Teach Your Kids to Run
This is the only race worth running. I've run hard right to the finish, believed all the way. 8All that's left now is the shouting--God's applause! Depend on it, he's an honest judge. He'll do right not only by me, but by everyone eager for his coming. 2 Tim 4:7-8 (MSG)
Friday night was a tough night for the GHS football team. After preparing all week and believing in a win, they lost. It was not just a loss of one team being better than another team, as is with all losses with any team.
When you leave the field of play in any sport and you or your team is on the low end of the final score, you are haunted by every mistake. It is not just the real mistakes that bother you. It is also the mistakes that you as a player believe are mistakes just because they did not go the way you hoped.
It is hard on game night, in the heat of the moment, in the midst of the emotion, not to believe that what just happened is a major setback in your life that will be used to judge who you are.
It is hard to explain to a high school student, or a woman going through a divorce, or an executive that has just lost his job or been demoted, that “It’s not whether you win or lose, it is how you play the game.”
The question you ask at the end should not be how many screw ups did I have in this game or in this marriage, or in this job, or in this life. The question should be “Did I give it my all? Did I leave it all on the field? Did I fight the good fight? Was I running the right race?
Paul is telling us in his last days through a letter to his apprentice Timothy, “Make sure you are running the only race worth running. And make sure that when you cross the finish line you can say, “I gave it all I had for God.”
I remember the pain of going through losses with my children, and still doing so with my adult children. I remember that as I tried to be a wise dad (hopefully not a wise guy) and remind them of what was most important, it did not carry a lot of weight in the emotion of the moment.
Now I love hearing my kids talk about giving it their best. I love hearing them remember the good stuff and that they have forgotten the bad stuff that at the time seemed most important.
Wherever you are in life right now. No matter how much you think you have messed up to this point. You can start to run the good race. Run as an apprentice to Christ in the only race really worth running. And teach your children to run the right race. And the best way to teach them to run is for them to follow you.
Keep Running
Royal
Friday night was a tough night for the GHS football team. After preparing all week and believing in a win, they lost. It was not just a loss of one team being better than another team, as is with all losses with any team.
When you leave the field of play in any sport and you or your team is on the low end of the final score, you are haunted by every mistake. It is not just the real mistakes that bother you. It is also the mistakes that you as a player believe are mistakes just because they did not go the way you hoped.
It is hard on game night, in the heat of the moment, in the midst of the emotion, not to believe that what just happened is a major setback in your life that will be used to judge who you are.
It is hard to explain to a high school student, or a woman going through a divorce, or an executive that has just lost his job or been demoted, that “It’s not whether you win or lose, it is how you play the game.”
The question you ask at the end should not be how many screw ups did I have in this game or in this marriage, or in this job, or in this life. The question should be “Did I give it my all? Did I leave it all on the field? Did I fight the good fight? Was I running the right race?
Paul is telling us in his last days through a letter to his apprentice Timothy, “Make sure you are running the only race worth running. And make sure that when you cross the finish line you can say, “I gave it all I had for God.”
I remember the pain of going through losses with my children, and still doing so with my adult children. I remember that as I tried to be a wise dad (hopefully not a wise guy) and remind them of what was most important, it did not carry a lot of weight in the emotion of the moment.
Now I love hearing my kids talk about giving it their best. I love hearing them remember the good stuff and that they have forgotten the bad stuff that at the time seemed most important.
Wherever you are in life right now. No matter how much you think you have messed up to this point. You can start to run the good race. Run as an apprentice to Christ in the only race really worth running. And teach your children to run the right race. And the best way to teach them to run is for them to follow you.
Keep Running
Royal
posted by Royal at 11:05 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home