Running the Race

Lee and I were going to grill hamburgers the other day.  We don't actually have a grill, but we borrowed one from the BCM a while back and haven't exactly returned it yet, ooops.  Lee goes out to turn the gas on and this is what he sees.

Birds have built a next in our borrowed grill.  We ended up just George Forman-ing the burgers instead.  Lee was a little perturbed, but I thought it was hilarious.  I guess I'm also not the one who has to clean it out.

I feel like life is like that sometimes.  A lot messier than you were expecting.  Some things we can't help if they're a little messy.  Other times we let things trip us up and throw us for a loop.  The verse that I'm memorizing for the first half of April talks a little about that.

"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," - Hebrews 12:1 (NASB)

I'm memorizing Hebrews 12:1-3 this go around.  This first verse starts with "therefore" so of course we have to go back to chapter 11.  Chapter 11 is known as the faith chapter and it talks about the faith of the forefathers of the Jewish (and ultimately Christian) religion.  It talks about the great faith they had, the great suffering they experienced and the fact that they didn't receive what was promised...salvation through Jesus Christ.  Therefore, since they had so much faith and had not seen the day Christ came to earth, shouldn't we, having accepted Jesus as our Savior, have even more faith.  But why don't we sometimes?

Because we let things weigh us down and entangle us.  It talks about two things that can keep us from faith.  Sin is a big one.  Sin entangles us so that we're like that bird's nest and can't tell one thing from another and our life is a mess.  We're to lay aside our sins.  We're also to lay aside the encumbrances (or weights or burdens).  These things may not necessarily be bad, but they're keeping us from what we're supposed to be doing.  We're weighed down by over committing ourselves.  We're weighed down by committing ourselves to the wrong things.  And we're weighed down by losing our eternal perspective.  It's hard to run a race when you're weighed down and your feet are tangled up.  Get rid of those things so we can focus on running that race with endurance.  That doesn't mean sitting down and letting life happen to us, but actively seeking the will of God and doing it.  What things do you need to set aside to run your race?