Hebrews 12:1-2
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. Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
At the beginning of this year I decided I need a change. I’m getting older and I don’t want to start spiraling downhill before my time, so I thought I would kick up the exercise a notch.
I started off like everyone does…with flying colors. For almost two months I worked out 6 days a week, hoping that this change would help me get more fit I’m into my 5th month now and I don’t go as often as I did before but I haven’t quit either. I go on average 3 days a week now. So, the purpose for me talking about this isn’t to brief everyone on my success or lack thereof on fitness goals, but to set a foundation to where I am going.
My co-workers and I were having a conversation mid April about running. My office has several avid runners that do marathons and triathlons. So the story goes as follows. My boss is telling the president of our company, that I have recently taken up running (I give her a progress report pretty much weekly about my efforts on just trying to stay on a treadmill longer than 3 minutes) So she is well aware of my new fitness goals for the year. So the president then mentioned that the bolder boulder is coming up soon and I should considering participating. I tell him that there is nothing more intimidating to me than to run a 10k race with thousands of people and not being able to keep up. He then mentions that in a couple weeks a 5k is taking place called the Iron Girl sponsored by Aflac and since it’s a shorter race, it might be an just the event for me to get my feet wet and experience the world of competitive running. So I talked to Will about my new aspirations on becoming a competitive runner and got his input on the event and he fully supported the idea.
Long story short…three weeks before the event I decide I am going to run this 5k race and so I register Jereme-Ashlee and I to run as a mother-daughter team. Before I get to my subject I’ll tell you our results…Jereme and I finished 36th out of 87 mother & daughter teams. With a finish time of 37:33 minutes. Well, I won’t tell you all the details of the next three weeks in between, when I am suppose to be building my endurance, my stamina, and my speed. Let’s just say I failed horribly short of my ideal goal.
So event day, May 4th, Jereme and I woke up early, rubbed the sleep out of our eyes, tied up our shoe laces, pinned our numbers on our shirts, pulled our hair back into a pony tail, and with our Ipods sync with a play list that would keep us pumped… we were off to City Park. When Jereme-Ashlee and I got there I’m not sure either one of us were prepared for what we were seeing. Avid, runners! Everywhere. Professionals, you know the kind of people who own the gear, and use it. My gear generally sits in the closet collecting dust. So at this point, I’m a little nervous. I looked at Jereme’s face and I could tell she was thinking the same thing I was…what did we get ourselves into…these people are serious.
Well I soon realized I made a big mistake, two of them of to be exact. The first mistake was taking my phone with me. When I left the car I deliberately left everything locked in the trunk so I wouldn’t have to carry anything. But at the last second I grabbed my phone to make a quick call to my husband and I walked away from the car carrying it. The second mistake was actually a precaution, It was quite chilly out at 7:30 in the morning but I didn’t take into consideration that I would be running soon. I truly believe that these two items, my hoodie and my cell phone kept me from taking first place in the entire race.
So, Jereme and I walk to the starting line…there are women everywhere. I heard the announcer say “we are hoping to break the event record and have 1000 women participate this year”. There were so many runners there. It was nothing like I expected it to be. Jereme-Ashlee and I were close to the front of the starting line so when it was time to go we had to move, and move quickly because all of a sudden a mass of bodies were pressing forward and unless we wanted to get trampled on we better hustle. So off we went, runners are weeding themselves through the crowd of bodies and they are pushing forward. There is now a clear distinction between the real runners and the casual participants.
About 5 minutes in I am burning hot and I take off my hoodie and tie it around my waist and I look at my phone and think to myself…”why didn’t I put this back in the car? Who was I expecting a call from this early on a Sunday morning?” And from that point forward my hoodie and my phone were nothing but a bother. I wonder, if I didn’t have two items weighting me down would I have made better time at the end. Would I have finished sooner? Although these were physical weights and not much of a bother initially, they proved to be gruesome as I ran.
See its much like some of the things we keep ourselves attached to, they aren’t really sins but they slow us down. They take our focus off the goal or at least delay our focus as we are adjusting to the weight of them. We must be mindful of the things we are attached to as we run our spiritual race. There is no telling how they can pull our focus away or distract us from what we can be in God.
So…I’m not sure about you, but I remember running in school thinking if I can just keep up with the girl in front of me or the guy along side of me then I’ll do fine. But then you learn quickly that they are much faster than you so you pick another running partner to keep up with. Well that is exactly what I was doing. I thought if Jereme and I can keep the pace with this mother and daughter wearing the pink feather boa and the purple alien ball head bands, you know the kind that stick up like ears and bounce. Then we’ll be fine Well that didn’t work because they had to keep stopping to adjust their feathers. So I picked someone else, If I can keep up with the girl with the bright pink neon skirt and camouflage leggings and shirt. I’ll be good. That worked for about 100 feet until I realized that she had legs twice the length of mine and she was at least 6 feet tall. I was getting wiped already and I hadn’t even gone a mile. So I kept picking new goals trying to keep my pace up with the crowd. Jereme-Ashlee the whole time along side of me keeping up and occasionally bumping into me because she was looking at her Ipod or adjusting her hoodie. I soon realized with all the factors that I was faced with I couldn’t really keep up the pace and I found myself needing to walk.
In church we all at some point find ourselves comparing our walk with God with those that around us. We do one of two things….we think wow look at me. I got all my stuff together and that person over there can’t even keep one foot in front of the other. Look at this spiritual peak I have achieved. The second way we compare ourselves to others is by saying to ourselves, look at Sis…so-so, she has it all together, look at her prayer life, look at the way she praises God in the front of the church, look at the way she reaches souls. Why can’t I be like her, I am such a failure. Comparing ourselves to others can be very detrimental to our salvation. Even in our day to day lives. I heard something on the radio the other day about how we are in the constant struggle to be like someone else. Doing our best to fit in a mold that the world finds acceptable.
There are many challenges we face in our day to day lives and we often think “if I can just be good looking like that person, or thinner, or smarter, or more popular then my life will be better. If I just had money, or if I lived some place different, if my parents acted differently, if I went to that school. Well…The list can be endless; we can go on and on about “If I can just be better”. This same mentality floods us in church just as much as in school and in the work place. If I can just learn to sing like him, or if I can teach like her then ,my life would be better.It’s fine to look up to people and have mentors that will help you achieve higher successes but you must be careful that you don’t compare yourself to others. We all have our rightful place in the kingdom of God, and in the Body of Christ and the hand can’t compare its ability to the ability of the mouth. Along with that, thinking that you are better than someone else isn’t good either. Pride is not something we want to take along in our walks with God. It’s a sin, and laying down sins and weighs that easily beset us is something we need to remember to do on a daily basis. So getting back to my run…
The 2 mile point is crucial for me. I can run on a tread mill for 2 miles slowing when I need to take a breath but increasing speed a minute or two later. My threshold is 2 miles. For the past few months I have been working on getting past that exhaustion point the pain point and I have been successful quite a few times but each time it has come at a cost for me. My mind gets mad at my legs because they feel like lead, my sides are aching, my lungs are burning and my breaths are shallow. And I literally want to start crying. I get so mad and frustrated because I want to quit so bad but I will my self to go further. So now I found myself at this very spot running with almost 1000 other people and I can’t give up. So my mind is searching for a focal point something to set my eyes on so I can keep going. And the Word of the Lord came to me.
Its funny, when you hear preachers or saints say that. Or when you read it in the Bible you don’t think much of it until it happens to you and God starts speaking to your situation.
The first thing that came to me is out of Ecc 9:11… the race is not to the swift...Immediately revelation started to flow, nothing new that I am sure you haven’t heard before but it was the fuel I needed, it was a word to help my focus. As a runner in this race I was trying to focus my goals on keeping up with that lady or this lady and when I failed I felt like I wasn’t doing well.
And when an older lady or a less than fit person passed me up I thought to myself how can they run past me, I am in better shape than they are. But then there were also those times when I was passing up women who looked to be in better shape than I was. And they were struggling and barely making it. After getting this word from God my whole perspective started to change. My focus should be on the finish line from the beginning. Although I couldn’t see it I knew it was out there. I saw it when I drove up. I stood in the very spot when I was at the starting line.
But I soon forgot about it. All I could think about is what had I gotten myself into, and how I just needed to just get through this ordeal of pain and the shame that I wasn’t as good of a runner as I hoped to be.
But now with this Word of God in my mind, I was thinking about our Spiritual race. Solomon was talking about the race not being to the swift nor the battle to the strong, but time and chance happens to us all. My goal was to make it to that finish line and if I eventually had to crawl there then so be it. But I had to stop focusing on what other people were doing and how they were getting there. We all know the proverbial tale of the tortuous and hare. With diligence and consistency the tortuous made it to the finish line. Although the tortuous wasn’t as fast as the hare he made it. And as we all know the swiftness of the hare didn’t get him past the finish line at all.
Right about this point I saw on the ground a timing device that everyone had tied to their shoes.
This device is used to track your progress across the finish line. It’s probably a magnet or a chip of some kind that sends off a signal to the mats that are laid out at the finish line. Triggering the start time and finish time of each runner. Well, It had fallen off some woman’s shoe and I felt bad for her because when she got to that finish line she would never know her true results because the device that was keeping track of them had been left behind. God was talking again…how often do we leave valuable things behind that we are going to need when we get to the finish line. As far as that timing system was concerned she never even made it across.
We have to be careful that we don’t lay down the doctrines that were handed down to us. The foundations that were laid by the apostles. It is too easy to casually discard something of value if we don’t recognize the worth of it. Think of the countless stories we hear about people who threw away some old book or painting only to later discover it was worth millions. My heart breaks for people who lose their love for God, or their passion for God. or their fear of God…who make it across life’s finish line without the necessary equipment to get them to Glory.
Finally I could see the turn around point; it’s the place where you turn around in the road and start going to opposite direction from where you just came. I knew it was just ahead, women that were ahead of me were running towards me now, and they all had that look of the tiger in their eyes They just made it up the incline and now they were running down hill and they were quickly approaching the goal. The finish line was just about a half a mile way. And just like human nature would have it, I thought to myself I can just almost merge with them and start running with them. Taking this bend in the road as a short cut…completely bypassing the real turn around point. My legs, my sides, my lungs wanted to cut across so badly but my mind was in control and God was still speaking. If I took that short cut, I might get away with it. No one is going to pull me aside and disqualify me, (at least from what I could see) but I would have to live my days knowing the first athletic event I ever participated in I cheated. I took a short cut...Of course this has so many parallels in the spirit. We have opportunities to build up a spiritual reputation or relationship with God, the bible says we go from faith to faith.
But sometimes we think taking a quick route to success is a good idea…no one will know I didn’t pray or fast, or compromised here. Or lied here…But God knows and you know and you will have to live with that shame forever. Imagine if Jesus would have taken a short cut while redeeming us from a life full of sin. He could have bypassed the garden or the pain but where would we be?
Would that have appeased the price that Jesus needed to pay to cleanse us from all our iniquity?
Would sin, death, and hell be conquered? Would we have been made over comers if Jesus took a short cut? Then why do we think it’s an option for us? He gave His all for us. Shouldn’t we do the same for Him?
So I’m running up a hill, I’m beat and Jereme-Ashlee is beat but we keep going and finally the turn around point and now we can run down hill. I now look at the faces of the women running the opposite of me and I want to tell them, don’t give up its only a few more steps and you will be running down hill too. All that pain you are going through right now will soon be over. Phil 3:13 says 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. That hill that I just ran up had to be forgotten, the temptation to cut corners needed to be cast away. I had to set my eye on the goal and press with everything in me.
Now we are approaching the last leg of the race. The finish line is in sight and a new rush of enthusiasm floods in. And Jereme-Ashlee looks over and we slow down to a fast walk for a minute. I encourage her and tell her we are almost there and from this point forward no more stopping… the finish line is right over there. So we start off…there are a couple more bends in the path and as we are going I see a woman running back towards us…she makes it to a woman she appears to know and I watch as they interact…it is evident that this first lady she has already made it across the finish line. She starts talking to the second woman and I can see that she is encouraging her friend who isn’t in the best of shape. From my guess, more than likely they started off the race together but somewhere along the way the second woman wasn’t able to keep up and she got left behind. As I watched the interaction between these two women I thought I saw a new determination in the woman in front of me. Her friend came back to run the rest of the way with her …she was refreshed and I am sure she was thinking she was lucky she to have a friend who was concerned with her run. Music is blaring in my ears but God is speaking to my heart again. We need to be concerned with those running along side of us. We want to make sure that we encourage them and that we lead them towards the finish line. They are apart of the Body of Christ just like we are.
Galatians 6:1-2 Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such a one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. The Message puts it this way…If someone falls into sin, forgivingly restore him, saving your critical comments for yourself. You might be needing forgiveness before the day's out...Stoop down and reach out to those who are oppressed. Share their burdens, and so complete Christ's law. If you think you are too good for that, you are badly deceived. At some point in all of our lives we want to give up or we want to slow down and we could all use an encouraging word. A helping hand. Someone who will give us sound advice and encouragement to finish the race that is set before us all. Just because someone isn’t running as fast as we are doesn’t mean that they don’t have any intention on finishing the race. They can just be going through a season of weakness and they need our love and support. Not our ridicule that they made a mistake or they are weak so we can’t associate ourselves with them.
Galatians says if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual; restore such a one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Restore by saying to them, come along side with me. I’ll pray for you, I’ll help carry that load, I’ll restore you and help you get stronger. If you haven’t encountered a time in your life yet when you need a friend and you need restoration, I’m sure that at some point you will. We all make mistakes. Some big, some small. Some more visible than others and some that are completely hidden. So just remember just because someone failed doesn’t mean they are forgotten. They need our help.
Finally… The moment that finish line was in direct sight of my vision I gave it all I had. I ran harder and faster. Why? Well I wanted to give it all I had, one last big push to make the difference on my time and how I was spending it. In these last days the finish line is just ahead and the signs of the times are everywhere and they are telling us. “Pick up the pace, there is work that needs to be done and your time is crucial. Give this everything you got.”
There is so much work out there that needs to be done.
As a mother running with her daughter and with all this revelation flowing I reached my hand over to Jereme-Ashlee. How wonderful it would be to cross the finish line with her. I thought about the day that will come. When in a moment, in a twinkling of an eye we will all be changed and caught up together. It’s going to be wonderful to have my kids next to me. My loved ones, my family and my friends. Imagine just to be walking along and all of sudden you hear a trumpet sound. And your feet leave the ground. That is going to be amazing.
When we finally finished that race…immediately there was someone who was handing out medals of accomplishment and placing it on our necks and saying Good Job! It made me think of the day when we finish our spiritual race and we hear...well done thou good and faithful servant! I don’t know about you those words I long to hear. Then we like Paul can say…I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing. There is going to come a day when all time stands still and we are before the one who redeemed us from all the junk we have done and all the cares of this life won’t matter anymore. Can you imagine what its going to be like?
Phil 4:8 Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true,
whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. And when you think that it’s impossible and you think you can’t continue on remember two things. The first being…that God is the author and the finisher of our faith. We didn’t come to him. He searched us out.. Yes, that means even if you were born into church. God told Jeremiah that he knew him in his mother’s womb. God started a relationship with you at Calvary and he will make sure that thing that he set out to do will be perfect and blameless someday. Not because we are so great and pure but because He is.
Philippians 1:6 says…Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ: Along with that…this is something that I find so encouraging Hebrews 11 says…“for the joy that was set before him endured the cross (the Him is Jesus) the joy is us. How amazing it to know that it’s my face, your face and the faces of countless others that Jesus considered worth dying for. He thought of the day that He will be with us. The Joy that was set before him. God has invested, and given so much to us. His love, his grace, his mercy…even his righteous judgment. . Romans 2:4 says…the goodness of God leads us to repentance. God is truly gracious and loving!
