The Christian life, if one uses running terms to describe it, is much more a marathon than a sprint. The focus is not on a brief span of time—my senior year, my college days, or my late 20’s or early 30’s. Rather, it is on a lifetime, however long that may be. The mistake people often make is they get caught up in the “moment,” thinking that they are doing well and successfully running the race when, in reality, all they’re doing is having a good sprint during a short leg of the competition. They may indeed be looking good at that point, but the race is long and those leading early or during an earlier portion, may indeed drop out before they reach the finish line.
As with a marathon, when we are following Jesus it matters more how we finish than how we start. We can easily be fooled into thinking we are doing great spiritually very early on when emotions are high and we are new to the race. But the terrain is bound to get tougher and we more weary as time goes along. Spiritual stamina is required and that is what makes the difference between those that finish with Jesus and those who don’t.
I have been doing ministry a long time and I have seen many start the race well, but struggle to build the stamina needed for the marathon in which they have entered. They base their fitness on how they feel rather than on truth. They lack the strength and diligence to persevere when the going gets tough. They get distracted by people or things along the way that lead them way off course. The end result is they fail to finish. They may have looked great at a certain point, but that was not enough to carry them to the end.
I think the Hebrew writer saw the danger for the believers in his charge. They had reached a very tough part of the race. Things were hard and discouraging, even dangerous, and he saw the distinct possibility of them falling by the wayside. So he gave them three separate instructions. And these instructions can serve us well in completing the race set out for us.
First, draw near to God in sincerity and confidence. There is a danger that we get so caught up in the minutiae of our lives that we gradually separate ourselves from the Lord. We get too busy and too focused on other things. But this is a sure way to sap our strength to complete the race because He is our source of strength.
Second, cling to the hope that is found in Jesus. Living in a world where hopelessness so often is the norm, one cannot hold onto this hope loosely or casually. We must cling to it with all of our strength or it will be ripped from our grasp.
Third, we must keep around us people of like mind and intention to give us the encouragement and incentive to keep running the race until the end. We are not meant to, and cannot, run this race alone.
All three of these instructions are meant to work together. Each reinforces the others and builds stamina. When people fail to finish the race, it is because one or more of these has not been put into practice.
Today, consider these instructions. If you are not following them in your life, know that you are in danger of falling out of the race, even if you feel at the moment that you are doing fine. You just won’t have the stamina to finish, which is the entire point of being in the race in the first place.
© Jim Musser 2017
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