“Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own.  Beloved, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.  Let those of us who are mature be of the same mind; and if you think differently about anything, this too God will reveal to you.  Only let us hold fast to what we have attained.”

~ Philippians 3.12-14

Paul’s words to the church at Philippi have spoken to and have spoken for believers for centuries.  Having been credited with writing approximately seventy- five percent of the New Testament, the writings of Paul are the foundation of the early church’s understanding of Jesus Christ after the resurrection.  Without Paul’s letters to the churches, we would not know “The Roman Road” (Romans 3.23; 6.23; 10.9-11), the gifts that comprise the five- fold ministry (Ephesians 4.11-12), the fruits of the spirit (Galatians 5.22-23) or the whole armor of God needed in spiritual warfare (Ephesians 6. 10-18). Raymond E. Brown, a New Testament scholar and theologian, said of Paul’s letter to the Philippians in An Introduction to the New Testament, “this is the most attractive Pauline epistle, reflecting more patently than any other the warm affection of the apostle for his brothers and sisters in Christ.  It contains one of the best known and loved New Testament descriptions of the graciousness of Christ: one who emptied himself and took on the form of a servant, even unto death on a cross (483).”

The above-mentioned passage serves as a foundational scripture for The Daily Race.  The goal that Paul speaks of is mentioned just a few verses earlier:

“Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ.  More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.  For his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things and I regard them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith.  I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead (verses 7-11).”

This is why we run this race.  This is why we run everyday and look to ensure that the other selves that run with us are in support of this goal.  We count whatever we have or could have gained through the social privileges of race as loss because of “the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus.”  We regard the social positions of race as “rubbish” as it is a social righteousness based on the laws of social color.  Instead, we desire the righteousness that comes from God through faith in Christ and not that which comes from the social coloring of our skin.

We are not merely running away from race but we are running toward Christ, that we may know Him.  We are moving away from the old person and its nature in order to move forward in our becoming the new person or creature in Christ Jesus (Second Corinthians 5.17).  I surmise that the more we learn of Christ, the less we will believe that we know about ourselves for our true identity can only be found in Him.  To be found in Christ is our starting position and the starting line.

But, not only is He the starting line for which we have only begun once we have accepted Him as our Savior and Lord but Christ is also the finish line.  Thus, there can be no looking back for when we look back, we look away from Christ.  We look away from the goal and the prize.  We look away from ourselves.