How Do I Run My Own Race?
Over the last several months in my walk with Christ, I’ve realized something important: comparing my relationship with Jesus to others doesn’t just rob me of deeper intimacy with Him, it also keeps others from experiencing Him fully through me. Because of my own sinful nature and because I can tend to choose my way over the Lord’s, it not only hurts me, but hurts those around me. What a great way to start a post haha. So often we are caught up in the comparison game. He has this, she has this, he looks this way, she looks this way, they’re better at this, etc. Isn’t it interesting that comparison was one of the roots of Satan’s fall? Instead of embracing his own purpose, he looked at what belonged to God and wanted it for himself. I don’t see that as a coincidence that this is such a common struggle in today’s society. We don’t necessarily help ourselves either when we choose to indulge in things like social media that present the best of people, causing you to feel less than, less important, less popular, and so forth. There are so many things in culture that scream for us to have more to be more. Why is it that we have lost the understanding that the only thing that truly leaves us fulfilled and a sense of belonging is through more of Jesus? It sounds so basic and simple, yet it is so hard to live out.
Back when I was in high school, one of my best friends had convinced me to run Cross Country for my senior year after begging me for a year straight. The thing is, I absolutely hated running. I don’t know that I will ever fully understand the idea of running for fun outside of running for the purpose of staying in shape, but if that is you more power to you. As I started to train and we began getting our bodies in shape for XC meets, I started to realize how quickly I would compare myself to others around me, how fast their times were, how quickly I got tired compared to some other teammates, and I began to get defeated. What I didn’t understand at the time was it was not fair on myself to compare myself to other runners, especially those who had way more experience than I did. Even if certain runners were at the same level but running faster than I was, there is so much that goes into your body to ultimately result in how someone runs. See I was allowing the results of others to dictate how I ran my own race. Instead of focusing on how I could personally improve and push myself to grow individually, I was solely focused on being better than others to prove I deserved recognition, attention, and praise.
Because I was so focused on proving myself and being better than others during my time of Cross Country, I missed out on so much of the joys of community, friendship, and self-improvement because I was more caught up in running someone else’s race rather than running my own. And this is true of us even in our own walk with Jesus. So often we can get caught in the comparison game of someone knowing more about Scripture, someone who prays “better” than you, someone who got that opportunity at church that you didn’t, someone who has that godly partner that you don’t. The list goes on and on. The value of running a race, especially when it comes to something along the lines of a marathon, there are times where you have to hit the gas and times where you need to pump the brakes. The truth is, those times might be completely different depending on the person. That is why it is silly to try to run someone else’s race instead of your own. If you’re not careful, you’ll mistake hitting the gas for pumping the brakes and let an opportunity that God is trying to bless you with pass by. The same is true for what the body needs during a race. At different times, you might need to be recharged during your run with things that are nutritious and beneficial to your body. If I end up putting things in my body that are not beneficial to my body personally, I could end up hurting the race that I am running. My walk with Jesus is mine, not my friend’s, not my neighbor’s, mine. That’s why it’s so important not to neglect my own walk with Christ to chase after and mirror someone else’s.
Now timeout, please don’t hear me say this and believe that it is not beneficial to learn from others and their walks with Christ. The thing I am cautioning that I have allowed myself to fall into time and time again is being so caught up in what others are doing that my faith is not personal and my own. There should be things/ aspects of your walk with Jesus that are between you and Him. Things that others have no idea about. There’s something special about having a friendship where there are things that are between just the two of you. It builds a tighter bond and draws you nearer to one another. But the other thing that is true is it demands a PERSONAL relationship with Him. If I have someone that I claim to be my best friend, yet I typically neglect them and choose to make them a lesser priority, are they truly one of my best friends? I don’t know about you, but the thought of being best friends with God over being friends that catch up for 15 minutes every several months sounds way better. It is just way harder to live out when we don’t have the right things set in place.
Because of the world we live in today, there is so much to distract and fill our time with. Whether it is doomscrolling, binge-watching, or filling our day with constant noise, we can distract and numb out most things if we try hard enough. It’s honestly scary how quickly we have access to dopamine through constant things to fill our days with in order to not have to actually live them. YIKES. We would rather spend our day numbing and wasting it away than choosing to live out our day and face the things in front of us. This one hits hard for me. I can so easily tend to numb myself with entertainment, things to fill a quiet room, and fill my day up with useless junk so I don’t have to be alone in my own thoughts. And man I get it. But what the Lord has been revealing to me is that in the midst of those thoughts, He has been waiting patiently to meet me in them, I just get so caught up in distracting and tuning out that I can end up tuning out God. Because I tend to tune out so much, I end up tuning out everything, not just that bad. That’s a scary thought that we can get so caught up in trying to play god and sustain ourselves rather than trusting God to be the one who meets us in the pain and sustains us long-term. Doomscrolling never actually fixes anything, it just keeps you scrolling
I think ultimately this all boils down to the root issue of us focusing on performance rather than true relationship with God. We start to judge our obedience based on the results we get and when we don’t get the answer we want from God, when we don’t get the thing we want, we chase after the thing that will give it to us. We let obedience be more about comfort when it should be more about a desire to be consecrated in Christ. But following Jesus isn’t about comfort, it’s about being conformed to the image of Christ. It’s about obedience because of the love that He offered us first. His love was already freely offered to us, and if the vast love of Jesus to willingly die on the Cross for you and me was all that He did, it would be enough. So I beg you, do not choose to live a less-than life when God is offering you a life of abundance to the fullest.
I love the verse in Hebrews 12:1 where it says, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” The message version puts it into a whole different perspective: “Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he’s there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls!” Simply put, let us run the race that is set before us, our own personal race and our own personal road that the Lord has set before us.
For those that are sports minded, I love this passage in 1 Corinthians where Paul is giving the same analogy through the eyes of someone who is a competitor. Sports were still something that were big back in Paul’s day and so he uses this to his advantage. This is what he says in 1 Corinthians 9:24-27: “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. Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.” Let’s break this down a little bit. In the same way that athletes train and compete, if we do not put effort into the race God has set before us, we will not obtain the thing we are sought out for. In the same way, we must be temperate in all things meaning we must refuse things that may be fine in ourselves, but will hinder the pursuit towards the goal at hand. And lastly, we must discipline our bodies and bring it into subjection, meaning that our body is to a servant and the inner man be the master, not the other way around. When we have the Holy Spirit within us, that is who should be in control. I love the message version for this verse as well because I think it just allows us to look at this text from another angle and perspective. This is what it says: “You’ve all been to the stadium and seen the athletes race. Everyone runs; one wins. Run to win. All good athletes train hard. They do it for a gold medal that tarnishes and fades. You’re after one that’s gold eternally. I don’t know about you, but I’m running hard for the finish line. I’m giving it everything I’ve got. No lazy living for me! I’m staying alert and in top condition. I’m not going to get caught napping, telling everyone else all about it and then missing out myself.”
So how do I actually run my own race? I think there are a few practical ways that we do this:
Eliminate the things that are distracting you while you “run”
One thing that I have known to be true when running is you have to be looking ahead at the road ahead of you while running. If I get caught up in looking behind me or to the left or right of me, it can cause me to stumble off the path. Any time I saw a runner look back during a race, that was when I knew I had them. The same is true for us in our walk with Jesus. If we get too caught up in what is happening off the path, we fall in danger of steering off the path that He has set forth for us. Eliminating distractions might look like deciding to finally stop making excuses for why you need to keep social media, assessing the true amount of time you spend scrolling each day, or even choosing to sit in silence rather than filling it with noise all the time.
Focus more on your relationship with Him rather than the things you are trying to do for Him
We can tend to get way too caught up in doing some much for God that we forget to do things with Him. Doing more for God does not really mean a deeper relationship with Him, inviting into the things that you are doing does. The more we are spending personal and unhurried time with God, the closer we get with Him. Then we He asks us to do things during our race, we invite Him into it with us rather than doing stuff for Him and giving Him the “debrief” later. When was the last time that you stopped and actually invited God into every aspect of your day? The exciting moments, the mundane moments, the hurtful moments? When we allow the Spirit to lead the flesh, it frees us up to trust that the one leading knows what He’s doing.
Learn to run the pace that God has set for you
Like I stated earlier, all of us have our own race to run, meaning all of us have different times where it is crucial we hit the gas and run hard and other times where we pump the brakes to slow down. In the same way, if I start out a race with an all out sprint, I will burn out and run out of gas in the tank. Each runners pace is different and catered to what they need during different periods of their race. Let God be the one who dictates the pace He has set for you. Afterall, He has already seen the outcome, why wouldn’t you trust Him? When you know how the story ends it effects the faith you have in the moment. And if I am being honest, if I were in charge of setting my own pace, I don’t know that I would successfully run the race to my fullest extent. Because when I am reliant on myself and my own strength, I will eventually fail. That is why there is so much value in having a coach that pushes you and gives guidance during the race in order to ensure you get to the finish line in the time he desires.
When we run the race that God has set before us and do so by keeping our eyes fixated on Him and not others, it allows us to grow a deeper, more authentic relationship with Him that blesses our personal walk and blesses others around us. So quit trying to run someone else’s race when God has set a prepared one that is specifically catered to you. You’ll never believe the things He will do in and through you when you allow Him to dictate the pace at which you run the race of your life. The God of the Universe knows how your story ends, so why not trust Him in the in between. Then, what a beautiful thing it would be to get to that finish line and hear “Well done, good and faithful servant.”Over the last several months in my walk with Christ, I’ve realized something important: comparing my relationship with Jesus to others doesn’t just rob me of deeper intimacy with Him, it also keeps others from experiencing Him fully through me. Because of my own sinful nature and because I can tend to choose my way over the Lord’s, it not only hurts me, but hurts those around me. What a great way to start a post haha. So often we are caught up in the comparison game. He has this, she has this, he looks this way, she looks this way, they’re better at this, etc. Isn’t it interesting that comparison was one of the roots of Satan’s fall? Instead of embracing his own purpose, he looked at what belonged to God and wanted it for himself. I don’t see that as a coincidence that this is such a common struggle in today’s society. We don’t necessarily help ourselves either when we choose to indulge in things like social media that present the best of people, causing you to feel less than, less important, less popular, and so forth. There are so many things in culture that scream for us to have more to be more. Why is it that we have lost the understanding that the only thing that truly leaves us fulfilled and a sense of belonging is through more of Jesus? It sounds so basic and simple, yet it is so hard to live out.
Back when I was in high school, one of my best friends had convinced me to run Cross Country for my senior year after begging me for a year straight. The thing is, I absolutely hated running. I don’t know that I will ever fully understand the idea of running for fun outside of running for the purpose of staying in shape, but if that is you more power to you. As I started to train and we began getting our bodies in shape for XC meets, I started to realize how quickly I would compare myself to others around me, how fast their times were, how quickly I got tired compared to some other teammates, and I began to get defeated. What I didn’t understand at the time was it was not fair on myself to compare myself to other runners, especially those who had way more experience than I did. Even if certain runners were at the same level but running faster than I was, there is so much that goes into your body to ultimately result in how someone runs. See I was allowing the results of others to dictate how I ran my own race. Instead of focusing on how I could personally improve and push myself to grow individually, I was solely focused on being better than others to prove I deserved recognition, attention, and praise.
Because I was so focused on proving myself and being better than others during my time of Cross Country, I missed out on so much of the joys of community, friendship, and self-improvement because I was more caught up in running someone else’s race rather than running my own. And this is true of us even in our own walk with Jesus. So often we can get caught in the comparison game of someone knowing more about Scripture, someone who prays “better” than you, someone who got that opportunity at church that you didn’t, someone who has that godly partner that you don’t. The list goes on and on. The value of running a race, especially when it comes to something along the lines of a marathon, there are times where you have to hit the gas and times where you need to pump the brakes. The truth is, those times might be completely different dependent on the person. That is why it is silly to try to run someone else’s race instead of your own. If you’re not careful, you’ll mistake hitting the gas for pumping the brakes and let an opportunity that God is trying to bless you with pass by. The same is true for what the body needs during a race. At different times, you might need to be recharged during your run with things that are nutritional and beneficial to your body. If I end up putting things in my body that are not beneficial to my body personally, I could end up hurting the race that I am running. My walk with Jesus is mine, not my friend’s, not my neighbor’s, mine. That’s why it’s so important not to neglect my own walk with Christ to chase after and mirror someone else’s.
Now timeout, please don’t hear me say this and believe that it is not beneficial to learn from others and their walks with Christ. The thing I am cautioning that I have allowed myself to fall into time and time again is being so caught up in what others are doing that my faith is not personal and my own. There should be things/ aspects of your walk with Jesus that are between you and Him. Things that others have no idea about. There’s something special about having a friendship where there are things that are between just the two of you. It builds a tighter bond and draws you nearer to one another. But the other thing that is true is it demands a PERSONAL relationship with Him. If I have someone that I claim to be my best friend, yet I typically neglect them and choose to make them a lesser priority, are they truly one of my best friends? I don’t know about you, but the thought of being best friends with God over being friends that catch up for 15 minutes every several months sounds way better. It is just way harder to live out when we don’t have the right things set in place.
Because of the world we live in today, there is so much to distract and fill our time with. Whether it is doomscrolling, binge-watching, or filling our day with constant noise, we can distract and numb out most things if we try hard enough. It’s honestly scary how quickly we have access to dopamine through constant things to fill our days with in order to not have to actually live them. YIKES. We would rather spend our day numbing and wasting it away than choosing to live out our day and face the things in front of us. This one hits hard for me. I can so easily tend to numb myself with entertainment, things to fill a quiet room, and fill my day up with useless junk so I don’t have to be alone in my own thoughts. And man I get it. But what the Lord has been revealing to me is that in the midst of those thoughts, He has been waiting patiently to meet me in them, I just get so caught up in distracting and tuning out that I can end up tuning out God. Because I tend to tune out so much, I end up tuning out everything, not just that bad. That’s a scary thought that we can get so caught up in trying to play god and sustain ourselves rather than trusting God to be the one who meets us in the pain and sustains us long-term. Doomscrolling never actually fixes anything, it just keeps you scrolling
I think ultimately this all boils down to the root issue of us focusing on performance rather than true relationship with God. We start to judge our obedience based on the results we get and when we don’t get the answer we want from God, when we don’t get the thing we want, we chase after the thing that will give it to us. We let obedience be more about comfort when it should be more about a desire to be consecrated in Christ. But following Jesus isn’t about comfort, it’s about being conformed to the image of Christ. It’s about obedience because of the love that He offered us first. His love was already freely offered to us, and if the vast love of Jesus to willingly die on the Cross for you and me was all that He did, it would be enough. So I beg you, do not choose to live a less-than life when God is offering you a life of abundance to the fullest.
I love the verse in Hebrews 12:1 where it says, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” The message version puts it into a whole different perspective: “Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he’s there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls!” Simply put, let us run the race that is set before us, our own personal race and our own personal road that the Lord has set before us.
For those that are sports minded, I love this passage in 1 Corinthians where Paul is giving the same analogy through the eyes of someone who is a competitor. Sports were still something that were big back in Paul’s day and so he uses this to his advantage. This is what he says in 1 Corinthians 9:24-27: “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. Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.” Let’s break this down a little bit. In the same way that athletes train and compete, if we do not put effort into the race God has set before us, we will not obtain the thing we are sought out for. In the same way, we must be temperate in all things meaning we must refuse things that may be fine in ourselves, but will hinder the pursuit towards the goal at hand. And lastly, we must discipline our bodies and bring it into subjection, meaning that our body is to a servant and the inner man be the master, not the other way around. When we have the Holy Spirit within us, that is who should be in control. I love the message version for this verse as well because I think it just allows us to look at this text from another angle and perspective. This is what it says: “You’ve all been to the stadium and seen the athletes race. Everyone runs; one wins. Run to win. All good athletes train hard. They do it for a gold medal that tarnishes and fades. You’re after one that’s gold eternally. I don’t know about you, but I’m running hard for the finish line. I’m giving it everything I’ve got. No lazy living for me! I’m staying alert and in top condition. I’m not going to get caught napping, telling everyone else all about it and then missing out myself.”
So how do I actually run my own race? I think there are a few practical ways that we do this:
Eliminate the things that are distracting you while you “run”
One thing that I have known to be true when running is you have to be looking ahead at the road ahead of you while running. If I get caught up in looking behind me or to the left or right of me, it can cause me to stumble off the path. Any time I saw a runner look back during a race, that was when I knew I had them. The same is true for us in our walk with Jesus. If we get too caught up in what is happening off the path, we fall in danger of steering off the path that He has set forth for us. Eliminating distractions might look like deciding to finally stop making excuses for why you need to keep social media, assessing the true amount of time you spend scrolling each day, or even choosing to sit in silence rather than filling it with noise all the time.
Focus more on your relationship with Him rather than the things you are trying to do for Him
We can tend to get way too caught up in doing some much for God that we forget to do things with Him. Doing more for God does not really mean a deeper relationship with Him, inviting into the things that you are doing does. The more we are spending personal and unhurried time with God, the closer we get with Him. Then we He asks us to do things during our race, we invite Him into it with us rather than doing stuff for Him and giving Him the “debrief” later. When was the last time that you stopped and actually invited God into every aspect of your day? The exciting moments, the mundane moments, the hurtful moments? When we allow the Spirit to lead the flesh, it frees us up to trust that the one leading knows what He’s doing.
Learn to run the pace that God has set for you
Like I stated earlier, all of us have our own race to run, meaning all of us have different times where it is crucial we hit the gas and run hard and other times where we pump the brakes to slow down. In the same way, if I start out a race with an all out sprint, I will burn out and run out of gas in the tank. Each runners pace is different and catered to what they need during different periods of their race. Let God be the one who dictates the pace He has set for you. Afterall, He has already seen the outcome, why wouldn’t you trust Him? When you know how the story ends it effects the faith you have in the moment. And if I am being honest, if I were in charge of setting my own pace, I don’t know that I would successfully run the race to my fullest extent. Because when I am reliant on myself and my own strength, I will eventually fail. That is why there is so much value in having a coach that pushes you and gives guidance during the race in order to ensure you get to the finish line in the time he desires.
When we run the race that God has set before us and do so by keeping our eyes fixated on Him and not others, it allows us to grow a deeper, more authentic relationship with Him that blesses our personal walk and blesses others around us. So quit trying to run someone else’s race when God has set a prepared one that is specifically catered to you. You’ll never believe the things He will do in and through you when you allow Him to dictate the pace at which you run the race of your life. The God of the Universe knows how your story ends, so why not trust Him in the in between. Then, what a beautiful thing it would be to get to that finish line and hear “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
