So we're going to be reading verses 1, 2, and 3, but we'll most likely spend most of our time today in verse 1. Hebrews chapter 12, verses 1, 2, and 3. Initially I prepared a two-part message, but it looks like it might turn into a three-part message. So I'm going to finish my sermon.

So verses 1, 2, and 3. "Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and a sin which so easily entangles us. 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." Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we pray for grace, we pray for guidance, we pray for your word to come alive to us. Whatever it is, Lord God, that we have wrestled with this week, I pray that you would allow your word to enlighten us.

Allow us to see a glimpse of who you are, that we may hear from you and your children, hear your voice, and follow you and you alone. May this time be a time of sanctification and glorification for your name. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. All right, so we are finally making a transition from chapter 11 to chapter 12.

And if you notice, chapter 12, verse 1, begins with the word "therefore." And so "therefore," whenever you see that in the Bible, is very significant because it's connecting or concluding a thought that was started in the previous chapter. But this "therefore" is not just any "therefore." This "therefore" not only connects it to chapter 11, which is the immediate context, it really is a connection to all of 11 chapters.

And so there's a big shift that happens between chapter 11 and chapter 12. So what happens in chapter 12 to chapter 13 is a conclusion of what he's been saying in the 11 chapters. Therefore, all the things that we have said, this is the conclusion. So we're moving from indicatives to imperatives.

Now the main emphasis in chapter 12 and 13 is considering who Jesus is. If he is truly superior over everything else in this world, what should that look like in the life of a believer? And so he's moving into not only just this verse, not only just for the next few sermons, but again, into the imperatives where he's going to give us instructions on what a Christian life should look like in perseverance.

You know, all of us probably fall into one or the other category. I find that there are some people who naturally gravitate toward theology. You know, you guys are thinkers. You love to read and you love to ask questions and dig and you get frustrated that people don't want to have conversations about dispensationalism and, you know, hypostatic union of Christ.

And you love deep things and you get frustrated when people are not that way. And then there are some of you that fall into the other category where as soon as we get into something that's a little bit deeper than what we see in scripture, we think it's like, "Oh, you know, we don't want to get into that.

Those are for theologians." You know, if we get too deep into theology, it divides the church. So we want to stay united. Just tell us what to do, right? And so we don't need to know all that other stuff. And, you know, keep that in the seminary. And we just, we just like teach us how to disciple and raise children and evangelize.

And so some of us fall into that other category. Well, if you do one without the other, you're going to really miss the whole point of scripture because the point of scripture is not to get somebody who's not in the church to be in the church and to have people who are in the church to become members and to have members come out to Bible study and then have Bible study people to serve in the church.

The point of Christianity isn't to get a group of people who is not doing something to do something, right? That they're not doing something outside or inside and get them to behave differently. So they didn't wake up early in the morning, so they need to wake up. They didn't read the Bible, so then they need to read the Bible.

The point of Christianity is not simply to change our behavior. So if all we do is go to the imperatives and say, "Just tell me what to do and I'm just going to do it," then you can completely miss the whole point of Christianity because the whole point of Christianity is to radically change our inner being so that we can see the glory of the gospel of Jesus Christ so that we can become worshipers.

So if all we're doing is changing our behavior, we're not necessarily worshiping God. We're just acting differently. If making disciples is just getting people to act differently, all we're doing is institutionalizing people. This is our expectations in the church and this is how everybody behaves. But what our true desire is to—what God desires is to be worshiped.

And worship, true worship has to happen when there's a transformation happening inside of us. And that's why the indicatives of who Jesus is is to show us his glory. So the reason why theology is important is theology basically is a study of God. Literally, it's a study of God.

And so the study of God causes us to see a greater glimpse of his glory and the more we dig, a greater glory is revealed to us in his work. And so when that glory is revealed, therefore, if you know this, this is how you ought to behave. So you cannot have the imperative without the indicatives.

You cannot have the indicatives without the imperatives. And that's why almost all the letters in the New Testament is written in that pattern. Book of Romans, 16 chapters, first 11 chapters are the indicatives. This is the gospel. This is what he has done. This is who we have become.

This is the hope that we have. And therefore, in view of this mercy, this gospel, we ought to live our lives as a pleasing, as living sacrifice to God. It wasn't that long when we started the book of Ephesians, we have three chapters about his election, his predestination, and how he saved us, why he saved us, his purpose, his will.

And then we get to chapter four, five, and six, and he says, "Therefore, live up to this calling that you have been given." So if you have a tendency to kind of like, "I don't want to get into these deep things and I just want to know what to do.

Give me instructions one, two, three," then you're not really truly worshiping God. Or if you're learning all these indicatives and you know, you know, especially if you've been in the church for a long time, you know so much and yet you do so little. And you completely missed the point of Christianity.

So that's why this "therefore" here is so important because we're transitioning from the previous indicatives. So this is what it's going to look like in the practical life of a Christian. This is how it ought to be practiced. If you look at Hebrews chapter 12, 1, and we're probably not going to even make it out of here today, okay?

Hebrews chapter 12, 1, it says, "Therefore, since all of this, since the supremacy of Christ has been established for you, therefore, since we have such great a cloud of witnesses, these people who've gone before us as an example, let us lay aside every encumbrance of sin so that so easily entangles us and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us." In the English, when you read it, there's a bunch of imperatives here, right?

Consider to let us, let us put aside every encumbrance and let us put aside the sin. Let us run. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus. So there's a lot of imperatives here. But in the Greek, there's only one imperative in the Greek. So it doesn't pop out in the English.

In English, it sounds like there's a lot of instructions going on. But the only imperative in these three verses is let us run. Let us run. And so what that means is everything else that he says here are supporting, supporting ideas. How do we run this race with endurance, right?

And so that's what we're going to be focusing on today and tomorrow and possibly the week after that. Let us run. Since you know all of this, if you truly believe that Christ is supreme over everything that we are tempted by, everything else in this world, if that's the case, therefore, let us run this race with endurance, the race that is set before us.

So there are four things that I want to highlight and I outlined it this way. First, to look forward. Look forward. Second, to look back. Third, to look within. And fourth, to look up. Usually I don't come up with these clever outlines. So this is a lot of work.

So I was like, "Oh, I like this. I stuck it." So even if it doesn't fit well, let's just go with it, okay? So the first instruction in running with endurance, he says to look forward, meaning to look at the goal. The final prize that God did not set us here just to start the race.

We started this race in order so that we can finish this race. You know, in 1968 in Mexico City, there was a marathon that took place and all the winners already came in and so many hours went by. So they already had the ceremony to award the gold medal, the silver medal, and the bronze medal.

And as they were wrapping up the ceremony, there was this one man that came into the stadium by himself, John Stephan Akwari from Tanzania. And it was a strange sight because even the ceremony was all done. So if you didn't know the context, you'd say, "Well, this guy is stubborn." You know, clearly, I mean, it must be embarrassing for him to run so late.

Because after everybody was done, he was just kind of limping into the stadium. But what happened to him is about midway through the run, this man from Tanzania basically had a very bad fall. He bruised his shoulder, his head on the ground, and then he actually dislocated his knee.

And so he didn't know if he was going to be able to run, but he was so determined, he began to limp. And this is a true story. He began to limp, and he limped the other about 12, 13 miles. And so that's why it took him so many hours to get in.

And as he was limping in, the people knew what had happened to him. And just the fact that he finished, they gave him a standing ovation. And he's known as the greatest last place finisher in Olympic history. And that's why we talk about him today, even though this happened in 1968.

So after all the things were over, they came and asked him, an interviewer said, "Why did you go through that excruciating pain of running 13 hours with a dislocated knee?" And his answer was this, "My country did not send me 5,000 miles to start the race. They sent me 5,000 miles to finish it." Our journey with God wasn't simply mental.

He justified us, and then we just kind of trickle in, into the finish line. The reason why he writes this, the whole letter, is to get people who are drifting. They were drifting because they were simply neglecting their faith. You know, backsliding doesn't happen because you wake up one day and say, "You know what?

I don't know if I believe in God anymore." It doesn't happen that way. Most people, it doesn't happen that way. Most people, it just happens simply out of neglect. You get busy in life, you start making a little bit of money, you travel a little bit, you buy this and you buy that, and after a while, your priorities kind of mixed up.

Have children and just busyness of life, concerns of this world. And so we start to neglect our walk with God. And that's why the whole letter, he doesn't say, "Don't reject Jesus. Don't deny Jesus." He says, "Do not neglect." How can we escape if we neglect such a great salvation?

And he keeps saying, warns us about drifting. Drifting requires no effort. Just sit there, relax, enjoy the ocean. Just breathe in the fresh air and you just start drifting. And so he, the whole letter is written to people who are just kind of drifting because it was becoming hard to be Christian.

Our natural tendency is when we're young, we're ideological and say, "We're going to turn the world for Jesus Christ." And we're in college surrounded by friends who are encouraging us, almost shaming us for not walking with Christ. If you're in college and you're not doing well in your faith, you get persecuted.

Where we are, "What? You didn't do this. You didn't do that." And all of a sudden you graduate and then you get a job and you don't have that pressure anymore. You don't have that accountability. In fact, you know, where in college you were like 80%, you had this accountability.

Now it's the other way. Now majority of the time with non-Christians where it's difficult to live your faith. And then you struggle for a little bit when you're young and then a lot of people by the time they're in their mid-20s has kind of accepted that. That's just the way it is.

And so you do a little bit of church and a little bit of this, a little bit of that. And by the time you're in your 30s, your heart has hardened. You've heard everything. And so you created a Christianity that doesn't really look anything like the Bible. And you just assume, "Well, maybe that was true of them.

Maybe this is true of a few elect. Maybe it's just for the apostles, but not for everybody." And so we end up prioritizing other things in this life, knowing full well that it's temporary. Knowing full well we're just sojourners passing by, but we just simply out of neglect. And when we neglect our salvation, we end up compromising.

So when trials come, temptations come, when we are tested, it's much easier to compromise when we've been neglecting our faith, when we haven't been striving after the things of God. And then when we are in a compromised state, apostasy isn't far away. So backsliding doesn't happen one day you wake up.

It just simply happens out of neglect. And that's what he was trying to say to the runners here, to the listeners, the recipients of this letter. That it's not enough that you started this race, you need to finish this race. God didn't justify you so that you can just fizzle out sometime five years, 10 years, 20 years later.

We have a tendency, the older I get, the more I hear this. I was. We say that about our physical life. We also say that about our spiritual life. And it's very dangerous when you're 30 years old and you begin to say, "Oh, when I was in college." Oh, let the college kids do it.

I'm so old at 30. You know what I mean? And then the 40 year olds hear that and it's like, "Oh my God, you're only 30 and you're saying that? I'm so old at 40." And then the 50 year olds will hear that and it's like, "Oh my gosh, you little infants.

At 40 year old?" And I'm sure the 60 year olds don't even say anything because it is just so ridiculous. You know what ends up happening is physically we don't retire until we're in our 60s and possibly 70s. But so many people retire spiritually in their late 20s and early 30s.

That this striving after God, this running with all our might, that's something you do when you're young. But as we get older, we have to raise kids, we have jobs, we have responsibilities. And so we just kind of have retired. You know, and then we just like, "Oh, it's great to see the younger ones living out their faith, but I'm old.

I'm 30. I'm 40. I'm 50." See, God is calling us to finish this race, to finish what he started, to be justified, to be sanctified, and to ultimately be glorified. And that's why the word that is used here for this race is agonai, a marathon, not a sprint. Our natural inclination is to give attention to the sprinters.

I mean, let me illustrate this. Who's the fastest runner in recent history? Record it. You all know. Usain Bolt, right? I don't know what his time is, but he's really fast. Fastest. So he become a celebrity. Everybody knows who he is. You don't have to be a track and field, like a connoisseur, I don't know what it is, like a fan of that to know, right?

Because he's on television. He's in movies. He makes commercials because we naturally gravitate towards the sprinters. Who's the fastest marathon runner? Unless you're some weirdo who likes to run marathons, most of you, most of you probably don't know, right? We don't gravitate toward marathon runners. The fastest recorded marathon runner is a guy named Eliud Kipchoge, which you're not going to remember and neither will I after today.

His time was set in 2018 Berlin Marathon, and his fastest time recorded is two hours and one minute and 39 seconds. We don't keep track of that, or at least the record keepers do, but most people don't know because we naturally gravitate toward the sprinters. And even in our spiritual walk, we have a tendency to elevate people who are sprinters.

They're gifted, they're talented, they have large churches, wrote great books, and they write great things, have great blogs, have more than a million followers on Facebook and TikTok and whatever. And so they're the sprinters. But the ones who are just chipping away, just being faithful in the background, they don't really get much press.

And they're the ones who faithfully finish. A lot of people just kind of flash and then once they're done with the sprint, they're just out there, right? But the marathon runners have to agonize. They know agony. They struggle. And that's the word that is used here to describe a Christian walk.

In other parts of the Bible, our spiritual life is described as a struggle, a strife, a wrestling, a boxing match, and even warfare. And we are often called soldiers. In modern day history with the church growth movement, we hear a lot of talk about the church needing to be a hospital.

And that is not wrong, right? People are sick. And so people need healing. But I think the problem with that is a lot of people in our generation only see the church as a hospital, a place to be loved and be safe. But when we start talking about agonizing and struggling and striving and warfare, it almost sounds foreign.

Even though the Bible clearly states, I mean, if you're talking about percentage, more of our spiritual life is described as agonizing, where we get the word agony. And we are challenged not only to simply sign up for the race, but to run as to win. In 1 Corinthians 9, 24 to 27, Paul says, "Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but only one receives the prize?

Run in such a way that you may win." Now think about the context of this, right? Why is Paul telling them to run in this way? Because the Corinthians got entangled with who's better, who's more spiritual. You know, I like Apostle Paul, I like Apollos, I like Peter, and then some is like, I like Jesus.

So they were competing with each other, all kinds of chaos in the church, and they've taken their eyes off of where they were supposed to go. And so the whole letter is written to kind of encourage them and to rebuke them to get back on track. That you're just satisfied that you're on this journey, you signed up, and you're comparing your outfits.

And that's why he's saying, everybody runs, but to run to win. You know, some people who just kind of get on into the race, sign up for the race, you know, but you can clearly tell that they're not there to really win. You know, they wear the wrong shoes, you know, maybe they got a coat on because it's cold, and they're talking and chatting with their friends while they're running.

You know, they're high-fiving their friends, they're posing for pictures. You could tell who's in this race to tell their friends that they ran the marathon, even though it took them four and a half days, right? Because they're not interested in the race itself. They're interested in the fact that they actually went.

But they're not striving, right? But the ones who want to win, you know, they got the proper shoes on. Sometimes they won't even pick up a drink because they're afraid it's going to slow them down. They're not going to sit and like take pictures while they're running, because that few seconds matter because they're trying to win.

And so Paul says, we all run the race, but he said, you need to run to win the race. Not just be satisfied that you are in the race. Verse 25, everyone who competes in the games exercises self-control in all things. Self-control meaning everything is determined by this race.

They practice this self-control by asking themselves, is this going to benefit me or not benefit me in this race? That's why they practice self-control. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. Even non-Christians pack up their bags and their young children and they'll go to a very difficult part of the world, living a very difficult life because they believe that that will give them the greatest success in this world.

Maybe there's some business going on there. Maybe that's where you want to go because you'll get the greatest amount of money. Some people will live in Alaska, right? They'll live in Alaska because the pay is much better. So even the secular world will sacrifice many things and be disciplined to get an imperishable wreath.

And so Paul is using that as saying, everybody practices this. How much more should we for what is imperishable? If they do it for perishable, we should do it for imperishable. Therefore I run in such a way as not without aim. Not without aim, meaning that there's no clear goal.

That everything that we do is what makes me happy today. If it makes you happy, why is it so bad? Do you know that song? Don't tell me that song. But that's kind of like the mantra of our day. If it makes me happy, why is it so bad?

I do it. I run in such a way not without aim. I box in such a way as not beating the air. Basically shadow boxing, right? Shadow boxing. Nobody's hitting you and you're not hitting anybody. And you don't need to train for shadow boxing. There's no danger of being knocked out.

And there's no goal of knocking anybody else out. So you don't need to be trained. So when you're shadow boxing without aim, it doesn't matter if you pray. It doesn't matter because you're not trying to knock anybody out. You're not trying to accomplish anybody. All you have to say is, "I did it." If you have the number on your chest, that's enough.

You're not trying to win. You just got in. So you're just shadow boxing, right? So if you do Bible study, you do Bible study because your church asks you to do Bible study. That's part of the covenant. So I just do it. So I put the number on. But you're just going through the motion.

The Word of God, all it is is just information. So I do it and people get off my back. If I don't do it, there's no effect because I'm not necessarily using the Bible for any other purpose other than to show people that's what I'm doing. So if you're shadow boxing, it's enough to just go through the motion.

If you're shadow boxing, it's enough to just attend church. If you're shadow boxing. But if you're committed to the struggle to win, shadow boxing is nothing. You're just playing. And that's what he's trying to tell the Corinthians. That you guys are just playing games. You're not necessarily wrestling. You're not engaging in spiritual battle.

And that's part of the reason why prayer in our generation is so weak because we're just shadow boxing. If you are wrestling to bring non-Christians to Christ, no amount of strategy, no amount of reading books, no amount of learning, no amount of talent can change a man's heart. That's the work of the Holy Spirit.

And it forces us to recognize that what God asks us to do is beyond us. So if you're not wrestling and there's no clear aim and just going through the motion, then if you just check off the box, right? Did it. Did quiet time. Did I pray? You know, they told me to pray five minutes.

I prayed five minutes. I showed up to praise and prayer and I did the assignment. And that's enough. But when we are wrestling to win, that's where the struggle comes in. But again, like I said, the greatest struggle in our generation and where you and I live is that the normal, the normal average Christian behavior is shadow boxing.

There's a lot of spiritual things that are happening. A lot of just boxing, not hitting anything. A lot of like form without substance. If you get too excited about your faith, one of the first things that you'll hear from people is relax. Relax. Relax. Why, you know? Why are you getting so uptight?

Why are you like that? You know? It's like, God didn't call everybody. God's not saying that we need to be poor. God's not saying we need to do that. Now, where do we draw the line? And so we have all these things that we say to kind of calm everybody down so that we can kind of live a average life and just kind of coast along.

And if you get beyond this, like, oh, he's a fanatic. He's a Jesus freak. And if you get really serious, why aren't you in ministry? You should be a missionary. So if you're passionate about God, right, and you're wrestling and struggling, you belong in ministry. The rest of us, we're just going to sit back and watch you.

I'll give you a high five as you run by. See, that's shadow boxing. And that's what he's trying to say. He said, to run, therefore, considering the cloud of witnesses that have gone before us, let us run this race with endurance, to finish this race. In Amos chapter 6, verse 1, the greatest problem of the Israelites was not that they weren't taking their temple sacrifices seriously.

In fact, during that period, right before the Assyrians came and took them into captivity, there were more sacrifices were given at that temple than probably any other time before that period. But the primary message of the prophets that God sent was that all that you're doing is shadow boxing.

It's just fluff. There's no real worship going on. In Amos chapter 6, verse 1, it says, "Woe to those who are in ease in Zion." They're relaxing, right? And he's like, oh, Yahweh is my God. Clearly He's for us. He's a covenant people. And they were just ease in Zion.

And those who feel secure in mountain of Samaria, meaning they relied on their topography, right? When the enemies come, we have this great mountain to fight on, and we can conquer all our enemies. Ease at Zion and feel secure at Mount Samaria. Again, in Amos chapter 6, 4 through 6, those who recline on beds of ivory and sprawl on their couches, beds of ivory, which you and I don't have, right?

So we can't be guilty of that. But modern-day version of it would be your memory foam, right? Those who recline on your nice king-size memory foam and sprawl on your recliners and eat lambs from flock and calves from the midst of the stall, your Korean barbecues, who improvise to the sound of harp, your music.

And like David has composed songs for themselves, who drink wine from the sacrificial bowls while they anoint themselves with finest oil, skincare. Now, is this saying that all of this is sin, that we can't sleep on bed? Now we've got to sleep on cement ground, right? Korean barbecue is from the devil, right?

Skincare is from Satan. No, obviously that's not what he's saying. There are plenty of people who are very wealthy who did godly things with their finances. It's what he says after. He says, "Yet you have all of these great things that God gave you because he blessed you." God wasn't saying like, "All my children need to be poor and be suffering and can't have nice things." That's not what he's saying.

He said, "I blessed you with all these things, yet they have not grieved over the ruin of Joseph." When it came to the things that really mattered, instead of seeing these good things as a blessing to use for God's glory, you just self-indulge and that's all it was. You use all the blessings, all the finances, all the things you have so that we can live nice and have nice things, and that was it.

And when it came to lost souls who are going to be judged when God comes, you just kind of swept that under the rug. And that's why the judgment was coming, of their constant shadow boxing without really being in the fight. Again, that's what this "therefore" is. Everything that he said up to this point, "Therefore," knowing all of this that I've said, knowing all of this of who Jesus is, "Therefore, let us finish this race.

Let's run this race with perseverance." He says the word for endurance is literally "hupomone," it means to submit. It means to place yourself, to bear yourself under pressure. That's what that means. And the reason why he says this to them is because they did well in the sprint. In fact, in the sprint, these guys were Usain Bolts.

They got there fast and they were celebrating even their material goods being confiscated. People were going to jail and they're like, "Man, we're being persecuted for Christ." But then when they realized it was a marathon, they started slowly, started being discouraged. It's like, "Oh shoot, they're actually dying. Oh shoot.

This is not, this is not relenting." You know, it wasn't like Joseph where he suffered and then at the end he was magnified and he used him for great things. They realized maybe they're Jeremiah, you know, that this suffering wasn't going to ever lend and maybe that is their purpose.

And they started drifting out and that's why he says not only to run this race, to stay under. Because our natural tendency is when we're under pressure, either to change our circumstance or change our theology. So our immediate action is to change our circumstance. This pressure, I feel this pressure, right?

We lived it with this tension between heaven, we're not there yet and we're saved. So we're kind of in this middle ground and because of that we feel pressure. We feel like we don't belong. So we're constantly reminded of that. And we're living nice but we feel people suffering.

We know people who don't know Christ and we feel like we need to share the gospel with them but what if we do that? We're going to lose our job and we're living with this tension. So our natural tendency is change our circumstance, change our neighborhood, change our job because this is the pressure we don't want.

Or we change our theology. Oh, that's not what God wants. It's because of these legalists. Oh, they're not interpreting the Bible correctly. Oh, that's his personality. That guy's always angry. And so we change our theology so we create a theology that accommodates this easy life. But the Bible says this pressure is normal because we're aliens and strangers.

It's when we think that there is no pressure, there is no longer this struggle, that you've run this race and let the kids take care of it. And we're just kind of coasting along and then when you see the waves coming, we got to go back to shore. And yet the Bible constantly reminds us of this pressure that we are under.

That is normal because we're aliens and strangers in this world, in a foreign land that is hostile to the message that you and I have embraced and loved. And we are actively sharing. So he says do not think it's strange when they don't accept you. Do not think it's strange when you don't belong, when you don't fit in.

Do not think it's strange when you say things that are straight out of the Bible and they call you a hate monger. Do not think it's strange because we live in a fallen world that is hostile toward God. So those children who actively follow Christ are also going to face some sort of hostility.

Do not think it's strange. Do not turn to the left or to the right. Do not turn to the left or to the right. That pressure that you feel as an alien and stranger in this world is supposed to be there. That's part of our sanctification. That's a part of a reminder that we don't belong.

And our constant wrestling and tweaking and planning to have it better fit in this world is what's destroying the church. To make the church as palatable as possible so that the people who have committed to the pattern of this world can feel at home in the church is what's killing the church.

This is a completely different kingdom with a completely different king. And our followers are supposed to be completely different. So this struggle, this agony, this wrestling match, this warfare that we are a part of, he says don't forget where we're headed. Don't forget the race that we're in, that we're in this struggle, we're in this battle.

Let me get to at least number two, okay? I'm not going to get to number three. He says to consider as we fix our eyes on this path to look back, consider the cloud of witnesses that has gone before us. Not that they are looking at us, cheering us on.

He said no, they've been set before us as examples for us to follow. Some of them endured much agony and God delivered them. And so they were all mentioned in chapter 11. And then some of them, no fanfare, no great hoopla, no names being written, just died in agony, just faithfully following Christ.

And whether they saw any glory, whether they died in a difficult situation, they all finished the race. And that's exactly what Paul says at the end of his life. He says he finished the race. He doesn't give a compliment, I planted a church here and I did this and I wrote so many passages.

He doesn't mention any of that. At the end of his life and he's summarizing his life, he says my life is being poured out as a drink offering, meaning I'm going to die. And all he says is I have finished the race. I finished it. You know, I think every single one of us, if I asked you what's your favorite character in the Bible and you would probably name somebody, right?

For whatever the reason, right? Me like automatically I would say Moses is one of those guys, right? And it's not because of his great leadership. Moses is a guy that always stands up to me as an encouragement too because this guy came into ministry kicking and screaming, you know?

And I told you last week, Jeremiah is another guy, you know, because he's agonizing. I mean, if you're too happy one day and you want to balance some of that, read Lamentations, right? Or Jeremiah. Or even Psalms, right? I mean, they'll level you out, right? And then you're going to have to go to Philippines to bring you back up.

Jeremiah is a guy who's just like, oh, he's like, why? And then even Apostle Paul. You know, the letter that I gravitate toward is 2 Peter and 2 Timothy. I mean, man, 2 Peter is hard to read, you know? I mean, he risked his life to bring the gospel to these people and they're saying, because they didn't like what he had to say, it's like, that guy's not an apostle, right?

I mean, his letters are strong, but his appearance is not impressive, right? He's not the best speaker. And they were criticizing him. He's like defending himself. I am an apostle. And the only reason why he's defending himself is because he's trying to tell them to listen. There's grave danger if you don't listen.

And then Apostle Paul, the last letter he writes, he basically tells Timothy, don't let this happen to you. All these guys are falling out. They love the world more than God, and so they went back. Don't let this happen to you, right? He said, you preach, even if they don't want to listen, in season and out of season.

You keep preaching it, even if they don't want to listen. Even if your life becomes hard, you preach. Don't turn. You preach. And that was the last letter. You know, I've always gravitated toward these people, and only recently I realized, like, huh, they all have similar character. They're all people who are reluctant, but remain faithful.

And I find great encouragement in them, not because of the great things that they've done, but because they're just faithful. They had their eyes on the prize, and they just made it to the end. Read the book of Psalms. Two-thirds of it is complaining. Why? Why? Two-thirds. We gravitate toward Psalm 23.

The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not be in want. He leads me beside quiet water. I mean, we put it on, you know, plaques, and we quote it. Two-thirds. Two-thirds of Psalms is, "Why? Why do you let the wicked prosper? When are you going to answer my prayers?

How long?" Two-thirds. My enemies are all around me. Where can I go to escape? It's because that's the human experience. You and I live in a fallen world. The God of this age is Satan. He doesn't like God's children. And so living in a fallen world is naturally, there's going to be struggles.

There's struggles when you're young, and there's struggles that come when you're old. There's a struggle because you're single, and then there's struggles that come because you're married. There's a kind of struggle that comes because you don't have children, and there's a kind of struggle that comes because you have children.

There's a struggle that you have from being unemployed, and there's a kind of struggle that comes from being employed. When you're working, when you're retired, every stage of life, there's a struggle because we haven't made it to the end. The struggle isn't just the first mile, or the second mile, or the eighth mile, or the twenty-fifth mile.

Until we finish the line, finish and finish this race, the marathon isn't over. So until our life is over, there is no real rest. Our Sabbath is when we meet Christ. So until then, he says, "Agonai," struggle. Struggle to get to that rest. Look at the people that have gone before us as an example.

You know, I mentioned all these people, and Martin Luther, and James Frazier, and Jim Elliot. These are people that made an impact in my life in reading the biography. But now as a bit older, I look back at my life and say, you know, probably outside of my immediate family, the guy who discipled me when I was in college, and he discipled me for about three years, probably made the biggest impact.

And part of the reason why is because I was so hungry. And he just, he wasn't gifted, he wasn't necessarily, said something, I don't remember a single thing he said. I should have listened to him better, but it wasn't because of anything he said. It was just he chose to love me.

And he dedicated himself to be there when I needed him. And that was enough for me. And anything that he did, I wanted to do. We have a tendency to put people on a pedestal that are far off. That's why we write books about, you know, Martin Luther. And every once in a while, I'll read, you know, stories of missionaries, like, oh, you know, like, Jim Elliot did this, and, you know, we had Amy Carmichael woke up at three in the morning and, and, you know, visited 50 villages and brought 10,000 people to Christ.

And it's like challenging, but like, who does that? I don't know anybody who does that. Martin Luther, you know, like, we have a cult from him, it's like, oh, you know, when he was busy, he prayed four hours, but when he was really busy, he prayed seven hours. When did he study the Bible?

When did he meet with people? Right? But we have a tendency to kind of highlight the good things from people from a distance and then say, well, these are cloud of witnesses that have gone before us. That's why all the dead people are perfect. You know, you go to funerals and, and no flawed people ever die.

Only perfect people die. Because at the funeral, they're perfect, because we don't highlight their flaws. So we tend to appreciate people who are more farther away, because we highlight the good and nobody knows their weakness. But the greatest cloud of witnesses in our lives are usually very, very flawed people who are very, very close to us.

People that we know their flaws very well, inside and out. And they seem just like us. In fact, some things are worse than us. But they dedicated their life to help us, to love us, to persevere with us. And we don't usually appreciate them until they're gone. And it isn't until we're way older, we look back and say, well, it's like, you know, you don't see people dying on their deathbed.

It's like Martin Luther. He made the biggest impact in my life. Or Moses, you know, like all the hard years of my life, Moses, like really was the one who changed my life. Usually at the end of our lives, we mention somebody obscure that nobody else would know, just only you would know.

Somebody that was close to you, flawed. Maybe you did a lot of complaining about them. But they left the biggest impact. You know, the older I get, the more I realize how much of my dad's faith is in me. I never got to tell him that. You know, when I get to heaven, I'm sure, you know, I'll tell him.

But when I got saved, I got saved in a charismatic group. My dad was a Presbyterian conservative all his life. So I've never seen like, you know, outpouring and like emotions. And it was just preach the Bible and sing the hymns. And to me, it was dead because I didn't understand it.

So I got saved in a charismatic church where we were, you know, praying and, you know, and singing out loud and casting out demons. And we're doing all this stuff. And my dad's faith seemed very foreign to me, very legalistic. There's no power in that. And then after I got a little bit older, I became a Baptist.

He's a Presbyterian, you know. So I didn't agree with him about baptism. So I never talked deeply about theology. My dad was a seminary professor. He taught Greek and Hebrew, wrote a book on church history. And I couldn't read it because it was in Korean. Neither did I really want to because I felt like there was such a distance between his faith and mine.

It wasn't until I got older, I started realizing how much of his day to day, day to day, the way he lived, who he was, made an impact on my life. You know, like I'm 53. I don't remember too well when he was 30 because obviously I was too young.

And I kind of vaguely remember him in his 40s because I was a teenager at the time. But I was in my 20s and probably already married, you know, by the time he was my age around that time. So I remember very vividly how I felt, the conversations I've had with the brief things that he said here and there and how much I hated him telling me about ministry.

I hated it because he would because he saw how I was struggling and he would always give me ministry advice and I didn't want to hear it. I didn't want to hear it because I was already struggling. And I didn't want my dad pointing out like do this and do that.

I don't agree with you. I'm not a Presbyterian. My faith doesn't look anything like yours. I don't read the books that you do and I don't want it. So anything he said, it was just kind of like, okay, okay, you know, I'm trying to be respectful, but I just couldn't hear it.

I had no ears to hear. So when I thought about my faith, I always thought about these great people and the people that made an impact, even though it was only for two, three years in my life. But the older I get, I hear myself saying, my dad said this.

My dad said this. My dad did this. Subconsciously. I'm not even trying to dig. It's just the things that is the most prevalent in my head are the things that my dad said and sometimes in passing that it just kind of came in. And I look back in my life and realizing the greatest cloud of witness was in my house, which I didn't know at that time.

And I remember very vividly, specifically this one time, and I was already a pastor, oh, not a pastor, but I was a committed Christian, really grown in my faith. And I went to my dad's church and there was a lot of turmoil at the church and people at the church were trying to vote my dad out.

They weren't happy with something. And so something happened and I was in the Wednesday service and one of the elders stood up after the sermon and tried to physically attack my dad. It was a small room. It wasn't a big room, probably no more than about 25 people in the room.

And I was sitting between my dad and that elder. And when he got up and he started to go toward my dad, all I could think of was if I was not a Christian, that's all I was thinking about. If I wasn't a Christian, I would put him in an arm bar, you know, and this is before MMA, right?

I would have twisted his legs and did something and it's like, how dare you, you know? Because I was a Christian, I was trying to hold back. Like I don't want to, as offended as I was, I didn't want to, I didn't want to offend God. So I kind of held my tongue and just sat there and watched this and burning in anger, but didn't open my mouth.

And my dad did nothing. You know, my dad's character, you know, I can't remember any time that he actually lost his temper. He's just a very meek person. But I remember specifically that Sunday, after that Wednesday, he came to Sunday worship and he was preaching a sermon in front of the same elder, in front of a room filled with people who are trying to get him out of the church.

I don't remember anything that he said. All I remember was sitting in there angry at the people in the church and the whole time looking at my dad thinking, how does he do this? How does he do this week after week? Like what, what, like what do you need to have to do what he's doing and just not quit?

And I realized at the end, and again, all of this was just kind of deep in my memory until recently, I remember that so vividly and the greatest impact, the greatest cloud of witness was somebody that I never even thanked. Oh man, I didn't lose it in the first service.

Sorry. Give me a second. James, a bond servant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ to the 12 tribes who are dispersed abroad greeting. All right, I'm back. God had left a cloud of witnesses. I'm pretty sure in your life, flawed people, probably very flawed people and in their flawed state, they did their best to reflect the love of God.

They weren't there by mistake. I pray that as we do our best to finish this race, think of the cloud of witnesses that had gone before us. Knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance and let endurance have its perfect result. Actually, the verse actually fits so that you may be perfect and complete lacking in nothing.

So that one day when this race is finished, we can thank them ourselves. Let's take a few minutes to, to really come before the Lord and pray. And I know that to bigger or smaller degree that the struggle is constant. Let's come before the Lord and ask for strength to remain under the struggle and persevere so that we may also finish the race along with those who have gone before us.

Let's take some time to pray as our worship team leads us.