The Race Set Before Us
Hebrews 12
Jared Mellinger

The following is an edited transcript of the audio

I wish that every time before I preach, I could have Dave and Barnabas share what they just did, because my heart is so filled with gratitude to God for this partnership that we enjoy. Many of you know I grew up as a pastor's kid in Sovereign Grace Churches. I grew up listening to the gospel preached from a young age in a Sovereign Grace Church. And when I rebelled during my teenage years, my parents turned to other pastors and friends in other Sovereign Grace churches to seek counsel and encouragement.

During that time, I was saved in a Sovereign Grace Church, baptized in a Sovereign Grace Church, discipled in a Sovereign Grace Church, married by a Sovereign Grace Pastor. In 2002, there was a church planter in Pittsburgh named Mark Prater that we were good friends with. And so, he did our wedding. And I've been trained in Sovereign Grace Churches and at the Sovereign Grace Pastors College, and then assumed a pastoral role in an established Sovereign Grace Church.

So, sometimes, people ask me, "Why are you so excited about partnership?" I say, "How much time do you have?" In countless ways, I am the beneficiary of what God has done through this family of churches. The reasons for my gratitude are many, but just one I want to highlight is how my life has been changed through this partnership. And so, whether you have been a part of Sovereign Grace for decades or just a few years or shorter, I want you to know that I thank God for you and for all the joy that I have because of what we enjoy together.

Mark, thank you for your love for us, thank you for your faith in God and for the friendship that you have with me. I thank God for you, brother. Let's turn to Hebrews 12. I too am going to be doing something different than what HB did last night. I was listening and I thought, "Should I do that?" "No." I'm also going to be doing something different than what Jeff did this morning. In fact, I'm going to be doing something different than what every great preacher has ever done.

Yet, I am so eager to share with you from God's Word in this glorious book of Hebrews. We'll be looking at the first three verses of Hebrews chapter 12. I'd like to invite you to stand for the reading of God's Word and as we pray. This is God's holy and authoritative Word. "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 that is set before us.

Looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our 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 faint hearted." Let's pray together. "Father, our prayer has been that You would use this conference, this time together to glorify your name and to refresh us and strengthen us as your people.

And we thank you for the ways you have already answered those prayers. And we thank you for all your goodness to us in Christ. You have loved us with an everlasting love. You daily bear us up. You are our rock and our redeemer, strong defender of our weary hearts. You have in your kindness, joined us to Christ. You have given us your spirit. You've brought us together in unity and love. And you are faithful from generation to generation.

And so, Lord, we cry out together to you now, and we ask that you would glorify your name in us and through us for years and decades to come. We are each one of us a weak and needy people. And therefore, we ask that You, the God who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, we ask that You by that same resurrection power, would equip us with everything good that we may do your will, working in us.

Even now, come and work in us that which is pleasing in your sight. May your Word go forth with power and clarity, we pray in Jesus name. Amen." You may be seated. One of the iconic movie scenes I remember from my childhood is that magnificent opening sequence in Chariots of Fire - instrumental theme song, group of athletes running on the beach in slow motion, start with the splash of their bare feet, and panned out men dressed in all white with sand splattered on their shirts as they run.

The movie as you know, tells the remarkable and famed story of Eric Liddell of the Flying Scotsman who won Olympic Gold Medal in the Paris 1924 Olympics under extraordinary circumstances. He refused to compete on Sunday. He nobly held to that conviction with all the determination of Chick-fil-a and ended up winning Gold in an event that wasn't his best. Liddell was a joyful man who spoke with a charming Scottish brogue, a brother in Christ whose life and character was even more impressive than his athletic gifts.

He was a man of fortitude, a man of integrity, a man of courage. There's another scene in the movie that's always stuck with me. It was created to capture something of Liddell's tenacity in the face of adversity. It's when he's running a race in Scotland, going into the first turn, another runner elbows him, and he falls into the in-field. He sits there for a moment as other runners are moving on, the man officiating the race says, "Get up, lad. Get up."

And Liddell suddenly gets up and he continues on, now running with even greater determination and speed, because sometimes the setbacks make you even stronger and more determined. And so, there he is heart racing, feet pounding, muscles burning, arms flailing. Liddell passes the runners one by one and eventually wins the race. Hebrews 12 portrays the Christian life, the life that we live, as a great race.

The writers of the New Testament were familiar with the Olympic Games held over 500 years earlier in Greece. Events there included not only wrestling and boxing, but also a long-distance footrace in a stadium. There were sprints as well. But the imagery here is of a long distance race. It's the imagery of a marathon in which endurance is required. We need endurance, because the race of life is long and it is far from easy.

Verse 3 talks about growing weary and faint hearted. I wonder, are your or have you been in recent months weary? Do you find yourselves faint hearted? Those are experiences that come to us all. There are times in the Christian life when we know we are not bringing zeal and spiritual stamina to the race. Times when we think to ourselves, "I'm just so tired." We grow tired of our own sin. We grow tired of setbacks and discouragements.

We grow tired of the many demands and responsibilities that we have in life. Sometimes, as pastors, we lose patience and grow weary, because we want excitement, we want immediate impact in ministry rather than steady, unnoticed faithfulness over the long haul. This is where Kevin DeYoung talks about the glory of plodding. Few qualities in our day are more counter-cultural then commitment, constancy, faithfulness, tenacity, steadfastness, resolve.

In a word, we need endurance. It could be that you've had an especially difficult year in ministry, or this past week or month has been especially challenging. I believe that through this scripture during this time, the Spirit of God is doing something in our hearts and in our lives. God is strengthening us for endurance. In the midst of our weakness, in the midst of our need for power to endure, God meets us with his desire to strengthen us for that endurance.

The Lord's desire is expressed later in this chapter verses 12 and 13, drawing from the prophetic imagery in Isaiah 35 - "Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed." I thank God there is a strengthening, there is a healing God has for his people today.

We need endurance. We need endurance, because as Hebrews repeatedly warns, nd as we have seen and know, apostasy is real. In recent years, we've seen the rise of Exvangelicals, those who would say they were ones evangelical Christians, but are now united around their criticism of Christian beliefs and criticism of the culture to which they ones belonged. Many have come to believe that organized religion is toxic and they rail against Christian institutions.

One of their central tenancies that they consider, Christian sexual ethics to be oppressive. They have abandoned the inerrancy of scripture; they've abandoned the doctrine of hell and the exclusivity of Christ, and have made shipwreck of their faith. They talk about deconstructing all that they once believed, now filtering all that the Bible teaches. They filter it through the lens of experience and emotions and the idol of self.

And it is a tragedy. Apostasy is a tragedy and yet, it should never be surprising. We continue to love those who have fallen away and we pray that they return to the faith. We grieve the dishonor they bring upon Christ and the harm they bring upon themselves, and we are humbled. We are sobered. We are reminded that we, weak and sinful and easily deceived as we are, are more desperate for the sustaining grace of God than we can imagine.

And we are motivated all the more to make our calling and election sure. We're motivated all the more to hold fast to what we have received, to run with endurance, to finish well for the glory of God. We need endurance. There is a race set before the Churches of Sovereign Grace. God has brought us together in his kindness and has set before us the race we now run. That "let us run" in the plural is a reminder that we are in this race together.

Endurance is not an individualistic achievement. And just as Christians need each other in local churches, so we as pastors and churches need each other now more than ever. We need the shared theological commitments that we enjoy. We need pastoral accountability. We need the effectiveness in mission that comes from joining resources. We need the encouragement that comes from ecclesiastical fellowship beyond our own churches.

Ecclesiastes 4 says that "two are better than one, because if you fall, a companion will lift you." And in Ecclesiastes 4:12, it says "though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him. A threefold cord is not quickly broken." Pastors who partner together find help to run the race. We find help to finish well. And I look at the pastors and the wives in Sovereign Grace Churches, I look at you and I respect you more than ever, brothers and sisters, for the race that you are running.

I see those who by faith have done great things for Christ and have remained steadfast. I see joy and gratitude. I see those young and old of whom the world is not worthy. And I thank God for you. I thank God for the strength I have found in the race through this gospel partnership. And for me, it truly is one of life's great honors to be able to run the race with the friends and the co-laborers that are in this room.

And I know many of you feel the same way. And it is the observed and proven grace of God in your lives that gives me the confidence to say, as the writer of Hebrews says at the end of chapter 10, that "we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed." Who are we? We are not those who shrink back. We are not those who are destroyed. We are those who press on. We are those who have faith and endurance.

We are those who keep going, strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus. As we run this race and for the sake of our endurance, we are told to remember those who have gone before us. Verse 1, "Therefore since we are surrounded by so great cloud of witnesses." That is referring to the saints in the previous chapter, Hebrews 11. Abraham left his homeland. Sarah believed that God is faithful even to old age.

Moses considered the reproach of Christ a greater treasure than that good life of Egyptian comforts. Gideon was made stronger as his army was made weaker and smaller. Rahab risked her life, the people crossed the red sea, the prophets were stoned, David conquered kingdoms. Their lives are testimonies to the faithfulness of God and they surround us in the amphitheater of salvation history, cheering us on.

And the better acquainted we are with the Old Testament, the louder we will hear that crowd roar as we run. I wonder, can you hear the voices of those saints of old today? They shout, "God is faithful." They declare that his promises are true. They are not silent, but testify today that though the people of God often faint and fail, by faith we shall endure. And so, let every weary, exhausted, discouraged soul take comfort today in knowing we are not the first to run this race.

There are saints who have gone before. J.C. Ryle says this at this point, I quote him at length, "The writer of Hebrews calls upon us to remember them in their troubles and take courage. Are we frail earthen vessels? So were they. Are we weak and encompassed with infirmities? So were they. Are we exposed to temptation and burdened with this body of corruption? So were they. Are we afflicted? So were they. Are we alone in our generation, the scorn of all our neighbors? So were they. Have we trials and cruel mockings? So had they. What can we possibly be called upon to suffer, which they have not endured?"

And Ryle continues on. He says, "Take courage, fainting Christians, you are encompassed with a great cloud of witnesses. The race that you are running has been run by millions before. You think that no one ever had such trials as yourself. Why is it happening to me? Why is it trial after trial? You think that no one ever had such trials as yourself, but every step that you are journeying has been safely trod by others. The valley of the shadow of death has been securely passed by a cloud of trembling, doubting ones like yourself. They had their fears and anxieties like you, but they were not cast away. The world, the flesh and the devil can never overwhelm the weakest person who will set their face towards God. These millions journeyed on in bitterness and tears like your own, and yet not one did perish. They all reached home."

They all reached home. We are surrounded by the countless saints who have gone before us, facing what we now face and overcoming by faith. We join the saints of old and set our faces toward God. We join the saints of old knowing that because he is faithful, we too will be brought safely home.

Some of those who have gone before, you learn when you read Hebrews 11, some were mighty in war, others were mocked and mistreated. Some were victors and some were victims. Some abounded and some were abased. Now, here's a hard saying. It is not ours to choose. It is not ours to choose whether the legacy of our faith will be triumph or tribulation. You don't get to choose. Yes, I'd like to sign for conquering kingdoms, shutting the mouths of lions and quenching the power of fire.

And God says in his great love for us, he says, "You, my precious child will be among those who are mocked, mistreated, destitute, afflicted, flawed, imprisoned, slandered, stoned, and sawn in two." More than a few of those in what is often called the faith hall of fame where during their lifetimes, part of the hall of shame. And yet, even these great saints were commended by God for their faith.

God is not ashamed to be called their God. They were rejected by the world, because they were those of whom then world is not worthy. And though they suffered greatly, God did not abandon them. And their faith was not in vain nor will God abandon you. Endurance through hardship is the triumph of our faith. Your steadfastness is in itself a victory and a testimony to the power of faith in Christ, the faith by which we will endure.

Here's something else - God teaches us here to look back with grace, to commend, to learn from, to be inspired by those who have gone before, as weak and as flawed as they are. It's become common in our day to view past generations of believers with great criticism. I am not encouraging hagiography, the uncritical and laudatory depiction of the life of a hero of the faith.

Christian biography shouldn't ignore the weaknesses and imperfections and sins of those who have gone before us, but I do believe that the far greater danger today especially among a younger generation is to go to the other extreme where we have become virtually incapable of commending and celebrating grace where it appears in the lives of saints who have gone before us. Let us learn to look back not only with honesty, but also with grace and charity.

And let those who have gone before us in scripture and in the history of Christ's church, inspire us in the race we now run. Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, verse 1, let us also lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely. We're not only to lay aside sin, we are to lay aside every weight, anything that will slow us down. You are allowed to run a race in a metal armor suit or an inflatable T-Rex costume.

It's not a good idea if you want your best time. We lay aside every weight and every sin, lay aside every sin. You know what trips me up and hinders me most in the race? Not other people, not circumstances, it's my own sin because even as believers, sin clings closely. It clings closely, because it works from within. Now, there's good news in this command. The good news of this command, to lay aside sin is that by the power of the Spirit, we are able to say no to ungodliness.

We're able to put off sin though the presence of sin has not been entirely removed from our lives. The penalty of sin has been removed and its power in our lives has been broken. And therefore, we are able to lay aside every sin, to lay aside sin means as Hebrews 12 later says that we strive for peace with everyone and that we strive for holiness. We lay aside our unbelief in God's goodness and we refuse to doubt his heart for us.

You cannot believe God is against you. Lay aside the sin of unbelief. We lay aside our pride, our pride in how we're different from others, because we know that the gospel leaves no room for ecclesiastical superiority. We lay aside all lovelessness, all lack of gentleness. We are kind to everyone and we patiently endure evil. We see to it that no root of bitterness springs up and causes trouble.

We lay aside as Hebrews 13 says sexual immorality, the love of money, the fear of man. We lay aside every weight and every sin, and we run. And brothers, if I can speak to the pastors for a moment, we are responsible to teach those we serve to lay aside every weight and to lay aside the sin that clings closely to us all. Part of the rich doctrinal heritage we received in Sovereign Grace is that we believe in the mortification of sin.

We believe in practical holiness. We believe that people must be taught how to live, how to apply God's truth to our daily lives, how to lay aside those things that will hinder us in pleasing God. Here's what I've learned in ministry. I've learned that if you teach people how to live, especially if you exhort them to lay aside every weight in sin, some will invariably say that you are legalistic. If you teach people to walk in sexual purity, to turn away from the world's approach to guy/girl relationships, if you teach them to value dressing modestly, they will label your preaching as purity culture.

They will say you are traumatizing young people and sexually shaming them. If you teach parents to train their kids in the way they should go, some will protest and say that kids need to be given more space to be themselves. If you teach God's design for gender, and how sin distorts gender and its expression, they will say you are teaching traditional and cultural ideals rather than scripture. Listen. A growing number of Christians are resistant to the ethical teachings of scripture, and have little tolerance for practical calls to obey God and to lay aside every sin.

Brothers, we must be faithful in this. We must be faithful in this. As we run the race, we ourselves must lay aside the sin that clings closely to us and we must exhort others to do the same. We are then told in verse 2 we're to look as we run. Now, I'm afraid some pastors preach and minister and counsel as if the text says let us run looking into our sin, because they always seem to be talking about our corruption, always aiming to produce a greater sense of guilt.

As we run the race, where do we look? As we run the race, our eyes are not locked on our sin. What awful thought that is, talk about a depressing reality. Nor are our eyes ultimately set on the cloud of witnesses. Where do we fix our eyes? What will fill our hearts and our minds as we run this race? "Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us looking to Jesus", looking to Jesus. To all who find themselves in need of power to endure, turn your eyes upon Jesus.

Let the lord Jesus Christ in all his excellency, captivate your heart and your attention once again. This is your help in time of need. This is the greatest counsel that can ever be given. Look to Jesus. Look to Jesus. And when you've looked to him, look again and never take your eyes off of the sight of Christ. Seeing Jesus through the eyes of faith is all that we need to be strengthened in the race we now run. One thing I have asked of the Lord, to gaze upon his beauty. Look to him. He is the radiance of the glory of God. He upholds the universe by the word of his power. Look to him. He partook of flesh and blood that through death, he might destroy the devil, and deliver us from sin and death that by the grace of God, he might taste death for everyone.

Christian, look to him. And when we look to him, we see the one who after making purifications for sin, sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high. We see Jesus. We see Jesus crowned with glory and honor. We see Jesus living forever to intercede for needy sinners like us. There is no one like him. There is no one like this Jesus. He is a merciful and faithful High Priest. He is the mediator of the new covenant. He is the great Shepherd of the sheep.

He is the sure and steadfast anchor of our souls. Look to him. Worship him today. Out of weakness, let strength arise as your eyes are fixed on this glorious Messiah. All of the sermons, we preach and we preach again and we spend our lives preaching, all of the sermons in all of the world cannot convey the riches of our Savior. And so, we get up one Sunday and we try, but we realize that all are too poor to speak his vast and priceless worth.

And so, we get up the next week and take again to the glory of this Christ, the one who is superior to angels in his glory, superior to Moses in the revelation he brings, superior to Aaron as a priest who perfects worshippers forever, superior to prophets in the tabernacle, superior to Sinai and Canaan, superior to all the Old Testament sacrifices, because he offers the once for all sacrifice of himself to deal with all our sin.

Friends, look to him, look to this Jesus. This gospel, this glorious Christ is everything to us. What more do we have? And if we have him, we have enough. He is our treasure. He is our prize. He is our endurance. He is our joy and our hope. He is our everything. Look to Jesus. Those of us who preach, it needs to be plain to everybody that our consuming passion is Christ and him crucified. Don't get rowdy about the wrong things.

We do not look to changing cultural trends, to ministry fads and hot topics. Okay, what do I fix my eyes on today, Twitter? What's trending? No, we are looking to the One who is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And brothers, to us it has been given. Preach the unsearchable riches of Christ. Let your sermons and your meditations and your affections be full of Christ. Those who sit under our preaching ought to develop a gloriously rich Christology through our ministry.

Teach them about the offices of Christ and their significance. Teach them the person of Christ, the names of Christ, the Old Testament types of Christ, the sayings of Christ, the incomparable love of Christ, the birth, life, death, resurrection, ascension, and session of Christ. Teach them to grow in grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We run this race looking to Jesus. We're told in verse 2 he's the founder and perfecter of our faith.

He is the pioneer, the exemplar of the faith, and he is the one who initiates and the one who completes our faith. Jesus has promised from heaven's throne, he promises that he will complete the work he began in you. Friends, you're going to reach the finish line. Every day, we are one day closer to that glorious reality. And on that day that is coming, we will see more clearly than ever before. We will see more clearly than we do now, how every trial that has tested us was refining a faith more precious than gold, and how every set back in the race was making the perfection of our faith all the more glorious.

He is the founder and perfecter of our faith. Verse 2 then says that Jesus endured the cross for the joy set before him. You think about endurance, think about Jesus. There is no endurance like his endurance. Through 40 days of temptation in the wilderness, he endured. Satan opposed him, the crowds rejected him, the Son of Man had nowhere to lay his head, but still he endured. His soul were told was troubled in Gethsemane, yet he pressed on with invincible courage.

Heaven's champion was running the race set before him. And nowhere do we see his unwavering fortitude more gloriously displayed than when he endured the cross and bore the wrath of God against sin, and secured for us this great salvation. He did it for the joy set before him. He looked to the future and he saw something better is coming. He looked through crucifixion to his exaltation at the right hand of the throne of God and to our salvation, the prize for which he died.

Our endurance every single day, our endurance, comes from remembering the endurance of Jesus at Calvary. This is how we endure. Verse 3 says that we are to "consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or faint hearted." You who have experienced the hostility of others, you have been wronged by others, have you considered the hostility our Savior endured from sinners?

Verse two speaks of the shame of the cross. He not only took our sin, he took our shame. He was insulted; he was misunderstood; he was slandered again and again. He was mistreated by religious leaders; he was abandoned by his friends; he was betrayed and sentenced to death. His reputation was ruined; he was unjustly accused; he was mocked and flawed; he was stripped naked and publicly crucified.

There is no shame like the shame of the Son of God at Calvary, bearing shame and scoffing rude. In my place, condemned, he stood. And it's the reason we sing "Hallelujah, what a Savior." What did our Lord do in the face of such great shame? Verse 2 says he "despised the shame." There's glory in Christ to be seen in this despising of the shame. Jesus said, "Shame, you have no mastery over me. Shame, I will not be distracted or controlled by you for this is a necessary part of the race set before me by the father.

And I know that the days of shame are numbered, soon to give way to glory and joy." That Jesus despised the shame means Jesus was fiercely indifferent to the approval of man. He considered the great shame of the cross as nothing for he knew the joy, the vindication, the honor that awaited him when he sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Have you thought much about shame? Shame is a pastoral category that every pastor should give attention to as we serve God's people.

Christians must be equipped to apply the gospel to their shame, to the deep pain of rejection and dishonor, to the experience of being damaged and marginalized and scorned. The original audience of Hebrews knew the weight of shame. Chapter 10 verses 32 and 33, it says "you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction. And sometimes, being partners with those so treated."

So many in our world today are hurting and know what it is to experience shame and long to be rid of their disgrace. There are those who have been mistreated and abused, kids who have been mocked and bullied. There are those who have been slandered and maligned; those who are marginalized, defiled, neglected. To one degree or another, we all carry shame. And at times, it can be absolutely paralyzing, life-dominating.

Friends, God has not left us to ourselves in our shame, he promises to do something about the problem of shame. Jesus is our compassionate elder brother who identifies with his people in our shame and is not ashamed to call us brothers. Have you been mistreated? So was Christ. Are you lonely and isolated in life? So was Christ. Have you experienced injustice? So did Christ. Are you the object of public reproach? So was Christ.

He was despised and rejected by man. A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. See, the cross, the cross of Christ in which we boast, is not only our supreme emphasis in life and ministry, but the cross also shapes our expectations for life and ministry. One of the greatly underemphasized categories of suffering that the apostle Paul endured was public disgrace and shame. Those of you who are just entering gospel ministry must prepare for this.

Paul knew shame from the world and shame from other believers. In 2 Corinthians 6, Paul speaks of his endurance through honor and dishonor, through slander and praise. He says, "We are treated as impostors and yet are true, as unknown and yet well known, as dying and behold we live." I marvel at the fact in 2 Corinthians 12, it's in verse 10, Paul includes... get this... Paul includes receiving insults among his weaknesses in which he gladly boasts.

Okay, I have not learned to do that yet. Insult, boast. God help me. Paul gives his vision of ministry in 1 Corinthians 4 when he says we are like men, sentenced to death. We have become a spectacle to the world, to angels and to men. He says we are weak, we are in disrepute. 1 Corinthians 4:12-13 says "when reviled we bless, when persecuted we endure, when slandered we entreat." We have become and are still like the scum of the world, the refuse of all things.

Okay, there you have it. Welcome to the Christian life, welcome to pastoral ministry, the scum of the world. John Stott has a book on Christian leadership that exposits that passage in 1 Corinthians 4 and the bold heading for that entire section is "Pastors are the Scum of the Earth". Wow, that sounds inspiring. Let me read on. Do tell me more. Can I get that on a plack and hang it in my office? For Paul, follow this, when it comes to what your ambition is, for Paul, his ambition was to share in Christ's sufferings and his boast was in being disparaged, because he knew he follows a Savior who endured hostility, who endured the cross despising the shame. And therefore, every trial he faced, every sorrow he experienced, every negative report about him, every desertion and betrayal, every weakness is totally transformed in light of the gospel and is now considered a point of identification with the crucified Messiah.

This is how we view hardship and suffering in Christ. The apostle Peter similarly says in 1 Peter 4, "Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you as though something strange were happening to you." Nothing strange or surprising has ever happened to me by way of hardship. "But rejoice in so far as you share Christ sufferings that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed."

We must never forget that the church of Christ advances from a position of human weakness. Just as suffering and weakness is the way in which Christ triumphed, so suffering and weakness are the way his people triumph as well. And I'm telling you, too many, the way so many Christians think about power and influence and popularity is totally wrong. We need to recover a theology of weakness.

We need to recover a theology of the cross. We need to learn to disregard and despise the shame as our master did before us, because oh how we crave status and praise and popularity. Our wretched hearts so desperately and so pathetically want to be some theme that others celebrate. Can someone please just say nice things about me? You know that's not the way of the cross. It is not the way of the cross.

The word scoffs at believers. They will never applaud us or cheer us on as we follow Christ. And even when it comes to all the Christians, Paul did know what it was to be afflicted by them (Philippians 1). And he says it is a very small thing to be judged by anyone (1 Corinthians 4). God is the only one whose judgment matters in the end. We run this race for the glory of God alone. Charles Simeon is known for being a pastor who went into decades of difficulty and opposition.

He pastored a church in Cambridge, England for 54 years. And over the first 12 years, there was so much opposition at his congregation. The people locked the pews and stayed away from them. They refused to let him be the Sunday afternoon lecturer in his own church. The students at Cambridge University despised him. He was slandered with so many rumors and insults. And so it was the Charles Simeon followed Jesus into what John Piper calls the glorious poverty of a bad reputation.

Piper has taught on the life of Simeon. And he said he did so, because he's concerned about the emotional fragility that marks far too many Christians. Piper says he's concerned that we have little capacity for surviving and thriving in the face of criticism and opposition. And Piper says Simeon's life and ministry should help all Christians see opposition, slander, misunderstanding, persecution, disappointment, weakness, and danger as the normal portion of faithful Christian living and ministry.

It was in April of 1831 Charles Simeon was 71 years old. And one afternoon in Cambridge, his friends, Joseph Gurney asked him how he had surmounted opposition and outlasted the long-standing prejudice against him. And this is what Simeon wonderfully says to his friend. He says, "My dear brother, we must not mind a little suffering for Christ's sake. When I am getting through a hedge, if my head and shoulders are safely through, I can bear the pricking of my legs"

Let us rejoice in the remembrance that our holy head, Christ has surmounted all his suffering and triumphed over death. Let us follow him patiently. We shall soon be partakers of his victory. Friends, brothers and sisters, let's not mind a little suffering. Let's remember that Jesus ran this race before us. Hasn't the gospel taught us that now is the suffering, that soon will come the victory, that now is the cross, that soon will come the crown. For we know that Jesus having endured the cross is now seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

And when he returns, we will reign with him forever. Being united to him by faith, we too will move from suffering to glory, from dishonor to honor, from shame to vindication, from death to eternal life. "Consider him who endured from sinners, such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or faint hearted." Let me close with three brief questions. This isn't a pastor's brief. This is real life brief.

Three questions, one, is the cross your supreme emphasis in life and ministry? Your emphasis? For Sovereign Grace pastors and churches, let this be our motto and our song all our days, looking to Jesus, looking to Jesus, looking to Jesus. Two, does the cross shape your expectations for life and ministry? In the book of Hebrews, this word of exhortation is moving toward the rallying cry found toward the end of the last chapter. Hebrews 13:13-14, "Therefore, let us go to him, to Christ, outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured." Let's go bear reproach, for here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come. And third, is the cross your source of endurance in life and ministry? How we need Jesus every day and every moment of the race. Apart from him, what hope do we have? We will, all of us, grow weary and faint-hearted. But we know that by the power of Christ, we will endure. We know that though we are weak, he is strong. We know that endurance ultimately is not the fruit of our resolve. It is the fruit of the power of Christ in us. We press on, we plow through. We keep going against all odds not as a testimony to our incredible stamina, but as a testimony to the character and the faithfulness of our Savior, Jesus Christ.

Friends, there is a great race set before the Churches of Sovereign Grace. I am more excited than ever about that race and about our future together. Let's remember what brought us together in the first place. Let's surround ourselves with "brothers and sisters who are running in the same direction, and let's cheer each other on even as we are cheered on by the saints of old. And as we press on in this race, day by day we will find that we have been made strong in the Lord.

By faith, we will run confident. By faith, we will run triumphant, our hope secure, our spirits alive. We will serve the Lord with gladness as we run side by side. We will fight the good fight. We will finish the race by the grace of God. We will keep the faith. Let us run the race set before us with endurance looking to Jesus, always looking to Jesus for the glory of God alone. Let's pray.

"Father, we ask now that through your word, the endurance and the strength that comes from You would be our supply and that there would be an outpouring of your power into our hearts and souls. We know that even youth grow weary and faint, but we look to You, we hope in You, we trust in you, we delight in you. And in You, we find strength to endure. Strengthen us by your word. We pray in Jesus' name, Amen."

Sovereign Grace Churches: Pastors Conference 2019