1526. Final Admonitions

Final Admonitions

"Let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before Him endured the Cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God" (Heb_12:1-2).

The 12th chapter of Hebrews is a summing up chapter. It tells us three things that we need to know just now.

1. Consider Christ Jesus. We are to run the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus. We are to consider Him, and behold Him, because it was the joy set before Him that caused Him to endure the Cross, and to despise the shame.

This joy, that was before Christ, is the same joy that is set forth in this whole Book, the joy of the saints of chapter 11.

Jesus Christ indeed is the princely leader, the perfecter of the faith, which substantiates the things hoped for, and has conviction of the things not seen.

Christ looked down the years, and He saw of the travail of His soul and was satisfied.

2. Consider Esau. Esau is brought before us as the type of a man who despises the things to come. Let us follow the Scripture: "Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears" (Heb_12:16-17).

The people who claim to be Christians, may throw to the winds the promise of our eternal inheritance, the birthright of believers, but we would hold them as dearer than life itself.

The coming things, the things which have to do with our Lord's Second Advent, are to us the things that we love and for which we seek. For them we should ardently and patiently wait. If we do not, we are as foolish as Esau, who for a morsel of bread sold his birthright.

3. Consider the Kingdom which cannot be moved.

"Wherefore we receiving a Kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and Godly fear" (Heb_12:28). Beloved, everything that is around us will be shaken, the world will pass away and the glory thereof; but we are looking for a Kingdom which Jesus Christ will order,–bring into existence, and establish, make secure.

Let us seek to enter into the rest that remaineth.

Autor: R.E. NEIGHBOUR