Five Minute Friday has rolled around once again!  In fact, it rolled around too fast for me.

I had a longer than usual Wednesday post that I couldn’t seem to get whittled down enough!  I bit off more than I could chew on that one!  I hope to make it up next week after I work this Saturday and Monday!  Eek!

So, here is today’s Five Minute Friday post.  It is linked to Gypsy Mama’s 5 Minute Friday Page.   And the rules?

• Write for 5 minutes and don’t look back.  Usually, all I do is check spellings, rearrange paragraphs and add a photo or two.
• Link to the page mentioned above.
• And most important, stop and add an encouraging note to the person ahead of you on the page.

GO

Of course these days, the race that is on our minds is the one for the office of president.  Do you really think I’ll spend my five minutes on that topic?  No way!

The race I’m thinking about most often is the race of Life.  It is the one that is the Most Important Race of ALL!

How have we run it?  How have we invested the time we had?

When you look back to gain some perspective…and some of you aren’t far enough along to do that yet, you realize that when you were living through it, some of the really important things weren’t as important as you thought at the time.

On the other hand, some of the really tiny moments, the ones that were very behind the scenes?  The ones others didn’t see?  Those were the important ones.  They often went by so fast, like a blink!  But in reality, they were the important moments.

• Like when you chose to walk the difficult but moral path when you knew no one would know if you cut corners.
• Or the time when you apologized to your child…I wish I had done that way more often in fact! 
• Or the times when you chose to not to say the true, but negative words about someone who wasn’t in the group…to add fuel to a fire of gossip.

And looking back, what was more important?

• The time you spent enjoying your young child?
• Playing games with her?
• taking trips in the car…and making them pleasant instead of miserable?
• sitting together in church?
• eating a meal together as a family and choosing words that built up?
• sitting on the couch eating popcorn and watching a movie together?

 STOP

But the most important thing about running the race is not who wins, or even who has the most toys.  It is about the perseverance and endurance.  That is what we learn from running the race.  That is what makes us stronger.

We need to keep on, even when life gets hard, or uphill, or sad or painful.  Perseverance is something we learn from keeping on through every circumstance.

And in the end we learn to endure through all of it!