by Eugene Higgins
The Christian Race
COVID-19 has put an end to almost all sporting events. NASCAR events in Atlanta and Miami, the Dubai World Cup, the Bahrain Grand Prix, the Boat Race between crews from Oxford and Cambridge universities, the Barcelona marathon, the Barkley Marathons; these and myriad others have been canceled or postponed. But there are some things that COVID-19 cannot change. The sun still rises; time still marches on; and you and I are still in a race. It is the most important race of all. Some of the things that characterize that race can be seen in the following 4 examplesExample #1Ravi Zacharias tells of a bike race he used to take part in as a boy in India. The goal of the race was not to finish first but last. The bikers’ feet could not touch the ground, and it demanded skill and balance to remain upright for as long as possible without bumping into and hindering another contestant as everyone slowly pedaled towards the finish line.
Example #2On numerous occasions, runners have selflessly helped a fallen or injured runner to complete a race. Perhaps the most touching example of this took place a few years ago at the Seattle Special Olympics. Nine contestants, all physically or mentally impaired, assembled at the starting line for the 100-yard dash. At the gun, they all started out; all, that is, except one boy who stumbled on the asphalt, tumbled over a couple of times, and began to cry. The other eight heard the boy crying. They slowed down and looked back. Then they all turned and went back – every one of them. One girl with Down’s Syndrome bent down and kissed him and said, “This will make it better.” Helping the fallen runner up, they all linked arms and walked across the finish line together.
Example #3Twenty-six-year-old Derek Redmond, a British athlete, was favored to win the four-hundred-meter race in the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. Halfway into his semifinal heat, he crumpled to the track with a torn hamstring. As the medical attendants approached, Redmond struggled to rise, fighting the awful pain. “It was animal instinct,” he later said. He pushed away those who tried to stop him and began hopping towards the finish line, in obvious agony. Then one man pushed through the crowd. It was Derek’s father, Jim. “You don’t have to do this,” he told his weeping son. “Yes, I do,” Derek said. “Well, then,” said Jim, “we’re going to finish this together.” Jim wrapped Derek’s arm around his shoulder and helped him hobble to the finish line. Fighting off security men, Derek’s head sometimes buried in his father’s shoulder, they stayed in Derek’s lane and kept moving. Leaning on his father, Derek, limping, finished the race.
Example #4
The Greeks had a unique race in their Olympic games. Those competing held a lit torch and started near an olive grove outside the city, at a spot linked with Prometheus, (the mythological god of fire). The finish line was within the city and the winner not only needed to finish first, but he needed to finish with his torch still burning.
Like the race Ravi wrote about, we, too, need to run with patience and run in such a way that we do not cause others to stumble. With that very thought in mind, Paul wrote, “None of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself.” In explaining three things he wished to avoid, Paul used similar language in each case:
- 1Co 9:27 But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.
- 1Co 9:12 If others be partakers of this power over you, are not we rather? Nevertheless we have not used this power; but suffer all things, lest we should hinder the gospel of Christ.
- 1Co 8:13 Wherefore, if meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to offend.
Like the contestants in Seattle, we, too, need to help each other in the race. Some are discouraged; pick them up! Some are slowing, wearied by the length of the course; give them fresh heart! Some are hurting; help them get back in the race! On another occasion, it may be you who are discouraged, weary, hurting, and needing help. I do not know whether it was before he was imprisoned by the Nazis, or during that awful incarceration, that Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote these significant words: “The physical presence of other Christians is a source of incomparable joy and strength to the believer.” We need each other!
And just as Derek Redmond had a father who came to his side, we, too, have a Father – a heavenly Father – Who loves His children, knows their pain, and comes to our aid. How many times we have sensed that “underneath are the everlasting arms”; that He was upholding us “with the right hand of His righteousness”! How many times we have stumbled and fallen, only to prove the truth of His promise, “Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down: for the LORD upholdeth him with His hand (Ps. 37:24)!
The race, and finishing his course, was deeply embedded in Paul’s heart. He wanted to finish with the torch still burning. He told the Ephesian elders, “None of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God.” He told the Corinthian saints, “I therefore so run, not as uncertainly.” He wrote the Philippian assembly, “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, 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.” We can sense the settled joy in his heart when he wrote to Timothy, “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.”
Each of us should have an unswerving desire to finish our course, however long or short the remainder may be; and not just to finish, but to finish with the torch still lit, our light still burning.
Eric Liddell said, “You see, each one of us is in a greater race than any I have run in Paris, and this race ends when God gives out the medals.”
So run, that ye may obtain.