Preparing for the Race.
It’s a cool morning, the sun shines and people are up running the trails, sidewalks, and treadmills. They wake up early and start preparing their bodies to be what they want it to be. Today's Christian should be doing the same, running the trails of life, walk the side walk of decisions, and starting up the treadmill of God's word. But sadly we more often than not miss it. We are surrounded by so many responsibilities and people we forget who we are running for. We start a new path a new trail; we start to run the trail of acceptance from others, the sidewalks of compromise, and the treadmill of monotony. Hebrews 12:1b tells us “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.” (NKJV) [Emphasis mine]. The problem we run into is that our lives become unbalanced. Just as we would never see a runner in the Olympics run with a trench coat on, a tree piece suit, or weights around their ankles; we should not weigh ourselves down either. We need to “…lay aside every weight and the sin…” runners don’t wear the coats or weights because they know it will weigh them down. It will slow there race and hinder them from reaching their goal. Too often the believer will find themselves surrounded by many “witnesses” that they start to find ways to please the witnesses around them the people they want acceptance from. They become the weightlifter that doesn’t know how to put on his own weight as he gets ready to lift. A proper weight lifter would balance their weight on the bar. If a weight lifter wants to lift two hundred pounds they do not let someone put 150lbs on one side and 50ibs on the other. That is why the weight lifter puts on his own weight. Beware of those who would regulate your weight for you, then throw it on you. That is why the words in verse one “Let us...” are very important. Whose job is it for us to lay aside every weight and the sin? That is our job not someone else’s. Just as someone who lifts weights would have a spotter, it is the lifters job to lift the weight not the spotters. We need to have coaches in our lives, (Pastors, Mentors, Teachers, Accountability Partners), who will help train us for the race we run so we don’t get ensnared, not be our own coaches. The verse lets us know that the weights we have and the sin in our lives “easily ensnares us.” Did you catch that? It is easy to get tripped up so we must train and train hard. In verse two we find out who our head Coach is. When we struggle, stumble, can’t figure out how to do it or when we are doing good and running a head of the pack, we need to start “looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith”. Christ did all this before we even thought about it. Every team has a T.O. (for those who keep up with football) the one who thinks they know better and are so great they do not need a coach. I hope this is not you, but I hope you learn from Christ’s example. For he ran a race resisting sin staying perfect and reach his Goal to save the human race through his sacrifice, being placed at the right hand of God. When our race is done and we look up and we see our Head Coach, I pray he will say “Well done my Good and faithful servant.” But remember this can only be done by balancing our lives training hard and running the trails of life, walk the side walk of decisions, and starting up the treadmill of God's word. If you train for it shed you weight put your life in Christ and shoot for the finish line you will get to it every time.
Created over 2 years ago
