Why Does It Matter At All?

This is the question I have been asking myself about my performance.  It is very very important to me in my heart, but on a rational level I have been struggling to answer to why.  I’m just some middle-aged mid-level manager in a mid-sized company grinding out a living for my middle school kids in our medium sized Midwestern town in the middle of America, and if I run a 2:42 marathon or a 3:02 marathon tomorrow it matters not at all in any way.  I’m not contending with the winners.  Heck, in this race I likely won’t even crack the top 20 in the Master’s category.  I am the very definition of the “also ran.”  So why is my performance so important to me?  Should it be?

Literally there are kids in Africa who don’t have clean water to drink, whose parents have died of AIDs, who are struggling to keep their younger brothers and sisters alive for another day.  In light of reality like that the whole Boston Marathon and this avocation of mine seem entirely trivial, even more so the number on the clock when I finish the race.  Still, in my heart, that number matters.  Why?

 

This year for the first time I will start the race in Corral #1.  In this corral are not the real big boys, the Greek gods of the elite group, but the very best mere mortals lined up immediately behind the elite runners.  In the 2^nd Corral, where I have three times before started the race, the pressure is off completely.  In the 2^nd Corral you will find runners who have qualified with times roughly from 2:53 to 3:03.  These are good runners for sure, but there are a thousand of them all clustered together fairly closely in ability.  This is not so in Corral #1 where the normal distribution really starts to tail off.  Here are runners like me at the bottom end who barely made it into this semi-elite group with times around 2:50 and runners capable of running 20 to 25 minutes faster, sub-2:30 guys who are not very far away from being fast enough to qualify for the Olympic Trials.  Being in such company makes me feel both proud and sheepish because I know that in this group I am a pretender.  Certainly I will be found out; I have snuck into an exclusive private club and they are going to spot me and kick me out at any minute.   Indeed, maybe my performance at Twin Cities last fall was a fluke, a one-of-a-kind.  Sure, I have my ticket to Corral #1, but the boys in this club, so I think, are looking at me to prove that I belong here.  Do I?

The whole God-blessed world, so it seems, is watching me run this year.  This is at least in large measure my own fault.  Although I think it was God’s call on me to fundraise for World Vision for this race, naturally creating a lot of extra attention, I have also probably drawn a lot of attention to myself about this race at work, in my online running community and elsewhere that I needn’t have done.  If I fail and blow up tomorrow a lot of people will rightly conclude, like the guys in Corral #1, that I’m not as good as I’m cracked up to be.  Many will be compassionate and a few will secretly rejoice in my failure, but all will know that I didn’t measure up.  Many others won’t care and don’t appreciate the difference between a 2:10 and a 3:10 (which is the difference between a Mozart opera and “Chopsticks”), but even so, and most importantly, I know.  My oldest son, thank God, has this ability to rise to the occasion when it counts, when he is on the stage and everyone watching.  He gets very nervous.  He makes mistakes in practice and is sure he will fail to perform, but then, whether it is a saxophone solo in front of the whole school or a mile race on the track, he puts forth his very best and usually nails it.  I have never felt that I possessed this ability nearly as much as he does.  With this fantastic sense of external pressure I sure could use it tomorrow.

In my heart I know that it is not really the imaginary voices of the Corral #1 runners or family or friends or coworkers or rivals putting the pressure on me to prove that I belong, that I measure up, that I’m a “real” runner, that the Twin Cities race was not a fluke.  Of course, it’s me.  Even if some of the voices are real they have no power over me at all unless I allow it.  It’s all me.

In the dark at 5:30 a.m. a few weeks ago, I was sitting in a parking garage with a very good, sleeping, friend of mine a couple of blocks from the State Capitol of Texas.  And I was enjoying it, just sitting there in the dark, thinking.  We had followed pre-race recommendations and had made our way early to await the start of the Austin Marathon.  As I sat there feeling a tremendous sense of joy at just being there, it occurred to me that I always feel that way on race day, especially on marathon race day.  Staring at the concrete parking structure around us I thought about how there are so few days in my life when I have that feeling, that overwhelming sense of joy.  Marathon race days are among them, and I thought, right or wrong, that it is a little sad to struggle through all other ordinary days to arrive at so few days like these.  I wondered, is it OK to feel that way?  Nothing in my life, absolutely nothing, can come above love for Jesus Christ, which would be idolatry.  But why do I love to run, and especially to race, so much?  Truly, on that morning, I feel like a voice came out of the dark:  because I was made to.  It is not all I was made to do.  Contrary to the t-shirt, running is NOT life.  Not even close.  But it is a part of my life, something God has given me the ability to work at and struggle against and fight for and, occasionally, do very well at.  And when I do it well – maybe even when I do it poorly – it gives God glory because “It is He who made us, and not we ourselves.”

And so it all boils down to really only two voices that matter.  All my fears that are driven by what others think, fears of starting up in the front with the big boys, fears of being found out as a fraud, fears of failing in front of everyone and maybe even small hopes of vain glory, do not matter at all.  At least so I need to preach to myself.  The voice in my heart about what it will mean if I perform poorly matters to some degree.  The voice of God, however, that he has made me (in part) for this purpose and that the results are in his hands matters a lot.  Certainly he has given me this frivolous gift and I think it would be a sin not to enjoy it to its fullest measure.  There is still a wicked, sinful, suffering and hurting world out there that needs the people of Christ to take joy in bringing it light and comfort – that is much closer to the meaning of life than running or any hobby or sport or recreation could possibly be.  But I believe that every good and perfect gift comes to us from God and should be enjoyed as such.  

Even though I have not trained as hard as I would have liked to, I still have logged a sufficient number of total miles to enable a good run.  I am coming off January best-ever performances in the 5k and half-marathon.  And, two and a half weeks ago I ran an 8-mile time trial on the track over a minute faster than I ran it last year before the Twin Cities race.  Finally, weather is looking real real good.  Bill Rodgers said, “You need the perfect-storm conditions, with cool weather and a west tailwind, to run fast at Boston.”  This is exactly what is forecast for tomorrow.  Wow.  It all adds up to a phenomenal opportunity for me.  My knee hurts.  My hill training is fairly weak.  My confidence is not high.  But I’m going to shoot for a PR run because these opportunities just don’t come along every day.  If the LORD shows up, if he strengthens me tomorrow, it could be a great one.  Maybe the best ever.  Or I could end up walking up Heartbreak Hill, heartbroken.  In any case, if I rise or if I fall, blessed be the Name of the LORD.

Oh, and one more thing, After missing this race for the last three years it is really really good to be back.  I am deeply grateful to be here.

“Know that the LORD is God; It is He who made us, and not we ourselves.”