I went for a jog last week and thought of Eric Liddell. - ‘‘When I run I feel his pleasure’’. Its not, ‘‘when I run I earn his pleasure’’. Too often we toil for an invisible something beyond the horizon. We miss the thrill of the present. The finish line is not beyond a distant horizon. It is accomplished, and our toil is a lived memory. It is hope filled from what has been done.
I saw a man run bold and fast
on an occasion he was passed
Thin his grin when other runners paused to gasp.
In the end his screaming legs pushed and dashed.
I whispered “Well run and done”. To the ground he crashed.
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“VICTORY!” Glory for toils spent and went. and yet…
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As the prize seeped down his face,
The striders passed, still fast upon the chase.
Not one paused nor glanced amidst their haste.
Each one steadied with open pace.
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The crowd ran too. Onward. Upward. Toward sun and height.
Long and westward fixed in the flight.
A massive herd fleeing loss and night.
Their striving thundered with speed and fright.
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Ambition veiled the good and bad.
This one laughing, that one sad.
A vengeful army chasing what they had.
Sprinting chaos. Sprinting mad.
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“No, Not this time… Not again.”
To his feet we rose bold and fast
on this occasion having just been passed.
Thin grins grew wide when others crashed.
At the end my screaming legs pushed and passed.
A victor not to be. my wreath slipping the horizon last
-B Oaks
“9 What gain has the worker from his toil? 10 I have seen the business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. 11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. 12 I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; 13 also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil—this is God’s gift to man.
14 I perceived that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. God has done it, so that people fear before him. 15 That which is, already has been; that which is to be, already has been; and God seeks what has been driven away. ”