I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us.
Philippians 3:14

Dear God, I wonder if the person who chooses the Bible Gateway verse of the day was involved in Fellowship of Christian Athletes in the 80s, because the Hebrews 11:1 from two days ago and now the Philippians 3:14 are both verse that were themes for national conferences I went to in 1984 and 1985. Anyway, it’s always neat when I run into one of these verses, but is really special when it happens twice in three days.

I’ve been at a hospital conference the last few days and one of the topics that has come up often is the appropriateness of care—especially end-of-life care. We have reached a point in our society where we have much more control over what the end of the race looks like than we did when Paul wrote these words. The end of the road often came fast and abruptly for them. The prize of which she speaks was much closer at hand. I am 48 now. If I had lived then I would probably be an elder. On the board on which I sit, I am the second youngest. Technology has changed so much over the last 100 years—even the last 20 years. So much so that we have started to adopt an attitude that we don’t want the prize. If we get sick, we want to do everything we can to run the race. But not necessarily to run the race for you, but to race for ourselves. We want to see our grandchildren do this or that. We don’t want to leave our spouse or our children. As I sit here and think about it, our reason for wanting to continue to run is probably all wrong.

Father, I will have decisions to make about myself and my life one day. I will possibly have to make a decision for my wife. I might have to counsel my parents or siblings. In fact, recently, I had to counsel a patient about calling hospice. But when I get to those times, help me to remember that life is truly all about the prize, and the race itself is not about me and the “bucket list” things on my agenda. It’s about running the race for you you, through Christ Jesus, called me.

In Jesus’ name I pray,

Amen