I used to enjoy road races; distant races, races that required endurance and outlasting those around me. What a joy to grind out a race and at the end slowly pass those whose endurance had ran out. It was a powerful feeling. Those days are gone. It is not that I am not competitive. The competitive juices still are pretty strong in me. The reason is simple; I just don’t win many races anymore. I have no endurance. And the reason for that is pretty simple. But before I explain it to you, listen to what Hebrews 12:1 (NASB95) says, 1 Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.
The Christian’s life is likened to a foot race
that everyone who knows the Lord participates in. And the reasons for failure that come in that race are
astonishingly similar to the reasons we fail in real life races. You have to
giggle at Wuest’s definition of the Greek word translated encumbrance. “The word is ogkon (ὀγκον) “bulk, mass,” hence,
“a swelling, superfluous flesh.” 1 Why don’t I have endurance to run anymore? I have ‘swelling superfluous flesh.’ Anyone
else have that problem? Jesus says that
if we wish to run the race of God with endurance we have to lay aside every
encumbrance or every bit of swelling flesh.
Five years ago, Ben and I went on a
backpacking trip. Whatever we felt
necessary to take on the trip, including our food, our tent and our sleeping
bag, had to be carried on our back. It didn’t take
long to realize that not everything one might normally take on a long trip was
worth having on this trek. Expositor’s says: “The
Christian runner must rid himself even of innocent things which might retard him.
And all that does not help hinders. It is by running he learns what these
things are. So long as he stands he does not feel that they are burdensome and
hampering.” 2 The
items in mind were not necessarily bad things but they were things that if
carried too long, made running with endurance nearly
impossible (- a busy schedule, a time and resource
consuming hobby, a preoccupation with a career or a relationship, etc.). Good things along the road of life,
when picked up and carried, can keep us from running the race of endurance.
But the Bible also says that we are to “lay aside the sin which so easily entangles us.” In Bible times
people often wore longer robes that, when running, could easily get tangled around
their legs and feet tripping them up. They would deal
with those robes, getting them up out of the way, before they set out running. Sin has to be dealt with or it will
trip us up and keep us from running. The sin in this passage seems to be unbelief,
or a lack of faith, but the truth of sin’s entanglement stretches from unbelief
onward into all types of sin.
Here is the problem, once we get weighed down,
tangled up, and tripped; it isn’t always easy to get up, cut away the tethers
of the vines of sin and rid ourselves of the weights that are keeping us from
effective Christian running. This is
the point of biblical counseling. It is to help
another person up, unburden and untangle them from those things holding them
back, and get them back to the race. Can I encourage
you that if you are weighed down by your lifestyle or life circumstances, if
you are tied down and tripped up by a particular sin that is keeping your
bottom on the pavement more than your Christian running shoes, let someone help
you. Through prayer
and careful training assignments from God’s Word, they can help you ditch the
items holding you back and allow you to run again, with endurance, the race set
before you. Tri County has counselors right now in the process
of getting certification in counseling and they want to help you, your
co-worker, your family member or your friend, get back to
successful running.
1 Wuest, K. S.
(1997). Wuest's word studies from the Greek New Testament: For the English
reader (Heb 12:1). Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
2 Wuest, K. S.
(1997). Wuest's word studies from the Greek New Testament: For the English
reader (Heb 12:1). Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Sounds like someone needs to start running again! JK Great post. Superfluous flesh...hahahaha
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