suffering He faced. He ran this race as a real human being. The One who suffered is the One standing across the finish line at God’s right hand. The preacher now turns to this suffering, by which He became the “Pioneer and Perfecter” of faith. The joy God set before him (12:2) was not so much the joy of returning to heaven, a joy He had had from all eternity, but the joy of bringing God’s sons and daughters across the finish line into God’s presence. For the sake of that joy, He endured the cross.