"I discipline my body like an athlete, training it to do what it should. Otherwise, I fear that after preaching to others I myself might be disqualified". - 1 Corinthians 9:27

Have you ever trained for some thing HUGE you had coming up? Maybe a marathon, a massive project at work, or maybe even hosting Thanksgiving Dinner with your whole family? (The perfect Turkey doesn't happen by accident, okay? That takes prep!) This past year, a very close friend of mine was training for a marathon, and it impacted EVERYTHING we did together. If a group of us were getting dinner, the restaurant had to have healthy options. If a bunch of us were hanging out, she had to leave by a certain time to make SURE she got 8 hours of sleep. She decided on a goal, and that decision informed everything else she did. And when the time came for her race? She crushed it. She had prepared for months, and it paid off. But what would have happened if she didn’t train at all? What if she showed up to her race and had eaten nothing but junk food and hadn’t run more than a mile in the months leading up to the race? She would have failed MISERABLY. That seems obvious to us, doesn’t it? It’s almost laughable to think of someone showing up to a marathon with no preparation. But how many of us are doing the same thing in our daily lives?

“I WANT to have a healthy marriage” but we assume it will just happen.

“I WANT to practice purity and not fall into sexual temptation” but we think willpower alone will get us there.

“I WANT to get closer to God” But we don’t change our lifestyle at all.

“I WANT to avoid living paycheck to paycheck” but we assume our debt will just magically become easier to pay someday. 

We express a lot of goals, but we don’t train for them, we just hope they’ll magically turn out in our favor. Is that not just as laughable? If we want to make the most of the gifts God has placed inside us, we have a responsibility to TRAIN for the desires and hopes He has placed in us. In 2 Timothy 4:17 it says  “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” To be alive is to know that there will be a next fight, and a next race, with the hope that when our time comes, we too will be able to say that we fought and ran well, with whatever tools and opportunities He gave us.

If there are habits you want to change, areas you feel you’re falling short, goals you aren’t meeting, it’s time to get honest with yourself. Have you really been training to make those goals happen? Have you allowed your goals and dreams to guide your daily decisions, to truly train to see them come to fruition? Does the goal of being more like Christ every day impact every decision you make? I would encourage you this week, whatever you’ve been struggling with, whatever you’re trying to change, take a long hard look in the mirror. Paul TELLS US in 1 Corinthians 9:27 that we are to train like athletes, and he isn’t talking about the gym. Identify the ways that you can not just hope for your dreams to come forward, but actually begin training and living in a daily way to make those goals a reality. Your time is limited and we have a responsibility to make the most of the gifts God has given us, however big or small, so what are you training for, and how is that going to impact the decisions you make today?

To read more about the concepts discussed in this devotional, I highly recommend the book The Power To Change by Craig Groeschel.

Read The Power To Change

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