Today's Devotional
February 29, 2008
Subject: Winning By The Rules
2 Timothy 2:5 "Similarly, if anyone competes as an athlete, he does not receive the victor's crown unless he competes according to the rules."
I stress continually to my cadets that they must live principled lives. I try to do it in a number of ways. Recently we went to a military skills meet competition in New Orleans and in preparation months ago, I told one of my team captains to daily record the absence and effort during practice of each team member. I let him know that this would be his gauge for determining who would go on the trip to compete. The captain kept his record and as the meet approached, he noticed that some of the "best" athletes were skipping practice and not giving much effort. The day finally came and he submitted the list. I began to ask him about each person that he selected and whether he or she had given a good effort to be on the team. He replied, "yes, but I want to add some of the other people because I want to win." I responded to him, "you win by principle. If you made the rules then you win by sticking to those rules."
The rest of the story is that we took inferior talent in many respects, but we took the people who practiced and gave their best effort. We arrived at the competition and competed and were standing in the awards ceremony and were all visibly shocked when they announced, "1st place in the physical training competition, Willowridge High School." It was a great lesson for the kids to understand that there are principles in life that make the difference in whether you win or lose and winning or losing is not based on a trophy you get, but the trophy that you receive from having done your best.
As believers it is the same. We receive the victor's crown when we compete according to God's rules. That means a number of things but chief among them is that we must be serious about the effort that we are giving. We can't give our best if we don't "come to practice." That's not talking about going to church, it's talking about our daily devotion to Him. It's through this daily exercise that we become prepared for the victories that He gives us. The victories might even surprise us, but we already knew that we had won because we had played by His rules.
Carlen
