The Race

Read this, written by Arthur F. Gafke (Disiplines 2013):

God's grace surrounds us throughout our race, not simple at the end of it.  This constant grace makes our running possible.

I know we know that.  I know that we say that we realize that God's grace is always with us, but when we think about Hebrews 12:1-2, which tells us to run the race with perseverance, there is an image in our minds of running a race to the finish line.

A race has a goal -- a place where it ends.  The image of a race connotes the idea that we must finish it to reach the goal.  We see heaven as the goal, and reaching God as part of the race.

Do we remember, though, that the running of the race is part of what we are to do.  Our goal is not just to run through this life, keeping the goal of heaven in mind.  Our goal is to participate in the journey.

In the eleventh chapter of Hebrews, the author lists great names in our faith, who ran the race with perseverance.  They aren't on the list because they finished the race; they are on the list because of the journey they took.

God is with us on the journey, and how we run the race matters.  That we run the race, matters.  Sometimes we forget, I think, that God makes it possible for us to take the journey at all.

We are in the kingdom of God.  Now.  Today.  We're not only running toward it, we are running through it.