Let Us Run With Endurance

The marathon, an unforgiving test of endurance as you traverse the uneven terrain spanning a seemingly endless perimeter. Some make it their life goal, an accomplishment like no other, training to face the mammoth task with precision engineered nutrition, sleep and training. The day arrives and their bodies are primed, their muscle fibres twitching as they prepare to emerge victorious in the war that will almost certainly ensue. It’s the calm before the storm. 

Hebrews 12:1

12 Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us'

Many of us have attempted to run the race of enduring faith as if it were a sprint, only to find ourselves weak, weary and overcome with a feeling of fatigue. Tempted to give up, to perhaps return to the sin which so easily ensnares us. This scripture serves not only to remind us of the method we must adopt, but also to instruct us of the preparations we must make in order to finish the race. We must position ourselves as athletes of a different kind, harnessing the word of God as our spiritual food (Jeremiah 15:16) and our prayer a form of training. Just as marathon runners turn to the pioneers in sportswear technology in order to run their race in the most aerodynamic, weight saving clothing. We must turn to God and lay aside every weight of sin that inhibits our steps toward Jesus.

We can find hope in the knowledge that although each step towards God may feel as if it brings new and uncomfortable uncertainties. He has already gone before us and will never leave us nor forsake us  (Deuteronomy 31:8) for God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved (John 3:17).

Written by Daniel Campbell