Hebrews 12:1-3  Click on link to read passage. You may select your own version of the Bible after the link opens.

This passage is such a wonderful challenge. How many of us truly recognize the baggage we carry around with us? What are the things that pull us away from a relationship with Christ? What is it that keeps us from extending Christ’s love to the sick, lonely and/or hurting people around us? Busy-ness? Business profits? Poorly utilized idle time? Self-centeredness? Pride? Worry?

Hebrews 12:1 commands us to cast off those things that hinder us. I have a lot of cluter in my life – both physical and personal demands I allow to be made on my time. How freeing it would be to cast it all off and to run the race with total abandon. May God help me through this process.

It is easy to get overwhelmed by our circumstances and to allow them to pull us down. Verse two tells us how to rise above them – to fix our eyes on Jesus keeping in mind how he endured even death on the cross to obtain his goal. Whatever our burdens are, they can’t begin to compare with what Christ endured, yet he not only endured it, he did it for the “joy set before him.” He set the example for us by looking above and beyond the current circumstances to the joy of heaven that awaited him. We can have that same joy. Let us not lose heart.

Father God, help us to recognize and cast off those idols and distractions that keep us from fellowshiping with you and from serving you. Help us to run the race with joy and abandon.

Copyright © 2008 by Janice Green