What is it that keeps us running the race?
I have several crazy friends who go in for marathons, ultramarathons, biathlons, triathlons and other such tests of endurance. One of them just finished a 100 mile race.
Other people I know run different kinds of races. Races of perseverance in marriage, in family, in health, at work, in finances, races often run through many disappointments and setbacks.
Sometimes we just keep going because there is no other alternative.
The Bible tells us we are all running a race, but we need to make it to the finish line if we want the reward. I admit there were lots of times over the years when Elaine and I felt like giving up. But we didn’t. God’s work, whether it was church or raising a family, had to be done and he had called us to do it.
I feel very sad when I hear of people who after many years stop running God’s race. It doesn’t happen often, but it does happen.
I can’t explain all the reasons people drop out. Jesus said the seed of the Gospel would be sown in four different kinds of people, and only the last group would persevere.
What I think I can explain is why people do persevere.
True saints persevere because they have been so gripped by the power of the Word of God, delivered into their hearts by the Holy Spirit, that they cannot walk away, even in the moments they want to.
People can follow Jesus for a season, maybe even a long season, because it works for them. It’s often expedient to be a professing Christian. We get benefits, both practical and spiritual, from being in a good church. The Gospels tell stories of people around Jesus who got blessed and even healed. But their following ended when the cost became greater than the benefits.
In the end, we will never be kept by expediency. Expediency is what works for you when in the final analysis your life is about you. If following Jesus works for you, you’ll follow him until it doesn’t.
What keeps us is truth, truth backed up by the One who is the truth.
When people walk away from Jesus, I have no alternative but to conclude it’s because, deep down, the conviction of that truth never completely gripped them. When the day of trial or disappointment came, when God did not meet their needs in the way they expected, when the world made a better offer, it became more expedient for them to walk away, and they did.
Expediency operates in the realm of money, desire, ambition, sex, in fact the whole gamut of human need. So long as we think Jesus can give us what we want, we’ll follow him. But if we’re tempted to think we can get what we want somewhere else, the only thing that will hold us is the conviction of the truth empowered by the Spirit.
And that conviction is simple. It is the rock solid knowledge that knowing Jesus is worth more than all this world can offer, and the willingness to give up the latter if that’s what it takes to follow him.
That’s what will hold you in the moment of wavering. People never stop following Jesus because of intellectual doubts. That’s just a cover that lets them off the hook. People stop following Jesus because, for one reason or another, they aren’t getting the benefits they want.
Is it fair of Jesus to ask us to follow him unconditionally? Yes it is - he has earned the right to do so because when you and I were on the brink of a lost eternity, he was so held by the power of conviction that he went to the cross for us, a cross whose benefits were all ours and whose pain was all his.
See you at the finish line.
CONSIDER PARTNERING WITH DAVID & ELAINE CAMPBELL IN HELPING TO SUSTAIN THEIR ACTIVE MINISTRY.
AWAKENING MINISTRIES // FOUNDATION of FAITH Project
Foundation of Faith Project is strengthening generations in faith and bringing beautiful changes to the communities around them. Through teaching, mentoring and coaching, many are finding out who they are and who they are destined to be. They are bringing more to their world. David Campbell is the key leader in this initiative and you can support him financially directly through Awakening Ministries.
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