Resting on Laurels

I have made it no secret that I have actively participated in the Beijing Games and I feel as though I should have podiumed in the "Rhythmic Remote Controlling" event. My heart was with the athletes while my butt was with the sofa.

And my favorite athlete coming out of these past two weeks has to be Adam VanKoeverden. I don't want to take anything away from the blazing fast Usain Bolt or the accomplishments of Michael Phelps, the two athletes for whom the Beijing Games will most likely be remembered. Far and away, I was most impressed by Adam VanKoeverden's interviews. Here is a guy who, going into the games had Canada's hopes literally on his shoulders as he carried the flag for the opening ceremonies. And then he breezes into the finals for both events he entered and completely tanks in the 1000 metre kayak. But it was what happened afterward that impressed me about this guy. The CBC interviewer (by the way, does the CBC make their interviewers ask those ridiculous questions? Every last one of them were brutal on the athletes!) asks him what happens and he looks straight into the camera and apologizes, presumably to Canada. Like, as if we need an apology. He has just paddled his tail off while our tails are making indents on the upholstery!

And then, every interview afterward just impressed me more. I am convinced that there is not a more honest athlete in the entire athlete's village. The guy was frank and honest and real. The kind of guy you can imagine watching the game with. During the closing ceremonies, he said something that was huge for me. He said that you just can't take anything for granted or rest on your laurels. You need to stop looking back at what you've done (or what you haven't done) and you just move forward.

We spend too much time looking backward. We might have a great spiritual experience, so we look to that as a pinnacle moment. But the problem is that we come down from that pinnacle in a hurry--and then what? Sunday was a tremendous morning for me. It seemed like God showed up in ways I never expected and in many ways it was a real pinnacle moment for me. But I left church and stuff just happens. We look back and say, "Wow, look what Jesus did." And we move forward and say, "Wow, look what Jesus is doing." Just like the story we read from John 5. Jesus told the man who couldn't walk: "Get up, take up your bed, and walk." "Take up your bed": remember what happened; but "Walk": move forward and don't rest on the laurels of that experience. He is doing something new today and something new tomorrow.