W351: We Are Family!: Running Together

Excerpt from my blog:

What touched me a lot was that God impressed my heart with this simple thing about cellgroups.

The Bible talks about Christians being in a race:

You've all been to the stadium and seen the athletes race. Everyone runs; one wins. Run to win. All good athletes train hard. They do it for a gold medal that tarnishes and fades. You're after one that's gold eternally. 1 Corinthians 9:23-25 (The Message)

Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we'd better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we're in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he's there, in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls! Hebrews 12: 1-3 (The Message)

Usually, when I come across this verse, this is what I picture:

OR maybe this:

which invariably leads to this:

As I was worshipping in prayer meeting tonight, I just felt that too often, I think of my Christian life as a long-distance marathon - a very lonely one at that.

Yes, I am running a race but I was never meant to run this race alone. Yes, there will be moments that I may feel like I'm running alone or worse trailing way behind - there are still the heavenly witnesses cheering me on. I or anyone for that matter wasn't meant to run this race alone.

I saw a marathon, there were a lot of people running, a huge crowd I might say. But no one seemed to be left out. They were running as one cohesive force. A united body, each runner's bodies glistening with sweat, their feet leave a trail of dust on the ground as they pass by.

A runner in the middle of the pack suddenly trips and falls down, maybe from exhaustion, maybe he tripped on something. This should not be happening, somehow, I felt that the success, the reward wasn't based on one man's power but on their collective effort!

The person next to him picks him up by the arm. Another runner reaches out an open hand to him. The fallen runner is back to his feet, each of his arms are hanging on to his friends shoulders. They once again run - together.

God showed me that this is how a cellgroup should be. Christianity is not an individual person's event, Christianity is about relationships - and Love.

Maybe it was a bad start, getting tripped along the way, exhaustion and fatigue conquering the runner, but whatever it is, we were never meant to run the race alone. We're running, fixing on Jesus the perfecter of our faith!

And this idea, is what made me glad that I came for prayer meeting.

Let's run this race together W351!