Fixing Our Eyes on Jesus

Introduction

On May 6, 1954, Roger Bannister ran the first sub four minute mile. For almost 70 years, from the 1800s, late 1800s, the best athletes in the world with high level coaches have been seeking to break this milestone. But they just failed over and over. And over the years, the sub four minute mile really came to be not only a physical barrier, but even much more so a psychological one. Bannister was a medical student. He was an amateur runner. But he even made this point himself. There’s no reason why someone can run a mile in four minutes and one second, but they can’t do it in 359. And yet over and over again, people failed repeatedly. Experts believe that if someone could break through this barrier, it was going to have to be perfect condition 68 degrees, no wind, hard, dry ground with a massive crowd cheering the person on to victory.

And yet Roger Bannister was a nonconformist. He had nothing more than a university coach, some friends that helped him in his own training schedule. And on May 6, 1954, it was a cold day, and he ran on a wet track. And relative to these men who were Olympic runners, their typical crowd, this was a small crowd of about 3,000 university students. You can look it up on YouTube and watch the race if you want. Bannister’s mile run changed everything. And in fact, some of you who like to read, you may have encountered this story in various self help books. Lots of different people talk about it. I think Malcolm Gladwell may talk about it in his book, Tipping Point. And it is one of these moments that was a tipping point in history.

It changed everything about track and field. And even though it took 70 years of concerted effort before someone actually made this happen, and people thought it was impossible for quite a while, only 46 days later, the second person, John Landy, ran a mile in under four minutes. Interestingly, I might come back to this later, but one of the friends of Bannister who helped pace him also helped pace John Landy. Just some interesting parts of the story. A year later, three other runners ran sub-four minute miles in a single race. And since 1954, well over a thousand runners have run sub-four minute miles. Pretty amazing. We were about the same distance from Bannister doing this as he was when they first started this project. And nobody did it in the first 70 or so years, and now well over a thousand.

What changed? Well, there’s all sorts of ideas about this, and the illustration itself has its limits. But I want us to kind of draw this comparison to what the Hebrew writer is doing as he talks about Jesus and the fact that Jesus really changed everything. A lot of my thoughts this morning were kind of drawn from some of what Matt talked about on Wednesday night, kind of have those moments. I like those talks where I’m sitting there and people are bringing things up, and that kind of a three-point outline just appears out of nowhere. That’s sort of what happened. This is really the idea of the Hebrew writer that with Jesus, everything is better, and everything changes. And of course, chapter 11 is about all these heroes of faith, you know, men and women who were faithful to God, and we can learn great lessons from them.

And as Matt pointed out, you know, the this the chapter seems to end a little soon because the greatest example, as we’re going to talk about this morning, is Jesus Himself. And certainly we can look to these people of faith, but the Hebrew writer himself points out in verse 39 that these people did not receive what was promised.

But they’re like those people for 70 years who tried and tried and tried, but they just couldn’t break the four minute mile. I mean, great runners, great athletes, dedication, and I’m sure Bannister himself learned a lot from these various people as he observed. But he was the pioneer. He was the one who did it. And after he did it, everyone started doing it. All these top level athletes started following him and crossing the line under four minutes. Something had changed. And this is what the Hebrew writer is saying about Jesus. Something has changed. Something is different now. Something is better than the way it used to be. And so he’s going to transition from chapter 11 into chapter 12 by talking about those the cloud of witnesses, right?

All those from the past, the ones who are looking at you and cheering you on, but they didn’t finish this before you. They’re waiting. They’re waiting for something better, but now something better has come. So chapter 12 and verse 1. 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 set as that before us. Looking to Jesus, or some of your versions may say, fixing your eyes on Jesus, the founder and perfecter of faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.

In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves and chastises every son whom he receives. It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? And if you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and lived?

For they disciplined us for a short time, as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness.

1. Jesus Is the Example

Primarily with the idea that as we run this race, as we’re living for God and we are following Jesus, he is the fixation of our life. He is the focus. We can certainly learn from other people, as chapter 11 talks about, but ultimately they don’t accomplish the prize, not without Jesus in this case. We can think about maybe abstract ideas that can give us some sorts of motivation or encouragement along the way. For example, we can think about heaven. You know, we want to get to heaven. Heaven is a place, but it doesn’t show us how to get there. You know, it’s an idea, it’s a concept, and that’s good as far as it goes. But there has to be some sort of method of getting there.

And so that encouragement, it may give us some sort of boost, but really the fixation or what we ought to be looking to is the example of how to get this done. The path that is to be trod. And that doesn’t come from an abstract idea. It doesn’t come from looking to people who didn’t do it. It comes from fixing our eyes on the pioneer of faith himself. And this is the direction the Hebrew writer wants us to think. As he’s getting into this section, he’s dealing with people who are going through oppression, various levels of persecution. At this point, it doesn’t seem to be to the point of violence. It’s more the kind of ostracized by society. They’re starting to be fearful, they’re starting to fall back.

He talks about that a little bit in chapter 10. So there’s a context to all of this that the writer is getting into, and he’s trying to boost them, encourage them, and he’s going to do this through the example of Jesus Christ. And what we’re seeing here in this text, first of all, is that despite all of these examples in chapter 11, Jesus is the example. He is the one that we look to, that we fixate on, that our eyes should be drawn to. As runners are running a race, particularly when you want to win. You know, at some point, you were in the clearing and there’s nobody in front of you. What are you looking for? It doesn’t seem like it now, I know, but I used to actually run a little bit when I was younger, and I ran a few races.

I won every race I ran in, so that was kind of neat. It wasn’t super comp challenging, but I ran in a Harding School of Theology race, and I ran in some race in Memphis. And it is interesting. The whole dynamic of racing is a little strange. You know, you’re trying to reserve yourself for a certain moment or whatever. And I did play sports my whole life, and so I was used to that sort of thing. But there’s there’s something different, right? You’re looking for a prize, and most of the time in the race, you’re kind of looking for the person in front of you, right? And you’re pacing yourself off of them, and you’re waiting for the right moment, not too soon, to then get into the lead.

And that is that’s pretty challenging. you know, and there was times you’re by the end, you push yourself to limits you didn’t know you could you could get to. I remember that happening in one of those races where I was waiting until the last moment, and then I sprinted to the finish, which I had never done in that kind of race before, and you’re exhausted. Fortunately, they had donuts and coffee after, so we got some of that, and I was good to go. But there’s a moment in which you are in front and there’s nobody there anymore. Now, what do you do? What do you what do you look to? You got to be prepared for that moment. You’re not catching somebody, you’re the one to be caught.

It’s a it’s a little different. And there are going to be moments as we kind of transition this illustration a little bit where we are running this life, this faith in a way that there’s no one around us anymore. What are we looking at? Well, we have the encouragements of faith around us, but there’s times when we either are alone or we’re by ourselves or we feel alone. And what the Hebrew writer wants us to understand is we actually aren’t truly alone. There is something to look to, right? There is a goal in mind. There is an example of something that can be done. And that is what we’re pushing for. It’s not just the people around us or the situations around us. There is an exemplar.

2. The Pioneer and Finisher of Faith

There is someone who has run before, who has done this well, and now we can look to him. He is the founder and perfecter. I don’t know what the different translations say that you’re holding. I know what the words can mean, and so I’m going to give you that. The idea really here is kind of like an originator or a pioneer. He is a pioneer and finisher of faith. Some of your translations say of our faith. Our is not actually in Greek. It’s supplied supposedly through context. And it’s what I would call an example of how translation often becomes very man-centered rather than God-centered. And scripture is what’s called theocentric. It’s really focused on God, and this is an example of that. So I would suggest, and I’m not alone.

There are plenty of scholars who suggest this as well. Kind of strike that hour there. It’s not in your Greek New Testament. This is about Jesus’ faith. He is the one, he is the pioneer of faith. He is the finisher of faith. He is the one who has completed this. He’s not the first person to have faith in God, but he is the first person that truly brought this to completion. And now, as we’re going to get to here, he is seated at the right hand of God. He is with God. He is He’s where we all want to be. He has done that. And He’s done it in a way that nobody else has done. He is the trailblazer. He’s the one who’s gone before.

And these others are commended by faith. Right? They have been faithful, but they are not Jesus. Jesus is the true pioneer. He is the one to look to. It’s interesting. Bannister is not the record holder. Pretty quickly it was broken, but he is known as the one who broke the barrier. Probably very few people know the people who came after him. They don’t really remember their names. But probably quite a few of you have heard the name Roger Bannister and may even know who he is before I even started talking about it. You may have even known the date, May 6, 1954. Some of you may have been aware of that before I even went into the story. And it’s not because he’s the fastest person who ever lived, or he is the first runner to ever run.

It’s none of that. It’s because he was a pioneer. He is the one who changed racing, particularly the mile, forever. And that’s the idea the writer’s getting at here with Jesus. He is the originator. He is the pioneer, the trailblazer. He’s the one that we follow. He is the example. And he brought us into a new and better era of faith. Back in chapter 10, he says, we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh. He gave access to the presence of God to all who follow. We can all now come before the throne of grace in time of need. It’s not just a few priests who go at certain times.

We all have that access. And so this is a new covenant. It’s a new era of faith that is all found through Jesus Christ. And it is only through Jesus. Anybody could have broken the four minute mile. Didn’t have to be Roger Bannister. It could have been various other people. And so again, the illustrations break down at some point. But Jesus Himself is the only way. This was his purpose. And he fulfilled this purpose in fullness, and thus this makes him the example for us of the type of life to live. Now let’s get into how he did that. So he’s the example, but what does that mean? Well, essentially the points are right here in verse 2. We are to fix our eyes on Jesus or look to him because he is the pioneer, the finisher of faith.

3. He Endured the Cross: Pain and Shame

But also he endured. He is an example of endurance. Not only that, he endured the cross. Just as we have a race that’s set before us, he endured this race that was set before him, realizing the hope that was going to come from that. So it says who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross. Again, he is this example that we are to compare ourselves to. This is the beginning of this illustration that the Hebrew writer wants to bring out. He wants us first to see the comparison, to see how we’re like Jesus. There was a race set before him, and there’s a race set before us. Verse 1 and verse 2. And now we’re supposed to see the manner in which he ran that race and see how it’s similar to how we ought to run the race, or how we actually are running the race.

The same sorts of things that we’re going through. And so there’s two elements of endurance that he talks about here. The first is pain, and the second is shame. He endured the cross. We’re all very familiar with the idea of pain when it comes to the cross. It’s probably what we think about most. The grueling nature of what would go on through the crucifixion process. It is maybe not the worst form of death, but it is certainly up there among the worst forms of death that any person could die. And certainly the people that this writer is speaking to may have been facing some forms of physical pain. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of violence yet. It may be from a material standpoint, their goods are being confiscated, and they’re going through various types of material difficulty.

But like the cross, the deeper issue is the shame. Jesus goes through pain and he deals with shame as he endures to the end. Your Bible’s probably used the idea of despising in Greek, it’s not really a negative connotation there in that term. It’s more of the idea of like disregarding. It’s so insignificant that it’s kind of no big deal. That’s the idea. We hear the word despise, we kind of think hate, right? He hated the shame. He was angry about the shame. But really, it’s more just the idea of he doesn’t care. The glory of men does not matter to him. He’s going through this and he’s persevering and he’s enduring. And although it is tempting to be very concerned about the glory that comes from men, as men often are, this is not something that is to be held on to by Jesus.

He’s not super concerned about this. And so the way he faces this race before him is not to worry about his self-honour and glory, but to disregard the shame that’s going to be brought upon him. And certainly the entire process of crucifixion was all about shame. Not just in the moment, but just ongoingly. To be part of those who were crucified, which is a death that is meant to publicly shame someone, was something that was to endure. It is one of the challenges that Paul even mentions in Corinthians with following Jesus himself. It seems so foolish and so shameful that you would follow somebody who was executed, who is crucified. That only happened to the worst of the worst, to slaves who were disobedient. Couldn’t even happen to a Roman citizen.

It was people who didn’t matter. They were the ones who were crucified to be shamed publicly before all. And yet now you’re going to claim him as your Lord, as your Savior. It’s a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness, to the Greeks. And yet none of that seemed to matter to Jesus. He wasn’t focused on what people thought. He was focusing on accomplishing the will of God.

And enduring the cross, going through much more pain than we can imagine, and facing much more shame than we can imagine, we are actually not like him. And both of these are meant to be encouraging. They’re meant to kind of prod us along and understand the nature of endurance and what we can handle and what we are able to do. So notice beginning in verse 3 consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary and faint hearted. The whole idea here is look at what Jesus did and then allow that to kind of resonate with you so that you don’t lose heart. You’re like him, but also, he continues, you’re also not like him. You haven’t done what he did.

In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And then he goes into this idea about discipline and training. It’s difficult, it’s hard. You’re going through some tough things, the Hebrew writer is telling these people. But keep in mind, you haven’t resisted yet nearly as much as Jesus.

And yeah, you’ve had some stuff taken away, you’ve been thrown in prison. But you haven’t suffered like he did. Like he was willing to do for you. Right? Do we see both angles here of what the Hebrew writer is doing? So you’re like him, and you’re going to be like him. People are going to reject you. They’re not going to accept you into normal life because you’re following someone that they don’t want to follow, and this is the nature of how things work. But at the same time, you haven’t resisted the same way that he has. Right? And as he goes through this text, we get to verse 12 and following. Now he encourages them to lift their drooping hands and strengthen their weak knees. It’s time to stand up and get to work and be diligent.

It’s not time to be down and depressed and think, woe is me. Right? We look to this person who is an example when we begin to have those feelings, which we do, right? It’s the same thing. Any of you who’ve ever run, you know this. You run for some time and you’re starting to get tired, and you really think, I want to quit. Have you been there? It’s hard. And so you don’t want to keep going. But whatever it is in that moment, you know, you don’t want to embarrass yourself or you want to win the race or whatever it might be, you keep going and you keep pushing. Right? And this is the idea he’s getting at here, right? Look at Jesus. He went through the same things you went through, first of all, and he went through more than you’re going through, second of all.

You can do it. That’s the idea. You can be faithful, you can serve the Lord, you can make it through persecution, through being ostracized, through the shame, whatever it might be. You can do all of that just like Jesus did. The writer is that these people are beginning to back away from their faith. They’re losing confidence. And they’re going to turn from the Lord, and so he’s working to encourage them. What faith truly looks like. Faith doesn’t mean you do it until it gets hard and then you stop. That’s not faith. That’s the message. Faith means you push through even when it’s difficult. Even when it seems impossible, you continue on. Realizing there is a goal in mind. And so the end of this is we are given the picture of Jesus’ enthronement.

4. Seated at the Right Hand of God

He is at the right hand of God. At the right hand of the throne of God. Really, the three ideas are right there in verse two. He’s the founder and the perfection. He endured the cross, and now he’s seated at the right hand of God. He reigns with him. This is the end result. If we are faithful, if we run the way that Jesus ran, then we will share in his glory, which he goes on to say, and is said at other places throughout scripture. As he begins to talk about discipline.

5. Discipline Is Training

The concept here in verse 7, for example, is for its training. It’s for training that you have to endure or for discipline. The idea of discipline here is really the idea of training. So you can kind of like transition those two words throughout the text. It isn’t maybe how we use the word discipline where we think of like punishing or those kinds of things. That can be a part of it, certainly. But really the idea of discipline is the idea that we’re training, that we’re learning, that we’re getting instruction, that we’re growing. That’s the concept here. And the illustration he uses here that God is a father, and a father that truly loves you, he will instruct you, he will train you, he will rebuke you if you need it.

And the whole point of this process is that you will grow and that you will become better. And if we look down in verse 10, the idea here is that he has disciplined us or he’s trained us for our good, that we may share his holiness. Continue down a few verses later. He says to strive for peace with everyone in verse 14, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. This is the way we see the Lord, this process. If we want to be with Jesus, who is now at the right hand of the Father, the way this works is that we run the race like he did. We endure, we work through struggles and difficulties. We understand that all of this is for the purpose of training, for growth.

And as we work through this training and growth, we are developing holiness. We are being sanctified in this process. And he says, with holiness, this is the means by which we are going to see the Lord. It all works together. Jesus reigns, he was rewarded. It was worth it. His struggle was worth whatever he went through. Remember who for the joy that was set before him endured. The joy there is the hope. Hope of what he knew was to come. In verse 4, he says, in your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted. And it’s interesting, that word struggle is the same word in verse one, race. Your struggle, it’s just your race. It’s what you’re running. It’s your faith and action. It’s what you’re doing as you’re serving the Lord.

It’s your struggle. It’s your race through life. The same word, just translated differently in a different context. And there, the exhortation is you haven’t struggled like Jesus did yet. You can continue on. You’ll be okay. The idea is you will be disciplined and trained to the point where you will develop holiness. You will persevere. This will strengthen your faith. And here’s what happens through struggles. There are really two beneficial things that can happen as we struggle. The first is that we recognize our weaknesses and we grow through them. We realize maybe where we fall short. As we struggle and we have difficulties, those things become clear to us. If we never have any struggles, those things never come out.

We don’t take care of every little thing that happens to them and make sure they never have to think or worry about anything. Part of the growing process is allowing them to do that. And then the other part of this, too, as parents, don’t we really enjoy this? The second one is it gives us the opportunity to demonstrate the strength of our faith and devotion to God. When we allow our children to grow and we don’t do everything for them, it gives them the opportunity to then do things that please us. Say, wow. I mean, look at what they can do. Look at what they’ve accomplished. And these are just little things, right? Maybe we say, hey, unload the dishwasher, and they’re a little kid, and they do all this.

I didn’t know they could do that. It gives opportunity to demonstrate where we are, and struggles have those opportunities for us. Either we realize where we need some help and we can seek that, or we realize where we’re strong, and that’s beneficial too. And so struggles, as James says in James chapter one, they’re not something to be looked at and thought they’re just completely negative and worthless and have no benefit, quite the opposite. Actually, we can count it all joy when we face various trials. Knowing that as we work through those things, it’s going to help us grow, it’s going to help strengthen our faith, and it’s going to prepare us for what actually matters most in life, which is not the things of this world.

6. Esau: A Lack of Endurance

But it’s sharing in his holiness and inheriting the blessing, being with him forever. And God doesn’t promise the race will be easy or comfortable. But he does promise it will come with reward. And then we get a little counterexample as this section ends. He brings up Esau. Esau is not an illustration of faith. Quite the opposite.

He is an illustration of lack of endurance, impatience. I mean, have you ever seen that in yourself? Like, I just can’t do it, or whatever the idea is. And it’s sort of like Esau. Sometimes we give up something really important and valuable for something that’s just as small as a single meal. I probably didn’t feel that way to Esau in the moment. You know, he comes in, he is ready to eat. The account shows he kind of has this almost animalistic nature. He just is ready to eat whatever’s there before him, and he’ll doesn’t matter what it is, he’s gonna give up what he has to give up to get it. Pretty dangerous. And so he sacrifices the blessing, inheriting the blessing for something menial and small.

That’s what happens when we lack faith. When we won’t endure. Maybe it seems important in the moment, but looking back, just as it is with Esau, he sought it with tears. I mean, he realized eventually later on how vital and how important this was. And yet he gave it up for something so small. So the writer wants us to understand this kind of from a holistic standpoint that Jesus is the answer. He is the example. He was willing to go through so much for me and for you. And we can endure, we can make it through. We can be people of faith like him. We can follow his example. He has brought us to a place that had never been before, a new era of faith.

Conclusion

And now we’re able to follow him and to endure and be rewarded and be with the Lord forever. A neat element of Bannister’s record setting run, I referenced this earlier, was how he did it. He had two friends, Chris Brasher and Chris Chattaway, who paced him through three-fourths of the race. Brasher did the first two laps. Best I can tell, some of you may be more experienced runners than I am. I certainly never ran track of any sort. Seems like Chris Brasher was the slower of the three, and he took the first two laps. As he got tired, he fell back. And the other man, Chris Chattaway, took the lead. And the whole purpose of this was kind of to pace Bannister. He was faster and bigger and stronger.

He didn’t want to exert too much energy too fast. And then by the end, the final lap, Bannister surged ahead, running alone. Not just in the race itself, but as a legend, transcending the mile. He paved the way for others, including his second pace setter, Chris Chattaway, who a year later broke the four-minute mile himself. Pretty amazing story. I wonder, I tried to look for information on this and just couldn’t find it, but it just has to be the case. Imagine being Chris Chattaway, who not only paced Roger Bannister, but John Landy later. You imagine how many times he sat there imagining watching those two guys finish, breaking the four-minute mile. It’s pretty amazing. He had tried and tried and tried and couldn’t do it, and yet now he had these two people who ran in front of him who did it.

And he was there to watch it all. He’s right there in the background, kind of an amazing picture. We’re kind of like Chattaway. We’re not Bannister. We’re not the pioneers. We’re not the one who paves the way. But we can be the one who’s sitting in the background, blurry and fuzzy, the one nobody’s really paying much attention to.

I loved how Matt talked about that in the talk Wednesday night. It’s not these big moments of faith necessarily that kind of earmark the nature of our faith. It’s the small things day to day. It’s all the training. And eventually Chattaway got some recognition for the things that he did, and he was a record-setting runner in the three miles. So he had his own accomplishments. But at least in this moment, he’s just back there in the background, fuzzy. No one’s paying attention to him. But it changed his life to have this pioneer in the sport before him that he could follow.

He showed us what could be done. We see his endurance and his struggle. And we realize we can share in his holiness and we can be with the Lord forever. We just have to fix our eyes on Jesus. Maybe this morning you need to start that process.

Follow him. That’s what we’re trying to do here. And we want you to join us. We’re told how to start that. It’s fairly simple. We die with Christ. We’re buried with him in the waters of baptism and we are resurrected to a new life. A new life where we don’t follow the things of the world, and we aren’t concerned about the glory of men, but we are worried about the things of God. And to the greatest of our ability, if you want to be a part of that, we want to help you. And we want to point you to scripture and show you what Jesus says and how Jesus says to live. Can we help you do that this morning? Why don’t you come as we stand and we sing?