RUN LIKE A CHAMPION

If you had a vision to really make an impact upon the world, how would you go about fulfilling it? Leadership and management courses today would probably suggest that one of the first steps in that process would be to find a group of sharp, competent people and to begin to impart your vision to them. We would probably search for the brightest and the best. We might go to the great institutions of learning or to the boards of highly successful corporations to find that group of people.
However, we find that Jesus did none of those things. He went by the seashore and called poor, uneducated fishermen. What would a fisherman know about changing the world? Or what would a tax collector know about communicating with a hurting world? Why did Jesus choose the common for this most uncommon task? Why did He give such an extraordinary job to such ordinary men and women?
The task of world evangelism was the most important task ever given to any group of people. And look whom He chose. A doubter. A denier. Men and women who couldn’t be found anywhere near in His most critical moment on this Earth, the moment in which He would die for the sins of the world. So, why did He choose them and why were they so successful? Christianity could have stopped dead in its tracks if that first group didn’t accomplish what Jesus gave them to do.
But just the opposite is true. The ways of God are different from the ways of the world. Jesus birthed the most revolutionary movement ever known on the face of this planet. Billions believe in Him and pledge their allegiance to Him today because of what took place in the first century. He took timid men and made them courageous giants. His plan of action was different from many of our church boardrooms. His plan was to wait. To wait? That’s right. Wait! They were to wait for the promise of the Father to be endued with His power.
Jesus told His disciples, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (Acts 1:8 NIV). The Greek language is very clear in its description of the power given to that uneducated band of men and women. The Greek word in this passage is “dunamis” from which we get our word “dynamite.” There was an explosive power given to those early disciples that would enable them to transform the Roman Empire.
But perhaps the most intriguing word used in this passage is “martus.” It’s the Greek word that’s translated into English as “witness.” Strong’s Dictionary defines “martus” as “a witness (literally [judicially] or figuratively [genitive case]); by analogy, a ‘martyr.'” This spiritual dynamite power given to those who wait upon the Lord is so forceful that it enables the most fearful to become the most courageous for Christ – even unto death. And many of those who heard those words would die for proclaiming the Gospel.
That’s why prayer is so critically important. Prayer is intimacy with God. And when we’ve met with God in deep fellowship, then His perfect love casts out all fear. There’s no fear of what man can do to us, because we have that “dunamis” to become a “martus.” When Jesus chose a group of people to change the world, He found simple, humble, holy, praying men and women, and with them He shook the world. God can do more with one simple person who prays than a dozen geniuses who don’t have a clue about intimacy with God. That philosophy may not go down well in the boardrooms of the world, but it sure went down well in the upper room of Jerusalem. Wait! Pray! And watch what happens.