The St. Jude Country Music Marathon (formerly the Music City Marathon) takes place tomorrow in Nashville, Tennessee.  Many will put themselves to the test as they run, yet they find the testing to be thrilling.  They love the challenge.

“The music of a marathon is a powerful strain, one of those tunes of glory. It asks us to forsake pleasures, to discipline the body, to find courage, to renew faith and to become one’s own person, utterly and completely.”  –George Sheehan

However the ultimate marathons are not the ones run in running shoes.  The marathon of a lifetime is the lifetime pursuit of God.  Filled with tests, challenges, and heartbreak hills, life can call forth all the passion, commitment, and sacrifice that a person has.  Many decide to fall back, to walk, to rest, to drop out of the marathon of life.

However, Paul of Tarsus, in the New Testament, gives a better way to deal with life’s marathon.  He asks:  “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.”

If anything in this life is worthy of all out commitment, it’s not a foot race — it’s following and obeying the living resurrected Jesus Christ in your daily life.  That’s the race worth running.  Don’t piddle around, don’t ignore, don’t deny — instead, run this race.

There’s a place in Nashville where runners are gathering to train in a spiritual support group, for the marathon of a lifetime — the all out pursuit of God — meeting every Sunday morning at 10:45 at 225 Berry Street, Nashville, 37207.   Rather than being passive spectators listening to a lecture, these spiritual runners are training each other as they show and tell what God has done.  Check it out — The Salvation Army Berry Street.