It’s Olympic season. It’s the time of year where we marvel at the talents and abilities of world class athletes. It took exactly 3 minutes, 16.85 seconds for Allyson Felix to became the most decorated United States track and field Olympian when she ran the second leg of the women’s 4x4 relay and won her 11th Olympic medal. In 40 minutes, Kevin Durant lead the United States Basketball Team to their 4th consecutive gold medal all while becoming the first player to score 100 or more points in three Olympics and becoming the all-time leading scorer in USA Olympic men’s basketball history. While we enjoy and celebrate their glory, we rarely take the time to inspect the story.
The victories we watch these athletes win in minutes actually took years to accomplish. Allyson Felix has overcome many challenges in her career and in her own words has said “I had some experience with hardship”. Kevin Durant had to beat a torn Achilles injury before fighting his way back to the Olympics gold medal stand. Any great victory requires 100 percent commitment and 100 percent consistency. In the middle of a three-year drought, God instructs the prophet Elijah to declare that He would soon send rain.
Elijah prayed for rain but it didn’t come instantly. Seven times Elijah told his servant to go back and look for rain before the rainfall victory came. Elijah was 100 percent committed. When things got hard and rough. How many times did you try before giving up and walking away? Most of us quit way too soon! You will fail 100 percent of the time if you give up. Even more tragic is that you won’t accomplish 100 percent of your dreams if you fail to have a dream. The heart of a true champion isn’t measured in medals or trophies, but real success is measured and always won by your level of commitment and consistency.
What have you stopped doing that you know God told you to do because you felt it was taking too long?
“Then he said to his servant, “Go and look out toward the sea.” The servant went and looked, then returned to Elijah and said, “I didn’t see anything.” Seven times Elijah told him to go and look. Finally the seventh time, his servant told him, “I saw a little cloud about the size of a man’s hand rising from the sea.” Then Elijah shouted, “Hurry to Ahab and tell him, ‘Climb into your chariot and go back home. If you don’t hurry, the rain will stop you!’”
