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Today one of my professors preached chapel at college. In it, he made an analogy from running a race to
run based on 1 Cor. 9:24-27. He called for three runners to come forward. Now I'm not the fastest but I'm fairly fast. I run
everywhere I can so I went up. We got on one end of the room and he stood in the middle and held up a DVD the college had
made and said the winner would get it. Well I believe I came in last but I ran.
What people don't realize was that
I was a real winner. Most people didn't realize that I had a steel rod on my spine because I had scoleosis when I was younger.
Thus, I run every time I can simply because I can. I'm the only person I know that runs down the sidewalk at college because
I can.
You know, sometimes we forget the primary gifts because of the pain of the secondary gifts. How many of us get
bored on the job but forget the primary joy that we have a job? How many of us complain when our car doesn't work but forget
the primary joy that we can own a car today? How many of us complain about our health when we are lucky to have life to begin
with? This isn't to say the other problems but don't matter but let us remember the primary joys. Take health again. We may
be upset that we have pain but what if you were a leper incapable of feeling pain and couldn't tell if rats were chewing off
your fingers such as what happens with lepers in India?
In the movie, Chariots of Fire, the main character is a runner
who wants to be a missionary to China who has the quote "God made me for a purpose, for China, but he also made me fast and
when I run, I feel his pleasure." When I run, I feel it also. Not many knew it today but when I ran that race I might have
come in last place but I still won. I had the pleasure of God and the ability to run. That makes me a winner.
And
you know something interesting? The speaker had been telling us about falling short of the glory of God and running to win.
Although I didn't win, someone came up to me later, one of the runners, and gave me the DVD anyway. You know, that's what
Christ did. We ran for holiness and did all we could and we just couldn't do it. Christ ran the race for us though and he
didn't keep the prize but gave it to us. He let us have his sinless lives though we were dead last. (And dead lost.) Isn't
that awesome?
Now go run out and tell someone.
In Christ,
Nick
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