Running your own race

Hebrews tells every runner to fix their eyes on Jesus - but every runner has to run their own race.

You see this when racers run the mile. For most of the race, the fastest runners stay off the pace - behind the leader. They are saving their "kick" for the end, keeping enough wind and strength to burst in front and leave the other runners behind.

We saw this in horse racing this year too. Take a look at this video of the Kentucky Derby and pay close attention to the race as it rounds the first turn. There is a horse that is four or five lengths back of the pack, seemingly out of the race. The horse's name is Mine That Bird. www.youtube.com/user/kentuckyderby

To all appearances, Mine That Bird was out the race. In fact, the announcer seemed to count him out, mentioning him only once before Mine That Bird was three lengths in front. NBC's camera men did likewise - the horse was left out of the picture until the home stretch.

Several weeks later at the Preakness, NBC handled the camera work differently. Mine That Bird again ran the first half of the race at the back of the pack. He finished with another spectacular burst and placed second that day, though few doubted he'd have won had the race been longer. But for most of the race - back of the pack or not - NBC kept him in the picture. Everyone knew Mine That Bird was running his race.

Running your own race means keeping your pace and your cool. Through the years, I've learned that the hard way to the point where I now run my races by myself. I find it throws me off my pace to run with others. That was true at the 2009 Winter Park 10K. I started the race with my brother in law and nephew. We all had a similar time in mind for the end of the race. But both wanted to run faster earlier in the race than my wind and legs would allow. I could have pushed ahead with them, but eventually I'd have broken down. Instead, I had to slowly let them drift ahead. With 3/4 of a mile to go, I caught up to my brother in law and we finished together. In the process, I passed my nephew but did not even know it.

Running my own race was key to my success in this friendly race. It's even more important in serious competition. In lacrosse, we continuously preach to our players to "play our game." We do that because our game is pretty good - and because it will ride our guys through the opponent's runs.

Good opponent or not, we always expect them to make a run on us. By a run, I mean that they seize the momentum with a flurry of goals or hard-nosed play. When the run comes, the tendency can be to panic - to throw the ball away, or play undisciplined defense, or generally unravel. The opposite of this is to keep our heads, do the things we know to do and to "play our game."

I think Kipling spoke of this in his poem "If." In fact, his first 'if' is "if you can keep your head while all about you others are losing theirs..." If our guys do keep their heads, we often find that momentum eventually swings back our way and we find we're close enough to make a run of our own and maybe to win the game.

In the grander scheme, this is true of our lives. In fact, circumstances - even Satan himself - periodically makes runs at us. These runs are more than just the periodic bad day. Instead, they are like a swing of the tide against us when when suddenly our lives are pushing upstream against a powerful current. Suddenly the opponent has the initiative. It can come in the form of financial reversal, or serious illness, or discord with those around us. Whatever it is, the runs are brutal. They are for keeps.

Caroline Beebe had one of these runs against her when, as a teen just months from her prom, she contracted polio. No one can get in her head to learn how it must have devastated her, a young attractive athletic gal, to find her limbs painfully bending and her fortunes suddenly so changed. The story that my mother tells is that while she couldn't attend the prom, her friends dressed her in taffita and silk then came to her house after the big dance where Caroline received her guests as if she was royalty. One of many displays of guts and style that would define her life.

As she entered her 75th year, the hobbling of polio still barely slowed her down. But life had one more run to make at her. Cancer struck hard and throughout her. She was given less than a year to live. It seemed like life saying one more time that it would finish on top. But that would not be the case.

Cancer cut her life short, but she went out on her own terms. There is no better story of this than the following. On the same day that Caroline Beebe told friends that she had decided to discontinue her chemo, she also renewed her driver's license. Some of those closest to her were horrified - not because she'd discontinued medication, but because they knew what a horrible driver she was. But you cannot miss the fact that once again she was saying to life, you dealt the cards, but I decide how we'll play them. She was running her own race. And when it was through, we could only ask along with Paul, Where O death is thy sting? Where O pain is thy victory?

As Christians, the challenge for us is to run our own race - and keep our eyes on the author and perfector of our faith. If we do that, we'll have a taste of how it feels to be the miler, and Mine That Bird and Caroline Beebe. If we do, we'll find there is nothing life can take away from us.