Robert Constable addresses the issue of discouragement, emphasizing that it often stems from self-occupation and the burdens we take upon ourselves. He illustrates this through the experiences of biblical figures like Moses, Elijah, and Jeremiah, who faced discouragement despite their close relationship with God. Constable reassures that even great servants of God can feel discouraged, but encourages believers to trust in God's faithfulness and to remember that they are not alone in their struggles. He concludes by highlighting the importance of looking to Jesus as the ultimate source of strength and encouragement.

I'm beat. We've all said it, haven't we? Last week we considered the problem men have in their suffering. We found from the Word of God that suffering is never punishment. It is always discipline. It is God leading us forward in his purpose for us to conform us to the image of his Son, and he knows how to work in human material. He knows what we need. He knows what he needs to do in us and through us and for us in order to accomplish this great result. This is what he's doing. It involves suffering. But when we think of suffering in those terms, it becomes altogether different than if we think of it as punishment for something we've done, which the Lord Jesus has already borne for us. But tonight we want to consider that other problem that I'm sure all of us have experienced, and that is the problem of discouragement. Ever be discouraged? Well, I'm sure we've all known some discouragement. It's a loss of courage, a loss of heart, and it comes upon us at various times. It comes upon us in sickness. It comes upon us in many of the circumstances of our lives, and that is to do partly with the war in which we are involved, for we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, the rulers of the darkness of this world. Wickedness in high places. And as we struggle to live for God in the world, we come to periods of great discouragement, and we think we're not making it. Our lives are not what they should be. And this doesn't only manifest itself in those periods during which we feel low, but it reveals itself all along after that. It is possible to get discouraged and to live with discouragement until pretty soon you're so used to it that you don't realize that your activities have been shut off by it, and you're not accomplishing anything for God. Why? Because some discouragement has got you down, and you may be used to it by now, but it's still the reason perhaps why you don't feel as though your life counts the way it should. Now largely it seems to me, I submit this to you for your thinking, largely discouragement grows out of self-occupation. We are thinking about ourselves, and you know this is always a discouraging thing. You get discouraged, and the discouragement is largely a matter of self-occupation. Now I want this evening, as we've done before, to consider in the word of God some people who had the problem. And then as you relate to these people, perhaps it will help with the problem in our lives. Now Moses was a great man, wasn't he? He was a great man. He had visitations from God. God speaking of it in the word of God says that he talked to Moses face to face as a man talks with his friend. How many people have an experience like that? You know we think, oh that's great. If you don't have an experience like that, never be discouraged again. And he had done great miracles, great miracles in the name of the Lord. He was a man with whom the Lord was. He said to the Lord on one occasion, if thou go not with us, send us not up. And the Lord said, I'll be with you all the time. Don't be discouraged, carry on. And Moses would go on, great man with God. But I don't know, when I asked you last week if you could tell me somebody in the Bible that had experienced suffering, I didn't have to wait long for an answer. Everybody said the same thing. Everybody said Job. I don't know who you'd say was the most discouraged man in the Bible, but I think before we're through this evening you'll admit that Moses probably was of the most discouraged men in the Bible. He was not immune to discouragement just because he was a great servant of God and had done great miracles and knew the presence of God with him. That didn't save him from discouragement. That's something I want us to think about for a minute because I think we get ashamed of ourselves when we get discouraged or when we have some of these problems. We think, oh I shouldn't do that. If I was a good Christian that wouldn't happen to me. Oh no, no no. Moses was a great man of God, but he still got discouraged. So don't be too discouraged by the fact that you get discouraged, because you're in good company. Turn to Numbers chapter 11. Let's turn to the 11th verse of that chapter. Let's turn to verse 10 for the sake of the connection, and let's read this now. Then Moses heard the people weep throughout their families, every man in the door of his tent, and the anger of the Lord was kindled greatly. Moses also was displeased, and Moses said unto the Lord, Wherefore hast thou afflicted thy servant? And wherefore have I not found favor in thy sight, that thou layest the burden of all this people upon me? Have I conceived all these people? Have I begotten them, that thou shouldst say unto me, Carry them in thy bosom as a nursing father, Beareth the suckling child unto a land which thou swearest unto their fathers? When should I have flesh to give unto all this people? For they weep unto me, saying, Give us flesh that we may eat. I am not able to bear all this people alone, because it is too heavy for me. And if thou deal'st with me, kill me, I pray thee out of hand. If I have found favor in thy sight, let me not see my wretchedness. Ever pray like that? Did you ever feel that low? You know, this man, he knew what discouragement was. He knew what discouragement was. But you know what his problem here was? You know the story right about him here is that the people had been going a long time without any meat. They'd been feasting on the manna. They'd been getting along all right. They had water. This wasn't a problem now. But they hadn't had any meat. And they said, Oh, it was great back in Egypt. We used to have this, that, and the other. I don't know why anybody would have thought it was great to have leeks and onions and garlic, but then that's something else again. That's my own opinion. But they thought it was great as they remembered it. They wanted meat. And they came to Moses with their complaining. And you know what Moses did? He took as his responsibility what God had said was his responsibility. Now, God had promised to take care of this people. God had promised to carry them in his bosom. God had promised to provide every needful thing for them. He promised to see them through. Moses didn't have a thing to do with that. He didn't have to do anything to make God make good on his promise. All he had to do was trust the Lord. But sometimes, you know, we do like Moses did. We take the idea that we've got to solve our problems, that we have to bear the burden. And we feel real sorry for ourselves, just like Moses did here. And we get discouraged, like Moses got discouraged. And he got his attention on the failures of the people instead of on the faithfulness of God. And as you and I read this in Numbers, we say, you know, Moses, what's the matter with him? Why did he do that? Didn't he know? Well, yeah, we say that. But what about us? You know, we have the same faithful God. We have the same word. He's going to do great things in, through, and by us. And we get discouraged, because somehow we think that it's up to us, instead of remembering that it's up to him. I want to go on with this story a little bit here. The Lord said to Moses, Gather seventy men of the elders of Israel, whom thou knowest to be elders of the people, and officers over them, and bring them unto the tabernacle of the congregation, that they may stand there with thee. And I will come down and talk with thee there. And I will take of the Spirit which is upon thee, and will put it upon them. And they shall bear the burden of the people with thee, that thou bear it not thyself alone. God is saying here to Moses, if you're so impressed with what a heavy burden you have, and you can't leave it to me, I'll give you a few other people to share it. And so they appointed seventy other people. And Moses no longer could feel like he was the principal goat. He could feel at least somebody else was under it. And the Lord recognized this. And so the Lord made the provision of these men. And say unto the people, Sanctify yourselves against tomorrow, that ye shall eat flesh. For ye have wept in the ears of the Lord, saying, Who shall give us flesh to eat? For it was well with us in Egypt. Therefore the Lord will give you flesh, and ye shall eat. Ye shall not eat one day, nor two days, nor five days, neither ten days, not twenty days, but even a whole month, until it comes out at your nostrils. And it will be loathsome to you, because ye have despised the Lord which is among you, and have wept before him, saying, Why came we forth out of Egypt? And Moses said, You can understand this now, can't you? Just imagine you were Moses. And the Lord said this to you. Here's what Moses said back. The people among whom I am are six hundred thousand footmen, and thou hast said, I'll give them flesh that they may eat a whole month. You know what Moses said? Well, even you can't do that. What do you mean you're going to feed these people? He said, Shall the flocks and the herds be slain for them to suffice them? Or shall all the fish of the sea be gathered together for them to suffice them? And the Lord said to Moses, Is the Lord's hand short? Thou shalt see whether my word will come to pass unto thee or not. You know, I always like Moses, because he talks back to the Lord. The Lord says something to him, and he says, Don't tell me that. And then the Lord says, All right, you watch. Now I'm going to say this to you people, because we've been talking about things like this from time to time, and that is that God is prepared to do great things through all of us and each of us. And I am afraid that some of us have a way of saying, Yeah, he'll do it through him or him or somebody else, but he's not going to do it through me. You know, and you can say that in your own heart and in your own mind. Nobody can know about it, and I can't argue with you about it, nobody can contradict you, but you keep this inside, and you say, Well, that's great for somebody else. May I remind you that there isn't a person in this room, but what God is prepared to do great things through. I didn't say it was prepared, I said it is greater than you have any idea about, if you'll only believe it. And you say, Me? Do you know who you're talking to? Like Moses said, Do you know the 600,000 footmen? That's the way we do it. Not me. But I remind you, you. God is not limited. God says, Is my hand shortened? Does it matter how the vessel is? Does it make a particle of difference whether you think I can do it or not? No, it doesn't. It doesn't make a bit of difference about that. He is able and he is ready. Let's believe him for it. And Moses went out and told the people the words of the Lord and gathered the 70 men of the elders of Israel and set them round about the tabernacle. I'll hand Moses credit for this. When he talked things over with the Lord, he always came out believing. Sometimes somebody tells us something that's just too good to be true and we keep it to ourselves to see whether it comes out that way before we say anything. Moses didn't do that. Moses came right out and said, This is what the Lord is going to do. And if Moses reacted the way he did when the Lord said it, you may imagine how the people reacted when Moses said it. Now, they said, He says a lot of goofy things, but this time he's overboard. But he went out and he told them what the Lord was going to say and what the Lord was going to do. And God made good. Now, it's easy to assume too much. It's easy to assume the burden beyond which the Lord intends us to assume it. To be too much impressed with the limitations and not to be impressed enough with the power and the resource that is available to us. This was Moses' problem. Now, this can become a sin. God lives and God works, and this God of yours and mine is the same God Moses had. He worked the same way today as he worked then. He's just as competent today, just as powerful today as he was then. But this, as I say, can become a sin if you go on back to Numbers 20. They're having problems again. This time it's water. Let's start at verse 7. The Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Take the rod and gather thou the assembly together, thou and Aaron my brother, and speak ye unto the rock before their eyes. And it shall give forth his water, and thou shalt bring forth to them water out of the rock, so that ye shall give the congregation and their beasts drink. And Moses took the rod from before the Lord as he commanded him. And Moses and Aaron gathered the congregation together before the rock, and he said unto them, Hear now, ye rebels, must we fetch you water out of this rock? And Moses lifted up his hand, and with his rod he smote the rock twice, and the water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their beasts also. And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron, saying, Because ye believe me not to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them. And this was the point at which Moses, what was his sin? He didn't follow the instructions of the word of God that had been given to him. God said, Go out and speak to the rock. And if Moses had spoken to the rock in the name of the Lord, and the water came out, who would have got the credit? The Lord would have. But when Moses goes out with his stick, and he says, Must we bring water out of the rock? And he hits the rock. He gives the impression that he's doing something. You see, he took more on him than he was supposed to take on him. In the one case, he took the burden on. In this case, he stepped into God's shoes as it were. Must we bring you water? He didn't have any power to bring water, but he assumed that he did. We must be careful with that. The one thing leads to the other. If we get so discouraged because we feel that the burden upon us is too great, we are apt to swing the other way and think that what we do accomplish, we accomplish in our own strength. And believe you me, that will lead to discouragement. Let's turn to Deuteronomy, chapter 33, verse 26. Moses is about to leave the people, and he says, There is none like unto the God of Jerusalem, who rideth upon the heaven in thy help, and his excellency on the sky. The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms, and he shall thrust out the enemy from before thee. He and shall say, Destroy them. Israel then shall dwell in safety alone. The fountain of Jacob shall be upon the corn, upon a land of corn and wine. Also his heavens shall drop down dew. Happy art thou, O Israel, who is like unto thee, O people saved by the Lord, the shield of thy help. And who is the sword of thy excellency? And thine enemies shall be found liars unto thee, and thou shalt tread upon their high places. Moses got over his discouragement. He learned before he came to the end of the road, God wanted to bless, and he would bless. Believe him for it, and leave it to him. So that's our first lesson. Leave it with the Lord. Trust in the Lord, and he will bring it to pass. Now there is another man who was greatly discouraged. He was a great man, too, and his story is over in 1 Kings, chapter 19, verse 2. Then Jezebel sent a messenger unto Elijah, saying, So let the gods do to me an moral, so if I make not thy life as the life of one of them, by tomorrow about this time. And when he saw that, he arose, and went for his life, and came to Beersheba, which belongeth to Judah, and left his servant there. You remember the story. Elijah has had the time of his great victory. The prophets of Baal have been slain, and the word got to Jezebel. And you know Jezebel. Wow! And he knew her, too. And he knew if she made a threat, the chances were she'd carry it out. He said by the next day that time he'd be dead. And off he went, scared to death. He went a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree, and he requested for himself that he might die. And said, It is enough. Now, O Lord, take my life, for I am not better than my father. And as he lay and slept under the juniper tree, behold, then an angel touched him and said, Arise and eat. O Lord, take my life. Take my life. Well, let's say what we can in mitigation of the way he felt. He was tired out. He had been one busy man, and he had gone a long ways. And he'd run far before he got under this juniper tree. And you ever notice that when you're physically tired, you get discouraged easily? And then you feel bad, and you think you're spiritually on the wane, you know. Check that out. If you're discouraged sometimes, go to bed. I mean, get some rest, and get over the weariness. Because physical weariness can really make you discouraged. And this is just as natural as can be, and there's no way to get around it. Wonderful thing about it is that the Lord deals with this first with Elijah. He let him rest. He took care of the physical problem. And he sent him on his way. He fed him here, and he fed him such food from the angel that he was able to go in the strength of that food for 40 days and 40 nights. The Lord really charged him up. Sent him on his way. And then he got tired again. He had a long walk. And all the time he's thinking about himself, and all the problems he had, and what he tried to do, and how the way people didn't respond, and all of this, all of this walking and thinking about himself all the time, until he's finally so discouraged again he can hardly stand it. And once again, it's a matter of being concerned about himself, being self-centered. Chapter 19, verse 9. And he came thither unto a cave, and lodged there. And, behold, the word of the Lord came to him. And he said unto him, What doest thou here, Elijah? And he said, I have been very jealous of the Lord God of hosts. For the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altar, slain thy prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left, and they take my life to take it away. And the Lord said, Go forth and stand upon the mount before the Lord. And, behold, the Lord passed by in a great and strong wind, went the mountains, and break in pieces the rocks before the Lord. But the Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire was still smoke. And it was so, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle, and went out, and stood me entering into the cave. And, behold, there came a voice unto him that said, What doest thou hear, Elijah? You see, we are told in this passage what Elijah was looking for. He had come out of Gilead, and he had come to bring a message from the Lord, and he preached to the king, and he had a great experience there with the prophets of Baal. And what he was looking for was a great national revival that was going to sweep the nation like a fire, like an earthquake, like a wind, and he was going to be involved in it, as kind of a person he was. But you see, he had his mind on the things, on the great movement, on the earthquake, on the wind, on the fire. And the Lord is saying there, it is not in what shows, it is not in what you expect. And I say this for us here, it is not on the people that are the great creatures, or that are the ones that make all the noise, or the ones that seem to be in the forefront all the time. He involves you, you see. He says to you, as he says to Elijah, What are you doing where you are? What about you? What are you doing here? And he is saying that to each of us. What are we doing here? We don't need to get involved in the filigree and campaign to be used with the Lord. We don't need to get involved in some great city-wide movement to get used with the Lord. We don't need to be radial creatures to get used with the Lord. The Lord is prepared to use us where we are, each one of us. He is not looking for a big shake-up. The Lord goes on talking to him. He said, Go, verse 15, Go, return on my way to the wilderness of Damascus, and when thou comest, anoint Ezekiel to be king over Syria, and Jehu the son of Nimshi, shalt thou anoint to be king over Israel, and Elisha the son of Shaphat shalt thou anoint to be prophet in thy room, and it shall come to pass, and him that escapeth the sword of Ezekiel shall Jehu slay, him that escapeth from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha slay. Yet I have left me seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth that hath not kissed him." Now, what is the Lord saying to Elijah? He is saying two things. On the one hand, you are not finished yet. You seem to think you are all washed up out here. Get back to work. I've got a job for you to do. I've got two kings for you to anoint and a prophet to be your successor. You know, those were important assignments. He said, now go get to work, and then he said, and all you've done, you act as though there's no results from what you've done. You're so discouraged you think there's nobody else. There's seven thousand people in Israel that haven't bowed the knee to Baal. Your work is paying off. You may not see it. You may not know it. But I'm accomplishing my purpose in your life. Now get going and keep it up. Carry on. That's what he said to Elijah. Do your thing in your place and leave the blessing to me. Now there's another man who I always feel very sorry for in his discouraging. That's the man Jeremiah. So turn to Jeremiah chapter 20, verse 7. Now Jeremiah has been out preaching. You remember the story, don't you, about Jeremiah? He was a young fellow, and he was a priest in Amathoth, his little village, and God called him and told him he wanted him to be a prophet. And Jeremiah said, Who, me? And God said, Yes, you. Not me, yes, you. But I'm only a young fellow, and I don't speak very well either. All the reasons, and the Lord said, Don't tell me about you. I know all about you. Just do what I tell you. And so he persuaded Jeremiah to go out and preach and be a prophet. And Jeremiah went out and preached, and he preached his heart out. He preached about the suffering of Jehovah over sin. He preached about the inevitability of the judgment that must come on sin. He preached about the triumph God would have over sin. Oh, what messages that man had! But nobody paid any attention to him. It's tough to have a good message and have nobody pay any attention to it. And so we come up to where we are. We're in verse 7 of chapter 20, he says, Oh, Lord, thou hast deceived me. And here he means to say, You've persuaded me. You sent me out on this. And I was deceived. I was persuaded. Thou art stronger than I, and hast prevailed. I am in derision daily. Everyone mocks me, for since I speak, I cry it out. I cry violent and spoil, because the word of the Lord has made a reproach unto me. I am in derision daily. And I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. Ever feel that bad about preaching? I wouldn't be surprised. There are some men in this room tonight that are sought to minister out of the Lord's word. And somebody has said something, just some little remark. And you gave it up as a bad job, because somebody didn't like it. Believe me, a lot of people don't like it when I do. And then it's easy to do this. But this man had to do it for you. And he was in derision daily, and everybody mocked him. And they finally got through to him. And I can imagine him coming home, can't you? One evening after he'd had a hard time out at a street meeting, and throwing his turban on the couch and saying, I'm through. That's what he did. I'll not preach ever again. I won't make mention of him anymore. Oh, look at the words that follow this. But his words was in my heart, and a burning fire set up in my bones, and I was weary with forebearing, and I could not stay. He tried to stay home and not preach. Well, that was harder than going out and facing the people. So he was back at preaching again. Oh, I'm discouraged this man got. Doing the thing the Lord persuaded him to do. The Lord wants to persuade you and me to be for him what he wants us to be in this world. Be persuaded. Listen to what he wants to do for you. Don't turn it off and say that's for somebody else. Have this experience that Jeremiah had. Thou hast persuaded me, and I was persuaded. I gave in finally to do the thing you asked me to do, Lord. And look at the mess it turned out. Okay, okay. Whether it was a mess or not, Jeremiah didn't have a thing to do with that. All he had to do was to do what he was told. God got the glory. This is the same man who wrote. Thy words were found, and I did eat them, and thy words was unto me the joy and the rejoicing of my heart. You know, when we're seeking to do the will of God, we're forced to come back to his word. And as we come back to his word, the discouragement flows out, and the joy and the rejoicing come out. We eat it, but take it for our own and appropriate it. And we'll have that experience. And I must hurry on to the other man who was discouraged. Who is he? Somebody can tell me real quick. Nope. Nope. What? Jonah. That's our man. All right, let's see what happened to him. Well, we know what happened to him, don't we? He wasn't going to get taken in this kind of a deal. Jonah, a Jew. And the Jews had been under the under the Assyrians. They'd been ground down. They were oppressed, and they hated the other beings. They hated them. And then the Lord said to Jonah, I want you to go up to Nineveh, and I want you to preach to them up there. Oh boy, Jonah said, look, I'll go anywhere else you want me to go, but not to that. Not to Nineveh. Those people, you know. And you know all he did to get out of it. But he finally got up to Nineveh, and when he preached to his dismay and his horror, everybody believed him. Just the other way around, didn't it? Everybody believed him. And the whole town, the whole town, from the king to the lowest man in the town, repented in sackcloth and ashes. You would think that Jonah would say, hallelujah, boy, what a great revival I ever saw, which he certainly was. No. These were Assyrians. He didn't want to see Assyrians saved. He didn't want to see people in Nineveh spared. Not that bunch. And so because God blesses, he gets all upset. And he gets so discouraged, and here in the fourth chapter of Jonah we hear what he has to say. But it displeased Jonah, chapter 4, verse 1, exceedingly, and he was very angry. He prayed unto the Lord and said, I pray thee, Lord, was not this my saying when I was yet in my country? In other words, he said, if I preached to him, I'd get saved. But I got saved, and Jonah said, see, I told you. Amen. Therefore I fled unto Tarshish, for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentant thee of the evil. Therefore now, O Lord, take I beseech thee my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live. And the Lord said, doest thou well to be angry? Doest thou well to be angry? Let's move on a few verses. He lay down then, went to sleep, or lay down in the middle of the day, and the Lord made a vine to grow out of a gourd and gave him some shade and everything, and he got some rest. Again, the Lord said, down, boy, and rest a while, get over this. And then in the morning, overnight, the vine died, and the sun comes up in the morning, and oh, is Jonah upset. And it came to pass, and the sun did arise, that God prepared a vehement east wind, and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah that he fainted, and wished himself to die, and said, it's better for me to die than to live. And God said to Jonah, doest thou well to be angry for the gourd? And he said, I do well to be angry. Ever feel like that? Then said the Lord, thou hast had pity on the gourd, for which thou hast not labored, neither madest it grow, which came up in the night, and perished in the night. And should I not spare none of that great city, wherein there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left, and also much cattle? Now, is it possible that our discouragement comes from the source that Jonah's discouragement came from, and that's our prejudices? We've already made up our minds the way the Lord ought to do things. The Lord doesn't always do things the way we think he ought to do them. He has his own way of doing things. He'd like to involve us in that way. Oh, but we have our ideas about the way it ought to be done, and if the Lord isn't going to do it our way, then do it alone. And we get discouraged if the Lord happens to have a way of doing it that way, if we insist. But he speaks to the blessed servants, and he listens to their arguments, and he deals with them. Jonah forgot the word of God to Abraham back in Genesis 23, where he said that through the children of Abraham all the nations of the world would be blessed. Jonah thought that God was just to bless the Israelites. We are the people, not those people. Ever get that idea? We're the people. We're the ones God ought to bless, not the others down the street, not the others cross-country. We're the people God ought to bless, and unless he's ready to cooperate the way we think he ought to do it, well, we just go our own way. We can go without a lot of blessings if we do that, and we can run into a lot of discouragement on that basis, if God is going to bless the way he decides to bless. And if we want to fit into his program, we're going to share that blessing. So prejudice blinded him to the purpose of God. You know that it's possible to get real pious about this and real spiritual, and to say, oh, I wish the Lord had come. I wish the Lord had come. This sounds good, to say I wish the Lord had come. This means you're spiritual, you want the Lord to come. But you know sometimes it may be you just want to get out of the crack. You just are discouraged. You just can't see any future. You can't see how the Lord can bless since things are going up the wall the way they are. And so you say, come Lord, get us out of this, please. And let's not let our discouragement become pious discouragement of all things. Saying I wish the Lord would come under circumstances like this is just like saying, it's too much. Let me die. And all these men said that. What's the cure? Now we spend a lot of time on the problem. We can't spend much time on the cure, but let's turn to it in Hebrews 12. And I kept the comments that I want to make about the cure short, because I want you to think about the cure. I don't care whether you remember all this about the problem, except that you relate it to yourself and you identify the problem and isolate it and say, now this is me. And then you need to know what the cure is. The problem may affect each of us differently, you know, like Moses or like Jeremiah or like Jonah. But the cure is the same for all of us. Wherefore, Hebrews 12, seeing we are all so compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, that is, we've got all these examples set in front of us. Let us lay aside every weight of sin. And the sin which doth so easily beset us, what is that sin? Now sometimes we think of this in the generic sense. We're talking about all kinds of sin or moral evil or something like that. That's not necessarily what's involved here. Discouragement can become a sin, and it easily besets us. And when discouragement besets us, it's a lack of justice, occupation with ourselves, and it's a sin. Lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself. Lest ye be weary, think ye of him. Remember, no matter how great the discouragement may be, the Lord Jesus went the rocky way. And to consider him, that will take the discouragement away. We think of the way he went for us. He's given us a pretty easy road.