God puts on the old tennis shoes, some Converse All Stars. God goes down to the track, to the starting line, he gets set, the gun sounds and God runs, God runs the race and he doesn’t quit until all the world runs with him.
The Olympics have been a very welcome and needed change to the world and to our country this year, they came just in time. We dream again with all the world of being young and strong and part of something bigger than ourselves.
We are told today in the letter to the Hebrews that we are to “run with perseverance the race set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith.”
We hear this reading on one Sunday morning every three years.
Now the Olympics happen every four years, that means that the last time we heard this reference to running the race during the Olympics was over twenty years ago.
It’s a good day to hear about running the race of faith.
Who are those who have taught us how to endure and persevere? To stick to it? To not quit?
Faith is like that. We learn from others about how to go on when things aren’t so good and the future doesn’t look much better.
Endurance. It takes practice and it takes examples to follow.
I remember my high school football and track teams would watch film strips of games and track events to learn from others.
Endurance takes study and practice and it takes a team.
Faith is like that.
We practice with hope and trust and belief in something that we can’t see and most us will never see until the longed for time when the world is remade.
Faith is like that, we run the race reaching ahead to a prize that we pray is there somewhere.
Faith is not for sissies or the occasional hobbyist.
How do we as a team train with hope? How do we practice trust? How do we run with faith? How do we grow strong with belief?
This is the stuff of being the Church, of being the Body of Christ, of being and proclaiming the Gospel.
We need this Good News vision of God running the race so that we may run as well.
Jesus is God running that we may run again, unhindered by all the things that bring death and ruin.
The world needs us to run with Jesus, to study Jesus, to love and follow him with great devotion and love.
The Gospel of the God who runs with and for us that we may grow strong again is a very welcome and needed change for the world and for our country.
It is just in time.
A vision of the world growing young and strong and part of something bigger than ourselves.
It is worth striving and stretching and enduring and persevering.
Study Jesus.
Practice hope.
Live with trust.
Persevere in belief.
Run that race together.
The prize is just up ahead, always just beyond reach…until one day…until then persevere.