The Last Mile Workout

Life experiences tend to teach life lessons. I know I haven’t been around a real long time but I have acquired enough life experience to get quite a few sermon illustrations and blog ideas, as you can probably see. I have gotten a lot of these life lessons from running cross country for three years. For instance, I have learned that my legs are really white (like seriously- you don’t understand… especially in those shorts, I have to wear sunglasses or I will be blinded by them). I have also learned that the whole world thinks you are a freak if you slightly enjoy running at all but I think they are just jealous of my meaty 150 pounds and tall lanky body that was crafted to do nothing else but run for miles on the side of the highway.
I have learned a lot about myself and my walk with God by running as well. What God reminded me of today is what is called the “Last Mile Workout.”
In high school, cross country is a sport (yes, it is a sport) in which the participants run a 3.1 mile course through woods, parking lots, or whatever else they can come up with and compete against up to a couple hundred runners at a time. Practice is more than just running for an hour or so, most of the time. A good coach will have different workouts that train the runner for different parts of the race.
I ran my first race in a year this past Saturday and as I hit my last mile I realized that in my training I had neglected my Last Mile Workout that would prepare me to finish the race strong. I was less than 400 meters behind first place and I did not have the strength I should have to catch him for the win.
As a beginning runner, I never understood when my coach would have us do a Last Mile Workout. We always had to run weird distances in weird times with weird paces. I discovered that the first half of the workout was designed to completely exhaust you while the second half is to show you what you are capable of when you are almost dead.
These past couple weeks for me have been a lot like the Last Mile Workout. I am learning things that don’t really seem to apply to where I am right now. Sometimes I don’t understand why I go through the things I go through. I don’t understand what I am supposed get from all of this.
Then I realize that I am being trained for the whole race, not just the first mile.
Some things I have just to file away for later and use when I need them.
If there is one thing I have learned about running, it is that if you do not have the end of the race in mind you will lose at the beginning.
I am in training to be in ministry, a field that has had its’ reputation burned since its’ inception. Ministers have broken families, destroyed faiths, and continually re-crucified their Savior with their actions.
The divorce rate is the same for clergy as it is for layman.
The Bible tells us that God gave about 400 people the responsibility of leadership. Only 25% of them ended their lives still in accordance with God’s will.
Anybody can start ministry, but I am here to finish. Every day we are one day closer to the return of Christ and I don’t think this world can afford another Jim Baker, another Jimmy Swaggert, or more recently another Eddie Long. I want to be who God created me to be 20, 40, and 60 years from now.
This does not just apply to ministry. If God has promised you something, every moment from the receiving of the promise to the fulfillment of the promise is preparation and training for the promise. God is always teaching you more than patience. Your whole life has trained you for today. What you do right now might not teach you what you need to know for tomorrow, but it might teach you what you need to know for the day after tomorrow.
So when you don’t understand what is going on or what the heck you are supposed to be learning just write it all down. You will use it later.
This nugget may not have been super spiritual but who knows what it will look like once I am in my last mile.