Message summary: When we enter the race we must steadily plod on.

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"The race is not to the swift" (Ecclesiastes 9:11). "Let us run with endurance the race marked out for us" (Hebrews 12:1). "But the one who endures to the end will be saved" (Matthew 24:13).

Early this morning one of the Amish teachers I drive to school gave me a freshly picked batch of asparagus from her own garden. Brooksyne and I both enjoy asparagus (but recall not liking it when we were kids). It has a strong, unique taste and an interesting after effect.*

When we moved to our present home 24 years ago we considered planting some asparagus but didn't do so since we were told it takes several years before you can harvest it. We didn't want to wait that long but if we had planted it at the time we would have had some 21 years of our own asparagus!

Now I am admittedly mixing illustrative material here, something a good writer would never do. Our human nature wants to reap what we sow quickly and sometimes it works that way. But in both negative and positive there can be a long lapse between sowing and reaping. The final reaping does not happen until we reach the other side.

When we enter the race we must steadily plod on. New Christians may get started and they give it all they've got not realizing just how long the race is. The Christian race is a lifelong marathon and in a long distance race pacing is important. Pacing, for the believer, is staying faithful all along the way, over mountaintops and through deep valleys, we run with endurance.

We will receive some harvests along the way but the main reaping will be fully experienced at the end of our life after we "fight life's final war with pain". "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up" (Galatians 6:9).

Be encouraged today, Hebrews 3:13

Stephen & Brooksyne Weber