In 1983, the Westfield chain of shopping malls in Australia decided to stage an ultramarathon between the cities of Sydney and Melbourne.
The race would begin and end, to no one’s surprise, at the Westfield mall in each metropolis.
That made the distance a staggering 543.7 miles.
World-class ultramarathon runners – young, specially trained, equipped with high tech gear, and bearing corporate sponsorships – flew in from around the globe. These competitors planned on completing the event in five to six days. They would run about 18 hours and then sleep for six.
On the day of the race, a curious figure approached the registration area.
He was a 61-year-old potato farmer named Cliff Young. He wore overalls and gum boots. Young picked up his number and joined the other runners.
Was this a publicity stunt? Or perhaps a delusional quest that would put an older man’s health at serious risk?
When reporters pressed Young to comment, he said he wasn’t intimidated by the distance. “I grew up on a farm where we couldn’t afford horses or tractors. Whenever storms would roll in, I’d have to go out and round up the sheep. We had 2,000 sheep on 2,000 acres. Sometimes I would have to run those sheep for two or three days. It took a long time, but I’d always catch them.”
He concluded, “I believe I can run this race.”
At the starter’s gun, the pros disappeared over the horizon. Cliff didn’t exactly run after them. He shuffled.
At the end of the first 18 hours, as the “serious” runners settled down to rest, Young the Old kept shuffling through the night. Sometime before dawn on the second day, he passed all of his competitors and never looked back.
He completed the Westfield run in five days, 15 hours and four minutes, a full 10 hours ahead of second place. He simply ignored the impulse to sleep.
The tortoise, wearing gum boots, beat a whole pack of hares.
Three subsequent winners of the Westfield run between Sydney and Melbourne have employed the “Young Shuffle,” choosing to run at a steady pace through the event instead of sprinting and stopping.
The biblical way of expressing the same thought is to “run with perseverance.” That is not the same thing as subsisting on six-packs of Red Bull or ignoring the impulse to sleep, which is central to sustaining a healthy life.
Perseverance, in this regard, means choosing not to give up on your resolve to be God’s person, even when the emotions that accompanied your original decision have faded away.
The call to pursue a spiritual ultramarathon appears towards the end of the New Testament book of Hebrews:
“[It’s time to] get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever… When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls!” (Hebrews 12:1-3, The Message).
Even when you feel exhausted, compromised, or disillusioned, and wonder if you’ll l make it through another night, by God’s grace don’t give up.
Keep running.
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