God has promised that the Church’s victory is sure in the midst of tribulation and that Christ’s return is sure for the PERFECTION of Old and New Testament Saints TOGETHER through resurrection into Messianic Glory. This hope is still pending in our time, so we still have opportunity to practice the race of Faith and be part of the Witnesses/Testifiers/Martyrs on the marble of the Faith Hall of Fame. This glorious hope requires that we use Grace to LAY-OFF and BRACE-UP for our relay lap determined that the relay labours of our heroes past so far must not be in vain, and that we PRESS-ON without wearying and LOOK-UNTO Christ without wavering or wandering.

1. Cloud of Witnesses
and the Relay Race of Faith
Hebrews 12:1
Therefore seeing we also are surrounded with SO GREAT
A CLOUD OF WITNESSES, let us lay aside every weight,
and the sin which does so easily ensnare us, and let us
run with patience the RACE that is set before US,
The Chapel of Grace, University of Maiduguri
Combined Men’s/Women’s Fellowships Seminar
By Venerable Dr I. U. Ibeme
Website: http://www.scribd.com/ifeogo
Monday, September 14, 2015

2. “Therefore….” refers to HEBREWS 11
• In A Commentary on the Old and New Testaments by Robert
Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown, published 1871, they
wrote this introduction to Hebrews 12:
“Exhortation to follow the witnesses of faith just mentioned:
Not to faint in trials: To remove all bitter roots of sin: For
we are under, not a law of terror, but the gospel of grace,
to despise which will bring the heavier penalties, in
proportion to our greater privileges.”
• Post-Modern Americanized false Calvinistic and pagan New Age
concepts of GRACE has abandoned this TRUTH.

3. The Cloud of Witnesses (Heb 12:1) are Faith
Witness Champions in the Faith Hall of Fame
(Heb 11).
• These WITNESSES/Testifiers/Martyrs are Champions of Faith who received
divine approval/good report and declared righteous/justified because in
their time they lived believing divine promise as infallible and from afar
hoped for the sure fulfilment of the promised victorious Messianic Seed
from the national seed, even though they did not receive or experience
the complete fulfilment.
• They witnessed/testified/suffered because they believed/hope in God’s
Personhood and His promise that both the national glory of Israel and
eventual Messianic Glory of Christ meant for the lighting of all Gentiles
shall surely prevail.
• Faith assures, ascertains and understands that the visible comes from the
invisible; and future actualization comes from present conviction.

4. Faith of the Witnesses
Hebrews 11
• (1) Now FAITH is the assurance of things we hope for, the certainty of
things we cannot see.
• (2) For by it our ancestors won (obtained) approval (good report).
• (3) By faith we understand that the universe was prepared by the word
of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are invisible.
• (39) All these people won approval for their faith but did not receive
what was promised,
• (40) since God had planned something better for us so that they would
not become perfect without us.

5. Faith of the Witnesses
Hebrews 11
• (13) All these people died having FAITH. They did not receive the things
that were promised, yet they saw them in the distant future and welcomed
them, acknowledging that they were strangers and foreigners on earth.
• (14) For people who say such things make it clear that they are looking for
a country of their own.
• (15) If they had been thinking about what they had left behind, they
would have had an opportunity to go back.
• (16) Instead, they were longing for a better country, that is, a heavenly
one. That is why God is not ashamed to be called their God, because he has
prepared a city for them.

6. Champions of Faith
• Found in GENESIS Heb 11:4-22 (Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah,
Isaac, Jacob, Joseph)
• Found in EXODUS Heb 11:23-29 (Moses and his Parents)
• Found in JOSHUA Heb 11:30-31 (Jericho spies/encirclers Rahab)
• Found in JUDGES, KINGS and PROPHETS Heb 11:32-38 (Gideon,
Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, and the Prophets..)
• Found ALSO in the GOSPELS Heb 11:35a (Women)
• Found ALSO with the APOSTLES and APOSTOLIC MARTYRS Heb
11:35b-38 (Others … of whom the world was not worthy)
• Needed in the CHURCH Heb 11:39-40 (Us)

7. Relay Race of Faith TODAY
• God has promised that the Church’s victory is sure in the midst of
tribulation and that Christ’s return is sure for the PERFECTION of Old
and New Testament Saints TOGETHER through resurrection into
Messianic Glory.
• This hope is still pending in our time, so we still have opportunity to
practice the race of Faith and be part of the
Witnesses/Testifiers/Martyrs on the marble of the Faith Hall of Fame.
• This glorious hope requires that we use Grace to LAY-OFF and BRACE-
UP for our relay lap determined that the relay labours of our heroes
past so far must not be in vain, and that we PRESS-ON without
wearying and LOOK-UNTO Christ without wavering or wandering.

8. Relay Race of Faith TODAY
• In our pagan modern generation, parenting and being parented
has been jettisoned and replaced by individualism since the
hippie movement in the second half of the last century, with its
rebellious counter-cultural tenets, tendencies and trends (2Tim
3:1-2).
• Unfortunately, this evil trend and tendency has been espoused
even in spiritual matters by the derailing and worldly Church.
• A generation of un-parented and anti-parental Parents and
Pastors now dominate leadership in the Church and the society.
God is not pleased with such generation, and there is need for
prayers and repentance (Judge 2:10-15).

9. Relay Race of Faith TODAY
• Christian Parents and Teachers must get a good grasp of their Faith,
adequate enough to pass it on through disciplined discipleship to their
children as they grow up in the Church but especially at Home.
• Modern popular laissez-faire philosophy and doctrine of parenting
through non-disciplinary “love” is pagan and contrary to God’s Word.
• Heb 12:5-6
• (5) You have forgotten the encouragement that is addressed to you
as sons: "My son, do not think lightly of the Lord's discipline or give
up when you are corrected by him.
• (6) For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he punishes every
son he accepts."

10. Relay Race of Faith TODAY
• Christian children should reject pagan trends know that what is right
and godly is to respect and obey but NOT begrudge parents and
teachers who disciple and discipline them as they grow up.
• Rom 1:30
• (30) slanderers, God-haters, haughty, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient
to their parents,
• 2Ti 3:1-4
• (1) You must realize, however, that in the last days difficult times will come.
• (2) People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, abusive,
disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy,
• (3) unfeeling, uncooperative, slanderous, degenerate, brutal, hateful of what is good,
• (4) traitors, reckless, conceited, and lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.

11. Relay Race of Faith TODAY
• Parents and teachers should endeavour not to discipline children to
satisfy their anger as if in a fight, but out of love as if in a training.
• When angry, discipline should be differed till the parent or teacher has
gotten a disciplined control over his/her anger, enough to reason with
the child/disciple and meet out appropriately edifying discipline
(correction, reproof, rebuke or punishment 1Tim 5:20; 2Tim 3:13-4:5).
• Heb 12:9-12
• (9) Furthermore, we had earthly fathers who used to discipline us, and we
respected them for it. We should even more submit to the Father of our
spirits and live, shouldn't we?
• (10) For a short time they disciplined us as they thought best, but he does
it for our good, so that we may share in his holiness.

12. Relay Race of Faith TODAY
• Every training for benefit in academics, sports or military is never
comfortable, contrary to modern philosophy of education and modern
theories of child development – is this modern illegitimate scholarship
not anti-God paganism contradictory to factual knowledge?
• Heb 12:7-8, 11
• (7) What you endure is for the sake of discipline. God is treating you as
sons. Is there a son whom his father does not discipline?
• (8) Now if you are without any discipline, in which all sons share, then you
are illegitimate and not his sons.
• (11) No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on,
however, for those who have been trained by it, it produces a harvest of
righteousness and peace.

13. THE CHURCH is for Athletes & Warriors of
Faith
we must finish as Champions and hand over to Champions
•The Christian Faith is NOT YET A REST BUT
STILL A RACE (though with Grace) in which
the prize is only for those who reach the
finishing line undiscouraged before
timeout.
•The Christian Faith is NOT YET A WIN BUT
STILL A WAR of Faith to be (though sure to
be) conquered and overcome.

14. JESUS
IS
LORD

15. May God
be with
You All
I’m
Venerable Dr I. U. Ibeme
Website: www.scribd.com/ifeogo