Epic Crawl

It was the final race of her high school career: the state meet. Ohio cross country runner Claire Markwardt of Birkshire High School was running a personal best as she passed mile markers 1 and 2.  It was a dream come true. But as she entered the final 400 meters of the race she heard a crack in her leg. At 200 meters, she heard a couple more cracks in the same leg. Finally, about 45 feet from the finish line, there was a louder crack and her leg gave out entirely. Encouraged by a teammate, she stood up only to hear the loudest crack of all and collapsed once more. Claire’s leg was broken in multiple places.

A choice was before her: finish or don’t finish. She says it was a no-brainer. Claire crawled the final 45 feet of the race to cross the finish line. This finish has been called the “epic crawl.” Indeed, it is a demonstration of bravery, grit, determination, and pain tolerance. It is a great moment of inspiration.

Sadly, this is the way many of the giants of faith finish their races: crawling across the finish line. Unlike Claire’s injury which was no fault of her own, these giants of faith stumble and fall at the end of their races because of sin they engage in. Simply put, it is their fault they finish poorly. Or worse – they never finish the race at all!

Though the crawl of Claire is “epic,” for a faithful person to fall near the finish line of life is a despicable event. There is no epic crawl; only an epic fall. Throughout Scripture these epic falls are recorded for us that they might teach us (Romans 15.4). Teach us what? They teach us that the servant of God is not to finish his or her life crawling into eternity, limping across the finish line. Rather, a Christian ought to finish this life striding victoriously into glory.

The apostle Paul understood this. Therefore, he made this triumphant statement: “The time of my departure has come…I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. There is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day” (2 Timothy 4.6b-8a). Paul knows that once he crosses the finish line he will receive the victor’s crown. Here is a life run and finished well.

Our charge is to keep our eyes focused on Jesus, the trailblazer of our faith (Hebrews 12.2). He has run the same course and has left us an example of how to run and finish well. Truly, Jesus teaches us how to avoid an epic fall and run our race with endurance to the very end.