We continue our sprint through Hebrews 12:1-3, a fantastic summary of our great journey through the Spirit-empowered Christian life. This passage is worthy of our repeated consideration and reflection. Some portions of the Bible really jump out at us, providing vital life-principles and rationales for our conduct of the Christian’s “worthy walk.” Have you ever thought in a time of great personal pressure, “I need peace now!” and gone to Philippians 4:6-7? Try it sometime. There’s an actual procedure for you to work through in prayer with the promise of peace from God Himself. What about the awesome utility of that central passage in the Law, Deuteronomy 6:4-5? Next time you find yourself thinking, “What is life all about anyway? What’s the point?” take that powerful medicine from Dr. Moses! It’s better than anything your MD can write you a scrip for. The thought process of 1 Peter 2:21-25 is one I like to mention a lot these days—a concrete way we can and must imitate Christ through suffering in His pattern. These little passages that really pack a punch need to be handy in our hearts, ready for deployment at a moment’s notice. Chunks of the Text like this are easy to memorize if you go to them repeatedly; you don’t even have to try.

In exploring the command in Hebrews 12:1-3 to “run the race that his set before us,” I want to focus on that word “race.”  This Greek word, AGON has come into English in the form of the word agony. It is only used a handful of times in the NT, always by Paul except in this case of Hebrews 12. While agony means suffering physical or emotional pain of some sort, the Greek word means some kind of struggle or contest. The NASB translates it variously by context as “fight,” “opposition,” “conflict,” “struggle,” and “race” as here. Yes, it can be agony to run up Mount Washington, so I’m told, but the origin of that word is not really the pain of the endeavor but the fight involved in mastering it.

As a pastor I love to point out where the Bible touches on our common experience and reflects life as we encounter it. In this case, everyone can agree that life is a struggle! It’s hard, just like a race or a fight.  In my limited athletic career, both in junior high school and college, I had a fairly consistent experience before a contest. Whether it was running the quarter mile (badly) in eighth grade or stepping up to a “graded bout” in Plebe boxing, the challenge of the engagement always made me feel sick. Adrenaline flooded my system, and the anticipation of the inevitable suffering involved made me wince for at least half of a day prior to the event.

In both types of contest, the suffering was primarily cardiovascular—sprinting a quarter mile all-out is a “gut race” that in the opinions of many should always result in the participant throwing up at the end. Boxing does involve getting hit in the head and midsection, but punches don’t hurt nearly so acutely during the fight as your lungs. Head shots do damage you will feel later, but they don’t “hurt” as the seconds tick by. Gasping for air hurts. My greatest fear in boxing was running out of air before the round ran out of time!

Both these cardio challenges required me to “keep up my wind.” If I ran the day before a boxing match, for some reason I had a better flow of energy when the bell rang.  A little stress-recovery cycle put me in position to perform the next day.  These events were high stress, and that stress was healthy. I did not like the feeling of impending suffering, but it helped me grow up and embrace the principle of rising to the occasion of duty that would require exertion and even cause pain.  I am still learning this daily.

The classic Western High Noon, starring Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly builds this sense of agonizing anticipation for about 90 minutes as Marshall Kane waits for the Frank Miller gang to come try to murder him in the street. Will Kane as a lawman is duty-bound to face the criminals while everyone around him tries to convince him to run and declines his requests for help. I don’t know of a better “man-up” movie that shows the contrast between those who get things done that need doing and those who make up excuses. America could use a little more Gary Cooper.

The writer of Hebrews calls the Christian life a race that has been set before us because he’s acknowledging that the struggle is hard. It hurts. It requires constant nutrition and exercise to “keep our wind up.” But think about that second wind! Have you ever had enough wind to get through a race or a bout? It feels awesome when you get into “the zone.” You perform at a high level, and though you may not win the contest against your opponents, you bring your body into submission and win the battle against your own weakness. Just like in High Noon, the release we will experience when our conflict is over will make the fight worth it. Our finish line in Hebrews 12:1-3 is when we meet our Savior. He ran a much more painful race without shrinking from the task, and he waits to greet us after our successful round.

Next time let’s equip ourselves to run by supplying endurance and removing distractions.