Along with many others, I spent much of the last two weeks watching the Olympics in Paris. There were so many interesting and compelling events and athletes. Yet it was the last athlete in the last event that touched and inspired millions of viewers in an unexpected way. Kinzang Lhamo was one of only three athletes from Bhutan and the only woman on that team. She was the last one to finish the women’s marathon coming in almost an hour after the next to last finisher and nearly an hour and a half behind the winner. She struggled along the way, alternating between running and walking the 26.2 mile course that many described as “brutal.” Her persistence evoked amazing responses from people who lined the course as well as those in the stands at the finish line. In a spontaneous gestures of support and encouragement, some people began to run or bike along side of her offering words and signs of encouragement along the final stretch of the course. As she finally approached the finish line, people in the stands cheered and clapped as they gave her a standing ovation. Kinzang Lhamo’s reminded us that persistence in the face of struggle is a power that ennobles our common humanity. When I saw the video of this amazing scene, the Biblical words of Hebrews 11:39 – 12:1 came to mind. The author was not referring to the Olympic marathon but to the generational “marathon” of people who persisted in their faith even when the finish line was not in sight. The author calls us to that same kind of faith and perseverance:
These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised, since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us…
The power of perseverance is essential in the ongoing struggle of discipleship for racial justice. Learning the history of that struggle from enslavement, to Reconstruction, to Jim Crow segregation, to the modern Civil Rights Movement, to contemporary manifestations of systemic racism reveals that we are in a 400 year “marathon” with the finish line not yet in sight. Throughout this long history, there have been people of faith in each generation who persevered in the face of injustice, oppression, physical violence, and even death. They dared to believe and live the truth often quoted by Dr. King that “the moral arc of the universe is long but it bends toward justice.” As you watch the video posted below of the inspiring perseverance of Kinzang Lhamo in the Olympic marathon, take time to remember and give thanks for some of those who persevered in the struggle for racial justice that paved the way for us today. May we also commit ourselves to persevere in that part of the generational “marathon” of racial justice that has been handed on to us. God calls us not to be famous or even successful but to be faithful in our time.