things that would drag us down in the Christian life, but they're weights? They're not really a gross sin, really. It's not a sin, so to speak, but it's something that will distract us from the Lord's work and something that will drag us down. Is there such a thing that will take us away or drag us down that will weigh us down, but it's not really a sin?

SPEAKER_00: 10:44

Well, I think there are things, if we keep in mind the theme that he's drawn here of running a race, that when you're running a race, longer distance race for sure, with other people, you want to make sure that you don't get boxed in and you can't get out. You have a clear path to where you can make that sprint towards the finish, or you can be unencumbered and not entangled with the other runners there. If I can continue with this theme that he's talking about here. I think that there are things that we do in living our life where we can come close to or next to other people who are living a sinful life that have the temptation for us to get sucked into something that they happen to be doing. I think that there are things like that just in our daily life that we just need to be aware of and not, as it says here, get entangled in it. Those are the things that I think the uh author is trying to get across to them. You're running the race. Make sure that you don't get yourself in such a situation where you can't have a clear path to continue on and finish the race in an unencumbered way, that you don't get bogged down in something as you run this race.

SPEAKER_01: 12:07

I remember the parable that Jesus told in the Gospels of the sower. The sower went out to sow, and the seed falls on different soils. One of the soils was the soil where the seed sprouted, but the weeds came up and choked it out. And Christ said that the weeds were the cares of the world. So there's times when we're doing ministry, we have the word of God implanted in us, but the cares of the world grow up and choke out the word of God. And the weeds of the world, the cares of the world will choke out our ministry as well. It'll choke out our time, it'll choke out our energy, it'll choke out our joy, it'll choke out our witness. There's things in the world that aren't really gross sin. You know, when we think of gross sin, we think of sexual sins or addictions or, you know, honesty, thievery, things like that. Those are indeed gross sins. But there's other things that are just the busyness of life and the distractions that get us away from the Lord. That I think is what he's saying here. Let us lay aside every hindrance, everything that will weigh us down and prevent us from doing the work of Christ that's present us from, prevent us from doing ministry, lay aside all those things. The Christians should have ministry as the primary focus of their lives. Not to say that we can't go out and enjoy some things. I mean, that Christian life is joyful, but we shouldn't focus strictly on our joy. The joy that we get should be in the Lord's work. That's what we should do. So, Steve, it says there in that verse to lay all those things aside so that we may run with endurance. And I think he's trying to give us encouragement. It's like a runner that's a long race and they're starting to get tired. He's giving us encouragement, saying, Don't forget, all these other people made it. You can too. Lay aside those weights and keep running, keep at it, stay at the Christian life. Do you feel in this a sense of encouragement that he's trying to get us to keep going?

SPEAKER_00: 14:21

I do feel that. And it is an endurance that you have to build up the race of life, so to speak. That here we are, we have our faith and hope in Jesus Christ, and we know that it's out there, just like he talked in previous verses, that Abraham was looking for a city and things like that, things that he did not see, but yet he knew that they were going to be there at some point in time. It's the same thing with us in that we have to endure the race. What happens when you're in a long-distance race, especially a marathon? People talk about around the 20, 22 mile mark of a 26-mile marathon of hitting what they call the wall, where it's just a place where you just feel like your body can't physically run anymore and your legs won't function. But yet, those people that have practiced for that marathon have built up an endurance and it's their mental toughness that drives them through that wall to then finish out the race. They endure through that. And part of the way is from their training, part of the way is like we talked about before, they have these witnesses and people that are encouraging them to finish the race. Again, first part of two, fix your eyes on Jesus. I think that's a picture for us. As we are enduring the struggles that might come along, we're to take them off of us, put them aside, and continue to run the race. Look to Jesus, fix our eyes on something that's ahead. Don't fix our eyes on the things that are in the past. And we can have, though, the witness of the faithful ones that he talked about in chapter 11 that they endured. I think this all goes together with what he's given a picture here for the people and the Hebrew people that he's writing to, and for us as well. We know that we can endure because others have endured it before us.

SPEAKER_01: 16:34

Others have endured it before us. That's exactly right. That's the idea. This cloud of witnesses are the people that are giving testimony of the faithfulness of the Lord. They made it, and we can too. It's supposed to be an encouragement for the Christian that might be getting a little tired of this Christian life. And he's saying, Look, all these other people are giving testimony to the faithfulness of the Lord. Lay aside the sin and all the weights and keep going. The apostle Paul told the Corinthian church to run as to win in 1 Corinthians 9 24. Well, in the Christian life, winning is just finishing the race. If we finish the race, then we win. Keep our eyes on the finish line, which is Jesus. Hebrews says to run with endurance. It means to not quit, keep our eyes focused on him. That's what the message is here. Verse 2, fixing our eyes on Jesus. We are to keep our focus on him and the joy set before him. Jesus kept his focus on the joy set before him. Therefore, we can too. Jesus had joy in knowing that his death would result in our salvation. He had joy in knowing that he would be glorified at the Father's side. And he had joy in knowing that he would fulfill his mission. Therefore, he endured all of the persecution he had received on earth and the cross. Because of these goals, he endured the cross. That's what Hebrews is saying is he did it so we can too.

SPEAKER_00: 18:08

Adding this one thing, Glenn, before we move on, is just that point where you were talking about there. This struck me, who for the joys set before him endured the cross. And you're exactly right. All the things you listed off were things that were beyond the cross. Those are the things that he looked to past the cross, past the pain, past the suffering, past what he was going to have to endure on the cross. I think that's a perfect picture for us. We're to look past what we endure in this life in general, to where we're going, our citizenship in heaven, a glorified body, eternal life. Those are the things that we should keep our focus on, knowing that we're going to have joy whenever we reach that part of our life. So therefore, we endure this life that we go through today. You know, life itself just seems to beat you down sometimes. We need to endure the life here in this world because we know the joyful things that are going to be on the other side.

SPEAKER_01: 19:12

Verse 2 here in chapter 12 says, Jesus, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Because of the joy, he kept his eyes fixed on the goal. He has now sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Now, Colossians 1 3 tells us that very often when the Bible says the word God, it's talking about the Father. Colossians 1 3 makes that very clear. Here in 12 3, it's saying that he sat down at the right hand of the Father, God the Father. Today, Jesus is sitting, and of course, sitting means he's finished the work. He's sitting. Here, in the sense that he finished the work. That's the point of the book of Hebrews. He is not sitting on the throne of David reigning as king just yet. That's not the point here in Hebrews 12, 2. He's saying he sat down because his work is finished. The throne of David is a throne over an earthly kingdom in Jerusalem. That's the throne of David. It's not a spiritual throne. If Jesus kept his eye on the future and endured the shame of the cross, can we not do the same? Can we not keep our eye on the future and keep faith through the trials and hardships of this life?

SPEAKER_00: 20:38

Yes, it's like I mentioned a while ago, life itself just seems to beat you down as you go through the different types of things that happen just as we live our life here in the world. And the word perfector that is used in the first part of verse two says that Jesus is the author and perfecter of faith. That word perfector means to complete, to bring something to completion. He has brought everything to completion. It is finished. It is done. There's nothing else that needs to be done. No more sacrifices that need to be made for the atonement of sin. He has completed all of that. All of those things go into us to give us to be able to endure this world, the things that are going on. There in the first part of verse three, that word endured is used again. It says, for consider him, talking about Jesus, who has endured such hostility by sinners. We're going to endure hostility by sinners as well. Not to the extent of what Jesus did, they're going to the cross, but there are hostile people that are out there, hostile to Jesus Himself and hostile to the Christian faith. Again, we're encouraged to endure. We have the ability to endure because we have the witnesses who did, and we have Jesus Himself who did.

SPEAKER_01: 22:09

My Christian friend, as you're going through this Christian life, are you discouraged? Are you feeling like you're being drugged down? Is the sin clinging to you? And is the discouragement nipping at your heels and catching up with you? Well, my friend, don't fix your eyes on me or anyone else around you or the pastor or the people in your church. Fix your eyes on Christ. That's what Hebrews is telling us is consider him. If we consider him, it says in verse 3, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. Such a great teaching, this is. Then starting in verse 4 says this you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin, and you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons. Quote, My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor faint when you are reproved by him. For those whom the Lord loves, he disciplines, and he scourges every son whom he receives. Now he's quoting the Old Testament there, and in verse 4, he's speaking of striving against sin. Steve, what do you get out of that passage?

SPEAKER_00: 23:22

Well, I think it says there that sin is something that we have to strive against. What is striving? Again, it is something that we deliberately take action against or try to avoid. It is something that is an ongoing basis. I think it's also something that we had to have a strategy of how we're going to deal with it as we encounter it. All of those things come to mind whenever talking about striving against sin.

SPEAKER_01: 23:55

When it speaks there of striving against sin, again, it says you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin. As I read that, he's speaking of the struggle against sin as if it's a normal part of their life. He's not shaming them. He's trying to encourage them, you're not to the point of blood yet. Keep struggling against the sin. It occurs to me that very often, at least in our day, modern ministers speak a lot about having victory over sin or walking in victory. We hear that a lot. How can we walk in victory as if it is a normal part of the Christian life to never be tempted and never sin? I don't know about you, my friend, but I've always strived or struggled against some sin. It seems like God took away some sins overnight when I became a Christian, and other ones I've had to struggle against for a long time. For much of John Wesley's life, he taught that Christians could reach the state of sinless perfection in this life. Well, he changed his mind before he died. This passage here is one of those passages that I think gives us a clue as to how to view our Christian life. Again, he's speaking to a group of Christians, the writer of Hebrews speaking to believers, and he's saying the struggle against sin is ongoing. He's saying, you haven't shed blood yet. He's not shaming them. He's encouraging them to keep struggling against the sin. It speaks of this struggle against sin as a regular occurrence in the Christian life. The writer is giving us a clue that it just might be the case that we will struggle against some sins for a very long time. And we shouldn't give up. That's the point. He said, don't give up. Don't just give in to the sin. There's been people that I've met that have totally given themselves over because they were striving against the sin and not able to get rid of it. They just gave up and fell into the sin wholeheartedly, head over heels. This is exactly the opposite of what the writer of Hebrews is saying. He's saying, keep going. You're not bleeding yet. We might be doing modern Christians a disservice when we suggest to them that victory over sin or walking in victory is the norm. And everything outside of that, that every time we struggle against temptation and sin, that is somehow outside of what is accepted in polite circles. My friend, I think we do people a disservice with that. The writer of Hebrews didn't. He was encouraging people to keep struggling against sin. Don't lose heart. When we struggle against sin, we've not yet struggled to the point of shedding blood. The writer is not saying it's easy. The writer is, again, encouraging. So that's what I think we should do. The pattern in Hebrews is to encourage people to stay faithful. Admit that in our Christian life and in our churches, admit to ourselves and to those around us that all of us struggle against sin. But we should keep our eyes on Jesus and the future rewards. Steve, if we look at verses five and six, what words does it use to describe what God does to his children?

SPEAKER_00: 27:20

He uses the word discipline here. And he also mentions there that verse six, for those whom the Lord loves, he disciplines. It makes me think of sports in my youth. And whenever coaches would come and correct you for something that you were doing wrong, whether it was baseball or football, you might be out of place or not where you were supposed to be on a certain play. And they would yell at you, they would holler at you. As you're younger, you might think that they're mad at you. But then at some point, your parents or somebody else comes to you and says, Look, maybe the coach himself and tells you, I'm not mad at you, but I'm correcting you so that you will do the right thing. If I ever stop correcting you, that means that I have given up on you as far as you being able to play this sport the way that you need to play it. And as long as the Lord disciplines us, then that means that he cares about us and he is concerned about us and wants us to have a good relationship with him. If we ever get to the point where the Lord is not disciplining us, then we need to wonder and we need to be aware that maybe something is wrong there because I'm no longer in God's discipline. I'm off doing whatever I want to. It could be the case that God has just turned us over to whatever sin that we want to. You used a good term a while ago that people have just been giving over, giving themselves over to whatever that particular sin was because they just given up. No, don't give up. Be encouraged and know that the Lord is going to discipline. And if you're getting discipline, then you have proof that He is loving you and is trying to get you back on the right path.

SPEAKER_01: 29:17

Again, verse five says, Do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord. The next verse, whom the Lord loves, he disciplines. Now we have to remember and not forget here, the word discipline may include punishment, but it's not necessarily punishment. Discipline, think of it this way: if you have a military soldier that's well trained, or an athlete that is on a team that does things very well, those are disciplined people. They do things the same way, the right way every time. That's what he means by discipline is doing things the same right way all the time. That's a good soldier or a good athlete. That's the idea, is somebody that is disciplined. It may include some training to get that discipline, and it may include some punishment along the way, but the discipline is really just doing things correctly all the time. However, that training and getting there sometimes takes some pain, I would think. Steve, is it the case that God sometimes does things with us and to us that we find painful?

SPEAKER_00: 30:30

The pain might come from distancing ourselves from something that we're doing that's not good for us. And that's what I'm thinking of in that regard. It's not something to inflict pain in order to bring about a certain behavior. It might be something where we think that it's painful because he's taking us away from something that we have gotten comfortable with. Therefore, when we're taken away from it, it might become what we perceive to be painful, but in reality, it is putting us back on the right path of a relationship with him.

SPEAKER_01: 31:11

As you said while it goes, Steve, the reason why God disciplines us is because he loves us. Think of a good loving parent, a good loving father. The reason the father disciplines his child is because he loves them. The parent that just let the child go and never taught them how to be disciplined is not a good parent. Remember, the Lord said, those that bear fruit, God will prune so that they could bear more fruit. I think that's part of the idea here is God is shaping us as a orchardist would shape a grapevine or a fruit tree. In Hebrews 12, in between verses 5 and 11, the word discipline appears eight or nine times. That's the theme, is we're in this section here on how do we live, how do we walk. We are to walk in the discipline of the Lord. We are to walk in following the commandments of the Lord. The Lord will chastise those that get out of the straight path simply because he loves us and he wants us to succeed. God's discipline is for our own good. And Steve, I think that's just a great teaching. There's too many teachings, I think, nowadays that suggest that God only does things that feel good. If you're raising a child, two, three, four, five, six-year-old, and you only do things that the child thinks feels good, then that's not gonna be a good parent.

SPEAKER_00: 32:55

There's also a teaching that God created everything and then he just walked away to leave us here by ourselves to kind of go through this life. Scripture like this tells us that no, he's interested in us and he wants to educate us and he wants us to have a good relationship with him.

SPEAKER_01: 33:11

We're gonna stop here for today because of time, but tune in next time. We're gonna continue to reason through this chapter 12 of Hebrews that talks about how to live our life and how to walk in the Christian life.

SPEAKER_00: 33:25

Thank you so much for watching and listening. May God bless you.