Though it is classified as an old movie, I know many of you have seen the 1981 movie Chariots of Fire. Even if the movie is 30 plus years old, many of us saw the movie in theaters or DVD in the years since it was released. It is an excellent movie. If you haven’t seen it, I know it is available on Amazon Instant Video and I would guess the same would be true for Netflix.
For those in the Strauss Sunday school class, I realize this story is a bit of a rerun from last Sunday’s class when I talked about this movie but I am making a bit of a different point this morning and the story of Eric Liddell is just too good for all the church not to hear it.
The film is the story of Scottish sprinter Eric Liddell in the 1924 Olympics in Paris. As the Olympics approached, Liddell was the favorite to win gold in the 100 meters, one of track and field’s flagship events. When the race schedule came out, Liddell, a devout Christian faced a dilemma. Thus far in his career, Liddell had refused to run on Sunday. But, when the schedule came out the preliminary heats for the 100 meters were set for a Sunday. If he didn’t run the preliminary heats, he would of course not be able to run in the finals. He would be disqualified. Liddell’s dilemma was, he believed running, or any other sporting event on Sunday dishonored God and didn’t keep the Sabbath holy. On the other hand, this was HIS event. It was the premiere event in the Olympics in those days, and he was the favorite in the race. What do you do?
In the end, Liddell, in spite of considerable pressure to run from both the British Olympic Committee and from the Crown, decided not to run. He stuck to his convictions, he stayed with what he was taught, what he had learned, despite what the world may have had to say about it. Eric Liddell was what Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount and our lesson this morning called, “The Salt of the Earth” and “The Light of the World.” By his decision, Eric Liddell showed the world what the flavor of Christianity might look like. He let the world see the light of the Christian faith by calling attention to it and demonstrating that faith and conviction, one’s beliefs, one’s code of conduct, is more important than sports or many things of the world.
Please understand, I am not saying playing sports or watching sports on a Sunday is some great sin. That isn’t my point. I am not even sure Eric Liddell would have said sports on Sunday was a sin for everyone. But, he knew it was wrong for him. He couldn’t do it.
This morning we are continuing our three part series, “The Race.” In many of his letters Paul and the writer of Hebrews, our theme passage for this series, uses the metaphor of sports, particularly running a race to illustrate the life of faith. Paul says, “I have run the race and kept the faith. The writer of Hebrews reminds us to “…run the race that is set before us…”
We began this series last week with, “On Your Mark.” On your mark is the starter’s call the racers to come to the line, to get their attention, to prepare for the beginning of the race. Last week we used the metaphor of “On Your Mark” to illustrate the calling we all have as Christians. When Jesus called the first disciples he was, in essence saying, “Andrew, Simon, on your mark. James and John, on your mark.” Jesus was saying, “Andrew, Simon, James and John, it is time to get ready to run your race, to live out your life in faith.”
We are all called by God to various things. Some are called to be preachers, others teachers, others to music, others to administration and so forth. We all have calls to some kind of ministry. “On your mark” is a metaphor for God calling us to begin our life and work in faith.
When the runners hear the command, “on your mark,” they get their feet into the starting blocks. They get their hands set down on the track behind the starting line. They are close to ready, but not quite. They are ready but relaxed. Their knees are usually down on the track. They may even leave their torso erect. There still may be a little talking. There is usually a bit of praying on at least one runner’s part.
Then, when finally all the runners come to stillness, when all is as quiet as possible, the starter will say, “Set” or “get set.” It is the final signal of preparation from the starter to the runners. It is a signal of complete preparedness. With that command, heads will go down and rear-ends will go up. Knees come up off the track’s pavement. The runners are waiting to start the race. It is almost time. If they didn’t come to the set position they wouldn’t be ready to run. If they didn’t come to the set position they wouldn’t really look much like a real runner.
For us, the command, “get set” is a command to get ourselves prepared in every way we can for the metaphorical race that is the life in faith. Many times, we can’t just go out and start, there is preparation to be done.
For the teacher or preacher, for the doctor or nurse or paramedic and for many others, it is a call to go get the education you need. Would any of us want to go to a physician who had never been to medical school? I think most of us would pass on such an idea. It doesn’t mean we aren’t trusting in God, it means we are getting ready, we are doing our part of what is necessary to live out the call God places on our lives.
Last week we had vacation Bible school. A great deal of preparation went into getting ready. We were getting set. Had we all just shown up on Monday and no prep work had been done, if we weren’t set, VBS would have been a miserable failure. We did our part and I believe God did God’s part.
Our lesson this morning focuses in on “getting set,” on preparation, for our call all of us share. Jesus says we are the salt of the earth.
Think about this, with the exception of the occasional sore throat gargle and the building of a beautiful fish aquarium, saltwater is pretty well useless to us humans. You can’t drink it. You can’t use it in your car or other engines. If you go to the beach and go swimming in it, for most of us, the first thing you want to do when you get out is go take a shower, with fresh water, to get the stuff off of us.
But the two things that are the primary ingredients of salt water, salt and water, when separated are quite valuable. BUT, you have to prepare them. You have to get them ready for human use. We all need water but if it has salt in it, it isn’t very useful. But by itself it is a liquid that is life itself.
Though you can buy it relatively cheap now, salt, in Jesus’ day was very valuable. It was used to cure meats, to flavor food, and even as a disinfectant for wounds. But, it wasn’t available just anywhere. So, it became valuable to people all over the Biblical world.
For us, salt’s primary use is for flavor. Cindy and I watch quite a bit of the Food Network’s show Chopped. I would guess the number one complaint on the part of the judges is, not enough salt. Salt enhances flavor and when it is missing or in short supply, the food isn’t all it could or should be.
For us, to be the salt of the earth is to live a life that shows the world the flavor of the Christian faith. We get set by learning to live our lives as a demonstration of faith, to show the world what being a disciple of Jesus Christ looks like and to encourage them to want what we have.
Jesus also says in our lesson that we are the “Light of the World.” It is more of the same thing. We are light because it takes light to be able to see. You can’t read in the dark. It is difficult to move around in the dark. On a moonless night you could get hurt just going on a simple walk in the dark. We need to be people who let our lights shine in a dark world. It is part of our call.
So, what does getting set look like in this part of all our calls? We need to be people who flavor the world with joy. We all need to be people who shine the light of hope to people who live in spiritual darkness.
There is something common in Christian behavior that really bothers me. Well, in truth, there are many things that tend to bother me but I am going to talk about one for just a few minutes. We sing songs like the Bible school kids sang a few minutes ago, “This little light of mine, I’m going to let it shine” and “Hide it under a bush, oh NO, I’m going to let it shine.” And then, we go and do the very thing we said we wouldn’t do. We hide our joy. We hide our faith. We don’t salt the world and we hide our light. I was watching some of you when the kids were singing. It was easy to do since I can’t see the kids from the chancel. I saw a lot of smiles out here. But for many of us, we will smile at the kids to encourage them and then when we leave here we take those smiles off and replace them with a face that would suggest we had just sucked on a bag of lemons. Now I like lemons folks. They are one of my favorite fruits. But, we need to not walk around with a scowl. We need to show people the joy of our hearts. We need to show people the hope we live life with.
Think about it this way. We are the people with the answer to life’s most important question. We are the people who claim to believe in Jesus Christ and know and believe we have eternal life. If we don’t have reason to be filled with joy and hope, who does? We have got to be more than frowns on faces. We need to be people who live life like “Joy to the World” and “I’ve got that joy, joy, joy, joy, down in my heart” really mean something to us. We need to believe and live like “My Hope is Built” is really a song of hope! We need to live a life of faith that makes to world wonder what is up with us. We need to live out of the joy and the hope that is life in Jesus Christ with the promise of life eternal with God above.
“On your mark.” Come and get ready. The race is about to begin. “Get set.” You need to focus, get ready, the race start at any second. You need to look like you are a runner.
“On your mark.” Come on God is calling you to a life in faith. That is our race. It is time to come to the starting line. “Get set.” We need to be salt and light. We need to flavor the world with faith. We need to let the light of God shine from us out into the world. How do we do that? By changing our lives so they show the joy and hope that is the life in the faith. We need to live out the words of the old song, “Oh I’m so happy, so very happy, I’ve got the love of Jesus in my heart.” Remember we live out those words on our faces and in our words.
On your mark. Get set….
