I ask you to take your Bibles and turn with me this morning to the book of Hebrews, chapter 12. where we continue through a series of sermons and exposition of this New Testament epistle. And we come in the course of those sermons to Hebrews chapter 12, verse 2. So our text this morning, which we're considering together, as always, with the Lord's help, is Hebrews 12, verse 2. We'll read from verse 1. Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which does so easily beset us, and 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. In the Christian pilgrimage, the believer always begins with the end. The believer begins with the end. And that's true because, like with all of our trips, our ordinary trips in this world, so with the Christian pilgrimage, our destination is what determines our direction. And so for the believer we have set before us the hope of heaven and glory and all that is To come in the reward that god gives to his people and that is set before our eyes We recognize that that reward is found chiefly In the lord jesus christ himself to be with him to have him to hear and to behold him for eternity We saw in verse 1, last Lord's Day, that this Christian pilgrimage is in fact a race. And if we were to summarize verses 1 and 2, or distill those two verses into a brief phrase, it would be this, let us run looking unto Jesus. That's the core of what these two verses say. Let us run looking unto Jesus. The second part is indispensable, looking unto Jesus. Because without that, we end up running in circles, rather than running progressively forward and upward. In verse 1, we saw that the Lord gives us this call to run. He gives us encouragement, the cloud of witnesses which testify those who are fellow runners who have gone before us and found the Lord faithful and His promise is sure. We saw impediments in our running. We have to lay aside every weight and we have to look at the sins which so easily beset us. We recognize that there are many things that weigh us down, that indeed a bag of gold is just as much a handicap as a bag of lead, and that we are to set aside the things we noted last Lord's Day in this run. And then, of course, there is a call to endurance. We are to run with patience the race that is set before us by the Lord himself. But the Lord doesn't just tell us to run. He also tells us how, which is why we have verse 2. In verse 1, these two verses are inextricably connected to one another. In verse 1, we're told what to do, namely to run. In verse 2, we're told how to do it. Verse one tells us to run. Verse two tells us how the Lord Jesus Christ ran. And so these things are held together. We recognize or must recognize that our ability, the believer's ability to run is solely from Jesus Christ. It is solely and entirely from Jesus Christ. He is all of our help. He is all of our sufficiency. He is the one who is our strength. He is the supply of grace. Without Him, we can do nothing. But in Christ, we can do all things through Christ, who strengthens us. Christ is the fountain. And as we've seen over the course of the preceding chapter, in chapter 11, Christ is the fountain, and faith is that pipe, if you will, whereby grace is conveyed to us from him. And so we're given in verse 2 motivation to run, and we're given answers to the question, how? The Lord weans us from this world by setting before us something exquisite and far surpassing, just as we would go to a child and perhaps their chubby little fist is gripping an object that they don't want to let loose. You know, a wise parent will at times bring another object and present it to the child in exchange for the other in order to take away the thing that they don't want to let loose. So the Lord gives to us this object of Christ himself and of the glory to come to wean and loosen our hearts from this world. This is a superior sight, Christ, and the glory that will follow. So we're going to look together at verse two, and we'll note three things, three points this morning as we seek with the Lord's help to unpack this particular verse. First of all, we begin with faith's object. First of all, faith's object. Notice the words of the text, looking unto Jesus. the author and finisher of our faith. Faith's object is the Lord Jesus Christ himself. This looking is the look of faith, just as Israel in the book of Numbers were told to look to the brazen serpent, and that in looking to the brazen serpent, they would be healed from the fiery serpents and the poison that threatened to kill them. So we are being called upon to look to what that brazen serpent prefigured, namely the Lord Jesus Christ himself. Or you think of the language of Isaiah 45, verse 22, look unto me and be ye saved. all the ends of the earth, for I am God and there is none else." Looking unto Jesus. My friend, you cannot look in two directions at the same time. I mean, I can't look that way and be simultaneously looking this way and vice versa. I can't be looking, you know, forward and not and looking backward at the same time. The Lord calls us to have our eyes fixed upon Jesus Christ, to be looking to him. You can't be looking at the burdens and trials and losses and pains and all of the fears that grip your heart and looking to Jesus at the same time. You can't be looking at the world's allurements and all of its enticements and temptations and entertaining the prospects that are there. You can't be looking at those things and the Lord Jesus Christ at the same time. But when looking unto Jesus, we are delivered from the sight and pull the tug of all of these things. We're to be looking unto Him. But here, especially, what is being highlighted in context is the fixed gaze of a runner. Let us run, looking unto Jesus. It's the fixed gaze of a runner, a runner who is eyeing the mark who is eyeing the goal, the finish line. That gives direction in terms of where the runner is headed, but it also gives stimulus to the exertion of running, to be reaching out, as it were, in one's mind toward that finish line. You'll notice what the object of faith is not. It is not looking to the witnesses that were mentioned in verse 1 and that are cataloged in chapter 11. It's not looking to the witnesses. We're grateful for the witnesses, the testimony of those who have gone before us. It serves an indispensable purpose within the Christian life. We learn much from it, as we have over the months we spent in chapter 11. But we are not to be looking to the many, but to the one. We are to be looking unto Jesus. Our eyes are to be fixed upon him. Sure, we're stimulated by the testimony of others, but our gaze is fixed upon. And what happens after all? When you look at these witnesses, what do you learn? Or to put it better, where did they look? If you go back to chapter 11, we were given the answer. In verse 10, we're told of Abraham, for he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. In verse 20, by faith, Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau concerning things to come. You look at the example given of Moses in verse 26, esteeming the reproach of Christ's greater riches than the treasures in Egypt, for he had respect under the recompense of reward, verse 27, as seeing him who is invisible. I mean, to consult these witnesses is only to have reinforced in our hearts and minds what they themselves found, and that is that we are to be looking unto Jesus. Our gaze has to be glued upon the Lord himself. And here he's described looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. That word author is translated earlier in Hebrews in chapter two, verse 10, as captain. He's the captain of our faith. Elsewhere, it's translated leader, or the leader of our faith. And in that sense, he is the exemplar of faith. He, as the God-man, himself in his humanity, exercising faith constantly, perfectly, sinlessly, depending upon his Father, is an exemplar to us. But when tied with the word that follows, author and finisher, it becomes clear that he is also the one who is the initiator of our faith. He is the author, the beginner. the creator, the giver of our faith. As Ephesians 2 tells us, faith is a gift of God. How is it that any sinner, any person is able to believe on Jesus Christ, to trust in the Lord, to receive and rest in Him, to look to Him? It's only by the grace of God Himself who gives faith to His people as a gift. He's the author of it. He's the one who both puts the believer into the race, as well as the one who ran before us in the race, we following him. He's the author, but he's also the finisher of our faith. He's the finisher. He's the perfecter of our faith. He's the completer of our faith. As Paul says elsewhere, Philippians 1, He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. He'll bring it to perfection, to finish. Right? He is the one who began it, and He will complete it. You think of how we have the language of our Lord Himself in places like John 10, where He's described as the Good Shepherd, and He says, look, all that have been given to the Father. I will lose none. All who have been placed into the hand of the Father, who have been placed in my hand, none can snatch them out. I will finish what has been begun." Or you think of the end of Romans 8, where, you know, Paul draws on every conceivable thing in the universe, in this world, outside of this world, above and beyond this world. And he says, there is absolutely nothing that can separate the believer. from the love of God in Christ Jesus. The Lord is the finisher of the faith of his people. And so our sight is fixed on the source on Jesus Christ himself, the author and finisher of our faith. And this is not something, my friends, which some of you are tempted at this moment to do. This is not something where you can just nod and then look elsewhere. You can't say, well, that's true, minister. That's true, pastor. Yes, Jesus is the object of our faith. And then carry on looking elsewhere. You know, sending your eyes back to that perplexing thing that's hanging over top of your head, looming over top of you, or turning your eyes to other people or to within your own soul or whatever else. No, this is a self-conscious choice. The question is, are you looking? Are you looking at the Lord Jesus Christ? Where this morning does this text find you? Where are your eyes? In what direction and upon what object? Jesus is the author and finisher of our faith. He is the Alpha and Omega. He is the first and the last. He is the beginning and the end because He is the believers all in all. All in all, there is none like Him. For those of you who are unconverted here this morning, who are unbelieving, this is the start line for you. The Lord calling you to the start line, calling you to look to the Lord Jesus Christ. And some of you are content To come short of that, you will say, I affirm that Jesus Christ is the Savior of sinners. That there's only one. He is the Savior. But that is not looking unto Jesus, my friend. It's very different to say that Jesus is the Savior. That is different from saying, Jesus Christ is my Savior. I am looking to Him. I am resting in Him. I'm receiving Him. I'm depending upon Him. I'm trusting in Him that all that He is and all that He's done, that that alone is sufficient to redeem my sinful soul. The Lord is calling you to look. for the first time, for the gaze of your soul to not be skating upon the surface of this world, but rather being lifted up into the heavens to behold Him and thereby to be thrust into the race that is described here. And believer, you recognize here that our faith is too fragile to be left in our hands. Our faith is too fragile to be left in our hands. We need the author and finisher of our faith. Our stability is in constantly looking and depending upon Jesus Christ outside of ourselves. We need to be preoccupied with Christ. That is the remedy for all of the world's burdens. That is the remedy for all of sins, assaults, and temptations. This is the consolation in the midst of vexation, to be preoccupied with Christ. Looking means expectation. It's not just turning the gaze of your eyes in one way or another spiritually in your soul, but it is looking with an expectation to find and to receive from Him. There is a confidence in this looking that He indeed will provide, that He will deliver aid and help in all of the ways that we need it most. looking unto Jesus. You can trace throughout the accounts given to us in the four Gospels of how this is seen in the life of Jesus Christ himself. That as the incarnate word, he was looking unto God himself. And it is the believer who then steps into the footsteps of the Savior by His grace, looking as complete dependence upon the Lord. And that's where Christ found Himself. He depended constantly upon the Father. We, who are believing, are to depend constantly upon Him. Christ lived in constant communion with the Father. In the words of Psalm 16, He was always at His right hand. He said things like, the Father is with me. So the believer is to be looking in a way that results in living in constant communion with the Lord. Christ walked in love and obedience to his Father. He delighted to do his Father's will in all that he was about. The believer is one who is looking with an eye to obey and to please our Father in heaven. Christ, as we'll see more in a moment, looked with confidence upon the unseen future that was before him. And so it is with the believer. Remember verse 1 of chapter 11. Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Believers looking unto Jesus with confidence in what is now the unseen future. but revealed in the word of God to us by faith. Christ is the one who supplies grace. Christ is the one who supplies strength. Christ is the one who leads the believer in the race. The Lord is the one who, Lord Jesus is the one who actually conducts personally every one of his saints to glory. When you arrive in glory, How did I get here? How did I make it through all the twists and turns and all of the explosions around me and all of the snares and difficulties and so on? How is it possible? The answer is the same for every believer. The Lord himself has conducted me into glory. He brought me all the way through that race and pilgrimage, right across the finish line and into the presence of himself in heaven. Hebrews 13. We're told, we're given the promise, for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee, so that we may boldly say, the Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me. And so we see, first of all, the answer to the question, how? How is it that we run this Christian race? It is by having Jesus Christ as the object of our faith, by drawing by faith upon all of the resources that are to be found in him. But the second answer to the question, how, is this. foreseeing the joy. Secondly, foreseeing the joy. How is it that the believer is able to run this race? It is by foreseeing the joy. Look again at verse 2. Who, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame. The Lord Jesus Christ, in his earthly ministry, set the joy before him. He looked and anticipated the future joy, the glory that was to follow, to use Peter's words, which we read in chapter one, verse Peter one. But you notice what's happening here, it's subtle. But you notice what's happening as we actually come to this text, place ourselves in the text, walk through the text, What's happening is this, we're called to look unto Jesus. So here we are looking unto Jesus and we see him looking to the joy. We're looking unto Jesus who was looking unto the joy that was set before him. Here's our pattern in terms of running the race. Jesus held up before his face constantly. the hope, expectation of the joy and glory that was to follow all that he had undertaken. The Lord Jesus Christ was presented with a cross. He had many sufferings, a few of which we'll highlight, culminating in his sacrificial and gruesome death by crucifixion. But even there, the Lord Jesus Christ looks past the cross to the crown. The crown, in a sense, displaces the view of the cross and the heart of the Redeemer. He endured by actively anticipating the future joy. You notice that the Lord in this passage, gave to us, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the word joy. Many other words could have been used, many of words we might have even expected, for the glory that was set before him, for the end that was set before him, for the future that was set before him. But God, the Holy Spirit, says, for the joy. It's joy, in particular, that is set as an object before the Lord Jesus Christ. He looked by faith. He gazed. He glued his gaze upon the joy. And you'll see it as you go back to the Gospels and begin working your way through it. I'll give you one example for the sake of brevity and time. In Luke chapter 10, we have an example of it. There, Christ had sent out his disciples to preach and so on. They've come back to him. And we read in verse 21, in that hour, Jesus rejoiced in spirit. Here he is, actually tasting the joy, experiencing joy, and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and has revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father, for it seemed good in thy sight. All things are delivered to me of my Father, and no man knoweth who the Son is but the Father, and who the Father is but the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal him." He's seeing the outworking of all that he has come to accomplish, and anticipating where it is leading, because he turns to his disciples, and he says in the next verse, blessed are the eyes which see the things that ye see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them, and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them. So the question remains, what was the joy? Who for the joy that was set before him? But what was the joy? And the answer is multitudinous, right? We can mention a handful of things that get us moving in the right direction. The joy included His resurrection from the dead, right? The first step in His glory. The joy included His glorification in heaven. Remember, on the eve before all of the torrent is unleashed, leading to the cross, there He is praying in John 17. And he's saying to his father in verse 5, you know, remember Lord, give me the glory that I had with thee before the foundations of the earth. Grant me glory. He's begging the Lord for his own glorification. Now, as the incarnate Word, now as the Word made flesh, as the God-man, to be exalted above the highest heavens, and everything conceivable that that contains. That would require dozens of sermons to unpack it, all that is entailed and encapsulated in brief words like His glorification. all the joy that would be brimming from that glorification. It would include ransomed sinners, reconciled to the father through his death and resurrection and ascension. The joy of looking out upon a sea of innumerable souls whom Jesus Christ had purchased at the high cost of his own blood and seeing them shining As it were like stars in glory all having been redeemed By the work in which he accomplished the intense joy That that indeed would bring indeed his people's resurrection The joy to him of seeing his people resurrected to seeing their glorification to see their everlasting joy and glory all purchased at His own hand, the joy of seeing the magnifying of the Father. Indeed, the honor that is brought to all three persons of the Godhead, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the magnifying of that glory throughout the expanse of heaven. in the angelic host, in the lives of those who have been redeemed, all of the joy and the glory that is brought to the triune God. The joy of eternal praises that would be His. The eternal glory that would be His. The complete victory that will be His. Coming in the joy of yielding up, as 1 Corinthians says, yielding up the kingdom. to the Father, having accomplished all for which he was sent. The joy of looking into unending eternity with the pure, relentless joy that it will contain. All of these things and a thousand things more. Christ spent his earthly ministry undoubtedly taking one thread after another, pulling it out, and thinking about all the joy that was contained in the glory that was yet to come, the glory that was to follow, all that he was undergoing. And he could look at one facet after another, and he could unpack and meditate and go down into the depths of all of the intensity of infinite joy that would indeed be his. Christ meditated on the reward. He meditated on the crown. He meditated on the eternal joy. And it outweighed all his sacrifices. And so it is with the believer. The believers has a share with Christ in all of this. We're told that if we suffer with him, we will also be glorified with him. That our cross is exchanged with a crown, that we who undergo shame will receive unending honor, that our humiliation will also result in glorification, that the believer is to look to the joy that is to come in glory. This is the key. You're wanting to know how do I run the race? This is one of the components. This is the key to, as the passage goes on to say, enduring the cross, despising the shame. How is it that we run with a heavy cross, multiple crosses that have been laid upon us? It is by setting the joy before us. who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross. He endured the cross. That describes patience, as we saw in verse one. It describes constancy. It describes perseverance. It describes being able and willing, under tension, under a load, to continue on, to be continuing on. He endured the cross. He didn't shrink from the cross. He didn't turn back. He didn't collapse under it. But rather he submitted. He submitted to the will of the father. He took the cross, embraced the cross, bore the cross, submitted to the will of his father. He willingly endured. It wasn't just suck it up and get on with it. Grit and bear it. He willingly took the cross, endured it, shouldered it, in confident dependence upon the Lord, despising the shame. All of the reproach, all of the disgrace heaped upon him, like Mount Everest, all of the ignominy. We're told that he despised the shame. He took all of that shame and he held it in contempt. in comparison to the joy that was coming. He could hold it in contempt, despise it. He endured the cross. He despised the shame. Here is one who underwent all of the various types and shapes and kinds and degrees of suffering that is known in this world and a whole host more. He's betrayed. stabbed in the heart by one of his own. He's denied by one of those nearest and dearest to him. He is mocked. Think of all that is said. You're a blasphemer. The ridicules that were heaped upon one who is the eternal son of God, the cry that rung out through the expanse around Golgotha, crucify him. Crucify him. Those words were not meaningless. Those words came like blows to the Redeemer. He was physically assaulted, buffeted, beaten, crown of thorns crushed into his skull. He was spit upon. He felt the spit hit his face. All of the shame. He was scourged. He stripped naked, which is a shame, and hoisted up upon a cross. crucified, the shame of burial, the eternal Son of God made flesh, buried in the earth, all of his sufferings in soul and body as the innocent, spotless Lamb of God, the one who is perfection itself, whose holy soul was pained by even the sight and presence of sin. You think of all of the persons that are involved. You have Judas, and you have Peter, of course, and you have the guards, and you have Annas, and you have Caiaphas, and you have Herod, and you have Pilate, and you have the Sanhedrin, and the chief priests, and all of these heaping shame upon his own head. You think of all of the words that were spoken against him, all of the actions preferring a scoundrel, Barabbas, in place of himself, vinegar, hoisted up to put into his mouth. The passage says that he despised it. You could translate it almost literally, he set his mind against it. He set his mind against the shame. He bore the cross. It did not unsettle his soul because of anticipation. For us, we stumble here because for us, in our experience, anticipation is sometimes, perhaps too often, greater than realization. You anticipate something, and you think about what it's going to be like, and what's going to happen, and how you're going to feel, and what pleasure you'll have to experience, and so on and so forth. There's anticipation. And yet, when the thing comes, there's so often a letdown. Realization wasn't quite what we anticipated. But this is never the case with what's being described by God in this passage. Never the case that our anticipation always falls infinitely short of the realization. eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, hath not entered into the heart of men what God himself has prepared for his people. And so we rightly set the joy before us, we enter into it, we plummet its depths, we explore it, we get it into our heads and into our hearts, all the while recognizing that as much as we can possibly, by the grace of God and the help of His Holy Spirit, drink in and see as much as is conceivable of this joy, it is nothing in comparison to what the Lord has, in fact, provided. We can endure almost anything if we know that there is an end, especially if there is a joyous end to it. And yet we sing in Psalm 16 that there are pleasures, there is joy and pleasures forevermore in the presence of the Lord. What does that mean? You know, it's not just all's well that ends well. The Lord is saying, believer, you must set this joy of glory, of heaven, all that it contains before your face. This is why the Lord Jesus Christ calls his people to joy in the midst of tribulation. He's saying, sip from it, drink from it. Realize what this means, that this sowing in tears is going to result in reaping an enormous harvest in joy. We sing it in Psalm 126. You put one seed in the ground and from that comes a plant full of fruit, full of seeds. Right? There's a disproportion between the sowing and the reaping. The Lord is saying, calls his people to rejoice in the midst of tribulation in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5, as well as not only in John 15 and elsewhere throughout the gospels, but in the epistles too. In the epistles, we have this constant call, like in 1 Peter 4 and elsewhere. Chapter 1 as well, a call to rejoice in the midst of tribulation. It's because of the sight of the joy. In fact, we often bump up against this dilemma. And we're bumping up against it here. It is impossible for me to overemphasize how crucial, how indispensable it is for you, believer, to fixate on the glory to come, to meditate on the glory of heaven. It is impossible for me to overemphasize that. When, in your Christian experience, your reflections, your meditations, your thoughts, your affections, with regards to the glory to come, when those are the highest, you will have the most disregard for the temporal sufferings of this world. God says so. Romans 8, verse 18, for I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. When you think of 2 Corinthians chapter 4, he speaks of our light afflictions, which is but for a moment Worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory Well, we look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen for the things which are seen are temporal But the things which are not seen are eternal Believer you must Set before your face the joy You understand these words. They're easy. Meditate on heaven. Anticipate the glory to come. Fixate on the joy that is to follow. You understand these words. But many of you do not see the significance of them. You don't. The words are easy to understand. I'm not saying anything complicated. But the significance is lost on you. Because grasping the words is indeed difficult. especially when you are clinging to the earth. When you're clinging to the earth, the thought of the glory of heaven does not have much luster to it. But when the Lord casts you into trials that tear the very fabric of your being, when you begin to lose what you thought was unlosable, when you are tempted to think that compensation is inconceivable. for the losses and suffering you're enduring, then you will begin to understand the difficulty in the fight to see. The fight to see. Because you can be, we often see it, or I see it, you can be broken on the outside, but not broken on the inside. but when the Lord breaks you on the inside, and you begin to ply all the arguments that are given from the Word of God, and you employ your reason to wrestle through the promises of the Word of God, and you begin to meditate and to sink into the depths of what the Lord is saying, and realizing that at times you see it with your mind, but you are struggling to taste it. You're struggling to actually see it. then you'll realize that this call, which is so indispensable, that we cannot overemphasize the need to set the joy before us, to meditate on heaven. You'll recognize it is not such an easy thing after all. to labor, to inflame our imaginations. But it will never be more essential to you, never more precious to you, and never, never more exhilarating to you, as you venture out, looking unto Jesus, setting before you the joy, and in the exercise of faith, entering into it, into the foretaste of heaven. Then, when you hear such language, you need to be meditating on heaven. It will not be so empty, so shallow, so easily dispensed with. This is key to enduring the cross. It is key to our running. We must set the joy. and to set it as joy before us. But then thirdly, we have the finish line. Thirdly, the finish line. Look at the text in verse two. And is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. Every race has a start and a finish, a beginning and an ending to it. Here we have the finish line that is being put before us. Here is Christ in what we call his session, right? His ascension, his resurrection, his ascension is followed by his session, his sitting. That's what the word session means, sitting. So you even think in terms of church government. You have a session, Presbytery, General Assembly. Session is sitting, right, the sitting of the elders. And so it's describing his being seated in heaven itself. What's happening is a transition. We're moving from anticipated joy, in the words that were prior to this, We're moving from anticipated joy to realized joy, to fulfilled joy, to having arrived and entering into that joy, to having been seated, as the text says, at the right hand of God. We move from running to arriving. It's described as being set down at the right hand of the throne of God. Elsewhere, the Bible describes it as being set down at the right hand of the majesty, or the majesty in heavens, the majesty on high. The point is, in all of these various descriptions, Christ is entering into the recompense of reward. for all of his sufferings. He's entering into all that the Father had promised him before all of this began in heaven. The reward that would be his to the full forever. As a consequence of his temporal sufferings in his earthly ministry here, he is sat down. He sat down with the Father. We read it in Psalm 110. The Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou at my right hand. The Father, He is sitting down as the God-man in His glorified humanity, as well as the second person of the Trinity. In one person, sitting down with the Father. What does that capture? What does that mean, to sit down at the right hand of God? It means, first of all, rest. You begin, you're out of the blocks at the beginning of a race, you run, you endure, you're exhausted, you cross the finish line, and then you rest. You sit down to breathe. Here is the rest after his own race. But it's also his sitting down at the right hand is also dominion. I mean, he is endowed with all power and authority in heaven and earth. He is being given a dominion as the ascended God-man over all of the expanse. It includes things like judgment. He is sitting down as the judge of all the earth, who himself will reign over the devil and his host and the angelic beings as well as all the sons of Adam throughout the human race. He sat down with the father at the right hand, the place of highest dignity on a throne, a royal seat suitable to him like none other. The point is that this imagery describes something that far, far exceeded all of his sufferings. The heights to which he was raised are exponentially higher than the depths to which he had been plummeted. This exceeds all of his sufferings. He is finished, his race. And so too it is for the Christian. the believer who enters in by faith to the race, looking unto the Lord Jesus, having the joy set before them. It is true for the believer as well. What does the Bible say? Revelation chapter three, verse 21, to him that overcometh. will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame and am set down with my father in his throne." This belongs to the believer. These prospects and indeed the full fulfillment of them is the property of the believer. And the believer will also enjoy all that that entails. the rest that it entails. For example, you think of how this comes out in various places of the Lord being the source of rest. So to be with him is to find rest in glory in its ultimate sense. You think of what it means to be with the Lord Out of this world to no longer have the devil at our heels and the world Enticing the the ground in front of us in our own sinful hearts Seeking to pull us in directions that are turn that are away from the Lord. All of that is silenced war is finished Sin is banished. It's eradicated. The soul is perfected in holiness. I and all the sorrows that come with sin, all of its miseries, all of its losses, all of its disappointments, all of its pains. They're gone. For the believer, there is rest. For the believer, there's also dominion. We sing Psalm 8. We know from Hebrews 2, it's fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ. But in the Lord Jesus Christ, Psalm 8 is fulfilled in the believer as well. And the believer is given a dominion. Revelation 2 verse 27 and he shall rule Them with a rod of iron as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers even as I received of my father I will give him the morning star speaking of his people a dominion given to his people The same is true with regards to judgment. We said the Lord sits down as the judge of all the earth But what does the Bible say about the believer? at the finish line 1 Corinthians 6, verse 2, do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world? And if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters? Know ye not that we shall judge angels? How much more things that pertain to this life. Christ the forerunner has gone into heaven. He is the firstfruits, and we are all that follow him. The believer has, in union with Jesus Christ, a share in all that belongs to him, so that the believer enjoys all of the glory of the Son, which is theirs in him. Romans 8 verse 17, and if children then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together, then follows the verse that we noted earlier. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us. My friends, this is the finish line. This is the finish line. It is glory, unending, unimaginable, uncontainable, eternal glory for the believer. And so we run. We run with the finish line in sight. Paul puts it this way to the Philippians in chapter 3, verse 14, I press toward the mark for the prize. eternal prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus He carries that thought in verse 20 for our conversation is in heaven from whence also we look For the Savior the Lord Jesus Christ who shall change our vile body that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body According to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself Seeing the joy transforms how we view the cross. How is it that the believer runs, laying aside weights and the sins which do so easily beset us? How is it the believer runs with patience and perseverance in the race that is set before us? It is looking, looking, looking, looking, looking unto Jesus. In him, looking at the joy that is yet to come. Looking to the finish line that the Lord himself has set for us. May the Lord grant his people to so run. Stand for prayer. O Lord, our God in heaven, the God who is bountiful, opulent, in goodness, because thy goodness is thy glory. And let us delight to overwhelm thy people with blessings that stagger the imagination. first in saving hell-deserving souls, but after to glorify them with the glory of the Son, thy Son. And to say unto them, well done, thou good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy. O Lord, grant to us help we cannot see so often. O Lord, increase our faith. Strip away from us all that we cling to in the world below. and enable us by thy omnipotent grace to fix our gaze upon the Son, upon Jesus, upon the joy, upon the finish. Help, we pray. For Jesus' sake, amen.