The winner takes it all

Chapter 26 – ( I skipped 25)

Good Monday Morning to this new week.

I hope you’ve been enjoying my weekly blog chapters. Now for Week 25…the famous week that Christopher Latham Sholes patented the Sholes and Glidden typewriter, the first commercially successful typewriter of its kind. Honestly, Sunday and Monday came and went in a blur, probably lost in a sea of to-do lists, and then, before I knew it, Week 25 itself was history! But fear not, dear readers! If you’d like me to make up for the lost chapter 25, I’m all ears for your suggestions! Stay tuned as I regroup for this weeks chapter 26!

“The winner takes it all.” This phrase, often heard in the context of competitions and high-stakes environments, came to mind recently while reading about a prominent bank in Switzerland of which they say it is the “Winner and took it all”!

Yesterday, I watched the game EM-2024 between Belgium and Romania. As a spectator, I felt like the real winner who took it all. It was an incredibly cool match, with both teams playing as if they had nothing to lose. Yes, Belgium won 2-0, but Romania continued to play excellently, taking chances and risks, and showcasing good football.
But is it really true? Does the winner truly take it all?

Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. 1. Corinthians 9.24

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

Know ye not—The Isthmian games, in which the foot race was a leading one, were of course well known, and a subject of patriotic pride to the Corinthians, who lived in the immediate neighborhood. These periodical games were to the Greeks rather a passion than a mere amusement: hence their suitableness as an image of Christian earnestness.
in a race—Greek, “in a race course.”

    all … one, although we knew that one alone could be saved, still it would be well worth our while to run. Even in the Christian race not “all” who enter the race win (1Co 10:1-5).

    So run, that ye may obtain—said parenthetically. These are the words in which the instructors of the young in the exercise schools (gymnasia) and the spectators on the race course exhorted their pupils to stimulate them to put forth all exertions. The gymnasium was a prominent feature in every Greek city. Every candidate had to take an oath that he had been ten months in training, and that he would violate none of the regulations .He lived on a strict self-denying diet, refraining from wine and pleasant foods, and enduring cold and heat and most laborious discipline. The “prize” awarded by the judge or umpire was a chaplet of green leaves; at the Isthmus, those of the indigenous pine, for which parsley leaves were temporarily substituted (1Co 9:25). The Greek for “obtain” is fully obtain. It is in vain to begin, unless we persevere to the end (Mt 10:22; 24:13; Re 2:10). The “so” expresses, Run with such perseverance in the heavenly course, as “all” the runners exhibit in the earthly “race” just spoken of: to the end that ye may attain the prize.

    So, does the winner take it all? In the literal sense, perhaps. But in the grander scheme, everyone who runs with dedication and integrity gains something invaluable. Whether it’s the thrill of the game, the satisfaction of trying our best, or the lessons learned along the way, we all have the potential to be winners in our own right.

    “The winner takes it all” in another context, yes it completely fits our run and journey of faith … after long perserverance, recieving grace upon grace!

    The runner, according to Paul’s vivid image in another of his letters, forgets those things that are behind and strains toward those that are ahead. And just as a man runs with his body leaning forward, and his eager hand nearer to the prize than his body, and his eyes and heart running ahead of them both to grasp it, so let us live with the one worthy goal for ours, and let us set our whole effort and faith on what is worthy of it all, the prize of our high calling, the crown of righteousness. Then let us run, that we may finish the race with joy!

    Wishing you a great start to this new week!

    Philemon



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