The Marathon

On behalf of VBS, I am doing a sermon today and it's sport related, and it's called The
Marathon. Next week I'm actually starting a summer series of the Dog Days of Summer and I'm
looking forward to that. Basically, the theme of it is that the heat is a sign in the bible of being
tested, the refining of character, going through struggle and things like that and we're gonna go
through bible applications of how to deal with struggle and themes in the bible that deals with
struggle and heat. That's in two weeks from now.

Next week will be the closing of VBS, but this week we're talking about sports-related
themes which are very much in the bible. Let's pray.

Father, Lord, thank you so much for this day. Thank you Father, for just meeting
us here on this Sabbath day and the opportunity to worship you and I pray Father,
that your Holy Spirit will guide us and speak to us right now. Thank you Father
in Jesus' name. Amen

In the bible, particularly in Paul's writings, Paul refers to a lot of verses that deal with
sports themes. For example, in 2 Timothy, he's writing a letter to Timothy and he says: "I have
fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith." He's writing to Timothy,
basically telling him, he's getting old. He's at the end of his missionary journeys. And he
describes this as "I have fought the good fight, I have finished this race." If you look at where
Paul was, in Ephesus where they did archeology, they discovered a coliseum, they discovered a
track for chariots and for other racing. And in Corinth they had like the Pan-American games.
That's the games in between the Olympics. They had the Isthmian games which were the year
before the Olympics and the year after the Olympics and they were in Corinth. We have the
book of Corinthians which is during that time period.

The Espy awards came on this year, and there was the story of this guy who is a
parachuter and he went through all these different parachute jumps. He ended up in Afghanistan
and he was a hummie and it landed on a mine and it burnt eighty percent of his body. You see
pictures of him where he was this good looking guy, if I could say that, beautiful family,
beautiful wife, child, and you see a picture of him now and it's really hard to look at, because of
all the burns. He probably has only two or three fingers left on his hands. Here is this guy going
through this great struggle afterwards, where he had everything and life was going completely
his way and this horrible thing happened to him.

There was a time when he was ready to give up on life and he couldn't bear the look of
his kids staring at him with the way he looked. Then he had this moment of inspiration and he
started to really work hard during his healing, during physical therapy. He started to train and
train and the started the Olympics for handicaps (I don't think it was the Special Olympics), but
he started training and he was doing shotput and he would be doing all these different sports and
it got him motivated even further. And then he became the first person ever to rejoin the Air
Force after his great disability. I watched this story and I was so inspired by this guy who
overcame so much – which all surrendered as sports themed.
 I don't know if you guys have seen where someone is overcoming all obstacles to win a
game, or overcoming all obstacles to win a race. We deal with that in our own lives. Life for us
is a race. The thing of it is, it's not a sprint. A sprint is like a 50-yard dash where you're running
as fast as you. Sometimes we live our lives as if they were just sprints, You have a big issue
going on in your life and you want to quick fix it and you don't think about the future. You don't
think far ahead. You just want this issue resolved right away and you just make a quick sprint to
get it fixed and taken care of. Sometimes in those quick fixes we make bad decisions. We
compromise maybe our faith and our principles to make these quick fixes.

Life is a marathon. What you do now is a small picture of your whole life and hopefully
we have the wisdom to live our lives at a slower pace than just trying to get the immediate
satisfaction of today. Paul recognized that and lived his long life centered on this principled that
he is going to serve the Lord with all his life. That he was going to dedicate his life and as he did
that, he fought that good fight. He finished that race and he kept that faith. Hopefully, when it's
all said and done at the end, when we are on our death beds, or when we are waiting for Jesus to
come and take us home that we could say the same thing as Paul has.

What is the good fight? It says in 1 Timothy: "But you man of God, flee from all of this
and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness. This is the definition
of fighting the good fight of faith. Take hold of the eternal life which you were called." There is
a battle out there. There is a great controversy. There is a struggle where the enemy is trying to
take us down in the incredible obstacle course running through this life. What is this race? What
are the steps that we are taking? In fighting the good fight, the race is, staying close to God, not
giving up, not giving in to our sinfulness, not surrendering our faith, not letting go of everything
God teaches us, so we can just do what we want to do, or do whatever it takes to survive. And
it's hard.

Here you are a high school student and you know what your peers are doing and they're
telling you to do one thing and you're thinking, I should just give in right now, here's the
moment. If you think of life not as a sprint, but a marathon, think of the bigger picture than right
now and whatever temptations you're dealing with and what are the consequences and the results
of these things. And even in our own lives, whether you're getting older and so, how are you
living? Are you living for the moment or are you thinking beyond, not only today, not only
thinking beyond tomorrow, not even thinking beyond your retirement plan, but beyond this life
and on to eternal life with Jesus.

Again, Philippians says: "He who began a good work in you will carry it on to
completion until the day of Christ Jesus." Who is doing the good work in you? God is doing the
good work in you. He has this great work. You were born on this earth and guess what? You
don't know everything. You don't have it all figured out, do you? You're gonna make mistakes.

I have a nephew who is a rambunctious little boy who makes mistakes and it's a big deal
right now. Guess what? At seventh grade I made a lot of mistakes, but praise God, he was doing
a great in me and I wasn't finished at seventh grade. You guys, maybe a little bit later on, made
horrific mistakes in your life. Thank God, you're not stuck in time right there and that is who
you are. God has done a good work in you. You've grown and he says that this good work that
is being done in you, will be complete; will be complete. Praise God for that.

James says: "Consider it pure joy my brothers and sisters whenever you face trials of
many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance." One of my
proudest sports moments – it's not kind of funny here – is with a guy I was playing racket ball
with and I was down 11-0 and I came back 15-11 to win this race. There was this great sports
analogy in my mind of something that I did. I came back from this one game 11-0 to 15-11,
amen. Alright, thank you! I shared my glory with you guys.

A great analogy in life is that there are tests and challenges and what do we do with our
challenges? Down 11-0, I'm thinking, this must be a waste of my time to put in any more energy.
Let this game go and I'll go on to another game, but I couldn't. I persevered and I came back.
The sports analogy in this is that in life you have these incredible challenges that we are facing
and what do we do with these challenges? We could just give up, too hard, I'm gonna let go, I'm
giving up on this one. I have this goal, this dream, but it's too hard. Someone told me, I'm not
good enough. Too many roadblocks to this goal. Too much energy and it's just too much for me
to deal with this any more, I give up.

James says consider it pure joy, brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials, consider it
a good thing as the testing of your faith produces perseverance, endurance in life. The older you
are, you can gain lots of endurance. I knew a guy who took me one time on a bike, for a ride.
He was 75 years-old and I was 35 years-old. I thought I had a handle on it and I'm riding my
bike and he's riding his bike and I'm smiling. He rides 100 miles every day. I've never gone ten
miles on my bike before. I made 50 miles which is pretty good, pretty proud of myself and then
literally, I just fell over. He had to ride back, pick up a van, drive to pick me up and put my bike
in his van. There was a part before that where he was pushing me while I'm riding. I'm looking,
how could a 75 year-old do this?

As an analogy this guy built endurance, he persevered. He woke up the first day riding
his bike and he went five miles and he said I'm tired and then the next day, he went six miles and
he said I'm tired. After 40 years of riding his bike, he's going 100 miles every day.

There's a story of a guy who runs a marathon. He ran a marathon everyday for an entire
year, that's 26 miles. I think all the running I did this entire year would equal 26 miles. He did it
every single day. Perseverance.

Another marathon story: In Siberia they have a marathon and the coldest marathon ever
recorded of running a marathon was when it was 40 below - Fahrenheit. I am from Montana and
I know what 40 below feels like. That is cold. At 40 below, you wonder how anything could
every survive. You wonder how the animals are going to be alive after that. One hundred and
thirty-four persons started the race, eleven finished. Life is hard; it is a challenge and it's so easy
to give up and surrender and forget about it, but those who persevere, stay on top and hold on to
their faith – they're fighting the good faith and they're going to experience such an incredible joy
and blessing as they're facing and fighting these trials.
 James 1:4 says: "Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and
complete, not lacking anything." This is the good work. There's a great work in all of us. If you
look at my life and you look at who I am, there is so much more growing that I need, just ask my
wife and she'll tell you. I am such a child on so many different things. I could go on and say
that's just who I am; I give up; that's it. But there's still so much more work to be done in me.
I'm growing and you, yourself, you know the mistakes you've made, you know your childish
behaviors and the things that you do, but God has this great work in you and he's always going to
be your coach to coach you through, cheering you on as you are running the marathon. You're
ready to give up at mile two and he says, come on, you can do it. Teaching you, leading you
through life.

Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness which the Lord the righteous
judge will award to me on that da and not only to me, but also all who have longed for his
appearing. There is an end goal in this life. When you're thinking about everything that's
happening to you and you're wanting to again compromise your faith or give up, or whatever,
remember there's an end goal. Remember running a mile in high school? Do you know how to
do that? You run the first lap, you're doing okay, but on the second lap you're kind of getting
tired. The third lap, you're really tired. The fourth lap, you're wanting to die, but there is that
end point. We might be at those different moments in our lives, but there is the end goal, a
crown or righteousness.

Philippians 3:14 says: "I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has
called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." Your is life is a marathon whether you're athletic or not,
whether we like sports or not, our life is a marathon. We are running a race. The things that you
do matter and they matter to God. But God is always there when we fall, to pick us up. God has
a goal for you and that goal is that someday you'll be with him when his Son comes to take us
home. I pray that I'll be there. I pray that you'll be there. Keep running, keep fighting the fight,
the good fight and running the race.

[Prayer].