A VERSE BY VERSE COMMENTARY ON HEBREWS CHAPTER 12 DEALING WITH GOD'S DISCIPLINE AND WARNING.NOT TO REFUSE HIS GRACE AND THEREBY ESCAPE JUDGMENT.

1. HEBREWS 12 COMME TARY
EDITED BY GLENN PEASE
God Disciplines His Sons
1 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.
1. BAR ES, "Wherefore - In view of what has been said in the previous chapter.
Seeing we also are encompassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses -
The apostle represents those to whom he had referred in the previous chapter, as
looking on to witness the efforts which Christians make, and the manner in which they
live. There is allusion here, doubtless, to the ancient games. A great multitude of
spectators usually occupied the circular seats in the amphitheater, from which they
could easily behold the combatants; see the notes on 1Co_9:24-27. In like manner, the
apostle represents Christians as encompassed with the multitude of worthies to whom
he had referred in the previous chapter. It cannot be fairly inferred from this that he
means to say that all those ancient worthies were actually looking at the conduct of
Christians, and saw their conflicts. It is a figurative representation, such as is common,
and means that we ought to act as if they were in sight, and cheered us on. How far the
spirits of the just who are departed from this world are permitted to behold what is done
on earth - if at all - is not revealed in the Scriptures. The phrase, “a cloud of witnesses,”
means many witnesses, or a number so great that they seem to be a cloud. The
comparison of a multitude of persons to a cloud is common in the classic writers; see
Homer II. 4:274, 23:133; Statius 1:340, and other instances adduced in Wetstein, in loc.;
compare notes on 1Th_4:17.
Let us lay aside every weight - The word rendered “weight” - ᆊγκον ogkon -
means what is crooked or hooked, and thence any thing that is attached or suspended by
a hook that is, by its whole weight, and hence means weight; see “Passow.” It does not
occur elsewhere in the New Testament. The word is often used in the classic writers in
the sense of swelling, tumour, pride. Its usual meaning is that of weight or burden, and
there is allusion here, doubtless, to the runners in the games who were careful not to
encumber themselves with anything that was heavy. Hence, their clothes were so made
as not to impede their running, and hence, they were careful in their training not to
overburden themselves with food, and in every way to remove what would be an
impediment or hindrance. As applied to the racers it does not mean that they began to
run with anything like a burden, and then threw it away - as persons sometimes aid their
jumping by taking a stone in their hands to acquire increased momentum - but that they

2. were careful not to allow anything that would be a weight or an encumbrance.
As applied to Christians it means that they should remove all which would obstruct
their progress in the Christian course. Thus, it is fair to apply it to whatever would be an
impediment in our efforts to win the crown of life. It is not the same thing in all persons.
In one it may be pride; in another vanity; in another worldliness; in another a violent
and almost ungovernable temper; in another a corrupt imagination; in another a heavy,
leaden, insensible heart; in another some improper and unholy attachment. Whatever it
may be, we are exhorted to lay it aside, and this general direction may be applied to
anything which prevents our making the highest possible attainment in the divine life.
Some persons would make much more progress if they would throw away many of their
personal ornaments; some, if they would disencumber themselves of the heavy weight of
gold which they are endeavoring to carry with them. So some very light objects, in
themselves considered, become material encumbrances. Even a feather or a ring - such
may be the fondness for these toys - may become such a weight that they will never make
much progress toward the prize.
And the sin which doth so easily beset us - The word which is here rendered
“easily beset” - εᆒπερίστατον euperistaton - “euperistaton” - does not occur elsewhere in
the New Testament. It properly means, “standing well around;” and hence, denotes what
is near, or at hand, or readily occurring. So Chrysostom explains it. Passow defines it as
meaning “easy to encircle.” Tyndale renders it “the sin that hangeth on us.” Theodoret
and others explain the word as if derived from περίστασις peristasis - a word which
sometimes means affliction, peril - and hence, regard it as denoting what is full of peril,
or the sin which so easily subjects one to calamity. Bloomfield supposes, in accordance
with the opinion of Grotius, Crellius, Kype, Kuinoel, and others, that it means “the sin
which especially winds around us, and hinders our course,” with allusion to the long
Oriental garments. According to this, the meaning would be, that as a runner would be
careful not to encumber himself with a garment which would be apt to wind around his
legs in running, and hinder him, so it should be with the Christian, who especially ought
to lay aside everything which resembles this; that is, all sin, which must impede his
course. The former of these interpretations, however, is most commonly adopted, and
best agrees with the established sense of the word. It will then mean that we are to lay
aside every encumbrance, particularly or especially - for so the word καᆳ kai “and,”
should be rendered here “the sins to which we are most exposed.” Such sins are
appropriately called “easily besetting sins.” They are those to which we are particularly
liable. They are such sins as the following:
(1) Those to which we are particularly exposed by our natural temperament, or
disposition. In some this is pride, in others indolence, or gaiety, or levity, or avarice, or
ambition, or sensuality.
(2) Those in which we freely indulged before we became Christians. They will be likely
to return with power, and we are far more likely from the laws of association, to fall into
them than into any other. Thus, a man who has been intemperate is in special danger
from that quarter; a man who has been an infidel, is in special danger of scepticism: one
who has been avaricious, proud, frivolous, or ambitious, is in special danger, even after
conversion, of again committing these sins.
(3) Sins to which we are exposed by our profession, by our relations to others, or by
our situation in life. They whose condition will entitle them to associate with what are
regarded as the more elevated classes of society, are in special danger of indulging in the
methods of living, and of amusement that are common among them; they who are

3. prospered in the world are in danger of losing the simplicity and spirituality of their
religion; they who hold a civil office are in danger of becoming mere politicians, and of
losing the very form and substance of piety.
(4) Sins to which we are exposed from some special weakness in our character. On
some points we may be in no danger. We may be constitutionally so firm as not to be
especially liable to certain forms of sin. But every man has one or more weak points in
his character; and it is there that he is particularly exposed. A bow may be in the main
very strong. All along its length there may be no danger of its giving way - save at one
place where it has been made too thin, or where the material was defective - and if it ever
breaks, it will of course be at that point. That is the point, therefore, which needs to be
guarded and strengthened. So in reference to character. There is always some weak point
which needs specially to be guarded, and our principal danger is there. Self-knowledge,
so necessary in leading a holy life, consists much in searching out those weak points of
character where we are most exposed; and our progress in the Christian course will be
determined much by the fidelity with which we guard and strengthen them.
And let us run with patience the race that is set before us. - The word
rendered “patience” rather means in this place, perseverance. We are to run the race
without allowing ourselves to be hindered by any obstructions, and without giving out or
fainting in the way. Encouraged by the example of the multitudes who have run the same
race before us, and who are now looking out upon us from heaven, where they dwell, we
are to persevere as they did to the end.
2. CLARKE, "Wherefore - This is an inference drawn from the examples produced
in the preceding chapter, and on this account both should be read in connection.
Compassed about - Here is another allusion to the Olympic games: the agonistae,
or contenders, were often greatly animated by the consideration that the eyes of the
principal men of their country were fixed upon them; and by this they were induced to
make the most extraordinary exertions.
Cloud of witnesses - Νεφος µαρτυρων. Both the Greeks and Latins frequently use the
term cloud, to express a great number of persons or things; so in Euripides, Phoeniss.
ver. 257: νεφος ασπιδων πυκνον, a dense cloud of shields; and Statius, Thebiad., lib. ix.,
ver. 120: jaculantum nubes, a cloud of spearmen. The same metaphor frequently occurs.
Let us lay aside every weight - As those who ran in the Olympic races would throw
aside every thing that might impede them in their course; so Christians, professing to go
to heaven, must throw aside every thing that might hinder them in their Christian race.
Whatever weighs down our hearts or affections to earth and sense is to be carefully
avoided; for no man, with the love of the world in his heart, can ever reach the kingdom
of heaven.
The sin which doth so easily beset - Ευπεριστατον ᅋµαρτιαν· The well
circumstanced sin; that which has every thing in its favor, time, and place, and
opportunity; the heart and the object; and a sin in which all these things frequently
occur, and consequently the transgression is frequently committed. Ευπεριστατος is
derived from ευ, well, περι, about, and ᅷστηµι, I stand; the sin that stands well, or is
favorably situated, ever surrounding the person and soliciting his acquiescence. What we
term the easily besetting sin is the sin of our constitution, the sin of our trade, that in

4. which our worldly honor, secular profit, and sensual gratification are most frequently
felt and consulted. Some understand it of original sin, as that by which we are enveloped
in body, soul, and spirit. Whatever it may be, the word gives us to understand that it is
what meets us at every turn; that it is always presenting itself to us; that as a pair of
compasses describe a circle by the revolution of one leg, while the other is at rest in the
center, so this, springing from that point of corruption within, called the carnal mind,
surrounds us in every place; we are bounded by it, and often hemmed in on every side; it
is a circular, well fortified wall, over which we must leap, or through which we must
break. The man who is addicted to a particular species of sin (for every sinner has his
way) is represented as a prisoner in this strong fortress.
In laying aside the weight, there is an allusion to the long garments worn in the
eastern countries, which, if not laid aside or tucked up in the girdle, would greatly
incommode the traveler, and utterly prevent a man from running a race. The easily
besetting sin of the Hebrews was an aptness to be drawn aside from their attachment to
the Gospel, for fear of persecution.
Let us run with patience the race - Τρεχωµεν τον προκειµενον ᅧµιν αγωνα· Let us
start, run on, and continue running, till we get to the goal. This figure is a favourite
among the Greek writers; so Euripides, Alcest., ver. 489: Ου τον δ’ αγωνα πρωτον αν
δραµοιµ’ εγω· This is not the first race that I shall run. Id. Iphig. in Aulid., ver. 1456:
∆εινους αγωνας δια σε κεινον δει δραµειν· He must run a hard race for thee. This is a race
which is of infinite moment to us: the prize is ineffably great; and, if we lose it, it is not a
simple loss, for the whole soul perishes.
3. GILL, "Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about,...., As the Israelites
were encompassed with the pillar of cloud, or with the clouds of glory in the wilderness,
as the Jews say; See Gill on 1Co_10:1, to which there may be an allusion, here, since it
follows,
with so great a cloud of witnesses; or "martyrs", as the Old Testament saints, the
instances of whose faith and patience are produced in the preceding chapter: these,
some of them, were martyrs in the sense in which that word is commonly used; they
suffered in the cause, and for the sake of true religion; and they all bore a noble
testimony of God, and for him; and they received a testimony from him; and will be
hereafter witnesses for, or against us, to whom they are examples of the above graces:
and these may be compared to a "cloud", for the comfortable and reviving doctrines
which they dropped; and for their refreshing examples in the heat of persecution; and
for their guidance and direction in the ways of God; and more especially for their
number, being like a thick cloud, and so many, that they compass about on every side,
and are instructive every way. Hence the following things are inferred and urged,
let us lay aside every weight; or burden; every sin, which is a weight and burden to a
sensible sinner, and is an hinderance in running the Christian race; not only indwelling
sin, but every actual transgression, and therefore to be laid aside; as a burden, it should
be laid on Christ; as a sin, it should be abstained from, and put off, with respect to the
former conversation: also worldly cares, riches, and honours, when immoderately
pursued, are a weight depressing the mind to the earth, and a great hinderance in the
work and service of God, and therefore to be laid aside; not that they are to be entirely

5. rejected, and not cared for and used, but the heart should not be set upon them, or be
over anxious about them: likewise the rites and ceremonies of Moses's law were a weight
and burden, a yoke of bondage, and an intolerable one, and with which many believing
Jews were entangled and pressed, and which were a great hinderance in the
performance of evangelical worship; wherefore the exhortation to these Hebrews, to lay
them aside, was very proper and pertinent, since they were useless and incommodious,
and there had been a disannulling of them by Christ, because of their weakness and
unprofitableness. Some observe, that the word here used signifies a tumour or swelling;
and so may design the tumour of pride and vain glory, in outward privileges, and in a
man's own righteousness, to which the Hebrews were much inclined; and which appears
in an unwillingness to stoop to the cross, and bear afflictions for the sake of the Gospel;
all which is a great enemy to powerful godliness, and therefore should be brought down,
and laid aside. The Arabic version renders it, "every weight of luxury": all luxurious
living, being prejudicial to real religion:
and the sin which doth so easily beset us; the Arabic version renders it, "easy to be
committed"; meaning either the corruption of nature in general, which is always present,
and puts upon doing evil, and hinders all the good it can; or rather some particular sin,
as what is commonly called a man's constitution sin, or what he is most inclined to, and
is most easily drawn into the commission of; or it may be the sin of unbelief is intended,
that being opposite to the grace of faith, the apostle had been commending, in the
preceding chapter, and he here exhorts to; and is a sin which easily insinuates itself, and
prevails, and that sometimes under the notion of a virtue, as if it would be immodest, or
presumptuous to believe; the arguments for it are apt to be readily and quickly
embraced; but as every weight, so every sin may be designed: some reference may be had
to Lam_1:14 where the church says, that her transgressions were "wreathed", ‫,ישתרגו‬
"wreathed themselves", or wrapped themselves about her. The allusion seems to be to
runners in a race, who throw off everything that encumbers, drop whatsoever is
ponderous and weighty, run in light garments, and lay aside long ones, which entangle
and hinder in running, as appears from the next clause, or inference.
And let us run with patience the race that is set before us. The stadium, or race
plot, in which the Christian race is run, is this world; the prize run for is the heavenly
glory; the mark to direct in it, is Christ; many are the runners, yet none but the
overcomers have the prize; which being held by Christ, is given to them: this race is "set
before" the saints; that is, by God; the way in which they are to run is marked out by him
in his word; the troubles they shall meet with in it are appointed for them by him, in his
counsels and purposes; the mark to direct them is set before them in the Gospel, even
Jesus, the author and finisher of faith, whom they are to look unto; the length of their
race is fixed for them, or how far, and how long they shall run; and the prize is
determined for them, and will be given them, and which is held out for their
encouragement, to have respect unto: and it becomes all the saints, and belongs to each,
and everyone of them, to "run" this race; which includes both doing and suffering for
Christ; it is a motion forward, a pressing towards the mark for the prize, a going from
strength to strength, from one degree of grace to another; and to it swiftness and agility
are necessary; and when it is performed aright, it is with readiness, willingness, and
cheerfulness: it requires strength and courage, and a removal of all impediments, and
should be done "with patience"; which is very necessary, because of the many exercises
in the way; and because of the length of the race; and on account of the prize to be
enjoyed, which is very desirable: the examples of the saints, and especially Christ, the

6. forerunner, should move and animate unto it.
4. HE RY, "Here observe what is the great duty which the apostle urges upon the
Hebrews, and which he so much desires they would comply with, and that is, to lay
aside every weight, and the sin that did so easily beset them, and run with patience the
race set before them. The duty consists of two parts, the one preparatory, the other
perfective.
I. Preparatory: Lay aside every weight, and the sin, etc. 1. Every weight, that is, all
inordinate affection and concern for the body, and the present life and world. Inordinate
care for the present life, or fondness for it, is a dead weight upon the soul, that pulls it
down when it should ascend upwards, and pulls it back when it should press forward; it
makes duty and difficulties harder and heavier than they would be. 2. The sin that doth
so easily beset us; the sin that has the greatest advantage against us, by the
circumstances we are in, our constitution, our company. This may mean either the
damning sin of unbelief or rather the darling sin of the Jews, an over-fondness for their
own dispensation. Let us lay aside all external and internal hindrances.
II. Perfective: Run with patience the race that is set before us. The apostle speaks in
the gymnastic style, taken from the Olympic and other exercises.
1. Christians have a race to run, a race of service and a race of sufferings, a course of
active and passive obedience.
2. This race is set before them; it is marked out unto them, both by the word of God
and the examples of the faithful servants of God, that cloud of witnesses with which they
are compassed about. It is set out by proper limits and directions; the mark they run to,
and the prize they run for, are set before them.
3. This race must be run with patience and perseverance. There will be need of patience
to encounter the difficulties that lie in our way, of perseverance to resist all temptations
to desist or turn aside. Faith and patience are the conquering graces, and therefore must
be always cultivated and kept in lively exercise.
5. JAMISO , "Heb_12:1-29. Exhortation to follow the witnesses of faith just
mentioned: Not to faint in trials: To remove all bitter roots of sin: For we are under,
not a law of terror, but the gospel of grace, to despise which will bring the heavier
penalties, in proportion to our greater privileges.
we also — as well as those recounted in Heb_12:11.
are compassed about — Greek, “have so great a cloud (a numberless multitude
above us, like a cloud, ‘holy and pellucid,’ [Clement of Alexandria]) of witnesses
surrounding us.” The image is from a “race,” an image common even in Palestine from
the time of the Greco-Macedonian empire, which introduced such Greek usages as
national games. The “witnesses” answer to the spectators pressing round to see the
competitors in their contest for the prize (Phi_3:14). Those “witnessed of” (Greek, Heb_
11:5, Heb_11:39) become in their turn “witnesses” in a twofold way: (1) attesting by their
own case the faithfulness of God to His people [Alford] (Heb_6:12), some of them
martyrs in the modern sense; (2) witnessing our struggle of faith; however, this second
sense of “witnesses,” though agreeing with the image here if it is to be pressed, is not
positively, unequivocally, and directly sustained by Scripture. It gives vividness to the
image; as the crowd of spectators gave additional spirit to the combatants, so the cloud
of witnesses who have themselves been in the same contest, ought to increase our
earnestness, testifying, as they do, to God’s faithfulness.
weight — As corporeal unwieldiness was, through a disciplinary diet, laid aside by

7. candidates for the prize in racing; so carnal and worldly lusts, and all, whether from
without or within, that would impede the heavenly runner, are the spiritual weight to be
laid aside. “Encumbrance,” all superfluous weight; the lust of the flesh, the lust of the
eye, and the pride of life, and even harmless and otherwise useful things which would
positively retard us (Mar_10:50, the blind man casting away his garment to come to
Jesus; Mar_9:42-48; compare Eph_4:22; Col_3:9, Col_3:10).
the sin which doth so easily beset us — Greek, “sin which easily stands around
us”; so Luther, “which always so clings to us”: “sinful propensity always surrounding us,
ever present and ready” [Wahl]. It is not primarily “the sin,” etc., but sin in general, with,
however, special reference to “apostasy,” against which he had already warned them, as
one to which they might gradually be seduced; the besetting sin of the Hebrews,
UNBELIEF.
with patience — Greek, “in persevering endurance” (Heb_10:36). On “run” compare
1Co_9:24, 1Co_9:25.
6. CALVI , "Wherefore, seeing we also, etc. This conclusion is, as it were, an
epilogue to the former chapter, by which he shows the end for which he
gave a catalogue of the saints who excelled in faith under the Law,
even that every one should be prepared to imitate them; and he calls a
large multitude metaphorically a cloud, for he sets what is dense in
opposition to what is thinly scattered. [242] Had they been a few in
number, yet they ought to have roused us by their example; but as they
were a vast throng, they ought more powerfully to stimulate us.
He says that we are so surrounded by this dense throng, that wherever
we turn our eyes many examples of faith immediately meet us. The word
witnesses I do not take in a general sense, as though he called them
the martyrs of God, and I apply it to the case before us, as though he
had said that faith is sufficiently proved by their testimony, so that
no doubt ought to be entertained; for the virtues of the saints are so
many testimonies to confirm us, that we, relying on them as our guides
and associates, ought to go onward to God with more alacrity.
Let us lay aside every weight, or every burden, etc. As he refers to
the likeness of a race, he bids us to be lightly equipped; for nothing
more prevents haste than to be encumbered with burdens. ow there are
various burdens which delay and impede our spiritual course, such as
the love of this present life, the pleasures of the world, the lusts of
the flesh, worldly cares, riches also and honors, and other things of
this kind. Whosoever, then, would run in the course prescribed by
Christ, must first disentangle himself from all these impediments, for
we are already of ourselves more tardy than we ought to be, so no other
causes of delay should be added.
We are not however bidden to cast away riches or other blessings of
this life, except so far as they retard our course for Satan by these

8. as by toils retains and impedes us.
ow, the metaphor of a race is often to be found in Scripture; but here
it means not any kind of race, but a running contest, which is wont to
call forth the greatest exertions. The import of what is said then is,
that we are engaged in a contest, even in a race the most celebrated,
that many witnesses stand around us, that the Son of God is the umpire
who invites and exhorts us to secure the prize, and that therefore it
would be most disgraceful for us to grow weary or inactive in the midst
of our course. And at the same time the holy men whom he mentioned, are
not only witnesses, but have been associates in the same race, who have
beforehand shown the way to us; and yet he preferred calling them
witnesses rather than runners, in order to intimate that they are not
rivals, seeking to snatch from us the prize, but approves to applaud
and hail our victory; and Christ also is not only the umpire, but also
extends his hand to us, and supplies us with strength and energy; in
short, he prepares and fits us to enter on our course, and by his power
leads us on to the end of the race.
And the sin which does so easily beset us, or, stand around us, etc.
This is the heaviest burden that impedes us. And he says that we are
entangled, in order that we may know, that no one is fit to run except
he has stripped off all toils and snares. He speaks not of outward, or,
as they say, of actual sin, but of the very fountain, even
concupiscence or lust, which so possesses every part of us, that we
feel that we are on every side held by its snares. [243]
Let us run with patience, etc. By this word patience, we are ever
reminded of what the Apostle meant to be mainly regarded in faith, even
that we are in spirit to seek the kingdom of God, which is invisible to
the flesh, and exceeds all that our minds can comprehend; for they who
are occupied in meditating on this kingdom can easily disregard all
earthly things. He thus could not more effectually withdraw the Jews
from their ceremonies, than by calling their attention to the real
exercises of faith, by which they might learn that Christ's kingdom is
spiritual, and far superior to the elements of the world.
7. GREAT TEXTS OF THE BIBLE, “The Race Set before Us
Therefore let us also, seeing we are compassed about with so great a clo of witnesses, lay
aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience
the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the author and perfecter of our faith,
who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising shame, and hath sat
down at the right hand of the throne of God.—Heb_12:1-2.
1. There is no more brilliant turning of the flank of an opponent’s position in all
controversy than that which we have in the preceding chapter—the eleventh.
Throughout the Epistle the writer is reasoning with converts from Judaism who were
threatening to go back. Their old Jewish position had powerful prejudices in its favour,

9. and powerful arguments too. The first tide of their Christian enthusiasm had abated, and
the pressure of persecution for Christ’s sake was telling against them, and driving them
back to their old beliefs and positions. Point by point the writer reasoned the question
out between the old religion and the new, showing in each particular how the new was
better. There remained, however, one stronghold of the old creed which seemed
impregnable. It had surely the great, the venerated, names of Jewish antiquity in its
favour. “We have Abraham, Moses, Joshua, Isaiah on our side,” they said. It was an
immense matter for a Jew to be certain that he had the Fathers on his side. They surely
lived and died within the Mosaic dispensation, under the covenant of works. It was good
enough for them; they found satisfaction and inspiration in it. “No,” says the writer; “in
heart these men belonged to us—not to the Judaists. These all died in faith.” Though
they lived under the forms of the old economy, they wrought with the inspiration of the
new; and he shows that it was so. He claims all the immense force of the argument from
antiquity for himself and for Christianity, whereas the drift of these Hebrews was
towards traditionalism, sacerdotalism, externalism. Then he brings his argument to a
close with a powerful appeal to his readers to endure as their great fathers did; and he
directs their eyes to Jesus as at once the inspiration of faith and its most glorious
example.
2. The figure that the writer employs is, of course, a reference to the famous Olympic
games, with which all Greek-speaking people in his day, and for many generations
before him, were perfectly familiar. No product of the Greek genius held a higher place
in the interest and esteem of that remarkable people. To s gain a prize in the athletic
contests at Olympia was one of the most cherished ambitions of youth. There games
were celebrated every fifth year, and all persons of Hellenic blood, no matter to what
particular nationality they happened to belong or from what corner of the earth they
came, were eligible to compete. They must have presented an inspiring spectacle,
watched as they were by huge concourses of people assembled tier on tier around the
great amphitheatre. Veterans of bygone similar occasions were given places of honour
from which to view the achievements of a younger generation, and it must have been no
small glory to the victors in the several events to receive the applause of the renowned
athletes who had preceded them in the same arena. This is the idea that the writer of
Hebrews seizes hold of to illustrate our spiritual experience. Earth, he says, is the arena
wherein great things are being wrought out from age to age by the sons of God.
I
A Race that All must Run
“Let us run with patience the race that is set before us.”
1. Life is a race: an individual effort, not a fatality. Every man is what his life is; and his
life is just how he has run his race. The road is his; the opportunity is his; the means and
appliances are his; and if he fails, the fault is his. To all alike God gives the race, and
gives to each the properties for success. Men are differently constituted and gifted, but
all have gifts and talents committed to them whereby to run the race of life. To be
humble as this world goes is no test of the capacities with which a man is qualified for
running the race.
The coarsest reed that trembles in the marsh,
If Heaven select it for its instrument,
May shed celestial music on the breeze

10. As clearly as the pipe of virgin gold.
2. What do we see in a race? Muscles strained; veins like whipcords; beaded
perspiration; strenuous, intense, earnest speed. The reality in the mental and spiritual
man corresponding to these symbols in the physical man—that is our aim. The figure of
the Olympian athlete means a life in earnest or it means nothing. Useful service in life, or
duty well done—that is our goal. Temptation met and resisted and conquered—that is
our goal. Power to love, to be just, to be pure, to be true, to control external life and
internal life—that is our goal. Honest success in the vocation of life which we follow—
that is our goal. The success of the Christian lawyer, of the Christian business man, of
the Christian artificer, of the Christian scholar, is just so much power added to the
personality which he consecrates to the cause of God and to the uplifting of humanity in
the world. We should therefore look upon success in our daily vocation as a duty which
we owe to God and man. We should push our business or our study, or our practice, or
our manual toil until it has become a success. To reach success in every case will take
hard work; but to do hard and healthful work is the purpose of God in bringing us into
the world. Hard work has always been the condition of success in all the departments of
life. No man ever became a Bunsen or a Faraday in the laboratory apart from endless
experimenting with chemicals. No man or woman ever went up the way of the violin, or
the way of the piano, or the way of the organ, or the way of the orchestra, except by
labour. The Beethovens, the Mendelssohns, the Mozarts, the Haydns, and the Handels,
who cheer human life with their sweetness of music, were all incarnated energy and
ambition and push.
The end of Mozart’s life can be compared to nothing but a torch burning out rapidly in
the wind. Unwearied alike as a composer and an artist, he kept pouring forth
symphonies, sonatas, and operas, whilst disease could not shake his nerve as an
executant, and the hand of death found him unwilling to relinquish the pen of the ready
writer. In April, 1783, we find him playing at no less than twenty concerts. The year 1785
is marked by the six celebrated quartets dedicated to Haydn. In 1791 he entered upon his
thirty-sixth and last year. Into it, amongst other works, were crowded La Clemenza di
Tito, Il Flauto Magico, and the Requiem. His friends looked upon his wondrous career,
as we have since looked upon Mendelssohn’s, with a certain sad and bewildered
astonishment. That prodigious childhood—that spring mellow with all the fruits of
autumn—that startling haste “as the rapid of life shoots to the fall”—we understand it
now. He would constantly remain writing at the Requiem long after his dinner-hour.
Neither fatigue nor hunger seemed to rouse him from his profound contemplation. At
night he would sit brooding over the score until he not infrequently swooned in his
chair.… One mild autumn morning his wife drove him out in an open carriage to some
neighbouring woods. As he breathed the soft air, scented with the yellow leaves that lay
thickly strewn around, he discovered to her the secret of the Requiem. “I am writing it,”
he said, “for myself.” A few days of flattering hope followed, and then Mozart was carried
to the bed from which he was never destined to rise. Vienna was at that time ringing
with the fame of his last opera. They brought him the rich appointment of organist to the
Cathedral of St. Stephen, for which he had been longing all his life. Managers besieged
his doors with handfuls of gold, summoning him to compose something for them—too
late. He lay with swollen limbs and burning head, awaiting another summons. On the
night of December 5, 1791, his wife, his sister, Sophie Weber, and his friend Süsmayer,
were with him. The score of the Requiem lay open upon his bed. As the last faintness
stole over him, he turned to Süsmayer—his lips moved freely—he was trying to indicate a
peculiar effect of kettle-drums in the score. It was the last act of expiring thought; his
head sank gently back; he seemed to fall into a deep and tranquil sleep. In another hour

11. he had ceased to breathe.1 [Note: H. R. Haweis, Music and Morals, 314.]
3. This race is appointed for the follower of Jesus. He also finds that he cannot choose
his own way to the goal; the race is set before him, marked out for him, measured and
staked in by a power not his own. His birth, his natural condition, temperament, and
talents, his opportunities, the vicissitudes of fortune he encounters are all arranged for
him—that is the course set before him, and he must win the prize by running in it. He
may not leap the ropes, and try a short cut; he may not demand some softer course,
some more elastic turf; he may not ask that the sand be lifted and a hard beaten surface
prepared for him; he may not require that the ascents be levelled and the rough places
made smooth; he must take the course as he finds it. In other words, he must not wait
till things are made easier for him; he must not refuse to run because the course is not all
he could wish; he must recognize that the difficulties of his position in life are the race
set before him. The Christian must open his eyes to the fact that it is in the familiar
surroundings of the life we now actually lead that God calls us to run; in the callings we
have chosen, amid the annoyances we daily experience, where we are, and as we are,
from the very position we this day occupy, our race is set before us.
Stewart closely resembled his hero Livingstone in his unfailing reliance upon God and
prayer and the Bible in his hours of need. Converse with God in African solitudes had
fostered his piety, his self-knowledge, and self-reliance. Under the depression of fever he
used to calm his mind by prayer, and so restore it to a quiet confidence in God. In one of
his journeys he was deserted by many of his carriers who took with them some articles
which he needed, and which he could not replace. He thought that he must turn back at
once. But on that day he was reading Heb_12:1: “Wherefore seeing we also are
compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses … let us run with patience
(endurance, holding on and holding out) the race that is set before us, looking unto
Jesus.” The words came to him as on angels’ wings: he marched right on and reached his
goal. From the very first he bore himself as a hero of the Dark Continent. In the
originality of his career, in tenacity of purpose, in his habit of never quailing before
difficulties, in splendid audacity of programme, in energy, in sanctified common sense,
and in his inexhaustible faith in the elevation of the African, Stewart set an inspiring
example to missionary pioneers.1 [Note: J. Wells, Stewart of Lovedale, 92.]
4. We must not suppose that the race is a very distinguished and splendid career of
Christian enterprise, which only some apostle or missionary or reformer might be
thought able to undertake. The people to whom the author writes were ordinary
Christians, poor Jewish converts, most probably people of less than average means and
pretensions. They had no resources at their command. Their names are unknown. They
were mere Hebrews. Their career and influence, whatever it was, must have been
confined to the narrowest limits. And though the writer speaks somewhat grandly of
what was set before them, and brings them into connexion with Jesus, and the great
forefathers of their race who subdued kingdoms and wrought righteousness, they were
probably very pitiable persons, so far as the world’s judgment would go; and some of us
might have been rather shy of associating much with them. Therefore the race set before
them cannot have had anything very extraordinary in it.
Nevertheless, it was the same race as that run by the Lord Himself—the race of faith. In
His case it was faith in God, the God of salvation; the faith of One conscious of being the
Messiah, the Redeemer, entering with the Father into the great and merciful purpose of
salvation, which He could accomplish in no other way than by coming down into the
family of men, and running this race of faith as their forerunner and the leader of their
salvation. In the case of the Hebrews it was faith in God the Saviour, and in His Son the

12. Redeemer, as the leader of salvation, and the author and finisher of the faith. Even the
faith of Jesus, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, was not the
isolated faith of a mere individual out of connexion with other men. It was the faith of
the Messiah, one with men, the leader of their salvation conscious of His relations to
men, their forerunner, the author and finisher of the faith. And thus the course of the
Hebrews, though nothing but the ordinary believing life of very mean persons, becomes
to the writer’s mind something great, and even one with the life of the Lord Himself.
It is not because, like many others, Jesus is a moral example to us, but because He
represents something more—the impassioned struggle of humanity after the impossible,
after that which the moral law only tells us of, but does not show us how to attain—the
spiritual, imaginative, and fine perfection we shall become when the bitter struggle of
life for righteousness and joy is closed in victory. In realizing that ideal for us, in giving
inspiration to our souls, in His inward support of the battle by which we press forward
towards the mark as men to a city encompassed with a host of foes, He is dearer to us
than He is as our moral example.1 [Note: Stopford A. Brooke.]
II
The Conditions of Successful Running
“Let us … lay aside every weight.”
1. We are to lay aside every “weight.” This term means that which is superfluous, that
which exceeds the proper extent or mass of anything; in the case of a runner, it would
refer to unnecessary clothing or undue fleshiness of body. These impede the runner; and
as the athlete in the race wears the scantiest clothing, and, if he be in training, keeps his
body under, and submits cheerfully to the trainer’s rules, denying himself even the little
indulgences which other men allow themselves, so here the Christian is exhorted to lay
aside every weight, everything that would be a hindrance in running the race set before
him. He must not carry an ounce of unnecessary weight. He will need all his spirit, all his
vigour, all his dash, all his buoyancy for this enterprise. If he handicaps himself by
putting weights in his pockets, or sewing them into his garments, he has no prospect of
prominence in the race. He may still, of course, struggle stolidly on, but anything like a
brilliant effort will be effectually discouraged. Wherefore, first and foremost, let us lay
aside every encumbrance.
Pleasures, friendships, occupations, habits, may be in themselves innocent enough, but
if they hinder our running well they must be given up. Carlyle once said, “Thou must go
without, go without; that is the everlasting song which every hour all our life, though
hoarsely, sings to us”; and those words are true of the Christian life.1 [Note: G. S. Barrett, Musings
for Quiet Hours, 57.]
(1) There are certain weights that are a help and not a hindrance to our progress. They
impart a certain momentum to the character, and carry a man through obstacles
victoriously. There are men who by nature are light-weights, with little chance, in this
hard world, of prospering, and God has to steady them with burdens sometimes, if they
are to run with patience the race that is set before them.
I should not like to travel in a train if I were told that it was light as matchwood. I should
not like to put to sea in a great steamer if I were informed there was no ballast in her.
When there are curves to be taken or storms to be encountered, when the way is beset
with obstacles or perils, you need a certain weight to ensure safety, and you need a
certain weight to give you speed. I have no doubt that this is the explanation of many of
the weights that we must carry. They steady and ballast us; they give us our momentum

13. as we drive ahead through the tempestuous sea. Life might be lighter and gayer if we
lacked them; but, after all, there are better things than gaiety. It is a real weight to a
young man, sometimes, that he has to support an aged relative. There is much that he
craves for which he can never get so long as that burden at home is on his shoulders. But
has not that burden made a man of him—made him strenuous and serious and earnest?
He might have run his race with brilliance otherwise, but he runs it with patience now,
and that is better.1 [Note: G. H. Morrison, The Wings of the Morning, 321.]
(2) Sometimes the things that we call weights are of the most insignificant and trifling
kind. They are like the weights beside a chemist’s scales, so tiny as hardly to be visible.
What would a thorn turn the scale at? There would be a good many thousands to the
pound. Caught in the fleece of a sheep upon the hills, it would not hinder it from freest
movement. But plunged in the flesh of a great saint like St. Paul, it hampers and retards
at every turn, till even the thorn for St. Paul becomes a weight, and drives him in
entreaty to the Throne. There are few things sadder in the world than the trifling nature
of much that hinders men. There are thousands who would run well if it were not for
only one thing between them and freedom. And that is often such a little thing that the
pity is that a man should be so near and yet, from the triumph of it all, so far.
2. “The sin which doth so easily beset us” has to be laid aside. There is some doubt as to
the exact meaning of the Greek word translated in our Version by “doth so easily beset
us,” for it is found only here in the New Testament. It may mean what our translation
gives as its rendering, or it may be as the margin of the Revised Version gives it—sin
which “doth closely cling to us,” or sin which “is admired of many,” popular sin, as it
may be called.
Whichever rendering we may take, the lesson is the same. We have not only to put on
one side all those weights which, sinless in themselves, would hinder our running, but
we have also to lay aside every sin, however closely it clings to us, and whatever may be
the struggle it costs to free ourselves from it. We cannot run at all if we are cumbered
with conscious sin. We cannot turn to God unless we turn away from sin. Coming to
Christ always means leaving something behind, and that something always includes sin.
Many are not saved, and never begin to run the heavenly race, because they are afraid of
this condition, giving up sin. And yet they must make the choice; they must give up sin,
or they will have to give up Christ.
One of the New Testament Revisers has told me that in order to get at the literal
meaning of this word we shall have to invent an almost grotesque expression; he says the
only words which represent the idea in his mind are these, “Let us lay aside the well-
stood-arounded sin”; that is to say, the popular sin. There is the sin, and round it there is
a band of admirers, and round that band there is another, and around that band there is
a third cordon; and so the throng swells and extends, and this sin becomes the well-
stood-arounded sin, the sin that everybody likes, praises, cheers.1 [Note: Joseph Parker, The Gospel
of Jesus Christ, 122.]
It is said that the electric current, though invisible and to our senses inappreciable, when
passed through a wire or substance, disposes every one of its particles differently from
what they were before. It is wholly altered, though to the eye the same. And the subtle
influence of sin, even when unknown, gives a new disposition to the powers of the mind,
puts it into a frame incompatible with that other frame which is faith in Christ. The two
cannot exist together. And, therefore, in order to faith, sin must be laid aside.2 [Note: A. B.
Davidson, Waiting upon God, 312.]
3. We are to run with patience. The ancients had their virtue—fortitude. It was more
active than passive, for the standpoint of ancient ethics was self-sufficingness. In the

14. Christian idea of patience, the passive element of it is as prominent as the active; even
more prominent, for first, the life we live on earth is often a life of suffering; and
secondly, the idea of humility—wholly foreign to antiquity—is one of the roots of
Christian ethics.
The very pace of the runner is itself the foe of patience. It calls, seemingly, for
impetuosity, and the more impetuous the runner, we are accustomed to think, the
better. Its certain effect is to heat the blood and fire the nerves. Behold the athlete with
every muscle taut, every line of his face hard-set, his eye intense and eager, the
applauding crowd urging him on! How can he be poiseful and self-controlled? Indeed,
patience would seem impossible, and impatience the very price of the prize. And yet
every athletic man knows that this is the talk of a novice. If there is anything the runner
needs it is self-control, to be able “to keep his head,” as we say, to command his nerves,
to hold his strength in check at the first and let it out toward the finish, to keep from
being unnerved by the shouts of the crowd, to be equal to any unforeseen turn the race
may take or any condition before unreckoned with that may appear. And does it not
always turn out that a running match is at bottom chiefly a question of self-command—
muscle, wind, nerve, mind, and even heart—and the winner ever found to be the one
who has run the race with the greatest patience?
Self-control may be developed in precisely the same manner as we tone up a weak
muscle—by little exercises day by day. Let us each day do, as mere exercises of discipline
in moral gymnastics, a few acts that are disagreeable to us, the doing of which will help
us in instant action in our hour of need. These daily exercises in moral discipline will
have a wondrous tonic effect on man’s whole moral nature. The individual can attain
self-control in great things only through self-control in little things. He must study
himself to discover what is the weak point in his armour, what is the element within him
that ever keeps him from his fullest success. This is the characteristic upon which he
should begin his exercise in self-control. Is it selfishness, vanity, cowardice, morbidness,
temper, laziness, worry, mind-wandering, lack of purpose?—whatever form human
weakness assumes in the masquerade of life he must discover. He must then live each
day as if his whole existence were telescoped down to the single day before him. With no
useless regret for the past, no useless worry for the future, he should live that day as if it
were his only day—the only day left for him to assert all that is best in him, the only day
for him to conquer all that is worst in him. He should master the weak element within
him at each slight manifestation from moment to moment. Each moment then must be a
victory for it or for him. Will he be King, or will he be slave?—the answer rests with him.1
[Note: W. G. Jordan, The Kingship of Self-Control, 11.]
Have you ever thought, my friend,
As you daily toil and plod
In the noisy paths of men,
How still are the ways of God?
Have you ever paused in the din
Of traffic’s insistent cry,
To think of the calm in the cloud
Of the peace in your glimpse of the sky?

15. Go out in the quiet fields,
That quietly yield you meat,
And let them rebuke your noise,
Whose patience is still and sweet.
III
The Cloud of Witnesses
“Seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses.”
1. The word “witness” has two meanings in our language, and out of that double meaning
has come some confusion, and a misunderstanding of the text. The word means one who
looks on and sees—a spectator; it also means one who gives his evidence. It is easy to see
how the word came to have the double meaning. He who gives evidence must have some
personal knowledge of the matter, and that personal knowledge comes mostly by seeing.
But the Greek word which is used here has but one meaning, and that is clear and
unmistakable. The word itself has been adopted into our language—“martyr”: seeing we
are compassed about by so great a cloud of martyrs—confessors, witnesses who have
borne their testimony to the power of faith in their own lives. The word runs through the
eleventh chapter, variously translated—witness, testimony, testifying, evidence. The
author of the Epistle puts Abel, and Enoch, and Noah, and Abraham, and Moses, and
these other great saints into the witness-box, and they tell us what faith has done for
them. Then he turns to us as the jury as if to say, “Sirs, you have heard what these have
said, these, who have come as near to a true and worthy life as any that ever lived. I have
a great many other witnesses who are all prepared to give similar testimony if time
permitted. Wherefore, then, seeing that we are compassed about with so great a cloud of
those who have shown us what faith has done for them, let us turn to ourselves and run
the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of faith.”
When immortal Bunyan makes his picture of the persecuting passions bringing in their
verdict of guilty, who pities Faithful? That is a rare and blessed lot which some greatest
men have not attained, to know ourselves guiltless before a condemning crowd—to be
sure that what we are denounced for is solely the good in us. The pitiable lot is that of the
man who could not call himself a martyr even though he were to persuade himself that
the men who stoned him were but ugly passions incarnate—who knows that he is stoned,
not for professing the Eight, but for not being the man he professed to be.1 [Note: George Eliot,
Middlemarch.]
2. To what do they witness?
(1) They are witnesses to a Divine, invisible, eternal life; witnesses to something that
many of us do not see at all, to something that most of us see only vaguely, dimly,
occasionally. They are witnesses to a great truth in the faith of which they walk, by which
they were inspired, which perhaps we fail to see, or see only at special times and on
special occasions.
Walking along the street, you see a group of men standing, looking up into the heavens;
and you are pretty sure they see something, and you wonder what it is, and stop and look
where they are looking. So we see men gathered in monasteries, gathered in closets,
gathered in houses of worship, drawn together by a vision, looking up into the heavens
at something invisible to most of us in the dust and darkness of life. And because these
men are looking we are sure there is something they see. A man without any love of
music may come into a concert-room, and the music which is sounding out from the

16. platform may mean nothing to him, but surely he cannot look upon this audience rapt in
attention and not know that there is something in music, whether he appreciates it or
not? So it is impossible for any man to look out upon the great worshipping
congregations of all ages and all times, seeing men stirred not only with a momentary
passion, a temporary enthusiasm, but lifted up into a higher, nobler, and grander life,
and not feel sure that there is a truth, a reality, in spiritual life.1 [Note: Lyman Abbott.]
(2) They are by their very lives witnesses to the power that inspired them. They are
witnesses to what God can make out of common men and women. In the sculptor’s
studio you see the form shaped by his skilful hands, and your heart is touched, your soul
is lifted up; you receive through the clay, but not from the clay, a new thought or a new
emotion. You see what a great sculptor can make out of common clay. Put a violin in the
hands of a poor player, and you will put your fingers in your ears to keep out the
dissonance. Put the same instrument in the hands of a skilful player, and you will feel the
soul breathing through the instrument. It is the player that makes the difference. Look
all along the line of human history, and you may see what kind of figures God can make
out of clay like yours; you may hear what kind of music He can play on instruments such
as you are. The great and good men of the world are witnesses to the power, not
ourselves, but which is in ourselves—to the power that makes men great.
The writing-master sits down at the desk, and says to the child, “See how I hold my pen,”
and shows his pupil how to place the fingers on the penholder, and with what freedom
and flexibility, and yet with what steadiness, the letters are formed; and then he says,
“Now you sit down and try.” And the boy sits down, and takes the pen, and the teacher
stands and looks over his shoulder to see how well he has learned his lesson. So the
sainted father or mother or pastor or friend sits down at our side, and says, “I will show
you what life means.” Or, rather, God in them sits before us, saying, “I will show you
what life means.” And then, having given us a momentary glimpse of life, they step on
one side, and look over our shoulder, to see whether we have learned the lesson well or
not.2 [Note: Ibid.]
The Force that had been lent my Father he honourably expended in manful well-doing: a
portion of this Planet bears beneficent traces of his strong Hand and strong Head;
nothing that he undertook to do but he did it faithfully and like a true man. I shall look
on the Houses he built with a certain proud interest: they stand firm and sound to the
heart, all over his little district: no one that comes after him will ever say, Here was the
finger of a hollow Eye-servant. They are little texts, for me, of the Gospel of man’s free-
will. Nor will his Deeds and Sayings, in any case, be found unworthy, not false and
barren, but genuine and fit. Nay, am not I also the humble James Carlyle’s work? I owe
him much more than existence; I owe him a noble inspiring example (now that I can
read it in that rustic character); it was he exclusively that determined on educating me,
that from his small, hard-earned funds sent me to School and College; and made me
whatever I am or may become. Let me not mourn for my Father; let me do worthily of
him; so shall he still live, even Here, in me; and his worth plant itself honourably forth
into new generations.1 [Note: Carlyle, Reminiscences, i. 3.]
IV
The Supreme and Inspiring Example
“Looking unto Jesus the author and perfecter of faith.”
1. The “author of faith,” says the writer. It is the same word as is translated “the Prince of
life” in the Acts of the Apostles, and, in another part of this letter, “the Captain of
salvation.” It means literally one who makes a beginning, or who leads on a series or

17. succession of events or of men. And when we read of the “author of faith” (for the word
“our” in the Authorized Version is a very unfortunate supplement), we are not to take the
writer as intending to say that Christ gives to men the faith by which they grasp Him—
for that is neither a Scriptural doctrine nor would it be relevant to the present context—
but to regard him as meaning that Jesus Christ is, as it were, the Captain of the great
army that has been deployed before us in the preceding chapter. He came first in order
of time, yet, like other commanders-in-chief, He rides in the centre of the march; and He
is the first that ever lived a life of perfect and unbroken faith. So He is the Leader of the
army, and in the true sense of the name, which is usurped by a very unworthy earthly
monarch, is the “Commander of the Faithful.”
The term “Captain” (rather than “Author”) suggests one who goes before us and cripples
the common enemy and makes a way for His followers through the thick of the fight. It
suggests one who fights from the same level and by His superior strength wins victory
for Himself and others; the strong swimmer who carries the rope ashore, and so not only
secures His own position but makes rescue for all who will follow; the daring man who
goes first and treads down the drifted snow, leaving a lane for the weaker to walk in; the
originator of salvation to all, by Himself leading the way from the present actual life of
men in this world to the glory beyond. There is only one path by which any one in
human nature can reach his destiny, and that lies through temptation and the suffering
which temptation brings. Christ being leader must take this way. He was human and
obliged to make growth in human righteousness, made under the law, subject to human
conditions and exposed to all human temptations, finding His strength not in Himself
but in another even as we, needing faith as we need faith.1 [Note: Marcus Dods, Christ and Man, 63.]
2. We are to run while ever “looking unto Jesus.” The Greek expression is most peculiar,
for it includes the idea of looking away from everything else and fastening the soul’s gaze
upon the Lord alone. We are all tempted to look at the things behind; to consider the
difficulties, the trials, the sorrows, the sins of life thus far prosecuted. Remorse bids us
catalogue our crimes. Discouragement bids us remember the past obstacles. Unbelief
constrains us to believe every tale of all the embarrassment which in the life of faith and
the labour of love we have met. The writer commands us to look away from the things
that are past. “Forgetting those things which are behind … press toward the mark for the
prize of our high calling in God in Christ Jesus.” There is nothing religious in the
remembrance of past sins or past sorrows. It clothes the soul with sadness, it deprives it
of strength, it disqualifies it for energy and action. From all—no matter how dense has
been the darkness through which we have passed, no matter how deep the sloughs of
despond through which we have stumbled, no matter how high the mountains of our’
divisions that we have already crossed—we are to look away. The life that God has given
us from His own glory is to accomplish the purposes for which we are sent.
Just as the modern conqueror of the air trusts to a power that surpasses human
strength, so is it with the man who would rise above a purely mundane existence. “I can
do all things through Christ which strengthened me,” says St. Paul. He finds that the
motor-power of the Spirit of God is sufficient to raise him far above the levels of the old
life. Looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of his faith, he finds that the frail craft
of his life is borne aloft, and so strong is the unseen motor-force impelling it that it is no
longer buffeted about by every wind of doctrine, but is carried steadily forward against
the many gusts that threaten to upset its equilibrium.1 [Note: M. G. Archibald, Sundays at the Royal
Military College, 261.]
3. The joy of victory lies in front. The man bent upon reaching the Pole spends no pity on
himself; the martyr, bent upon establishing some new republic of virtue and truth, has

18. neither the desire nor the instinct to recount his wounds. They move with a sort of
ecstasy towards that goal which they have set before them. They know a solemn
exaltation of spirit which makes them indifferent to wounds and death. It may almost be
said that they scarcely feel what to another would be dreadful pain; spirit has so far
conquered sense that the very edge of pain is blunted. No one who reads the story of
martyrdom can doubt that the martyr often reached a condition of sublime ecstasy, in
which the ideal he loved had become so real to him that the real had almost ceased to be
a part of himself. And it was so with Jesus. The joy set before Him was so real and vivid
that He endured the cross and despised the shame—the tragic and the agonizing being
swallowed up in the triumphant.
When I was at a public school, we used to have a great system of paper-chases, especially
in the Easter term, when there was not quite so much football. I used to be very fond of
running in these. They were generally rather long and tiring, and you needed to be in
very good training for them. One custom we always had was, when we were a mile or two
from the college, to form up in a line and race home; and very hard and exhausting work
it was. But I well remember one thing about those “runs in,” as we called them, and that
was how wonderfully you seemed to forget fatigue and exhaustion the moment the
college towers came in sight. We saw our goal clear before us, and it seemed to put new
life into us. It was a real help, just when we most wanted it. It helped one to keep going
strongly and make a good finish.2 [Note: F. S. Horan, A Call to Seamen, 128.]
Why those fears? behold, ’tis Jesus
Holds the helm and guides the ship;
Spread the sails, and catch the breezes
Sent to waft us o’er the deep
To the regions
Where the mourners cease to weep.
Could we stay when death was hov’ring,
Could we rest on such a shore?
No, the awful truth discov’ring,
We could linger there no more:
We forsake it,
Leaving all we loved before.
Though the shore we hope to land on
Only by report is known,
Yet we freely all abandon
Led by that report alone:
And with Jesus
Through the trackless deep move on.

19. Render’d safe by His protection,
We shall pass the wat’ry waste;
Trusting to His wise direction,
We shall gain the port at last,
And with wonder
Think on toils and dangers past.
8. EBC, "A CLOUD OF WITNESSES.
"By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau, even concerning things to come. By faith
Jacob, when he was a-dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph; and worshipped,
leaning upon the top of his staff. By faith Joseph, when his end was nigh, made
mention of the departure of the children of Israel; and gave commandment
concerning his bones.... By faith the walls of Jericho fell down, after they had been
compassed about for seven days. By faith Rahab the harlot perished not with them
that were disobedient, having received the spies with peace. And what shall I more
say? for the time will fail me if I tell of Gideon. Barak, Samson, Jephthah; of David
and Samuel and the prophets: who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought
righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the power
of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, waxed
mighty in war, turned to flight armies of aliens. Women received their dead by a
resurrection: and others were tortured, not accepting their deliverance; that they
might obtain a better resurrection: and others had trial of mockings and scourgings,
yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment: they were stoned, they were sawn
asunder, they were tempted, they were slain with the sword: they went about in
sheepskins, in goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, evil-entreated (of whom the world
was not worthy), wandering in deserts and mountains and caves, and the holes of the
earth. And these all, having had witness borne to them through their faith, received
not the promise, God having provided some better thing concerning us, that apart
from us they should not be made perfect. Therefore let us also, seeing we are
compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight, and the
sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set
before us."-- Heb_11:20-40; Heb_12:1 (R.V.).
Time fails us to dilate on the faith of the other saints of the old covenant. But they must
not be passed over in silence. The impression produced by our author’s splendid roll of
the heroes of faith in the eleventh chapter is the result quite as much of an accumulation
of examples as of the special greatness of a few among them. At the close they appear
like an overhanging "cloud" of witnesses for God.
By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau; and Jacob, dying in a strange land, blessed the
sons of Joseph, distinguishing wittingly, and bestowing on each[289] his own peculiar
blessing. His faith became a prophetic inspiration, and even distinguished between the
future of Ephraim and the future of Manasseh. He did not create the blessing. He was
only a steward of God’s mysteries. Faith well understood its own limitations. But it drew
its inspiration to foretell what was to come from a remembrance of God’s faithfulness in
the past. For, before[290] he gave his blessing, he had bowed his head in worship,
leaning upon the top of his staff. In his dying hour he recalled the day on which he had
passed over Jordan with his staff,--a day remembered by him once before, when he had

20. become two bands, wrestled with the angel, and halted on his thigh. His staff had
become his token of the covenant, his reminder of God’s faithfulness, his sacrament, or
visible sign of an invisible grace.
Joseph, though he was so completely Egyptianised that he did not, like Jacob, ask to be
buried in Canaan, and only two of his sons became, through Jacob’s blessing, heirs of the
promise, yet gave commandment concerning his bones. His faith believed that the
promise given to Abraham would be fulfilled. The children of Israel might dwell in
Goshen and prosper. But they would sooner or later return to Canaan. When his end
drew near, his Egyptian greatness was forgotten. The piety of his childhood returned. He
remembered God’s promise to his fathers. Perhaps it was his father Jacob’s dying
blessing that had revived the thoughts of the past and fanned his faith into a steady
flame.
"By faith the walls of Jericho fell down."[291] When the Israelites had crossed Jordan
and eaten of the old corn of the land, the manna ceased. The period of continued miracle
came to an end. Henceforth they would smite their enemies with their armed thousands.
But one signal miracle the Lord would yet perform in the sight of all Israel. The walls of
the first city they came to would fall down flat, when the seven priests would blow with
the trumpets of rams’ horns the seventh time on the seventh day. Israel believed, and as
God had said, so it came to pass.
The treachery of a harlot even is mentioned by the Apostle as an instance of faith.[292]
Justly. For, whilst her past life and present act were neither better nor worse than the
morality of her time, she saw the hand of the God of heaven in the conquest of the land,
and bowed to His decision. This was a greater faith than that of her daughter-in-law,
Ruth, whose name is not mentioned. Ruth believed in Naomi and, as a consequence,
accepted Naomi’s God and people.[293] Rahab believed in God first, and, therefore,
accepted the Israelitish conquest and adopted the nationality of the conquerors.[294]
Of the judges the Apostle selects four: Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah. The mention
of Barak must be understood to include Deborah, who was the mind and heart that
moved Barak’s arm; and Deborah was a prophetess of the Lord. She and Barak wrought
their mighty deeds and sang their pæan in faith.[295] Gideon put the Midianites to flight
by faith; for he knew that his sword was the sword of the Lord,[296] Jephthah was a
man of faith; for he vowed a vow unto the Lord, and would not go back.[297] Samson
had faith; for he was a Nazarite to God from his mother’s womb, and in his last
extremity called unto the Lord and prayed.[298]
The Apostle does not name Othniel, Ehud, Shamgar, and the rest. The Spirit of the Lord
came upon them also. They too were mighty through God. But the narrative does not tell
us that they prayed, or that their soul consciously and believingly responded to the voice
of Heaven. Alaric, while on his march towards Rome, said to a holy monk, who entreated
him to spare the city, that he did not go of his own will, but that One was continually
urging him forward to take it.[299] Many are the scourges of God that know not the
hand that wields them.
Individuals "through faith subdued kingdoms."[300] Gideon dispersed the Midianites;
[301] Barak discomfited Sisera, the captain of Jabin king of Canaan’s host; Jephthah
smote the Ammonites;[302] David held the Philistines in check,[303] measured Moab
with a line,[304] and put garrisons in Syria of Damascus. Samuel "wrought
righteousness," and taught the people the good and the right way.[305] David "obtained
the fulfilment of God’s promises:" his house was blessed that it should continue for ever
before God.[306] Daniel’s faith stopped the mouths of lions.[307] The faith of Shadrach,

21. Meshach, and Abednego trusted in God, and quenched the power of the fire, without
extinguishing its flame.[308] Elijah escaped the edge of Ahab’s sword.[309] Elisha’s
faith saw the mountain full of horses and chariots of fire round about him.[310]
Hezekiah "from weakness was made strong."[311] The Maccabæan princes waxed
mighty in war and turned to flight armies of aliens.[312] The widow of Zarephath[313]
and the Shunammite[314] received their dead back into their embrace in consequence of
[315] a resurrection wrought by the faith of the prophets. Others refused deliverance,
gladly accepting the alternative to unfaithfulness, to be beaten to death, that they might
be accounted worthy[316] to attain the better world and the resurrection, not of, but
from, the dead, which is the resurrection to eternal life. Such a man was the aged Eleazar
in the time of the Maccabees.[317] Zechariah was stoned to death at the commandment
of Joash the king in the court of the house of the Lord.[318] Isaiah is said to have been
sawn asunder in extreme old age by the order of Manasseh. Others were burnt[319] by
Antiochus Epiphanes. Elijah had no settled abode, but went from place to place clad in a
garment of hair, the skin of sheep or goat. It ought not to be a matter of surprise that
these men of God had no dwelling-place, but were, like the Apostles after them, buffeted,
persecuted, defamed, and made as the filth of the world, the offscouring of all things. For
the world was not worthy of them. The world crucified their Lord, and they would be
ashamed of accepting better treatment than He received. By the world is meant the life
of those who know not Christ. The men of faith were driven out of the cities into the
desert, out of homes into prisons. But their faith was an assurance of things hoped for
and, therefore, a solvent of fear. Their proving of things not seen rendered the prison, as
Tertullian says,[320] a place of retirement, and the desert a welcome escape from the
abominations that met their eyes wherever the world had set up its vanity fair.
All these sturdy men of faith have had witness borne to them in Scripture. This honour
they won from time to time, as the Spirit of Christ, which was in the prophets, saw fit to
encourage the people of God on earth by their example. Are we forbidden to suppose
that this witness to their faith gladdened their own glorified spirits, and calmed their
eager expectation of the day when the promise would be fulfilled? For, after all, their
reward was not the testimony of Scripture, but their own perfection. Now this perfection
is described through out the Epistle as a priestly consecration. It expresses fitness for
entering into immediate communion with God. This was the final fulfilment of the
promise. This was the blessing which the saints under the old covenant had not
obtained. The way of the holiest had not yet been opened.[321] Consequently their faith
consisted essentially in endurance. "None of these received the promise," but patiently
waited. This is inferred concerning them from the testimony of Scripture that they
believed. Their faith must have manifested itself in this form,--endurance. To us, at
length, the promise has been fulfilled. God has spoken unto us in His Son. We have a
great High-priest, Who has passed through the heavens. The Son, as High-priest, has
been perfected for evermore; that is, He is endowed with fitness to enter into the true
holiest place. He has perfected also for ever them that are sanctified: freed from guilt as
worshippers, they enter the holiest through a priestly consecration. The new and living
way has been dedicated through the veil.
But the important point is that the fulfilment of the promise has not dispensed with the
necessity for faith. We saw, in an earlier chapter, that the revelation of the Sabbath
advances from lower forms of rest to higher and more spiritual. The more stubborn the
unbelief of men became, the more fully the revelation of God’s promise opened up. The
thought is somewhat similar in the present passage. The final form which God’s promise
assumes is an advance on any fulfilment vouchsafed to the saints of the old covenant
during their earthly life. It now includes perfection, or fitness to enter into the holiest

22. through the blood of Christ. It means immediate communion with God. Far from
dispensing with faith, this form of the promise demands the exercise of a still better faith
than the fathers had. They endured by faith; we through faith enter the holiest. To them,
as well as to us, faith is an assurance of things hoped for and a proving of things not
seen; but our assurance must incite us to draw near with boldness unto the throne of
grace, to draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith. This is the better faith
which is not once ascribed in the eleventh chapter to the saints of the Old Testament. On
the contrary, we are given to understand[322] that they, through fear of death, were all
their lifetime subject to bondage. But Christ has abolished death. For we enter into the
presence of God, not through death, but through faith.
In accordance with this, the Apostle says that "God provided some better thing
concerning us."[323] These words cannot mean that God provided some better thing for
us than He had provided for the fathers. Such a notion would not be true. The promise
was made to Abraham, and is now fulfilled to all the heirs alike; that is, to those who are
of the faith of Abraham. The author says "concerning,"[324] not "for." The idea is that
God foresaw we would, and provided (for the word implies both things) that we should,
manifest a better kind of faith than it was possible for the fathers to show, better in so far
as power to enter the holiest place is better than endurance.
But the author adds another thought. Through the exercise of the better faith by us, the
fathers also enter with us into the holiest place. "Apart from us they could not be made
perfect." The priestly consecration becomes theirs through us. Such is the unity of the
Church, and such the power of faith, that those who could not believe, or could not
believe in a certain way, for themselves, receive the fulness of the blessing through the
faith of others. Nothing less will do justice to the Apostle’s words than the notion that
the saints of the old covenant have, through the faith of the Christian Church, entered
into more immediate and intimate communion with God than they had before, though
in heaven.
We now understand why they take so deep an interest in the running of the Christian
athletes on earth. They surround their course, like a great cloud. They know that they
will enter into the holiest if we win the race. For every new victory of faith on earth, there
is a new revelation of God in heaven. Even the angels, the principalities and powers in
the heavenly places, learn, says St. Paul, through the Church the manifold wisdom of
God.[325] How much more will the saints, members of the Church, brethren of Christ,
be better able to apprehend the love and power of God, Who makes weak, sinful men
conquerors over death and its fear.
The word "witnesses"[326] does not itself refer to their looking on, as spectators of the
race. Another word would almost certainly have been used to express this notion, which
is moreover contained in the phrase "having so great a cloud surrounding[327] us." The
thought seems to be that the men to whose faith the Spirit of Christ in Scripture bare
witness were themselves witnesses for God in a godless world, in the same sense in
which Christ tells His disciples that they were His witnesses, and Ananias tells Saul that
he would be a witness for Christ.[328] Every one who confessed Christ before men, him
did Christ also confess before His Church which is on earth, and does now confess before
His Father in heaven, by leading him into God’s immediate presence.
FOOTNOTES:
[289] hekaston (Heb_11:21).
[290] Gen_47:31.

23. [291] Heb_11:30.
[292] Heb_11:31.
[293] Rth_1:16.
[294] Mat_1:5.
[295] Jdg_4:4; Jdg_4:5 :
[296] Jdg_7:18.
[297] Jdg_11:35.
[298] Jdg_13:7; Jdg_16:28.
[299] Robertson, History of the Christian Church, book 2:, Heb_7:1-28 :
[300] Heb_11:33.
[301] Jdg_7:1-25
[302] Jdg_11:33.
[303] 2Sa_5:25.
[304] 2Sa_8:2; 2Sa_8:6.
[305] 1Sa_12:23.
[306] 2Sa_7:28-29.
[307] Dan_6:22.
[308] Dan_3:27-28.
[309] 1Ki_19:1-3.
[310] 2Ki_6:17.
[311] 2Ki_20:5.
[312] 1Ma_5:1-68
[313] 1Ki_17:22.
[314] 2Ki_4:35.
[315] ex (Heb_11:35).
[316] Luk_20:35.
[317] 2Ma_6:19.
[318] 2Ch_24:21.
[319] Reading eprêsthêsan.
[320] Ad Martyras, 2.
[321] Heb_9:8.
[322] Heb_2:15.
[323] Heb_11:40.
[324] peri.

24. [325] Eph_3:10.
[326] martyrôn (Heb_12:1).
[327] perikeimenon.
[328] Act_1:8; Act_22:14.
Hebrews 12:1-17
CONFLICT.
"Therefore let us also, seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of
witnesses, lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us
run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the Author and
Perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the Cross,
despising shame, and hath sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For
consider Him that hath endured such gainsaying of sinners against themselves, that
ye wax not weary, fainting in your souls. Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving
against sin: and ye have forgotten the exhortation, which reasoneth with you as with
sons,
My son, regard not lightly the chastening of the Lord, Nor faint when thou art
reproved of Him; For whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, And scourgeth every son
whom He receiveth.
It is for chastening that ye endure; God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is
there whom his father chasteneth not? But if ye are without chastening, whereof all
have been made partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. Furthermore, we had
the fathers of our flesh to chasten us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much
rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live? For they verily for a few
days chastened us as seemed good to them; but He for our profit, that we may be
partakers of His holiness. All chastening seemeth for the present to be not joyous,
but grievous: yet afterward it yieldeth peaceable fruit unto them that have been
exercised thereby, even the fruit of righteousness. Wherefore lift up the hands that
hang down, and the palsied knees; and make straight paths for your feet, that that
which is lame be not turned out of the way, but rather be healed. Follow after peace
with all men, and the sanctification without which no man shall see the Lord: looking
carefully lest there be any man that falleth short of the grace of God; lest any root of
bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby the many be defiled; lest there be
any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one mess of meat sold his own
birthright. For ye know that even when he afterward desired to inherit the blessing,
he was rejected (for he found no place of repentance), though he sought it diligently
with tears."-- Heb_12:1-17 (R.V.).
The author has told his readers that they have need of endurance;[329] but when he
connects this endurance with faith, he describes faith, not as an enduring of present
evils, but as an assurance of things hoped for in the future. His meaning undoubtedly is
that assurance of the future gives strength to endure the present. These are two distinct
aspects of faith. In the eleventh chapter both sides of faith are illustrated in the long
catalogue of believers under the Old Testament. Examples of men waiting for the
promise and having an assurance of things hoped for come first. They are Abel, Enoch,

25. Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. In some measure these witnesses of God
suffered; but the more prominent feature of their faith was expectation of a future
blessing. Moses is next mentioned. He marks a transition. In him the two qualities of
faith appear to strive for the pre-eminence. He chooses to be evil entreated with the
people of God, because he knows that the enjoyment of sin is short-lived; he suffers the
reproach of Christ, and looks away from it to the recompense of reward. After him
conflict and endurance are more prominent in the history of believers than assurance of
the future. Many of these later heroes of faith had a more or less dim vision of the
unseen; and in the case of those of whose faith nothing is said in the Old Testament
except that they endured, the other phase of this spiritual power is not wanting. For the
Church is one through the ages, and the clear eye of an earlier period cannot be
disconnected from the strong arm of a later time.
In the twelfth chapter the two aspects of faith exemplified in the saints of the Old
Testament are urged on the Hebrew Christians. Now practically for the first time in the
Epistle the writer addresses himself to the difficulties and discouragements of a state of
conflict. In the earlier chapters he exhorted his readers to hold fast their own individual
confession of Christ. In the later portions he exhorted them to quicken the faith of their
brethren in the Church assemblies. But his account of the worthies of the Old Testament
in the previous chapter has revealed a special adaptedness in faith to meet the actual
condition of his readers. We gather from the tenor of the passage that the Church had to
contend against evil men. Who they were we do not know. They were "the sinners." Our
author is claiming for the Christian Church the right to speak of the men outside in the
language used by Jews concerning the heathen; and it is not at all unlikely that the
unbelieving Jews themselves are here meant. His readers had to endure the gainsaying
of sinners, who poured contempt on Christianity, as they had also covered Christ
Himself with shame. The Church might have to resist unto blood in striving against the
encompassing sin. Peace is to be sought and followed after with all men, but not to the
injury of that sanctification without which no man shall see the Lord.[330] The true
people of God must go forth unto Jesus without the camp of Judaism, bearing His
reproach.[331]
This is an advance in the thought. Our author does not exhort his readers individually to
steadfastness, nor the Church collectively to mutual oversight. He has before his eyes the
conflict of the Church against wicked men, whether in sheep’s clothing or without the
fold. The purport of the passage may be thus stated: Faith as a hope of the future is a
faith to endure in the present conflict against men. The reverse of this is equally true and
important: that faith as a strength to endure the gainsaying of men is the faith that
presses on toward the goal unto the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
The connecting link between these two representations of faith is to be found in the
illustration with which the chapter opens. A race implies both a hope and a contest.
The hope of faith is simple and well understood. It has been made abundantly clear in
the Epistle. It is to obtain the fulfilment of the promise made to Abraham and renewed
to other believers time after time under the old covenant. "For we who believe do enter
into God’s rest."[332] "They that have been called receive the promise of the eternal
inheritance."[333] "We have boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of
Jesus."[334] In the latter part of the chapter the writer speaks of his readers as having
already attained. They have come to God, and to the spirits of just men made perfect,
and to Jesus, the Mediator of the new covenant. In the first verse he urges them to run
the race, so as to secure for themselves the blessing. He points them to Jesus, Who has
run the race before them and won the crown, Who sits on the right hand of God, with

26. authority to reward all who reach the goal. Both representations are perfectly consistent.
Men do enter into immediate communion with God on earth; but they attain it by effort
of faith.
Such is the aim of faith. The conflict is more complex and difficult to explain. There is,
first of all, a conflict in the preparatory training, and this is twofold. We have to strive
against ourselves and against the world. We must put away our own grossness,[335] as
athletes rid themselves by severe training of all superfluous flesh. Then we must also put
away from us the sin that surrounds us, that quite besets us, on all sides,[336] whether
in the world or in the Church, as runners must have the course cleared and the crowd of
onlookers that press around removed far enough to give them the sense of breathing
freely and running unimpeded in a large space. The word "besetting" does not refer to
the special sin to which every individual is most prone. No thoughtful man but has felt
himself encompassed by sin, not merely as a temptation, but much more as an
overpowering force, silent, passive, closing in upon him on all sides,--a constant
pressure from which there is no escape. The sin and misery of the world has staggered
reason and left men utterly powerless to resist or to alleviate the infinite evil. Faith alone
surmounts these preliminary difficulties of the Christian life. Faith delivers us from
grossness of spirit, from lethargy, earthliness, stupor. Faith will also lift us above the
terrible pressure of the world’s sin. Faith has the heart that still hopes, and the hand that
still saves. Faith resolutely puts away from her whatever threatens to overwhelm and
impede, and makes for herself a large room to move freely in.
Then comes the actual contest. Our author says "contest."[337] For the conflict is against
evil men. Yet it is, in a true and vital sense, not a contest of the kind which the word
naturally suggests. Here the effort is not to be first at the goal. We run the race "through
endurance." Mental suffering is of the essence of the conflict. Our success in winning the
prize does not mean the failure of others. The failure of our rivals does not imply that we
attain the mark. In fact, the Christian life is not the competition of rivals, but the
enduring of shame at the hands of evil men, which endurance is a discipline. Maybe we
do not sufficiently lay to heart that the discipline of life consists mainly in overcoming
rightly and well the antagonism of men. The one bitterness in the life of our Lord
Himself was the malice of the wicked. Apart from that unrelenting hatred we may regard
His short life as serenely happy. The warning which He addressed to His disciples was
that they should beware of men. But, though wisdom is necessary, the conflict must not
be shunned. When it is over, nothing will more astonish the man of faith than that he
should have been afraid, so weak did malice prove to be.
To run our course successfully, we must keep our eyes steadily fixed on Jesus.[338] It is
true we are compassed about with a cloud of God’s faithful witnesses. But they are a
cloud. The word signifies not merely that they are a large multitude, but also that we
cannot distinguish individuals in the immense gathering of those who have gone before.
The Church has always cherished a hope that the saints of heaven are near us, perhaps
seeing our efforts to follow their glorious example. Beyond this we dare not go. Personal
communion is possible to the believer on earth with One only of the inhabitants of the
spiritual world. That One is Jesus Christ. Even faith cannot discern the individual saints
that compose the cloud. But it can look away from all of them to Jesus. It looks unto
Jesus as He is and as He was: as He is for help; as He was for a perfect example.
1. Faith regards Jesus as He is,--the "Leader and Perfecter." The words are an allusion to
what the writer has already told us in the Epistle concerning Jesus. He is "the Captain or
Leader of our salvation,"[339] and "by one offering He hath perfected for ever them that
are sanctified."[340] He leads onward our faith till we attain the goal, and for every

27. advance we make in the course He strengthens, sustains, and in the end completes our
faith. The runner, when he seizes the crown, will not be found to have been exhausted by
his efforts. High attainments demand a correspondingly great faith.
Many expositors think the words which we have rendered "Leader" and "Perfecter" refer
to Christ’s own faith. But the words will hardly admit of this meaning. Others think they
are intended to convey the notion that Christ is the Author of our faith in its weak
beginnings and the Finisher of it when it attains perfection. But the use which the
Apostle has made of the words "Leader of salvation" in Heb_2:1-18 : seems to prove that
here also he understands by "Leader" One Who will bring our faith onward safely to the
end of the course. The distinction is rather between rendering us certain of winning the
crown and making our faith large and noble enough to be worthy of wearing it.
2. Faith regards Jesus as He was on earth, the perfect example of victory through
endurance. He has acquired His power to lead onward and to make perfect our faith by
His own exercise of faith. He is "Leader" because He is "Forerunner;"[341] He is
"Perfecter" because He Himself has been perfected.[342] He endured a cross. The
author leaves it to his readers to imagine all that is implied in the awful word. More is
involved in the Cross than shame. For the shame of the Cross He could afford to despise.
But there was in the Cross what He did not despise; yea, what drew tears and strong
cries from Him in the agony of His soul. Concerning this, whatever it was, the author is
here silent, because it was peculiar to Christ, and could never become an example to
others, except indeed in the faith that enabled Him to endure it.
Even in the gainsaying of men there was an element which He did not despise, but
endured. He understood that their gainsaying was against themselves.[343] It would
end, not merely in putting Him to an open shame, but in their own destruction. This
caused keen suffering to His holy and loving spirit. But He endured it, as He endured the
Cross itself in all its mysterious import. He did not permit the sin and perdition of the
world to overwhelm Him. His faith resolutely put away from Him the deadly pressure.
On the one hand, He did not despise sin; on the other, He was not crushed by its weight.
He calmly endured.
But He endured through faith, as an assurance of things hoped for and the proving of
things not seen. He hoped to attain the joy which was set before Him as the prize to be
won. The connection of the thought with the general subject of the whole passage
satisfies us that the words translated "for the joy set before Him" are correctly so
rendered, and do not mean that Christ chose the suffering and shame of the Cross in
preference to the enjoyment of sin. This also is perfectly true, and more true of Christ
than it was even of Moses. But the Apostle’s main idea throughout is that faith in the
form of assurance and faith in the form of enduring go together. Jesus endured because
He looked for a future joy as His recompense of reward; He attained the joy through His
endurance.
But, as more than shame was involved in His Cross, more also than joy was reserved for
Him in reward. Through His Cross He became "the Leader and Perfecter" of our faith.
He was exalted to be the Sanctifier of His people. "He has sat down on the right hand of
God."
Our author proceeds: Weigh this in the balance.[344] Compare this quality of faith with
your own. Consider who He was and what you are. When you have well understood the
difference, remember that He endured, as you endure, by faith. He put His trust in God.
[345] He was faithful to Him Who had constituted Him what He became through His
assumption of flesh and blood.[346] He offered prayers and supplications to Him Who

28. was able to save Him out of death, yet piously committed Himself to the hands of God.
The gainsaying of men brought Him to the bloody death of the Cross. You also are
marshalled in battle array, in the conflict against the sin of the world. But the Leader
only has shed His blood--as yet. Your hour may be drawing nigh! Therefore be not weary
in striving to reach the goal! Faint not in enduring the conflict! The two sides of faith are
still in the author’s thoughts.
It would naturally occur to the readers of the Epistle to ask why they might not end their
difficulties by shunning the conflict. Why might they not enter into fellowship with God
without coming into conflict with men? But this cannot be. Communion with God
requires personal fitness of character, and manifests itself in inward peace. This fitness,
again, is the result of discipline, and the discipline implies endurance. "It is for discipline
that ye endure."[347]
The word translated "discipline" suggests the notion of a child with his father. But it is
noteworthy that the Apostle does not use the word "children" in his illustration, but the
word "sons." This was occasioned partly by the fact that the citation from the Book of
Proverbs speaks of "sons." But, in addition to this, the author’s mind seems to be still
lingering with the remembrance of Him Who was Son of God. For discipline is the lot
and privilege of all sons. Who is a son whom his father does not discipline? There might
have been One. But even He humbled Himself to learn obedience through sufferings.
Absolutely every son undergoes discipline.
Furthermore, the fathers of our bodies kept us under discipline, and we not only
submitted, but even gave them reverence, though their discipline was not intended to
have effect for more than the few days of our pupilage, and though in that short time
they were liable to error in their treatment of us. How much more shall we subject
ourselves to the discipline of God! He is not only the God of all spirits and of all flesh,
[348] but also the Father of our spirits; that is, He has created our spirit after His own
likeness, and made it capable, through discipline, of partaking in His own holiness,
which will be our true and everlasting life. The gardener breaks the hard ground, uproots
weeds, lops off branches; but the consequence of his rough treatment is that the fruit at
last hangs on the bough. We are God’s tillage. Our conflict with men and their sin is
watched and guided by a Father, The fruit consists in the calm after the storm, the peace
of a good conscience, the silencing of accusers, the putting wicked men to shame, the
reverence which righteousness extorts even from enemies. In the same book from which
our author has cited far-reaching instruction, we are told that "when a man’s ways please
the Lord, He maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him."[349]
Here, again, the Apostle addresses his readers as members of the Church in its conflict
with men. He tells them that, in doing what is incumbent upon them as a Church
towards different classes of men, they secure for themselves individually the discipline of
sons and may hope to reap the fruit of that discipline in peace and righteousness. The
Church has a duty to perform towards the weaker brethren, towards the enemy at the
gate, and towards the Esaus whose worldliness imperils the purity of others.
1. There were among them weaker brethren, the nerves of whose hands and knees were
unstrung. They could neither combat a foe nor run the race. It was for the Church to
smooth the ruggedness of the road before its feet, that the lame things[350] (for so, with
something of contempt, he names the waverers) might not be turned out of the course by
the pressure of the other runners. Rather than permit this, let the Church lift up their
drooping hands and sustain their palsied knees, that they may be healed of their
lameness.