Saturday, June 14, 2008

At four year intervals, people around the world watch as men and women compete in the Marathon at the Olympics. Great attention is given to the winners - who, of course, have finished that race. Somehow, their accomplishment is complete in less than 3 hours. In America, people also give large amounts of attention to the Marine Corps Marathon and the Boston Marathon. Somehow, finishing a 3 hour accomplishment, backed by thousands of hours of training, is regarded highly by many people.

A portion of the importance of the accomplishment lies in the history of the victory at Marathon and a messenger's 26+ mile run that is linked to the first Olympics, in Greece, sponsored by Pericles.

Three or four hundred years later, Saul of Tarsus had his name changed after an encounter with Jesus along the road to Damascus. Subsequently, he wrote as Paul about the spiritual need to believe in the Ressurrected Jesus by Faith, to enter the Spiritual Race and he encouraged his readers to finish the "race."

Paul never advocated dropping out.

He never advocated "coasting" through one's mortal life.

While the Thief on the Cross entered "the race" at the last few steps, Jesus indicates that the Thief crossed the finish line. Other believers have entered the Spiritual Race for hundreds and thousands of days, depending upon the hour they first believed. In this sense, the Hellenistic laurels that come to a single winner of a three hour footrace are dwarfed by the quantity of runners who have entered the Spiritual Race...and many of those "runners" can all claim the prize.

In this age, winners receive a gold medal after placing first at a modern Olympic Marathon. Twenty-three hundred years ago, the winner received a wreath of laurel leaves.

For more than 2,000 years, the Spiritual Prize awaits every believer who enters the Spiritual Race and finishes it. Praise God for Paul!