Work. Race. Win.
Notes
Transcript
Read 1 Corinthians 9:24-25
Read 1 Corinthians 9:24-25
24 Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain. 25 And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible.
This verse just makes me cringe. Running, racing.. those words know how to strike fear into an overweight man.
But in reality Paul is drawing an accurate and realistic analogy to our Christian life.
He compares our pursuit of heaven to a race
No doubt Paul is thinking of one of the two great Greek athletic festivals. “The Olympic games and the Isthmian games”
The Isthmian games were held at Corinth and would have been real familiar to the Corinthian church.
The race was always a major event at the games. Paul uses this main event to illustrate the Christian life.
One cold day in New York, on January 26,1917 an eleven and a half pound baby with coarse black hair was born. They named him Louis Silvie Zamperini
As soon as he was on his feet, he was impossible to contain. Laura Hildenbrand writes in his biography, “His siblings would recall him careening about, hurdling flora, fauna, and furniture.”
It was so bad that the moment his Mama plopped him in a chair and commanded him to stay there and be still, he would vanish.
“If she didn’t have her squirming boy clutched in her hands, she usually had no idea where he was.”
The older he became, the more troublesome he became. Louis became a thief, picking locks at the local bakery and snatching pies and other pastries and eating till he was stuffed and using others “as ammunition for ambushes.”
Louis was headed for serious trouble when his older brother realized his talent for running. and in the summer of 1932 Louie did almost nothing but run. He stayed at an Indian reservation in Southern California and rising with the sun would run up and down the hills and over the desert.
He came home with a mania for running, to help expand his lungs he would run to the public pool, dive to the bottom, grab the drain plug and hang on till eventually he could stay underwater for three minutes and forty-five seconds.
Louie ran competitively and began to win. He won so many wristwatches, the traditional trophy for track, that he began handing them out all over town.
Hildenbrand writes:
“Louie’s supreme high school moment came in the 1934 Southern California Track and Field Championship. Running in what was celebrated as the best field of high school milers in history, Louie routed them all and smoked the mile in 4:21. shattering the national high school record, set during World War I, by more than two seconds.* His main rival so exhausted himself chasing Louie that he had to be carried from the track. As Louie trotted into Pete’s arms, he felt a tug of regret. He felt too fresh. Had he run his second lap faster, he said, he might have clocked 4:18. A reporter predicted that Louie’s record would stand for twenty years. It stood for nineteen.”
But one has to ask was Zamperini just special? While he did have some physical attributes that aided him - the majority of Louie’s success came from the natural things that Paul is attempting to spiritualize for us in this passage:
24 Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain. 25 And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible.
Louie knew three things that Paul tells us:
1.) There’s a race to be run
2.) There Is Discipline to be done
3.) There is a Crown to be won
Sis. Rhoda Web - The Race
I’ve started out to run this race: I’m in it now to win.
I fell in love with Christ my Lord, and left the paths of sin.
I’ve caught a glimpse of jasper walls, and splendor nondescript,
I don’t want one thing down here to cause my feet to slip.
Not to the swift the race is run; But faithful we must be
Not to the left nor to the right, but straight ahead for me
For I need strength to reach my goal, tho’ rugged be the way
While others seek the things of earth, I will walk this narrow way.
So we are out to gain recruits, to join us in this race
You won’t regret You’ve started my friends, when one you’ve seen his face.
Tho’ some may walk a slower pace and some take giant strides
If we keep in step with Him, We will all land safe inside.
1. A Race to be run 1 Cor. 9:24
1. A Race to be run 1 Cor. 9:24
24 Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain.
A race is by definition a test of speed and agility faster and of better quality than someone or something else (an opponent) Paul uses the analogy of the race for the Christian life - there are some things we race - .
Attention: This gives us three questions:
What are we focusing on?
What direction are we going?
What is my destination.
“Researchers have now identified some of the common mental processes that mark out elite athletes. And one of the most intriguing aspects appears to be a phemomenon known as the ‘quiet eye’. It is a kind of enhanced visual perception that allows the athlete to eliminate any distractions as they plan their next move.
…The quiet eye is extremly helpful at times of stress. It prevents the athlete from “choking” at moments of high pressure. It’s the same laser-sharp focus that helps doctors perform surgery.
One researcher monitored a group of professional golfers. She had a device that precisly monitored their eye movements as they putted. She found an intriguing correlation: the better the player, the longer and steadier their gaze on the ball just before, and then during, their strike. Novices, by contrast, tended to shift their focus between different areas of the scene for shorter periods of time.
We are in a race for our attention - what are we looking at or to?
Do we know the direction we are running in?
Do we know where we are running to?
But not just our attention is in the race so is our:
Adoration - Devotion - how committed and devoted are we? Paul says to run to obtain. Not run for fun or for the sake of running.
Affection - What do we love? Do we run for attention, do we run for money? Do we run for what we can get?
We are in a race a race for our Attention, Adoration, and Affection; it is a race to run and run hard. and in order to run in this race there is...
2. Discipline to be done 1 Cor. 9:25(a)
2. Discipline to be done 1 Cor. 9:25(a)
25 And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible.
In 1 Cor. 9:24 we are told to “run so that ye may obtain”
this next verse talks about those who strive to master is temperate in all things
A wrestler once asked his coach, “Can’t I smoke and drink and have a good time and still wrestle?” The coach replied, “Yes, you can, but you can’t win!”
William MacDonald and Arthur Farstad, Believer's Bible Commentary : Old and New Testaments (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1997, c1995), 1 Co 9:25.
Zamperini gave up many things in order to race - he didn’t eat certain types of food, he trained almost daily. He changed his lifestyle, changed his personality, He wasn’t a person who ran - he was a runner. He lived running, he slept running, it was his constant thought and governed his choices and decisions.
In one race he trained for which Louie described as a “fifteen-minute torture chamber” He trained so hard that he rubbed the skin right off one of his toes leaving his sock bloody.
That is a discipline many people who try to run this race haven’t figured out. Some get distracted and quit. Some become exhausted trying to work their way, some become hurt and injured
But if we are going to run this race we are going to have to discipline ourselves that this is a race worth running and running well.
1 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, 2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
As a disciplined runner one has to be disciplined to keep their focus and attention is the right places - we talked about that earlier - but I do want to mention that this verse talks about seeing this great cloud of witnesses - again an figurative picture of a massive audience who is cheering and enthusiastic.
A disciplined runner will use that to add to their energy but notice that Hebrew author says we see them - but we are looking to Jesus
We notice the crowd but our eyes are on the goal - to be like Jesus!!!
A disciplined runner in this race is doing just that!!!
We realize there is a Race to be run, there is Discipline to be done and last we have;
3. A crown to be won
3. A crown to be won
25 And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible.
Running the Christian race isn’t just about being temperate to be temperate. It’s about conditioning ourselves so that the prize is obtained.
Just entering in this race doesn’t guarantee you win the prize — you must run in such a way as to win it.
Now this crown that is available isn’t just for one winner - But for all who will finish the race
Many would-be Christians are only try-outs, and not a few, unfortunately, are drop-outs when they learn of the realities of the Christian way. Many who entered on the invitation of a “Smile, Smile” or “Climb, Climb Up Sunshine Mountain” child’s chorus fall out of the procession when they learn that the cross involves tears as well as smiles, and the sun is hidden behind the crags as they laboriously struggle up the steep, jagged, dark mountain trails.
Charles W. Carter, “The First Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians,” in Romans-Philemon, vol. 5, The Wesleyan Bible Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1966), 181.
The Greek races that Paul was thinking of offered a prize of a crown that was made of leaves and vines. It was pretty but not something you could put in a trophy case and keep forever. It was corruptible and would fade away and turn brown and ugly.
But Paul says the crown we are striving to obtain is “incorruptible” that means the gimey hands of death and decay can’t get their hands on it.
4 To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you,
4 And when the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away.
8 For bodily exercise profiteth little: but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come.
12 Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.
How about it this morning? Are you in the race to be run? Are you training doing the discipline that needs to be done? Are you running to obtain the crown incorruptible?
If not I would encourage you to recheck your attention, your affection, your adoration (devotion) and run the race