Run, run, run!

Therefore... let us throw off everything that hinders, and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus... Hebrews 12:1-2

Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last for ever. 1 Corinthians 9:24-25

I wonder if the name Roger Bannister means anything to you? If you are remotely interested in sport I’m sure it will. Bannister was the man who broke a record many thought could never be broken: he was the first person to run a mile in less than four minutes.

I recently picked up a book he originally wrote in 1955, the year after he broke that record. I was just a small boy at the time (picture me with short grey trousers and Brylcreemed hair), but I still remember the fuss and excitement. It was a bit like when Edmund Hillary and Tensing Norgay became the first men to reach the top of Everest.

In his book Bannister talks about his compulsion to run, and the thrill he got from it. 

Well, I can’t pretend to have any kind of similar compulsion. Running has never much interested me, though I do appreciate its beauty. I remember a boy at school - I even remember his name: Farthing - who ran like the wind, all smoothness, focus and fluency. I can see him right now, flowing down the track. But I’m afraid that I was one of those who, when it came to the annual cross-country run, reckoned to hide away for a few laps and hope no-one would notice.

In the world of the New Testament they didn’t have the kind of complicated and sophisticated games we have today - no football or tennis or cricket. But what they did have was athletics, and especially that most basic and primitive of all sports, running.

So it’s no surprise that the writer to the Hebrews (and Paul too in 1 Corinthians) compares the Christian life to the running of a race. It’s clear that he has in mind long distance, not a sprint (think Mo Farah or Paula Radcliffe), because he talks about “running with perseverance”. Even an unfit person can put on a bit of speed for a hundred yards or so, though perhaps at risk of a heart attack. But running a marathon, say, is a rather different matter. You need to be supremely fit and totally dedicated. And exactly the same thing applies to the spiritual race.

You have to get rid of any excess baggage. The writer picks out two sorts.

First, “everything that hinders”. There’s not much point running a race in your wellies or eating a bacon sandwich, is there? All of us have things in our lives which are not at all wrong in themselves but which trip us up - hinder us - through having an over-important place in our priorities. Do I, say, watch too much television, or read too many novels, or eat too many donuts, or (this is me) play too much chess?

Perhaps, looking at your life, you can think of a bit of pruning that needs to be done, a few tough decisions that need to be made. How about it?

Second “the sin that so easily entangles” - things or attitudes, motives or ambitions, which are quite clearly wrong, no ifs no buts, but which we have got comfortably used to. Things which have become part of the furniture of our lives. But things which are offensive to a pure and holy God. 

A sinking ship may need to jettison its cargo, and that must be very hard to do. But if the cargo consists of outright sins on the one hand and distracting habits or hobbies on the other, sorry, it’s got to go.

The kind of fitness and dedication the writer is talking about calls for one very simple thing: “let us fix our eyes on Jesus”.

Doesn’t that little expression sum up perfectly the heart and soul of Christianity? Every minute of every day we are to be Christ-centred men and women. Fix your eyes. An occasional glance is no good. Nor even a weekly stare, most likely on a Sunday morning. No, our eyes must be focussed on him twenty-four seven, as they say.

The next stretch of the race lies before us. Are you a true athlete for Christ?

Father, help me to be the kind of runner the Bible speaks of, remembering that one day I will receive a prize that can never be taken away. Amen.