Weights and Sins
A. Maclaren, D. D. Hebrews 12:1-2 Why seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight… There is a regular series of thoughts in this clause, and in the one or two which follow it. If we would run well, we must run light; if we would run light, we must look to Christ. The central injunction is, "Let us run with patience"; the only way of doing that is the "laying aside all weights and sins"; and the only way of laying aside the weights and sins is, "looking unto Jesus." Of course, the apostle does not mean some one special kind of transgression when he says, "the sin which doth so easily beset us." He is speaking about sin generically — all manner of transgression. It is not, as we sometimes hear the words misquoted, "that sin which doth most easily beset us." All sin is according to this passage a besetting sin. I. THERE ARE HINDRANCES WHICH ARE NOT SINS. Sin is that which, by its very nature, in all circumstances, by whomsoever done, without regard to consequences, is a transgression of God's law. A "weight" is that which, allowable in itself, perhaps a blessing, the exercise of a power which God has given us — is, for some reason, a hindrance in our running the heavenly race. The one word describes the action or habit by its inmost essence, the other describes it by its accidental consequences. Then, what are these weights? The first step in the answer to that question is to be taken by remembering that, according to the image of this text, we carry them about with us, and we are to put them away from ourselves. It is fair to say, then, that the whole class of weights are not so much external circumstances which may be turned to evil, as the feelings and habits of mind by which we abuse God's great gifts and mercies, and turn that which was ordained to be for life into death. The renunciation that is spoken about is not so much the putting away from ourselves of certain things lying round about us that may become temptations, as the putting away of the dispositions within us which make these things temptations. It is an awful and mysterious power that which we all possess, of perverting the highest endowments, whether of soul or of circumstances, which God has given us, into the occasions for falling back in the Divine life. Just as men, by devilish ingenuity, can distil poison out of God's fairest flowers, so we can do with everything that we have. II. And now, if this be the explanation of what the apostle means by " weights" — legitimate things that hinder us in our course towards God — there comes this second consideration, IF WE WOULD RUN, WE MOST LAY THESE ASIDE. There are two ways by which this injunction of my text may be obeyed. The one is, by getting so strong that the thing shall not be a weight, though we carry it; and the other is, that feeling ourselves to be weak, we take the prudent course of putting it utterly aside. (A. Maclaren, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us 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, WEB: Therefore let us also, seeing we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,