Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. Hebrews 12:1-3 (NIV)
In our verses for today, we discover the key to running our race well – keeping our eyes fixed on the Lord Jesus. He is the Author and the Perfecter of our faith. We want what He wants and we are called to walk as He walked. As we focus on Him – His will and His ways - forgetting what was behind and straining toward what is ahead – we run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Jesus is to be our Supreme Model as Scripture tells us whoever claims to live in Him must walk as Jesus did. And this is not a burden rather a blessing.
All too often we get bogged down in life with the non-essentials – perhaps even good things yet not the best things. We can be consumed and distracted by the “loudest” voices pulling us in every direction but up, Amen? Our thinking and our desires can become distorted and twisted leaving us hindered and entangled. And our clocks of life keep on ticking. We can regain many things yet when time is gone, it is gone. We have one life and it matters how we live it. That is what we are ultimately and individually accountable for. Scripture tells us we are to set our hearts and minds on things above – not being uber concerned with the temporal earthly things. Not living with grasping rather open hands. That’s how Jesus lived – always with a heavenly focus, always about His Father’s business.
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Matthew 6:25-34 (NIV)