Today

Hebrews 12 compares the Christian life to a race. “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.”

No runner carries more than he has to. Some of what we carry is plainly sin, and some of it is simply weight: habits, worries and attachments that are not wrong in themselves but slow us down. Both have to go. I have carried some weights so long that I stopped noticing them, until I tried to run.

But the real secret of the race is not in what we drop. It is in where we look. “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith.” He started our faith, and He finished it. I love that He is called the finisher. I have started many things I did not finish. He never has. And He ran this race before us: “who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

When we get tired, the writer tells us what to do. “For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.” Think about what He endured, and you will find strength to keep going.

Are you weary this morning? Lay aside the weight, and look unto Jesus.