Finishing The Race!

In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge: Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry. For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time for my departure is near. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing. 2 Timothy 4:1-8 NIV

No one ever said that living a life of righteousness would be easy. In fact, most people are warned about the traps of temptation that Satan would set the moment a person accepts the love of Christ in their hearts. To avoid the pitfalls, one must always keep their eyes on the prize that can only be obtained if we stay in the race.

In the midst of hardships, turmoil and chaos, confusion, stress and doubt--we must never lose sight of our purpose--whatever that purpose is for we will not achieve our goal, if we quit before we reach the end.

Think of a marathon--any kind of marathon--the goal or purpose is to finish and we all know--there can only be a limited number of winners--those who finish ahead of all the rest. But most people who enter a marathon are not doing so to win, but to finish--for them the finish is a win--and no matter how difficult the course becomes, no matter how tired they get or much muscles ache, their determination to finish is their reward.

This is the determination we must all have in life--to finish--whatever it is we start that is honorable in God's sight--by staying in the race. Though we may get tired from all the obstacles put in our path, we must keep our eyes and hope on the end--when we'll see the fruits of our labor and know we were on the right side of history.

And this is what The Resistance is all about--staying in the race--the goal to see wrongs righted in our society and force truth to surface by any means possible--at the end, to see all treated with equality and ability to live in peace and harmony.

No matter what each day brings--especially when it seems that efforts are wasted--we don't give up; that's just the trick of the enemy to create doubt in the minds of those who are determined to stay the course.

We continue the fight for justice against tyranny by keeping one another encouraged.

When we feel overwhelmed by news reports that appear to take a turn; we back up, rest and refuel the drive that led us here in the first place--ready for the next fight.

Wisdom is the principal thing and with all our getting--we must get understanding of all we read, hear, and see that could alter the direction of our fight. We cannot be deterred by minor setbacks and lies yet uncovered or by those who refuse to speak truth when asked. We must believe that there are others who will uncover all truth and even if the truth uncovered is not what we expect, we must be prepared to accept--the whole truth and nothing but the truth--no sugarcoated lies, no half truths, no white lies, no little lies and certainly--no alternative facts.

Though there may be many battles and all not won--we can rest assured that in the end--the war against tyranny, hatred and bigotry--will be won with Jesus on our side. We just have to stay in the race--no matter what!

I have seen something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all. Ecclesiastes  9:11 NIV