I had to construct a resume - a “curriculum vitae” in more official terms. It’s been a very long time since my last one! But the institution for which I am teaching this summer required it.
To be honest, my resume writing skills were so rusty I had to borrow one from a colleague to use as a template. As I read all his impressive achievements, I began to wonder how mine would stack up. Not very well, at least in the academic context.
The word curriculum in Latin means a race. Vita means life. So a curriculum vitae means literally the race of life.
The apostle Paul talked quite a bit about that race. He urged others to run it well, he said he was running it as fast as he could with a view to winning, and he knew when the time was drawing near for his race to be done.
You can have a lot of achievements that may look impressive on paper. But in the end, all that matters is how you have run the race of life.
Here are some tips for success.
Don’t look back. Ask God to forgive you for messing up and learn your lessons so you don’t do it again. Don’t let the past imprison you.
Don’t look around. Stop comparing yourself to others around you. Either you wind up looking down on others or being envious of them. You are the only participant in your race. Nobody else is running it but you.
Keep your eyes on the finish line. This can be a hard thing if you’re young, but the best way of winning the race is to keep our eyes on the One standing at the end of it. Allow the values of heaven to determine how you run the race, not what you see around you.
As you do this, you should develop a very keen sense of the difference between what success is in the sight of the world, and what success is in the eyes of God.
Most of us at some point or another have to construct a resume. For the most part, they deal with things that come and go, and in the end don’t mean a lot. But your spiritual resume means everything.
I’ll offer two final thoughts.
If your resume looks good, be encouraged by your achievements but don’t find your worth and value in them.
If your resume looks a bit bare, like mine did, don’t be discouraged. I do have to be qualified to teach the course, but if I can make an impact on the lives of the students and help them to understand and to love God’s Word more deeply, how many academic articles I’ve published is not that important.
Run the race of life and run it well.
Photo by Josiah Weiss on Unsplash