Hebrews 12:2: What Jesus Was Looking At

fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Hebrews 12:2 (NIV)

What Jesus Was Looking At

He’s had his daughter’s backpack on his knees since the shift changed, because there’s nowhere else to put it. The television is bolted high in the corner with the sound off and the captions running a beat behind. His friend from two doors down drove over at ten, sat down next to him, and has said nothing about going home.

Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. The writer asks for both: run, and keep your eyes on Jesus. The running costs what running costs.

For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. The joy was out ahead of him the whole way and it did not shorten the hours he was hanging in. He endured it, and he thought nothing of the shame that came with it, and the enduring took exactly as long as it took.

For years I read that joy as an advance payment, the thing that made the cross bearable while he was on it. I don’t read it that way now.

That matters to a father in a plastic chair at two in the morning. He can’t work up a feeling about God tonight. He’s asked to keep his eyes where they are and keep going.

His friend went down for sandwiches around midnight and came back with two, and they ate them out of the wrapper without saying much.

At the end of the enduring, Jesus sat down. This father will walk out of the building eventually, in daylight, and he has no way of knowing tonight what he’ll be carrying when he does.