Run your life to obtain that heavenly prize
Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified. (1 Corinthians 9:24 –27) Corinth was the host city to the Isthmian games, where elite athletes from all over the ancient Greek-speaking world gathered to compete in years between the quadrennial Olympiad. So Paul’s analogy was particularly powerful for his Corinthian readers. And what Paul was saying would have been just as convicting to the affluent, indulgent First Century Corinthians as it is to us affluent, indulgent 21st century Christians in the West: the Christian life should be lived with the ruthless focus and discipline of an elite athlete. But let’s ...