Finish Strong

Several years ago, I wrote a blog on Finishing Well. In that article, I examined the frequency of individuals who are highly respected, but stumble later in life and become disgraced. It has always been my desire to avoid that finish. Now that I am on the other side of retirement, I realize there is another dimension to finishing well. I still think that is a worthy goal. We can do better. We can finish strong.

Retirement. My first retirement came in 2014 when I hung up my professorial robes and left the classroom never to return. I had also maintained a CPA practice for a number of years and did not envision ever giving that up. But that time came, and in 2021 I prepared my last tax return and closed the business. That was a year of great change, as I not only gave up the CPA business but I met and married my second wife. The marriage still thrives, but I realized that I still felt the need for a purpose in my life. With Heather’s guidance and approval, and after much prayer, I felt led to use my writing skills. Out of that came “Lift Up My Eyes.” I believe God has given me a mission to inform others about Christianity through the written word.

 Purpose and Goals. God puts us on this earth for a purpose. God keeps us on this earth for a purpose. If you are alive, God has a ppurpose for you. We may not see it, but I believe it to be true. Admittedly, there are what we call untimely deaths, because there are wrongs in this world that may impact us.

As a runner, I was very goal oriented. May goals were to complete a marathon in under four hours and a 10K in under 40 minutes. I had met the marathon goal and was really focused on the 10K. I was running a 5K to help get me ready for the larger goal. The course was flat, it was good weather, and I was running well. I was going to finish in under 20 minutes. As I came down the final stretch I my legs were protesting. The thought came to me to pack it in and walk to the finish. I had proved to myself that the goal was possible, so I could take it easy. But easy is not how I do things. I immediately kicked it into high gear to finish the race strong. I wanted to do it, not just know that I could. I am grateful that my brain overrode my body as I sprinted to the finish. What would I have accomplished if I could say “I proved to myself I could do it in under 20 minutes.”? That’s nothing, anyone could claim they were capable. I needed to be able to say I ran a sub-twenty 5K, not just that I could have. There are too many “could-haves” in our lives.

Our Best. As  Christians we need to offer God our best – always. Finishing strong is about maintaining faith, obedience, and diligence, no matter the challenges or obstacles that we face. In II Corinthians 8:6 Paul wrote “yet for us there is only one God, the Father, from whom are all things, and we exist for Him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we exist through Him.” Everything we have is from Him. We exist for Him and through Him. We have a mission to fulfill – the “for” part. He works in our lives to accomplish that mission – the “through” part.

I can remember one of the most terrifying final exams I had in college. Our  professor was obviously focused more on research than teaching. He did nothing to prepare us for the final exam nor did we even know how we were being evaluated as students in the course. To give you an example of his mindset, the whole class got off on the wrong foot. The class was scheduled to begin at 10am and last for 90 minutes. On the first day of class we arrived in a timely manner, but no professor. We waited, and finally about 45 minutes later, we decided he was not going to show, so we headed down the hallway. Then he showed up. He told us in no uncertain terms that the class was scheduled from 10am until 11:30am. If he showed up at 11:29 he expected to find us waiting for him. We seemed to be a distraction from more important things he had to do. That is the exact opposite of God. 

God With Us. God is more than from, for, and through us. He is with us. In Genesis, God made a promise to Abram (28:15) “Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” God made some amazing promises to Abram. Promises that required God-sized faith. God was “new” to Abram. To obey Him required more faith than most of us can muster. Yet God assured Abram that he would not be left alone. God would be with him to the end. God’s promises to Abraham are still being fulfilled.

In this same manner, God will not abandon us. Romans 8:31-32 reads “If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things? God is for us, not against us.

There is no retirement from Christianity. That is not a negative statement. As long as we are on this earth, God has a task for us. The nature of our assignment may change but we will always have a mission. My father was an amazing man and a very faithful Christian. He spent the last few months of his life in a hospital, unable to speak. Yet, his Christian spirit showed through. Terminally ill, he ministered to the hospital personnel and visitors to his dying day. That should be our goal. 

Finish well but finish strong.

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To learn more about a new life in Christ, click here.

All scripture unless otherwise indicated is from the New American Standard Bible.

Picture credit to Christian Photoshops and to Jim Cramer, Zeshdo, and Daniel Roberts on Pixabay.