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Now serving ~ “Heartaches and bitter pain of defeat topped with a regard to accept a defeat with a constructive attitude”.

Competition is tough and you better compete with a winning attitude or accept being defeated with dignity. We train for a marathon, we practice daily, if you are on a basketball team, gymnastics team, or the swim team; in addition to the conditioning, training and proper diet that is needed to compete.

Other competitions that are not physical take intense studying; whereas, you still have to rest so the brain will retain the knowledge you need to “win”.

I was a low hurdler in high school; however, when I was asked to compete in the low hurdles, I did not know how to even jump over them properly. One day during practice, my older brother was at the track practicing shot put and looked over at me struggling with the hurdles. He came over and gave me some much needed advice. He said, “Gwen, you have to hit ‘em low and take only three steps in between each hurdle. Yeah right ~ was my comment. 

Yeah right ~ I was determined to do it too! And it wasn’t fun at all; I hit that hurdle more than I jumped over it. And it hurt! So to make a long story short, I would go over to the track on weekends and practice ~ alone. I mastered hitting them low and getting threes steps in between each hurdle.

Now I had to hurdle with speed!. That took running more than 2 miles daily ~ and I wasn’t up to that. I was not that ambitious to practice on my endurance. I lost some and won some, but if I would have practiced with the same amount of determination on my running as I did my technique; who knows what type of scholarship I could have had to attend college. I qualified for state my junior year and my senior year, and that's as far as it went.

Was I disappointed? Yes and no! Yes ~ I thought I could get there because I was fast, not because I was determined; and No because I defeated myself by not conditioning more in running ~ If I did, then I would have been "a winner" every time!

But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. 

That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. II Corinthians 12:9-10 NIV