In this sermon, the speaker discusses the importance of living a life of faith and surrendering to God. He uses examples from the Bible, such as Isaac and Jacob, to show that even though they faced challenges and doubts, God still used them for His purposes. The speaker also emphasizes the need to lay aside any burdens or weights that hinder our spiritual growth. He encourages listeners to focus on the joy that awaits them in heaven and the place that Jesus has prepared for them.

Hands up and says, I started at 75. Somebody says, well, I can't put myself on the altar. Isaac said, I did. Somebody says, well, I can't serve the Lord. I got family problems. Jacob says, tell me about them. Would you love to have four wives, having a lottery, who's going to get you? That's what Jacob had to put up with. And yet God used Jacob. We criticize Jacob and we shouldn't do it. God has deigned to call himself the God of Jacob. And so in Hebrews 11, the writer gives us a catalog of heroes. The Olympic heroes of the faith. And every one of them says to us, now if you live by faith, you can make it. You can make it. You can knock down walls. You can conquer enemies. Surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight. That word weight bothers me. Last Wednesday, I think it was, USA Today had a front page story on the health of America. Did you read that? One third of the American public is overweight. Those are round figures, of course. If a person's going to run in the Olympic, he trains. There's the discipline of it. Let us lay aside every weight. You don't go into the races carrying 50 pounds of flour. And the sin which so easily ensnares us, which I think is the sin of unbelief. And let us run with endurance. Ah, that's a great word. Endurance. It's always too soon to quit. The race that is set before us. Now, in the Greek Olympics, everybody who was going to run was given a lane. You had to stay in that lane. That was your lane. You stay there. That's why in Galatians, Paul said, Who got in on you? Who bumped you out of your lane and got into your lane? And not only that, in the Olympics, only one person won. There was no second place, third place. Now, in the Christian race, we aren't competing with each other. There's no place in the Church of Jesus Christ for the kind of competition the world has. There's just no place for it. We are laborers together with God. And the race that I'm running in the lane that God has given me, I'm not running against you, I'm running against myself. I'm competing with myself. I want to be a better prayer person today than I was a year ago. I want to be a better writer than I was six months ago. I want to be a better preacher than I was yesterday. So I'm competing with myself, not with you. Any ministry that's built on competition is built on the world. How do you run with endurance the race that's set before, looking unto Jesus? Well, why watch Him? He ran the race of God. Who, for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross. We've never had anything quite that bad. We've endured a lot, but we've not had to endure the cross. Despising the shame that is sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. That's why He can be called the author, the originator, and the finisher, the perfecter of our faith. When He starts, He finishes. Having this confidence that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it. God doesn't manufacture losers. We may think we're losers sometimes. Jesus Christ endured the cross for the joy that was set before Him. What was that joy? Well, Jude 24 tells us, Now unto Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His gloriously exceeding joy. He endured the cross and looked beyond the cross for the day when He would take His bride and say, Father, I want you to meet my bride. And we're going to be there. So the writer is telling us that if we look to Jesus by faith, through the Word, He helps us to keep running the race and we'll finish well. Dr. Culbertson used to pray, Oh Lord, help us to end well. Not everybody does. Saul, King Saul, made a great beginning. Tragic ending. Demas made a great beginning. Paul said, Demas, my fellow servant. Tragic ending. Praying that we might end well. F.B. Meyer, whose books you have read, whose sermons we have preached, when he was getting old, said to a friend of his, I prayed to my father to keep the river of my life flowing. I don't want to end in a swamp. And yet some of God's servants have ended in a swamp. Because they did not look to Jesus and let Him carry them through. Now the whole book of Hebrews is written on the theme, Let's go on. Chapter 6, verse 1. Not let's go back. Let's go on. And in Hebrews chapter 1, He starts with the word God. Can't start much higher than that. Hebrews chapter 2, verse 9, He says, we see Jesus. How about that? Chapter 2, three little words. We see Jesus. Chapter 12, three little words. Looking unto Jesus. So, the beginning of the book, the end of the book, The author says, When the outlook is grim, try the uplook. Keep your eyes on Jesus. Don't keep your eyes on Warren Risley or John Calvin. Keep your eyes on Jesus. Don't keep your eyes on Billy Graham or anybody else. Keep your eyes on Jesus. Alright? Let's suppose we do that. Let's just walk through the book of Hebrews and find out what is Jesus doing for us right now to keep us going. Now I know what He did for me on earth. What is He doing for me now up in heaven? God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us. Spoken to us by His Son. Oh, here's the first ministry Jesus is performing for us right now. He's speaking. God speaks to us. The President doesn't phone me. When we call the bank, you don't get the President's bank. You don't even get a person. When we call the airport to see when our friends are going to be flying in, you get that numbers game, you know. Thank you for calling Lincoln Airport. If the flight is coming in today, punch two. If the plane is blue, punch seven. The Cartoon and Publishers Weekly showed a man, obviously he was a writer. You could see a computer and paper and everything. He was holding the phone. He was holding the phone and the phone was saying, thank you for calling Acme Publishers. If you are ordering books, punch one. If you are checking on an order, punch two. If you are an author inquiring about royalties, please hold. God talks to us. When you open your Bible, God opens His mouth. God talks to us. To us. Because we're His children. I was very busy working on a book, and our Judy came in to talk to me about something. I said, honey, can you wait just a short time? I want to finish this. She looked at me and said, and she's the one who reads my mind all the time. She looked at me and said, well, you took time to have me. Why don't you take time to talk to me? Yeah, she's the one. I was taking my pills in the morning. We all take, at this age, you take pills. I said, these pills are the secret of my great beauty. And Judy said, I hope they're industrial strength. Now, the basic theme, a basic theme of the book of Hebrews is God's talking. God talked to Abraham, and God talked to the prophets, and now God's talking to us through Jesus. Through the Word. When you get to the end of Hebrews, in chapter 12, verse 25, he says, See that you refuse not Him who speaks. I mean, if you walk up to me to talk to me, and I turn and walk away, you'd be insulted. God talks to us every day. He wants to talk to me. One of the great joys of my life is to begin the day opening my Bible, and I mean, God talk to me. I don't hear a voice. If I hear anything at all, it's the ringing in my ears from an auto accident I was in many years ago. A drunken driver about killed me. They have a cure now, though, for ringing in the ears. You get an unlisted head. God talks to us. And I meet these people who have built fences in my Bible. They say, that's not for you. That was for the Jew, and this is for the Assyrian. All Scripture is inspired of God, and all Scripture is profitable for doctrine. That's what's right. For reproof, that's what's not right. For correction, that's how to get right. For instruction in righteousness, that's how to stay right. All of it. What is Jesus doing to keep you going? He's speaking. If you want to keep going in the work of the ministry of God, live in your Bible. Live in your Bible. Take time to be holy. Beyond the sacred page I seek Thee, Lord, my spirit pants for Thee, Thou living Word. Let's move on. He's speaking through Jesus, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world, who being the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power. Here's the second ministry He's performing. He is upholding. Now, that word is so marvelous, it has three meanings to it. It means, first of all, Jesus is holding everything up so it doesn't fall down. He hangs the world on nothing. On nothing. That's great. He's holding everything up. Secondly, it means He's holding everything together so it doesn't fall apart. This platform I'm standing on is primarily space, according to the scientists. All these electrons and protons and neutrons and quarks and all these other particles down there are in some kind of array, and this is space. What holds it all together, Jesus? Paul said, in Him all things consist. He holds it all together. The stars don't run into each other. The planets go on their orbits. In fact, things up there are in better shape than they are at O'Hare Field. You can predict years in advance when a comet's going to come. And it's so accurate, the way He's put it all together, that we can shoot people up there and know where they're going to land. You can't do that at O'Hare Field. So, He's holding everything up and He's holding everything together, and that word also means while He's holding it up and holding it together, He's carrying it along to its ultimate destiny. That's great. I'm not worried about atomic bombs. I'm not worried about earthquakes and things. We think about those things, but we don't worry about them, because Jesus is holding everything up and holding it together and carrying it along. Now, if He can do this for the whole universe, can't He do that for my life? Can't He hold me up so I don't stumble? Can't He hold me together so I don't fall apart? And can't He not carry me along to accomplish what He wants to accomplish? Can't He do that for my family? Can't He do that for the church? What's He doing? He's speaking. He's upholding. Upholding all things by the word of His power. That word has power. When He by Himself purged our sins, sat down. The right hand of the majesty on high. Five times you'll find that in the book of Hebrews. He sat down. That's His third ministry. He's sitting. Our Lord is not pacing the golden streets. Worry. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord high and lifted up. His train filled the temple. In a great year of sorrow, Isaiah said, I saw Jesus and He was quite calm. He was sitting. He was sitting. Most of the problems in families and churches, yea, in society are caused by people who can't sit still. The test is can you sit still? I don't mean because you have to. You're in the dentist's chair. I don't mean that. Or you're arthritic and can't walk. I don't mean that. I'm talking about that inner peace down inside. Three verses of scripture have been a great encouragement to me because I'm an activist. I'm the kind of person who wants to keep moving. I get nervous when the red light is a long red light. And when they announce that a plane is delayed, which is normal, I get nervous. I shouldn't. Moses said to the children of Israel, God told them to say this, Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. Just stand still. Naomi said to Ruth at the end of chapter 3 of the book of Ruth, Sit still. Sit still. Boaz is out there making arrangements for the wedding. You just sit still. Psalm 46, be still. Be still and know that I am God. The word be still means take your hands off. Our problem as servants of God is too often we want to get our hands in there. We make a mess out of it. Some of you are worried about children or grandchildren. And you want a medal. Take your hands off. Let God take care of it. You're in a situation that's difficult. Let God work. He'll show you what to do. Jesus Christ is sitting. He's sitting on the throne of glory. He's sitting in the place of authority. Far above all principality and power. No name in Encyclopedia Britannica has a greater name than His name. And He's sitting. And that keeps me going. Because my Savior is up there in control. Chapter 2. You say, are we going to cover every chapter? No. But I want to tell you what Jesus is doing for you now to keep you running the race. He's cheering you on by speaking and upholding and sitting. Chapter 2, verse 10. For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through suffering. He is bringing. Bringing what? Bringing many sons and daughters to glory. It doesn't say He's trying to bring them. It doesn't say He hopes to bring them. It doesn't say that if things work out okay, He will bring them. It says He is bringing them to glory. Peter wrote, but the God of all grace, who has called us to His eternal glory, whatever begins with grace ends with glory. After you've suffered a while, make you perfect. So here we are. God in His grace called us, and He called us to glory. And He is bringing many sons to glory. If you have more than one child in a family, one of them is impatient. We had four children, and Judy was the youngest. She's the one who reads my mind, and she's the impatient one. That is until she had two sons of her own, and she's learning patience the hard way. We'd get in the car to go off on vacation. We'd read a psalm, and then we'd pray, and off we'd go. Stop at the first stoplight, and Judy would say, Are we there? When will we be there? In about five hours. I'll never make it. Ever feel that way? God says, Let's go. I'll never make it. I've got news for you. You're going to make it. Jesus Christ is bringing many sons and daughters to glory. And He's written our names in heaven, and He's got us in His hand, and by the hand, and no one, said Jesus, shall pluck you out of my Father's hand. And He's bringing many sons and daughters to glory. That encourages me. When I get tired on the race, I say, I'm not going to make it. He said, We'll make it. We'll make it. Chapter 4, and verse 15. The Lord Jesus is speaking, and upholding, and sitting, and bringing, and sympathizing. Let's start with verse 14. Chapter 4. Seeing then that we have a great high priest, who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. He said, Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Jesus is sympathizing. Now, let me define the term. The Lord Jesus does not pamper His people. Sympathizing doesn't mean that He says, Oh, I'll kiss it and make it well. Oh, you broke your doll. I'll get you another one. That's the way we grandparents grow juvenile delinquents. It does a child good sometime to learn that a doll costs money. It does a child good sometime to discover that a bicycle left on the street is not replaced that easily. My Lord sympathizes with my weaknesses, not my sins. He'll never sympathize with sin. Spurgeon said, God does not allow His children to sin successfully. Boy, David found that out. Any sinner in Jerusalem could have pulled that thing off, not David. God will not allow His children to sin successfully. He sympathizes with my weaknesses. He looks at me and knows that I have the weaknesses of clay. But that's the kind of people He uses. He chooses the weak things of the world that confound the mighty. And every situation you and I have been through, He has been through, everyone. You come home from a meeting and say, boy, they lied about me down there. They lied about Jesus. He had more trouble with the religious crowd than anybody else. They lied about Him. They called Him names. One of the Messianic Psalms, it says, I am the song of the drunkards. They called Him a glutton and a wine gibber, the friend of prostitutes and publicans and sinners. They lied about Him. They falsely accused Him. They even said that His ministry was of the devil. It's rough. So, when people talk about you and lie about you, the Lord Jesus says, I know how you feel. I went through that. His disciples failed Him. One of them was a traitor. More than one church has had to find a traitor on the staff or somewhere in the officer's list. And your heart is broken. Here's somebody that you're working with, mentoring. And then, crash! Peter denied the Lord three times. That hurts. Here's Peter. You are Simon. You're going to be a rock. And so, Jesus is making this clay into rock. And then, he fails the Lord Jesus three times. That hurts. But in His grace, the Lord Jesus didn't hit him with a baseball bat, didn't zap him with a stroke of lightning. It says, And Jesus looked at Peter. And Peter went out and wept. That's greatness. God said to David in Psalm 32, I will guide you with my eyes. What Jesus did, He just looked at him. My mother used to guide me with her eyes. She'd just look. I got the message. The Lord Jesus is sympathizing. Now, He's seated in heaven on a throne, but it's an accessible throne. We have walked past Windsor Castle. I've been out to Windsor Castle. We've walked past Buckingham Palace. Many times. Never been invited in. Never. In fact, I can't even get in the White House without a special ticket from my senator. The places that we pay for, we can't get in. I mean, I'm paying the bill. And yet, the Lord of the universe says, The door is always open. You don't need an appointment. You don't have to talk to my secretary. Let us come boldly to the throne of grace. Our God is the God of all grace. See, what I need is grace. God in His grace gives me what I don't deserve. God in His mercy doesn't give me what I do deserve. And so I come to the throne of grace. To the God of all grace. This book is the Word of His grace. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of grace. And James says He gives more grace. What we need is grace. All kinds of grace in the Bible. Saving grace. By grace are you saved through faith. Serving grace. 1 Corinthians 15. Paul said, By the grace of God I serve more than all of them. But not I. But the grace of God. Serving grace. You say, I can't go to one more meeting. Sure you can. I cannot preach one more sermon. Yes you can. They're serving grace. They're suffering grace. My grace is sufficient for you. My strength is made perfect in weakness. Suffering grace. They're singing grace. Singing with grace in your heart. Sometimes it takes grace to sing. Sometimes it takes grace to listen to people sing. But it takes grace to sing. We pastors understand this far better than some other people. Because we know our people. At least I hope you know your people. I recall the first church we pastored. There had been a tragic death in a home. And we had the service. Had the funeral. And for weeks afterward I saw the children. The three children of that man and his wife. It was hard to sing. It was hard to sing. But God gave them grace. Paul and Silas were in prison. And they had been beaten. And they were mistreated. They had their civil rights taken from them. And if I had been there I would have been writing my resignation. But they were singing. God gives songs in the night by his grace. So Jesus is sympathizing. And he's saying, come to the throne of grace. The spirit of grace will guide you in your praying. The word of grace will give you the promises that you need. I am the God of all grace. And I give grace upon grace upon grace. And of his fullness have all we received, wrote John. And one wave of grace upon the other. And yet we live like paupers. And we complain. So he is speaking and upholding and sitting and bringing and sympathizing. Chapter 10. Here's another ministry our Lord is performing. Verse 11. Chapter 10. And every priest stands ministering daily. And offering repeatedly the same sacrifices which can never take away sin. There were no chairs in the tabernacle. No chairs in the temple. Because their work was never done. But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever. Sat down at the right hand of God. From that time, waiting. Expecting. Until his enemies are made his footstool. Our Lord is expecting. He's waiting. Now that word means he is prepared and capable of handling whatever is going to come. For he must reign until he puts all of his enemies under his feet. He is expecting. Every time we pray, thy kingdom come. We're a part of this. The Lord Jesus is waiting. We've often said, oh even so come Lord Jesus. Come quickly Lord Jesus. Why is he waiting? He's accomplishing things. He knows what he's doing. He's not inactive. It's not the waiting of inactivity. It's the waiting of preparation. And when things begin to happen, folks, they're going to happen. He is expecting. He is waiting. Chapter 11. Verse 16. Talking about the patriarchs. That now they desire a better, that is a heavenly country. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God. For he has prepared a city for them. What's he doing for us today to keep us going? Preparing. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself. That where I am, there you may be also. He is preparing. When the Lord Jesus was here on earth, he was a carpenter. He said I'm the good shepherd, but he never took care of sheep. He was a carpenter. His father Joseph, his foster father Joseph, was a carpenter. They looked at Jesus and said, is this not the carpenter's son? So from early childhood, Jesus was associated with carpentry. One of the many things I cannot do is carpentry. I don't have the kind of skills. My two brothers are skillful with their hands. They can make and fix anything. I can break anything. When I was in seventh grade, we had to take wood shop and make footstools and little book racks and so forth. At the end of the semester, you know what I had to show for all my work? A pile of shavings. Other people were making that. I just don't have that skill, but Jesus does. He built the universe. He built the universe. And he's building a church. And doing a good job. He knows what he's doing. And he's building a home for us, a place for us up in heaven. He's building a place for his bride. And so as I'm running the race, I, like the Lord Jesus, have to look at the joy that is set before me. One of these days, entering into the presence of Jesus with great joy and receiving the place he has made for me. Now, please don't believe all of these ballads about if you don't live a good Christian life, you're going to live in a dog house. But if you live a real good Christian life, you're going to live in a palace. No, no. Mahalia Jackson used to sing about the people who would have a rusty old halo and a skinny white cloud. No, no. Your salvation is by grace and your heavenly home is by grace. Now, the Lord is saying to us, I love you. And while you're down there running the race, I'll be preparing a home for you. So when you cross the finish line, I'll be there to welcome you. He is preparing. Chapter 13, verses 20 and 21. Now may the God of peace who brought up our Lord Jesus from the dead, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you complete. Make you perfect. Perfect you in every good work to do his will. Working in you, right now, what is well pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. It's a great benediction. Here is a ministry my Lord is performing. That word, make you complete, means to equip. It means to perfect and equip. It's a beautiful Greek word. It's the Greek word katartidzo. And right in the middle of it is the word artist. We get our word artist from this word. Katartidzo. It was a familiar word back in those days. Of course, we don't speak Greek today. But to the people in that day, it was a very familiar word. If I were reading that passage in the Greek to a congregation back in the first century, and I got to that word katartidzo, the doctor would have jumped up and said, hey, I know that word. We use that word when we set a broken bone. You know what the Lord Jesus is doing? The great master artist up in heaven, when he sees that some place in the body of Christ things aren't working, he starts to set that. He's equipping. He is repairing. He does it for me. Sometimes I get a little out of kilter spiritually, and I can't walk like I ought to walk. And then the Lord has to come, and he says, look, I want to set that the way it ought to be. And then a sailor would jump up and say, oh, yeah, we use that word. That means to rig a ship for the journey. The Lord looks down at me and says, well, there's where he's being his ship. He's about to set sail, and he doesn't realize that right down there is a storm, terrible storms coming. I know it. He doesn't know it. I'm going to equip him and get him ready for that storm. Isn't that great? We never have to be afraid of what's going to happen. The future is your friend when Jesus is your Lord. And a soldier would jump up and say, well, wait a minute. The doctors and the sailors aren't the only ones who know that word. We soldiers use it. It means to equip an army. We're an army. Thou therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. No man who wars entangles himself with the things of this world, that he may please the one who's called and drafted him to be a servant, a soldier. We are soldiers in the army. And Jesus looks at me and says, now there's a battle coming right down there, but you're not ready for it. Let me equip you. That's why we come together in church to worship. He equips us. That's why the Word of God is taught and preached. It equips us. That's why the saints pray together and encourage one another. We're helping to equip. Fishermen use that word. The fishermen used it. It means to mend a broken net. It's used in the Gospel of Mark, where it said that Peter and his friends were mending their nets. Now, what makes a net break? Work. See, you and I, as we serve the Lord, our equipment sometimes gets frazzled. That's why we have meetings like this. We've got to come apart. If a fisherman doesn't wash his nets and mend his nets, he's soon out of business. And if a servant of God does not take time to mend his spiritual equipment and let Jesus mend the nets, he's going to be in trouble. That's why we've been here these two days. And so Jesus Christ is speaking, and He's upholding, and He's sitting, and He's bringing, and He's sympathizing, and He's expecting, and He's preparing, and He's equipping. And folks, if that isn't enough to keep me going, something's wrong. The problem that we face, however, is the problem that the people faced who got this letter written to the Hebrews. Dr. Donald Ray Barnhouse used to say in his own inimitable style, the book of Hebrews was written to the Hebrews to tell them to quit being Hebrews. Did he mean that they should forsake their race? Of course not. What a privilege to be born a child of Jacob. No, what he meant by that was everything that the Jews trusted wasn't going to last. Oh, behold this beautiful temple, said the disciples. And Jesus said, yeah. The day's going to come when not one stone will be on top of another. You trusting in a building? Look at our beautiful priesthood. Notice the garments of our high priest. He's gorgeous. Oh, the day's going to come when you won't have a priesthood. You won't have an altar. You won't have a sacrifice. It'll all come to an end. Then what? You're holding on to the things you can see, says the book of Hebrews, when the things you can't see are going to endure forever. Live by faith. The book of Hebrews is one of three commentaries written on one verse of Scripture. Habakkuk 2.4, the just shall live by faith. Romans explains who the just are. Galatians tells us how they live. And Hebrews tells us it's by faith. And our tendency is to lean on crutches. Oh, the church is going to go well. We have some wealthy people in the church. Don't depend on that. Overnight they could become your enemies. And so the Lord Jesus Christ is doing everything necessary to keep me running the race, and so I won't give up. I suppose all of this could be wrapped up in one word. He's interceding. Interceding. Which means He's representing me before the Father's throne, and He's rooting me, cheering me onward to finish the race. Abraham made it. Nehemiah made it. The galaxy of the greats in Hebrews 11 made it. Did they make mistakes along the way? Sure. Remember, the victorious Christian life is a series of new beginnings. And if you're running the race and you trip and fall, you don't lie there and whine. You get up and run. All the while, by faith, looking to Jesus. And saying, He's the author. He's the finisher. He's the alpha. He's the omega. He started this. He will finish it. I'll trust Him. Thank you, Lord Jesus, for your faithful, untiring, unending ministry. While we sleep, you stay awake and take care of the whole universe. Thank you. You understand us, and you sympathize with us, and you encourage us. And I pray, Lord, that all of us will end well as we run the race. Grant this. Father, in Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Amen.