FAST OR SLOW JUST KEEP RUNNING
Hebrews 12:2b NLT
“Let us run with endurance the race God has set before us.”
God has given each of us a unique faithlife race to run. Each of us will have unique life trials to endure that were divinely placed or allowed by God into our lives. God has a wise, divine plan for them all, though they may perplex us, confound us, and even at times cause us great pain, anguish, and torment. Be fully aware—God has thought it all through beforehand. He has thought of everything. He knows what’s coming around the next curve in the course of your race.
However, our greatest temptation will be to quit running as we grow weary, tired, and distressed from the duration and intensity of our race.
I’ve found one of the greatest challenges in continuing the race is this stark reality—“Think about all he endured when sinful people did such terrible things to him, so that you don’t become weary and give up.”—Hebrews 12:3 NLT
Oh man, that one really hits home, doesn’t it? The hard, faith-reality of our Christian experience is that God often allows sinful people to do such terrible things to us! And it hurts so bad and can destroy so much. It’s so exasperating, so vexing, so tormenting, and can be overwhelming to the soul.
I’ve given this truth a great deal of thought over the course of my lifelong faith journey. It has been without a doubt the most difficult aspect of my faithlife race—the terrible things others have done to me.
As I’ve walked through these realities, I discovered tremendous help through the advice given by God in the rest of that scripture—I think about all the terrible things people did to Christ that he endured.
I vividly ponder how much he was disrespected. How he was disregarded by family members. He was ridiculed and taunted by corrupt, hypocritical religious leaders. He was falsely accused repeatedly during the years of his public ministry by those same corrupt religious leaders. He was publicly embarrassed, humiliated, and treated with tremendous contempt. Though He went everywhere doing good for others, many of these same people were part of the raging mob screaming “Crucify him! Crucify him!” I think of the many he helped and healed who wouldn’t even return to say thank you, nor appreciate his great kindness to them. I think of the thousands of so-called “disciples and friends” who deserted him during the years of his ministry. I think about those in power who plotted and schemed to destroy him with their slander and lies, and their nefarious plan to kill him. I think of the injustices of his trial. The deceitful scum who betrayed him. I think of the terrible rejection he endured by the very people, the very nation he had created and rescued time and time again, who treated him with such malice and disdain. I think of the savagery, the brutality, and the torturous way he was beaten, bloodied, marred beyond human recognition, stripped naked, and savagely nailed to that cross. Over and over again, I envision in my mind’s eye the things Jesus had to endure in his liferace, and I find strength and encouragement to keep running mine.
When I was about 12, my father worked for a sales company selling fasteners, nuts, and bolts to companies like John Deere, Maytag, etc. He worked very hard to provide for his large family in those years. Though he never went to high school, sales allowed him to earn a living to care for us all. He especially relied on the year-end bonus he would get by meeting and exceeding his sales goals. This particular year, his bonus was going to be a lot of extra money, as he had far exceeded his sales goals. But at the end of the year, the company literally changed their bonus policy, just so they would not have to pay my dad his huge, year-end financial bonus. This was a terrible, painful injustice as he really needed this money for his family. He was shocked they would cheat him out of this bonus. It made my dad very angry, and was extremely demoralizing, as he was powerless to do a thing about it. Over the course of that next year, he became more and more discouraged, embittered, and slowly began to drift from his faith in God.
As I got older and became a father myself, I began to understand just how devastating it is to be so severely mistreated by other people, and how, if you are not very, very careful, it will turn you away from God and ruin your faith, and you quit the race.
This left a deep, lasting impression on me. As a young man, looking back on it, I determined by God’s grace that I would not let the terrible things others do to me dissuade me from my “faithrace,” and my love for God.
It does not matter whether you run fast or slow, just keep running the “faithrace” God has set before you. There is great, unending joy and reward that waits for you at the end.
Helping you become a Strong Disciple,
Because of Jesus,
Pastor Mark Darling
