Let Us Run
Download MP3Before we open up God's word together, I I just want to talk a couple of minutes about something that, I think is important that I like for us to do as a church. This church, got started in many ways by something my wife and I did, 8 or 9 years ago during the Advent season. We were thinking of, intentional ways that we could try to reach out to our neighbors And so we came up with something called Advent Gatherings. We just made it up. But we sent invitations to, all the lost people we knew around in Crestwood and and invited them to our home.
Joel Brooks:We said for 3 Sundays in a row, would you come to our home? And we're gonna have a time where we'll have some wine, wassel, and hors d'oeuvres. We'll have some time of singing and I'll do a devotional. Very, you know, very forward with what we were doing. I wasn't trying to deceive them in anything.
Joel Brooks:And, and we had over 40 people come, who were unchurched. And over the next 3 weeks, just able to do a 5 or 6 minute devotional, telling them about Jesus. It was really neat. A lot of these people who are unchurched the next week they brought food because they just wanted to be a part of something like this. And as I was looking at our calendar and what's coming up with this Advent season and where we are as a church, I thought our church is ripe to do something like this.
Joel Brooks:If you would be interested in hosting an advent gathering at your house, and you wouldn't have to do it alone. What you could do is I will I will find other maybe redeemer families that could come alongside with you. But if you would like to do some kind of intentional outreach to those lost people around you in your community and you'd like to do that, this Advent season, I would love to talk to you and I will walk you through that process. I've actually created an Advent gathering guide. And so if if you're interested in that in the welcome room after the service, I would love to talk to you.
Joel Brooks:Because I think when I look at where everybody lives here, the people who are here, I think this is something our church could do really well. I think you could do really well. So I'll be there after, the service. If you'd open your Bibles to Hebrews, Hebrews 11, we are gonna part from John for just a couple of weeks. Look at Hebrews 11 And I will begin reading in verse 32.
Joel Brooks:And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Women received back their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release so that they might rise again to a better life. Others suffered mocking and flogging and even chains and imprisonment.
Joel Brooks:They were stoned. They were sawn in 2. They were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated, of whom the world was not worthy. Wandering about in deserts and mountains and in dens and caves of the earth.
Joel Brooks:And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us, they should not be made perfect. Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, Let us also lay aside every weight and sin, which clings so closely. And let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. For the joy that was set before him endured the cross, Pray with me. God, we ask that you would, through your spirit, honor the reading of your word.
Joel Brooks:And now, begin planting that word deep within us. And may we see the fruit in the days and the weeks, months, and years ahead. I pray that my words would fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore. But Lord, may your words remain and may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus.
Joel Brooks:Amen. A number of years ago, I went to visit my mom. She lives in Alpharetta, Georgia. I picked up my old basketball. I've got this old Michael Jordan black leather basketball, but actually all of the the leather's gone.
Joel Brooks:It is now just a rubber piece of twine and it somehow still holds air. And I got that and I went outside and I tried to find my old free throw line and it took a while and I found it and I began to shoot baskets. And and as I was doing that, the strangest sensation overcame me. I became overcome with emotion and I'm not an emotional guy. I'm not very emotional but it just hit me.
Joel Brooks:You would have thought I had some kind of you know hormonal imbalance or pregnant or something, you know. I literally had chills running through my body and I just sat down and I wondered what in the world is going on. And I began just thinking about this and praying about it and then it hit me That of of all the places on the earth, this one place here was the place I actually considered home. It's where I considered home more than my house, my front porch, my old room, more than any place else, my driveway, that spot in my driveway was home. Because so many events of my life took place there.
Joel Brooks:Before there ever was a driveway and I was just a small child, I remember my dad, he would he would take me out into the country, which was Alpharetta at the time and and we would go and we would climb up this big hill and he would say, this is the land. Someday we're gonna build a house here and we would stand up on top of the hill and that's right where our driveway would go. My childhood was defined by having a lots of camping trips there, in which we would we would pitch our tent right at that place. After more than 10 years of waiting, we we finally we were going to build there and my dad, he let me take a wooden stake and he let me just stake right where the driveway in the house were going to meet. I remember when the bulldozer was coming and it was making the driveway, without any fear I just ran up to the bulldozer driver, and I was like, you need to make sure this place is perfectly flat here, because it's going to be a basketball court.
Joel Brooks:Alright. And he did. He made it as flat as he could for being on top of a hill. I can remember getting up early before school, walking out into the driveway and shooting free throws before the sun even came up. I would hang a light over the basketball goal and just shoot and shoot.
Joel Brooks:I had to get at least a 100 in before every day of class. My first date with Lauren, she was a sophomore, I was a junior in high school. She came over to my house and we were gonna walk down to the lake and it was dark and so we walked down the drive and, and she had to put her arm in mine, so she wouldn't fall. It was it was smooth. And, and took her down and we got to see the lake.
Joel Brooks:I've only had 2 car wrecks in my life, and one of them was in my driveway. And I totaled my car. I can remember the joy of of seeing my brother. He was he was kind of the prodigal child, and and he had gone off to Alaska without my parents permission. He had been gone for a number of months, and I'm just out there shooting baskets.
Joel Brooks:And I see my brother in this huge beard and this this walking stick just walking up the drive. He had hitchhiked back from Alaska. Just how happy I was to see him. I can remember the incredible sorrow of my dad who had a heart attack, and he died right there on the driveway. I can remember another time, my brother, he was in Australia at this point and going through a hard time.
Joel Brooks:And he said, can I just can I just fly home and talk to you? And he flew and and I met him there at the driveway. And we just shot baskets and we talked for hours. And I remember every time when I leave home, my mom walking out and waving goodbye to me there. Thinking that this piece of land is And then I remember I stood up once again.
Joel Brooks:I got the basketball and I spun it in my hands and I was like, Lord. I spun it in my hands and I was like, Lord, I can see, I can see the ebb and flow of my life from right here. I can see all the places you have taken me from. All these major events and here I now stand. And God, as as the master of my life, the creator of my life, as the potter and me being the clay, what's next?
Joel Brooks:Where do I go from here? We're getting to the climax of this letter and God is taking him to a certain place where he is absolutely flooded with emotion, flooded with memories. And suddenly his life is becoming clear. He's looking back at the history of God's people not as some objective historian, but this is his story. What happened to them happened to him, his story.
Joel Brooks:And he sees it so clear coming up to this moment intersecting in this place. He's thinking, what's next? He looks back at Abel, who had a better sacrifice than Cain. Enoch who walked with the Lord and was not. Enoch who never died.
Joel Brooks:You have Noah who built a boat even though it had never rained. You have Abraham who who left his homeland to go to a place where he had no idea where he was going, but walking out on faith. Abraham, who was willing to sacrifice his son. You have Isaac who blessed Jacob and Esau. Jacob who blessed each of Joseph's sons.
Joel Brooks:You have Joseph who, in a prophetic word, he spoke of the Exodus when he told his people, take my bones out of the land of Egypt someday. I will not remain here forever. You have Moses who refused to be known as the son of pharaoh's daughter, but he chose rather to join in with the ill repute of God's people. You have Rahab, who welcomed the Hebrew spies. Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, all the prophets.
Joel Brooks:You have those who were delivered for their faith. Delivered from the mouths of lions, from flames, sword. You even have people raised from the dead. You have those who were persecuted or killed for their faith. Who were tortured, who were flogged and imprisoned, stoned, sawn into, wanderers of the earth.
Joel Brooks:And so the the writer of Hebrews in this moment, he is flooded with all of these memories of God's people and how they have shaped him, how they have molded him, how they have brought him to this point in his life. And now he is saying, Lord, what's next? As a part of your great people, as this being my story, and it's intersecting right here with my life, what's next? And the Lord answers, run. I want you to join the race and to run.
Joel Brooks:Considering everything that has led up to you being here, there is only one thing left and that is for you to run and run hard. The word run here is the focal point of the entire letter to Hebrews. The whole letter has been building up to chapter 12 and Run is the focus of this chapter. The author of Hebrews is saying that we need to wake up from this myth of a Christian walk, In which you know, you just kind of stroll through the Christian life without sacrifice, without any kind of struggle, without any passion. Just kind of walking through as if nothing really matters in what you do.
Joel Brooks:Nothing's at stake. God says, you're not at a walk. It's not a Christian walk. This is a Christian race. It's a run.
Joel Brooks:You're in a strenuous race and there's a definite finish line and sight. You've been given one very small vapor of a life. How are you going to use it? Just hear me. God did not breathe life into us.
Joel Brooks:He did not give us his spirit so that we could just sit. The book of Hebrews was written to a church that in many ways is where we find the American church right now. It's getting older. It's established. It's becoming complacent.
Joel Brooks:They had become comfortable and were beginning to drift a little, beginning to lose the focus. And so in Hebrews 2, the writer says pay closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. Hebrews 5, he says, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need to some for someone to teach you the basics. You have come to need milk instead of food. These were the people who had made a profession of faith many years ago, but now they had gone into cruise control and they did little else.
Joel Brooks:They are just coasting through the Christian life. It's easy and they're just coasting through it. And so now the writer, he writes these things because he wants to stir them up by way of reminder of who they are as God's people. The word race, The word race here is used in verse 1. It's the word, agona, which is where we get the word agony or agonizing.
Joel Brooks:And this is the type of race that we are called to run, an agonizing race. It's not easy. It's gonna take all of your energy, all of your effort, everything you have. Hear me, it might even take your life, but this is the race we are called to do. It's our calling.
Joel Brooks:And it's always been the calling of God's people. Hear me. Hebrews 11 is your heritage. You are part of this long line of saints. And now it is your turn.
Joel Brooks:It is my turn to run this race. So the question is how, how are we to run? One of the first things I want you to notice is the phrase set before in verse 1, when it says, let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. This might seem really obvious, but humor me. We are first of all called to be a people who are moving forward.
Joel Brooks:The race is not behind us. It's not to the side of us, but it is straight ahead. And let me tell you what I think, why I think this is so important. It's because I found that many Christians live off their past experiences. They're like uncle Rico, embellishing their past spirituality, but never being able to really move forward.
Joel Brooks:I mean, we often say, you know, the Lord is teaching me this or you know, he's teaching me that. And a problem with that can be when. When has he been teaching me these things? Was it was it this past week? Was it a month ago?
Joel Brooks:A year ago? Was it many many years ago, and you keep drawing to that story. You can't live on bread that is a month old. You need daily manna, daily bread. And let me just confess personally that this is especially hard for me as a pastor, especially as the founding pastor of this church.
Joel Brooks:Because rarely does a week ever go by when I am not asked by someone, so tell me, how did you start Redeemer? And so I go back, you know, 7 years ago. Did this. You know, my wife and I, we had to take a big step of faith and we had to do this. And so I keep telling this story and it's a joy to tell that story.
Joel Brooks:But there is a danger for me in that, to pat myself on the back and think, okay, I'm still taking steps of faith. When actually I'm just telling an old story. The question is, what is God doing now? What is he doing in this moment? Are you relying on the spirituality of your past, which has often been glamorized?
Joel Brooks:Are you pressing forward? Are you forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead? Do not think of past spiritual successes like trophies that you could bring out and you can polish and you could show off to people. Remember the time I did this? I did this.
Joel Brooks:They're they're not trophies you bring out the polish, they are stepping stones. Stepping stones of faith that are leading us to an to run even harder in the present moment. So we are to run the race that's before us. Verse 1 also says that we are to lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely to us. Now throwing aside sin is easy to understand.
Joel Brooks:We looked at that last week, what it means to repent and to stop sinning. But what about casting off these weights that are clinging to us? Believe it or not, I I go to the gym some. And when I go, I don't wear a suit. I look better in a suit than I do in gym clothes.
Joel Brooks:I do. I I look better in a suit. But I'm really restricted in in a suit. You can't work out in a suit. I don't have nearly the freedom that I need to do the exercises that I'm going to do if I'm dressed up like that.
Joel Brooks:If I'm dressed up like that. And what the author of Hebrews is saying here is if we're gonna run, we we have to we have to throw off the things that are gonna restrict us. Coming to an understanding of this, I would say, as I am coming to an understanding of this, I'm not here yet, really is changing my life. I hope it changes yours. What I have found is that often I have asked the wrong questions.
Joel Brooks:And likely you ask the wrong questions as well. We tend to ask questions like this. Well, what is wrong with me doing this? Or if I do this, is this a sin? And we ask these questions because we sincerely, we wanna throw off those sins that entangle us.
Joel Brooks:But that question is limited. It's not enough. There are other things that will slow us down just as much as those sins that we also need to get rid of, these weights. And so a better question to ask is not, is this sin? But is this going to help me run?
Joel Brooks:If I do this, if I buy this, is it gonna help me run? Will this build my faith? Will it build the faith of others? So we don't need to be asking questions like is, you know, watching this show or watching this movie sin. Instead we need to ask, does watching this help me run faster and harder?
Joel Brooks:Will dating this person help me run faster? Will marrying this person help me run with endurance? Will spending my money this way help me run? Will taking this job, will moving into this neighborhood, will these things bring me closer to Jesus or move me farther away? Are they gonna help me run this race that I've been called to run?
Joel Brooks:And so you need to ask yourself the questions. Do I have things in my life that are not necessarily sin, but they bog me down? They really do nothing more than just take away my precious time and my energy? Are there time killers I need to let go of and lay aside? Listen, I'm not talking about a sacrifice here, because what you're doing is you're laying aside these dead weights and you are embracing joy.
Joel Brooks:You're embracing joy. It'd be wrong for me to end this message and you know, it's just kind of a pep talk. Come on guys, let's run hard after Jesus. And that will get you about 5 minutes. Alright?
Joel Brooks:Plus you can't do it. You cannot conjure up the faith that is demanded of you here. You can't do it. This passage though is clear that it's Jesus, and it's not you that's the one who's gonna give the faith, and it's gonna be Jesus who's gonna be the one who perfects your faith. Even the great saints that we just read about didn't have the strength to do whatever just challenged us to do.
Joel Brooks:I mean the author of Hebrews could have easily gone through this list of people and said things like this. Abraham, who lied about his wife Sarah, not just once but twice. Jacob, who lived an entire life full of deceit. Joseph, who was a spoiled brat. Moses, who was a murderer, had a short fuse.
Joel Brooks:Gideon who had so little faith he had to keep asking for signs over and over again. David who committed murder and adultery. Okay, you could go on with that type of list, in Hebrews 11. These people here, they are not witnessing to their own strength because left on their own strength, they would fail. What they are testifying about is that God can use such weakness as a platform for his glory.
Joel Brooks:God can utterly transform these wretches into something beautiful. They cannot run on their own strength and you cannot either. But understand that Jesus is the one who's actually done this for us, and we look to him for strength. Verse 2. Verse 2 says that we are to look to Jesus, the founder and the perfecter of our faith.
Joel Brooks:The word founder is a, it's it's a foundational loaded word here. It's the word, Greek word, arkagos. It's the same word that Peter uses in Acts chapter 5 when he is brought before the high priest and all these other priests. He is on trial And he steps up to the high priest. Peter who has failed over and over again, but he steps up to this high priest and he says, we must obey God rather than men.
Joel Brooks:The God of our fathers raised Jesus whom you killed. He's pointing to the high priest. He's saying, whom you killed. And God has exalted him at the right hand as the archagos and the savior. This word is only found a few times, and This word is only found a few times in scripture.
Joel Brooks:It's often translated as author, the author of life, leader, founder, captain. I found some translations that translated it as prince or pioneer or champion. And here in Hebrews 12, it is translated as founder. Looking to Jesus, the founder, the arkagos and perfecter of our faith. The reason there's so many words are used to translate this is because Arkagos is a very rich word and it's hard to convey all of its meaning.
Joel Brooks:I would say, if you had to pick one word to define it, I would actually use the word hero. He is our hero. Tremper Longman, who is a famous Bible scholar, he cheesily translates this word as superhero. One of the commentators I read on Hebrews, George Guthrie, he calls Jesus the real Superman. That's how he translated it.
Joel Brooks:And I know it's somewhat ridiculous, but he is right on in this. He understands it. The reason I think this is so, is because this word was was most used in the 1st century. It was most used to describe Hercules. As the one who was like half God and half man, the hero.
Joel Brooks:It was a common word in that day, but Jesus is far greater than any Hercules. As we run this race, we are to look to Jesus, our hero. Our hero. He's the one who has run it before. He ran it perfectly.
Joel Brooks:He's the hero because when we we saw him run, he overcame every obstacle. He overcame every temptation. He was always strong. He lived perfectly. And so we look to Jesus as our hero, and we certainly see an example.
Joel Brooks:He's an example for us, but he's more than an example. Because he's also a savior. And when we fail to meet his example, which we will, our hero is the one who picks us up and carries us. He's the one who sustains us. He is both an example of our faith and he is also the one who sustains our faith.
Joel Brooks:Jesus has said he ran this race because of the joy that was set before him. Our hero had a joy set before him. You you can I can spend a whole lot of time here? Let me just ask a question. What is what is the one thing that Jesus gained when he came here?
Joel Brooks:There there's one thing he didn't have when he was in heaven. When he was in heaven, he had perfection. He had holiness. He had a perfect relationship with the trinity, within the triune God. He had all glory.
Joel Brooks:He had all of those things. The one thing that Jesus did not have was you. That was it. It's the only thing he gains here. The joy is us.
Joel Brooks:The joy that Jesus had before us was that we would be with him and behold his glory. John 17, when we get there about 2 years from now in our study, John 17 is gonna make that so clear. This was the joy of Jesus. Yes. That he would be glorified where he was before.
Joel Brooks:We would see him in the glory that he's always had. But that's it. It's not that he would just get that glory back, but that we would be there looking at him, gazing at his perfection. We will be brought into his presence to gaze upon his beauty. That's the joy that is before him.
Joel Brooks:The joy set before Jesus was that he would once again be in glory and that we would see him and we would bask in his glory. And you know what? Our joy is the same thing, that Jesus will be glorified and that we will get to someday sit and to bask in his glory. We have the same joy. The joy set before Jesus is our joy as well.
Joel Brooks:And that's what gives us the strength to run this agonizing race that is before us. Hear me, oh, church. You you might feel like you were just stranded on some island. Your faith has nothing to do with with the the centuries and the millennia before. But know you are part of the family of God.
Joel Brooks:What he has been doing in his people is your story. And I want you to see your whole life in a movement up to that now intersecting. And I want you to ask your creator, what is next? As part of the people of God, what is next? And I want you to hear him say run.
Joel Brooks:Pray with me. Our Jesus, you are our founder and perfector. You are our hero of the faith. You are both our our example and you're the one who lifts us up when we fail. In other words, you are everything to us.
Joel Brooks:And I pray we would run hard because of the joy that is set before us, which is that someday we will see you in glory. Wake up, those of us here in this room that have been slumbering for so long. Wake us up to the life that you have called us to live. And we pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.
