Hebrews 12
1 We [know about] many people like that [who showed they trusted in God]. They are like a crowd of spectators [who are cheering for us inside a stadium] [MET]. Knowing that, we must put away all the things that hinder us, [as a runner puts aside everything that would hinder him because they are heavy] [MET]. Especially we must put away sinful actions that [hinder us, as a runner] sets aside clothes he does not need, clothes that would entangle him [MET]. Let us [wholeheartedly strive to achieve what God has planned for us, as someone] in a race wholeheartedly runs the course that is before him [MET].
THEREFORE also seeing we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, laying aside every weight, and that most easily besetting sin, let us run with patience the race lying before us,
2 And let us [keep our minds on] Jesus, [as a runner] keeps his eyes on [the goal] [MET]. Jesus is the one we should imitate in the way he perfectly trusted [God. When he died on] the cross he endured it as he suffered greatly [MTY], instead of [thinking about the things he would] rejoice about [later]. He disregarded being disgraced by [dying that way]. He is now sitting at the place of highest honor [MTY] at the throne [where God rules].
earnestly looking up to Jesus the author and the finisher of faith; who, for the joy set before him, endured the cross, despising shame, and hath sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
3 [Jesus] patiently endured it when sinful people acted so hostilely against him. Try to act the way he did, so that you do not give up [trusting] God or become discouraged.
Consider then attentively him that endured from sinners such opposition against himself, that ye be not wearied out, fainting in your souls.
4 While you have struggled against [being tempted to] sin, you have not yet bled [and died because of resisting evil, as Jesus did].
As yet ye have not resisted unto blood, struggling against sin.
5 Do not forget [RHQ] these words [that Solomon spoke to his son, that are the same as God] would exhort you as his children: My child, pay attention [LIT] when the Lord is disciplining you, and do not be discouraged when the Lord punishes you [DOU],
And have you forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you, as children, “My son, count not lightly of the Lord’s childlike correction, nor faint when under his rebuke:
6 because it is everyone whom he loves whom the Lord disciplines, and he punishes everyone whom he accepts as his child.
for whom the Lord loveth he correcteth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.”
7 It is in order that God may discipline you that he requires you to endure the disagreeable things [that happen to you]. [When God disciplines you] he is treating you as a father treats his children. All fathers [RHQ] discipline their children [LIT].
If ye patiently endure correction, God carries himself towards you as his children: for who is the son whom the father doth not correct?
8 So, if you have not experienced God disciplining you just like he disciplines all his other children, you are [not true children of God] [MET]. [You are like] illegitimate children; [no father disciplines them].
If then ye are without correction, of which all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not children.
9 Furthermore, our natural fathers disciplined us [when we were young], and we respected them for doing that. So we should certainly more readily accept God our spiritual Father disciplining us, with the result that we live eternally [RHQ]!
If then we have had the fathers of our flesh for correctors, and reverenced them; shall we not much more be under subjection to the Father of spirits, and live?
10 Our natural fathers disciplined us for a short time in a way that they considered right, [but it wasn’t always right], but God always disciplines us [in a right way], to help us. He does it so that we may be holy as he is.
For they indeed for a few days as seemed proper to themselves corrected us; but he for our own advantage, that we might be partakers of his holiness.
11 During the time that God is disciplining us, that does not seem to be something about which we should rejoice. Instead, it is something that pains us. But later it causes those who have learned from it to be peaceful and to [live] righteously.
Now all correction at the moment seemeth not to be cause for joy, but for sorrow; but after a while it produceth peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have thereby been disciplined.
12 So, [instead of acting as though you were spiritually exhausted], renew yourselves [MET] spiritually.
Wherefore stretch out again the hands that hang down, and the paralytic knees;
13 Go straight forward [in your Christian life] [MET], in order that believers who are uncertain about their faith [will imitate you] and not ([leave God’s way/] useless [to God]) [MET]. Instead, they will be spiritually restored [MET] as an injured and useless limb is restored.
and make strait paths for your feet, that what is halting may not be turned out of the way; but that it may rather be healed.
14 Try to live peacefully with all people. Seek to be holy, since no one will see the Lord if he is not holy.
Earnestly seek peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord:
15 Beware that none of you stops [trusting in] God, [who has done kind things for us that we did not deserve] (OR, Beware that you have never [experienced] God kindly [saving you]). Be on guard lest any of you [act in an evil way towards others], because your doing that will [grow like] [MET] a root [grows into a big plant], and the result [of your] doing that will be that many believers will sin and become unacceptable to God.
carefully observing lest any of you fail of attaining the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and by it many be defiled;
16 Do not let anyone be immoral, or be irreligious as Esau was. He exchanged the rights he had as a firstborn son for only one meal.
lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of bread parted with his birthrights.
17 You know that after he did that, he wanted to receive [what his father would promise to give him if] he blessed him. But [his father] was unable [to change what he had already done]. And Esau found no way to change things, even though he sought tearfully to do that.
For ye know, that when afterwards he wished to inherit the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place for a change of his father’s mind, though he sought it earnestly with tears.
18 In coming [to God] you have not [experienced things like what the Israeli people experienced] at [Sinai] Mountain. [They] approached [a mountain that God told them they] should not touch. [They approached] a blazing fire, and it was gloomy and dark [DOU], and there was a hurricane/cyclone.
For ye have not approached the mountain that could only be groped for, and that burned with fire, and the thick cloud, and the darkness, and the tempest,
19 They heard a trumpet sounding and they heard [God] speak. The result was that those who heard it pleaded for God not to speak to them like that again.
and the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words, which they who heard, earnestly begged that the discourse might not be directed to them:
20 When [God] commanded them saying, “If [a person or] even an animal touches this mountain, [you] must [kill him/it by] throwing stones at him/it,” they were terrified.
for they could not bear the charge given, and “If but a beast touch the mountain he shall be stoned, or shot through with a dart:”
21 Truly, because Moses was terrified after seeing what happened [on the mountain], he said, “I am trembling because I am very afraid!”
and so terrible was the appearance, that Moses said, I am exceedingly afraid and trembling:
22 Instead, [it is as though] you have come to [the presence of God in heaven] [MET]. [That is like what your ancestors did when they came to worship] God on Zion Hill, in Jerusalem, in the city of God who is all-powerful. You have come (OR, you are coming) to where there are countless angels, who are rejoicing as they have gathered together.
but ye are come unto mount Sion, and to the city of the living God, to the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of angels,
23 You have joined all the believers [who have privileges like] firstborn sons, whose names [God] has written down in heaven. You have come to God, who will judge everyone. You have come to where the spirits of God’s people are, people who lived righteously [before they died], and who now have been made perfect [in heaven].
and to the general assembly and church of the first-born registered in the heavens, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of just men perfected,
24 You have come to Jesus, who arranged a new covenant [between us and God]. You have accepted [what he accomplished when] his blood flowed [when he died on the cross. His doing that made it possible for God to forgive us]. That is better than the blood of Abel, [who just] wanted revenge because his brother Cain murdered him.
and to Jesus the mediator of the new testament, and to the blood of sprinkling, which speaketh better things than that of Abel.
25 Beware that you do not refuse to listen to [God] who is speaking to you. The Israeli people did not escape [God punishing them] when [Moses] (OR, [God]) warned them here on earth. So we shall surely not escape [God punishing us] if we reject him when he warns us from heaven! [RHQ]
Beware that ye reject not him that speaketh: for if they escaped not, who rejected him, that upon earth spake by divine influence, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from him who speaks from heaven:
26 The earth shook [PRS] then when he spoke [MTY] [at Sinai Mountain]. But now he has promised, “I will shake the earth again, one more time, but I will shake heaven too.”
whose voice then shook the earth, but now he hath promised, saying, “Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also the heaven.”
27 The words “again, one more time” indicate that things [on earth] will be shaken {that [he] will shake things [on earth]}, meaning that he will set aside all that [he] has created, in order that the things [in heaven] that cannot be shaken {that nothing can shake} may remain forever.
Now this word yet once more manifests the removal of the things shaken, as of things formed, that the things not shaken may endure.
28 So, let us thank God that we are becoming members of a kingdom that nothing can shake. Let us worship/serve God in a way that pleases him by being greatly in awe [DOU] before him.
Wherefore receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, may we hold fast the grace, by which we can offer to God acceptably divine service, with reverence and pious awe:
29 Remember that the God we [worship/serve] is like a fire that burns up everything [that is impure] [MET]!
for our God is a devouring fire.
