The Race of Endurance

Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. (Hebrews 12:1 NKJV)

In 490 B.C., King Darius of Persia sent his army, including a fleet of two hundred ships, to attack the Greeks. The Persians destroyed the city of Eretria before sailing to their next rendezvous with the Athenian troops at Marathon. Recognizing their dilemma, the Greeks sent Pheidippides, one of their runners, to Sparta in an effort to rally assistance for the battle. Pheidippides was a marvel of human endurance, racing the one hundred fifty miles to Sparta in a mere two days. Having completed his mission, he retraced his steps and ran back to Marathon. Although only about six hundred soldiers joined the fight at Marathon, the Greeks thoroughly routed their enemies. Once again, Pheidippides hit the road at top speed to Athens. “We win!” he joyfully declared, then collapsed and died.

Although the truth of these details is up for debate, who doesn’t admire the faithful endurance of Pheidippides? On November 1, I turned forty-five, another year closer to old age, and it has caused me to seriously consider, “What does it take for a man to joyfully endure the span of time the Lord has designed for him?”

I searched for examples, but it seems they are rare. Instead of endurance, there is survival. In place of joy, there is resignation. As Dean Taylor once stated in reference to Joel’s prophecy, “Instead of young men with visions and old men with dreams, we have young men fantasizing and old men with cynicism.”

Who wants to be a cynical grandpa? I do not desire to become a sour old man, difficult if not nigh impossible to live with. I want to joyfully endure with the stamina of Pheidippides. So, what can I do? I cannot escape growing old, but surely I can choose how I age! Since I believe the characteristics of an older man are largely a result of who he was as a younger man, at forty-five I hold a wonderful opportunity to lay the foundation for joyful endurance into and throughout my older years.

This then, is a map, a spiritual geographic layout of what I am going to do to become a Pheidippides and joyfully run the race of endurance.

First, I am going to continue walking closely with my Heavenly Father. There has never been and will never be any substitute for an intimate relationship with Him. From Him flows the strength to endure. Scottish minister and novelist George MacDonald made this penetrating statement, “This is the Father’s work from the beginning—to bring us into the home of his heart. This is our destiny.” Author John Eldredge agreed, “Intimacy with God is the purpose of our lives. It’s why God created us. Not simply to believe in Him, though that is a good beginning. Not only to obey him, though that is a higher life still. God created us for intimate fellowship with Himself, and in doing so he established the goal of our existence—to know Him, love Him, and live our lives in an intimate relationship with Him.”

In my quest to endure, I will seek relationships with other godly men who can encourage me during those seasons of dryness and battle and discouragement and temptations to endure. No man can give me life, but each one carries a responsibility to point others back to the true source of life when we lose sight of the road in front of us. Even Jesus had His band of brothers. He had The Twelve, but even more than that He had The Three, who went with Him to places like the heights of the Mount of Transfiguration and to the Chasms of Gethsemane. Every David needs a Jonathan.

If I desire not merely to survive but also to endure joyfully, then I must commence to praise my Father, especially when the chips are down and the odds stacked against me. When my one-year-old son wakes for the third time in the same night and needs Daddy to calm him back to sleep, I will praise God I have been given this priceless opportunity. Sighing and complaining about this tiresome burden subtly but surely evolves into bitterness. Nehemiah wrote, “The joy of the Lord is my strength.” Sounds like he had discovered the secret to endurance. James was onto the same secret when he wrote, “Count it all joy when you fall into various trials.” Although I may be able to live a life of endurance like James did without emulating his alleged Nazarite lifestyle, it will be impossible to endure without being joyful in various trials.

Trying to be joyful may be putting the cart before the horse and may become a frustration if I do not first “flee for refuge to the hope that is set before me.” It’s a hope with vision that pierces through the present situations, a steadfast and sure anchor of the soul for those unsteadfast and unsure times we encounter, a hope that gives us the boldness to enter the Presence just behind the veil of our current habitation. Doesn’t such a hope cascade forth joy without any trying?

Rest is not a popular activity among we who have been taught that busyness plus diligence equals godliness and that more busyness plus more diligence equals more godliness. It’s a deadly and deceptive mixture of truth and error. Ever wonder why so many people fight panic attacks and experience dark emotions of despair? Look at what Jesus advised his disciples on their return from a mission trip in Mark 6. People were coming and going, the disciples didn’t even have time to grab a sandwich, and Jesus kindly told them, “Come aside by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.” Resting may not be the same for me as it is for you, but we each need to find what refreshes and recharges us and then do it. Even though resting is not stylish, I would rather rest and endure than run the treadmill and burn out. It’s one or the other.

Finally, in order to endure I need to be flexible. Oh yes, I am aware that we men are told to keep visions with flinty resolve. True to a certain degree. What happens when I decide that in five years, I will have my 139-acre farm fenced for my Angus herd, but the Lord says, “I don’t want you to live on a 139-acre farm; I want you and your family to learn contentment on a two-acre lot”? What happens when my business has grossed half-a-million this year, and I set my sights on a million next year, but the Lord says, “I don’t want you in that category. I want you and your family to learn satisfaction in being able to earn what it takes to keep the wolf from the door”? Unless I have learned flexibility, my life will not only be bent completely out of shape, but I will also become incapacitated to joyfully run the race of endurance that is set before me.

Although I may never be able to match the physical endurance of Pheidippides, I may match him stride for stride in spiritual endurance and at the end of the race hear my Father say, “Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord!”