(upbeat music) Well, every area of life calls for evaluation. Should we be doing one thing or something else? Career A or Career B? Enough school or more school? Stop spending, start investing. Don't settle for the good when you can go for the great. All sorts of books and workshops and apps stand ready to help us live from higher priorities.

And this is important, especially for Christians, because we live for the highest priority that there is. We live for the eternal. Our everlasting priority bears on our media diets, our gaming, our careers, our parenting, really every single decision that we make in life. In the summer of 1997, Pastor John preached a sermon on Hebrews 11:39-12.2, a section of scripture popularly referred to as God's Hall of Fame or the Hall of Faith, a section celebrating our ancestors in the faith who learned to live faithfully in this life, turning away from the good in order to pursue the eternally great.

Here's a clip from that sermon sent to us from a listener named Melissa in Lumberton, New Jersey. Here's Pastor John. - And life has begun to be trivial, light, L-I-T-E, blood light, life light, church light. - That's who he's writing to. Chapter five, verse 12. Though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elemental principles of the oracles of God.

You come to need milk and not solid food. You hear the ache in this writer's voice? There's been enough time since you got saved that you should be teaching a class. Or a small group, or a wife, or children, or a neighbor. You should be teaching. And you need milk still all these many years later.

Why? You're drifting, you're coasting, you're neglecting, you're not vigilant. You're treating life as though you can just get up in the morning and meander instead of run. That's who he's writing to. Chapter 12, verse 12. Strengthen the hands that are weak and the knees that are feeble. Make straight paths for your feet so that the limb which is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed.

In other words, there's still time, there's hope for this church. This is a metaphor of their spiritual condition. Hands are kind of weak. They're on the bat like this at the home plate. You don't stand like that at the home plate. You stand like this. The knees are weak, just kind of wobbling around.

And you know what happens with weak knees? They get hit from the side and it's over. History, big surgery, big brace, and no more basketball. So while there's still time, do some exercises to get the cartilage and to get the muscles up to speed. This is all spiritual talk here.

He doesn't give a rip about your knees, I don't think. Well, a little bit. The Bible says he gives a little bit of a rip, but not much. He'd rather have your legs cut off and go to heaven than to keep legs and go to hell. So have you got the picture now of this church that he's writing to in chapter 12?

Let's read verse one at the end again, 'cause here's the main point. Chapter 12, verse one, near the end of the verse. Let us lay aside every encumbrance and sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. Now this command, let's run, let's run, let's run, does not come out of the blue.

It comes out of a passion for this church that's in tremendous spiritual danger because of a false concept of life as meandering and coasting and drifting, no vigilance, no care, no watching, no earnestness, no weightiness. And he says, "This is very dangerous. And so please let us look to Christ and let us run." So the main point of this whole text that I read from verse 39 of chapter 11 to verse two of chapter 12 has one imperative, even though in English there's several, in Greek there's one imperative and it's run.

Let us run. Everything else in this text explains running or motivates running. So the point is don't stroll, don't meander, and don't wonder about aimlessly run as in a race with a finish line where everything hangs on the race. Now, what supports it? In verse one, there are a couple of things said here as a means to running.

It says, "Lay aside every encumbrance and sin which so easily entangles us." Now, I remember as a boy the effect a sermon had on me on this verse. And the only thing I remember was the distinction that the preacher made between, he was preaching from the King James at the time, weights translated encumbrances here and sins.

And he looked out on us and he said, "Not just sins. Don't just lay aside sins to run this race. Lay aside every other weight that gets in your way." As a boy, you know what the effect, it was a revolutionary effect that that had on me because what it said to me was, and I speak it now, especially for young people, kids, if you can get this, but especially young teenagers and teenagers, but it applies to everybody.

What this says is, don't just ask, "What's wrong with it?" In life. Don't just say about your music, about your movies, about your parties, about your habits, about your computer games. Don't just say, "What's wrong with it?" Don't just ask, "Is it a sin?" That's about the lowest question you can ask in life.

I'm gonna do it if it's not a sin. So tell me, is it a sin to do this? Well, not exactly. Okay, that's all I wanna know. I'm gonna have to do it. And the preacher said, and I'm the preacher now, saying, "This text says, "look to Jesus and lay aside sins for sure "and lots of other stuff too." Now that's a different way to live.

So what, well, preacher, what question as a 13-year-old, 14-year-old, should I ask if it's not, is it a sin? And the answer is, does it help me run? That's the answer. Does it get in my way when I'm trying to become more patient, more kind, more gentle, more loving, more holy, more pure, more self-controlled?

Does it get in my way or does it help me run? That's the question to ask. Ask the maximal righteousness question, not the minimal righteousness question. That was the difference it made in my life. And I've been ever since then, I didn't always live up to this. I'm not making any claim that from age 12 on, I did some great spiritual thing, but oh, I had a trajectory that was so much better than the minimalist ethic that comes with, well, what's wrong with it?

What's wrong with it? What? I don't even wanna talk about what's wrong with it. Let's talk about, does it help me run? Now, you know why that question isn't very often asked? Because we're not passionate runners. We don't wanna run. We don't get up in the morning saying, what's the course today?

What's the course of purity? What's the course of holiness? What's the course of humility? What's the course of justice? What's the course of righteousness? What's the course of love? What's the course of self-control? What's the course of courage and witness? Oh God, I wanna maximize my running today. If you have that mentality about your life, then you'll ask not how many sins can I avoid, but how many weights can I lay down so that I am fleet-footed in the race of righteousness.

- Powerful. Thank you, Melissa in Lumberton, New Jersey for the clip. This was the first John Piper sermon I ever heard. She writes, "It was five years ago. "My husband and I had both been going through "spiritual dry spells, trying to navigate life "with our very young family without God-centered direction.

"I became spiritually lazy and got lost "in the rut of day-to-day life. "My husband felt God pulling at him "to bring more discipleship into our home. "So one night, instead of turning on the TV, "he went to Desiring God and played this sermon. "Within 15 minutes, I was in tears.

"God used Pastor John's words like a lightning bolt "to electrify me and resuscitate my heart. "While we obviously are not perfect, "a new sense of purpose and calling "drives our lives every day towards Jesus, "towards Christ-likeness and towards his purposes. "For the rest of my life, I will hear echoing in my ears "Pastor John's clarion call, 'Does it help me run?'" That's a powerful testimony.

The clip is from John Piper's sermon titled "Running with the Witnesses" preached on August 17th, 1997. You can find it at DesiringGod.org, the whole sermon, DesiringGod.org. If you have a life-change clip like this one from Melissa, email me. Give me your name, your hometown, the sermon title, and the timestamp of when the clip happens in the audio, and tell me how it impacted you as well.

Put the word "clip" in the subject line of an email and send it to me at AskPastorJohn@DesiringGod.org. That's our email address, AskPastorJohn@DesiringGod.org. Well, 1 Peter 3:7 calls wives the weaker vessels in the marriage relationship, but what exactly does that mean? Are we talking about physically weaker, emotionally weaker, spiritually weaker, or something altogether different?

That's next time. I'm your host, Tony Reinhke. We'll see you back here on Friday with Pastor John back in the studio. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)