Race for Life?

At 9:15 am on Friday 1st June 2012 the Olympic flame passed the Christadelphian hall in Ormskirk as it made its 8,000 mile journey around the UK.  Thousands of people lined the streets as Olympic fever swept the town.  When it arrives in London

Olympics-Button

it will open the XXX Olympiad where we will witness a global spectacle with viewers all over the world rooting for their national athletes, willing them on and longing to see them on the winners’ podium feeling proud and excited.

For most of us the ideas of competing in the Olympics, breaking a record or winning a medal are  merely pipe dreams, but the reality is that if we open a Bible we can see a promise which aims to make us all winners.

The apostle Paul wrote a letter to the believers in Corinth (in Greece) a city which was steeped in Olympic culture and had gymnasiums, arenas and stadiums.  Paul used athletic terms when he wrote to them saying:

“Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it.  Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable.”

1 Cor 9:24-25  (ESV)

The “imperishable” which Paul is talking about is eternal life in the Kingdom of God.  The sad fact is that we all die whether we are Olympic athletes or ordinary people.  Gold medals cannot give us eternal life, but the message in the Bible explains how we can share in this promise of eternal life.  Paul continued his letter:

“So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air.   But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.”

1 Cor 9:26-27  (ESV)

So how are you running your life?  What is at the finishing line; the grave or eternal life?  Only you can decide.  If you would like help understanding the Bible message then browse around this web site a bit more to find out what the Bible message is, or pop into our hall on Moorgate on a Sunday or to one of our “Ask your big questions” coffee mornings.