Joni Eareckson Tada: Sharing Hope

Welcome to Joni Eareckson Tada: Sharing Hope. Today Joni has a great story to help us all keep our eyes on the prize.

Joni Eareckson Tada: When I was on my feet, I loved athletics. I loved working out. I loved staying fit, giving it my best, whether on the basketball, volleyball court, hockey field, cross-country course.

Now, there is no doubt that training was the hardest part. The many, many, many laps around the court or the field made my legs burn. And even though I have not run, I have not taken steps in decades.

Even being paralyzed, I can still feel, as it were, the burn. But you keep at it, don't you? You keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Your lungs are going to feel like they're going to burst, and your legs are going to buckle, but you don't stop. If you're an athlete, you just don't stop.

Part of it has to do with the prize, the goal. I mean, you want to win, right? But the other part of it is, it's just who you are. You are not a quitter. You are not the kind to give up. You're almost afraid to.

As an athlete, it would be so out of character. It would be so unlike you. You're not a quitter, and if your coach thinks you can run 25 laps and then do half a dozen sprints, you do it.

It may not look very pretty, but you get it done, even if you feel you will drop and faint. I guess that's why, back in high school, I was voted the best athlete in my senior class.

It was all a matter of pleasing the coach, believing he knew best, and that if you trained hard, you could make it to the finish. But then I broke my neck, and all of it stopped.

I was paralyzed with a body that quickly atrophied due to paralysis. But you know what? Those athletic skills which drove me on the lacrosse field and the volleyball court, those principles had served me well over the years.

And it's why I love First Corinthians chapter 9, where the Holy Spirit tells us all to, quote, "Run in such a way as to take the prize. Everyone who competes trains with strict discipline."

They do it for a crown that is perishable, but we do it for a crown that is imperishable. Therefore, I do not run aimlessly. I do not fight like I am beating the air. No, I discipline my body.

As a quadriplegic, I can't really discipline my body, but the point is all about spiritual discipline. You and I have to fight. It's a spiritual fight. It's spiritual training.

And you may feel like giving up, but you cannot quit. As a Christian, it would be out of your character. Your Savior thinks you can handle the life that he has given you, and it's all about pleasing him.

It may not be the best. You might not look very pretty at it, but it's all about persevering through your hard times. Look, I do it every day in this wheelchair, and I encourage you to join me.

And as far as the finish line, when the fight is over, when we've run the race, I'm keeping my eye on that prize, that glorious time when all the suffering I now experience will one day, it'll be nothing but a half-forgotten dream.

Just a hazy, vague memory. And then, it'll seem to have passed with the snap of a finger. And how wonderful it will be to step on the edge of heaven and feel the soft, warm sand of that celestial shore.

We may arrive tired and spent, but you and I will happily drop to our knees exhausted, roll over on our backs in that sand, gaze skyward in relief at having arrived. And then, looking up, maybe we'll see Jesus lean into our field of vision as we look skyward, and he'll say, "Well done."

And now, at this point, I picture Jesus reaching out his hand to help me up off that celestial shore. And now, "Enter the joy of your Master. You've made it. Welcome home." That is the picture that keeps me running this race.