We had so much fun watching the Olympics with our kids this summer. Josh was especially excited about the track and field events. The poor boy actually cried when he realized he wasn’t going to be participating in them this year. While the Olympics were on the kids did a lot of pretend Olympics around our house. One morning Josh was jumping off the bed and yelled to me, “Is anybody in the Olympics brave enough to do THIS!” I told him, “Well, there are the hurdles. They run around the track and then jump like that.” He gave me a very confused look and asked, “Can they talk? And I didn’t know they could jump and run fast.” I said, “What do you mean.” And Josh answered, “Mom, the TURTLES. I didn’t know the TURTLES could jump and run fast.” I guess that would have made the Olympics quite a bit more exciting.
I am surely not an athlete and probably have more in common with your average turtle than with an Olympian, but I do know a bit about running a race. In I Corinthians 9 we read “Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.” Even if I don’t have the body of a runner, I have a soul that needs training and discipline. It isn’t always fun, but I do it because there’s a reward for those who will persevere. And when I run that race with grace and strength, I become a coach who inspires my kids to run, too.