I made a very serious Biblical mistake concerning the eleventh chapter of Hebrews.  Even though I read it.  Even though I reread it, I missed that the author mentioned Sarah, the wife of Abraham--the mother of all Israelites.  I said that Rahab was the only woman mentioned.  My bad.  It was bound to happen sooner or later that I would leave something important out.  My friend Carolyn is always careful  to review what I write and caught my mistake.  I even had Sarah's name underlined in my Bible.  I must have been half asleep when I wrote that blog.  Nevertheless, with two women mentioned, there couldn't have been a a greater difference in those two women.  God honored each woman's faith.

I am reading a book written in 1888 called Moody's Sermons.  The transcribed notes from the "Cleveland Leader."  Dwight L. Moody was the Billy Graham of his day.  Literally thousands and thousands of people found Jesus through his preaching.  I just finished his sermon on Faith.  God seems to find a willing servant through the ages to proclaim the gospel of Christ.

And Hebrews 12:1-2a says it all:  "Since we have such a huge crowd of men of faith watching us from the grandstands, let us strip off anything that slows us down or holds us back, and especially those sins that wrap themselves so tightly around our feet and trip us up; and let us run with patience the particular race that God has set before us.  Keep your eyes on Jesus, our leader and instructor…"

It is the description of an amphitheater.  Those who have gone on before us are watching us.  And because of their lives, we must try even harder to keep ourselves clean.  Each particular sin that holds you captive must be dealt with.  The writer says we are running a race.  Paul put that another way:

Philippians 3:13-14  "Brothers, I don not count myself to have apprehended (the prize): but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus."

Forget the past.  Tomorrow is a new start.  "Press on," was one of my husband Ken's favorite sayings.