Extraordinary

Last night I watched Michael Phelps, Garrett Weber-Gale, Cullen Jones and Jason Lezak win the 4x100m free in world record time. They beat the previous world record by 4 seconds - an incredibly long time considering they beat the French team by .08 of a second. Jason Lezak was the anchor and threw down the fastest split of all time, 46.06. (Michael Phelps opening leg was 47.51 and Eamon Sullivan of Australia touched ahead of him, in 47.24 -- a new world record in the 100m. Only the first leg is eligible for world records.) They are already calling this the greatest race of all time.

In talking about the last lap of the race -- "I'm not going to lie", Lezak said, "When I flipped at the 50 and I still saw how far ahead he (Bernard from France) was, and he was the world-record holder 'til about two minutes before that, when Sullivan led off with the world record, I thought, it really crossed my mind for a split second, there's no way.

"Then I changed. I said, you know what, that's ridiculous. This is the Olympics. I'm here for these guys. I'm here for the United States of America. It's more than -- I don't care how bad it hurts, or whatever, I'm just going to go out there and hit it.

"Honestly, in like 5 seconds, I was thinking all these things -- you know, just got like a super charge and took it from there. It was unreal."

Lezak was behind the whole last leg until the very end. Bernard tightened up some which gave Jason the slight window of opportunity to touch a split second ahead of him in the closest finish in the event in Olympic history. After the race, Lezak said "People always step up and do things out of the ordinary at the Olympics."

That got me to thinking about pastor's sermon yesterday. He spoke about taking wise risks and how gymnasts at the Olympics have to take a risk in doing a higher degree of difficulty in order to be able to get gold. If they play it safe, there's no way they can get enough points to win. If they don't risk big, they can't win big.

Pastor also talked about how the great "heroes" of the bible were not supernaturally gifted. They were ordinary people who did extraordinary things. He challenged us to take wise risks and do great things for God.

One thing that struck me about Jason Lezak is that he had prepared ahead of time. He has been training for years and was in peak physical condition. He still did something beyond himself, but if he had not been prepared, he could not have done the seemingly impossible.

Are we preparing daily for the risks God will ask us to take, so that when the time comes we can do the impossible with God's help? Are we ready to raise the dead, heal the sick and win our world for Christ?

In his article about this race, Alan Abrahamson ended it by saying "At the Olympics, people step up and do extraordinary things." In life, are we as Christians ready to step up and do extraordinary things for God?