Run Your Race - part 3

 Run Your Race 3


Hebrews 12:1 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us…

While technically you could bracket race a dump truck, that wouldn’t be much fun for those of us that want to go fast… just too much weight.  And for those of us that want to go fast, we prefer a tail wind to a head wind.  These are the factors our writer has in mind as he describes weights and besetting sins.   Some things weigh us down and some things get in our way.  Let's consider  both.


The word “beset” means to “skillfully surround”.  Think guarding a basketball player or covering a wide receiver…hindering progress and aggravation to the point of defeat.  Our writer suggests that there are sins that do just that…hinder our progress, slow us down.  They can be sins of omission like failing to do things we should.  They can be sins of commission, doing things we shouldn’t.  They can be sins of habit, allowing things to have preeminence in our lives that hinder our work for our Lord. 

Weights are a category unto themselves.  These may not be sins, but are things that simply are not conducive to running our Christian race.  They steal our energy and strength…leaving us little horsepower for the race.  These things can sometimes be harder to deal with than actual sins.  Categories include emotional / mental weights such as worry, doubt, fear, or irrational thought patterns.  Or lifestyle weights such as poor sleep patterns, chaos, and disorganization.  Or countless other things that aren’t sin, but encumbrances to our moving forward and finding success in our race.  

The solution to both weights and besetting sins is in the word “lay aside”.  In the original Bible language it is one word which in our modern English would carry the idea of “casting off”, “throwing down”,  “violently ridding ourselves of”.    

So identify the things sapping your horsepower, and cast them out of your race.  You will find speed you didn’t know you had.

More to come

Race On 

Dean

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