FROM THE PULPIT: Have the courage to run the race of faith

Dear readers, if I were to ask you who you thought was the greatest athlete of all time, you would likely have an opinion.

However, if I qualified that question by asking you, who was the greatest Olympic athlete of the ancient world, you would probably draw a blank. Who wouldn’t?

Time for disclosure: Milo of Croton was born around 560 B.C. in the Greek city-state of Croton in southern Italy. Milo was a young man endowed with remarkable strength, skill, perseverance and courage. Milo’s name was legendary in his day and for centuries to follow.

Consider his triumphs: He was a six-time champion in what we would today call Greco-Roman wrestling; he won victories at the Isthmian Games, the Pythian Games and at the Nemean Games, along with the Olympic Games already mentioned.

You are probably wondering, what might be the application in regard to Milo? How might the example of Milo be captured for the faithful in Christ? Here is how:

Wherefore, let us also, seeing that we are compassed with so great a cloud of witnesses, cast away everything that presseth down, and the sin that hangeth so fast on: let us run with patience the race that is set before us,

Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, and despised the shame, and is set at the right hand of the throne of God.

Consider therefore him that endureth such speaking against of sinners, lest ye should be wearied and faint in your minds.

Ye have not resisted unto blood, striving against sin. (Hebrews 12:1-4, Geneva Bible of 1599)

Milo of Croton competed for worldy glory and fame. But, dear reader, do you have Milo’s perseverance and courage to run the race of faith, or are you like Peter in Matthew 14, who started out well walking across the water, but because of adverse circumstances took his eyes off Jesus and sank?

Remember Jesus’ words here: “O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt.” (Matthew 14:31, Geneva Bible of 1599).

The lesson is this, not that we will not be buffeted by the winds and waves and afflictions of this world, but rather to remember, in our difficulties, to call out to Jesus recognizing he is the “author and the finisher of our faith.”

Peter called out — will you?

Christianson serves as pastor at Grace Reformed Church in Clarkston.