DAILY VIDEO DEVOTIONAL
Today in our devotion, I want to speak to you about Finishing Well. Often people start well in the Christian life, but they finish poorly. The Bible says in Hebrews, chapter 12, verse 1, “…let us run with endurance the race that is set before us…” God has a race given to us, but he wants us to finish that race and not just finish it but finish it well.
I did a grand experiment, and I said, “God, teach me.” I ran the Greek marathon, and it was my first and only marathon I’ve ever run. When I ran it, I said, “Lord, I want to learn what it means to run with endurance the race you’ve given me. Teach me the great biblical truths of the Christian life as I train and as I run this race.”
I ran the Greek marathon, and I finished, but I did not finish well. I learned some things. I learned there are three basic things that are critically important if you’re going to finish well. What I mean by “finishing well”… Let me define that for you. That means running to your full potential. The first thing to do is you must be trained. You must train properly. You’ll never run to full potential unless you train properly. We’re trained in righteousness. That’s obeying the Word of God, going out and practicing every day. You see, I had to practice. I ran five times a week and had to practice for about six months going out there and just doing the workouts.
That’s what training in righteousness is. It’s just going out and living the Christian life. It’s putting into practice God’s Word, doing those things day-by-day that you know God wants you to do. As you practice those, you become stronger and stronger and stronger. There’s an element of training.
There’s a second thing, and I alluded to it in I think it was the very first devotion we did. That is you need refreshing. You need to drink from God’s refreshment table. There’s a fountain that flows from the throne of God, and God will refresh you. You need to drink. Well, I did both of those things in training for the Greek marathon, and they helped me. It got me 20 miles, 11 of those miles uphill. But then toward the end, the last few miles, I collapsed. I wondered, “What was it? Why did I collapse?”
There’s a third element, and without this third element, you’ll never run to your full potential. Do you know what it was? It was nutrition during the race. You see, as you run, what I didn’t know was your body is depleted of the nutritional things that feed the muscles. You have to replenish it all during the race. There are these little nutritional substances you can take, and they replenish your glycogen, and you can continue to run with endurance and with the speed you’ve trained at. What happened was all of that broke down because I didn’t have the proper nutrition during the race. You must have nutrition during the race.
I came across the line. I collapsed. I finished, but I finished far below what I knew I was capable of. You know, the sad thing is that’s the way so many Christians are running today. Part of the reason is we’re not partaking of God’s Word daily. Jesus said, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”
So three things if you’re going to run with endurance. First of all, training. Daily obeying the Word of God. Secondly, drinking from the fountain that flows from the throne of God. Thirdly, partaking of the nutrition God has given you in his Word.
Deuteronomy : Chapter 8
1) Be careful to follow every command I am giving you today, so that you may live and increase and may enter and possess the land the Lord promised on oath to your ancestors. 2) Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands. 3) He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. 4) Your clothes did not wear out and your feet did not swell during these forty years. 5) Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, so the Lord your God disciplines you. 6) Observe the commands of the Lord your God, walking in obedience to him and revering him. 7) For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land—a land with brooks, streams, and deep springs gushing out into the valleys and hills; 8) a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey; 9) a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills.
Book of the Month
Sammy Tippit told his fiancée, “I can’t promise we’ll be rich, but life won’t be boring.”
Sammy had no idea what an understatement that would become. Beginning in the bars of Baton Rouge and the nightclubs of Chicago, Tippit has shared the news of life-changing faith in Christ all over the world – including in the middle of a revolution in Romania, the aftermath of genocide in Rwanda, and war in Burundi and the Congo.
Sammy’s lifelong adventure has come at a great price. He’s been cursed, threatened, arrested, deported, and blacklisted. He’s also been personally broken, ravaged with illness, and devastated by grief.
Yet he continues to preach to in stadiums, in open fields, and via satellite technology to hundreds of thousands around the globe. For all other books…
About Sammy Tippit Ministries
STM has been providing inspiration and help around the world for nearly 50 years. Sammy Tippit, founder and president, is a world renowned counselor, teacher and evangelist with experience serving and helping people in over 80 countries. Sammy provides materials that help people tackle a broad array of social, societal, psychological and spiritual issues. He is particularly passionate about making materials accessible to other countries around the world. Sammy is married to Debara “Tex” Tippit, and they have two children and five grandchildren.
Sammy Tippit Ministries is a registered 501c3 non-profit organization.
Contact: info@sammytippit.org
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