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12
Jesus, the Author and Perfecter of Our Faith
1 So therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every impediment, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2 looking unto Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Do Not Grow Weary
3 For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you be weary and discouraged in your souls. 4 You have not yet resisted to the point of bloodshed, struggling against sin. 5 And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as sons:
“My son, do not despise the discipline of the Lord,
nor be discouraged when you are reproved;
6 For whom the Lord loves He disciplines,
and scourges every son whom He receives.”
7 It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons. For what son is there whom a father does not discipline? 8 But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. 9 Furthermore, we have had human fathers who disciplined us, and we respected them. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live? 10 For they indeed disciplined us for a few days, as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may partake of His holiness. 11 Now no discipline seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, later it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those having been trained by it.
12 Therefore strengthen the hands which are weakened, and the feeble knees, 13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that the lame may not be turned aside, but rather be healed.
14 Pursue peace and holiness with all people, without which no one shall see the Lord: 15 looking diligently lest anyone fall from the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness growing up cause trouble, and through this many be defiled; 16 lest there be any fornicator or profane person like Esau, who in exchange for one meal gave up his birthright. 17 For indeed you know that afterward, wishing to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no place for repentance, having sought it out diligently with tears.
The Glorious Company
18 For you have not come to the mountain that may be touched and that burned with fire, and to blackness and darkness and to a whirlwind, 19 and to a sound of a trumpet and to a voice of words, which those who heard it begged that no further word be spoken to them. 20 For they could not bear that which was commanded: “And if so much as a beast touches the mountain, it shall be stoned.” 21 And so fearful was the spectacle, that Moses said, “I am greatly afraid and trembling.”
22 But you have come to Zion, to the Mountain and city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of angels, 23 to the general assembly and church of the firstborn having been enrolled in the heavens, to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, 24 and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling which speaks better things than the blood of Abel.
Hear the Heavenly Voice
25 See that you do not refuse Him who speaks. For if they did not escape, having refused Him who warned them, how much more shall we not escape if we turn away from Him who warns from heaven; 26 whose voice then shook the earth; but now He has promised, saying, “Yet once more I shake not only the earth, but also the heaven.” 27 Now the phrase, “Yet once more,” signifies the removal of the things being shaken, as having been made, so that the things which cannot be shaken may remain. 28 Therefore, since we are receiving an unshakable kingdom, let us have grace, through which we serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. 29 For our God is a consuming fire.

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© 2014 Dr. Paul W. Esposito