Faith That Functions At A Walk

Today, let's think about faith that functions at a walk. The Scripture is Isaiah 40, beginning in verse 28: READ

Isaiah 40 is one of the most fantastic chapters in God's Word. Read Isaiah 40 every day for thirty days, and it will change your life. Isaiah has almost been singing what it means in this world to have our God as our Creator. He is the one who made and controls the world and the one who loves us and beams that love at us so that we may know there is at work within us His power and love. He closes with a climax and says, "God will never grow weary. God is not one whose mind will ever stop functioning. He is the one who will always be there for us.

He will give us strength. Even the youths shall grow weary, and the young people shall utterly fail. But they that wait upon the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar like eagles, run like Olympians unwearied, and will walk and not faint."

If we were writing that we would have ended that differently. We know this is God's Word, so it's written right, but aren't we tempted to say, "Isaiah, you didn't write it right. You need to talk to John Grisham, or Michael Crighton and learn how to write." You don't take a big climax to a chapter about the power, love, grace and majesty of God and slow that down to a walk. You don't come to a climax where you have people plodding along day by day." That's not the way we would have written it.

One of the Laws in Life

Yet, there is a law of life we need to learn, a law we need to know. On the exit doors of most athletic locker rooms, there's usually a motto right above the door, like "Do whatever it takes" or "Through these portals pass men who are going to get hurt." There's always a motto up there, and some teams have this tradition of touching the motto as they go out the door. Notre Dame does that.

One fellow said they had a motto in the locker room of his high school. The problem was no one ever explained what it meant. The motto went something like this: "This is the law of the gridiron, as old and true as the skies. The one who obeys it will prosper. The one who doesn't will die." The problem with that motto is, it never tells you what the law of the gridiron is. It would have been helpful to my high school team if we could have known what that law of the gridiron was, because many was the time when we went out on the field and died.

But it's true. There is a law of life. It is as old and true as the skies. The one who obeys it will prosper. The one who does not will die. That law of life is this: Life is lived mostly at a walk. So while we might say to Isaiah, "Talk to us about the flying high and soaring in these times when our faith is called to do that. Talk to us about running hard in life's race but don't slow it down to a walk. Don't talk to us about walking and not growing weary," Yet, most of life is lived at a walk.

Life is won or lost at a walk, isn't it? That's where it's really won or lost.

You see an honor student in school and say, "Boy, she's smart," but she didn't just show up in class one day and make a good grade. All through the years, there have been times of study, discipline, work, and learning. The walking hours are what made the difference.

You meet someone who's done well in business. You read about the grand opening or grand deal, but behind that are years of learning, study, sacrifice, and deferred gratification until it could all be put together at this time when everything was ready to blossom and grow. It was the walking hours that made the difference.

What about people who excel physically, say the basketball player with great skill and stamina or the ballerina whose body seems to be under such fantastic control? We see what they do and say, "That's wonderful," but we realize that behind that are days and days and days of hard conditioning and work.

I heard about a basketball player who sank a thirty-five foot shot. He said as he was running back down the court, he heard a fan say, "You lucky stiff." He said, "I wonder what he would have thought if he had seen me sink that shot seventy-five times the night before in practice."