“Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.”  – 1 Thessalonians 5:11

David Schilling, a local youth minister, stepped onto Knoxville Christian School’s gymnasium floor to conduct chapel. As impressionable students looked on, he retrieved a beach ball and unrolled 30 feet of butcher block paper. He invited his son, a student at the school, to attempt to roll the beach ball the entire length of the paper without it going out of bounds. His son’s first attempt rolled halfway down the paper and then veered off to the left. His next try went two-thirds of the way and then faded off to the right.

Despite his son’s lack of success in completing the challenge, David made the task even more difficult. Halfway down the paper, he tore it in two and put the second half of the pathway at an angle. Unfortunately, his son’s third try was his worst yet. His ball was unable to negotiate the turn and once again went off course.

Life is like that. With all the twists and turns, staying on track seems impossible. There are temptations and bad influences all around us. We face unanticipated hurdles and roadblocks. In 2 Timothy 4:7, the Apostle Paul tells us, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” As difficult as it is to stay on the straight and narrow path, how can we follow his lead and finish the race?

With his son holding the beach ball at the starting line, David invited the entire 1^st-grade class to join them on the gymnasium floor. He distributed about a dozen pool noodles to these students and asked them to sit along both sides of the butcher block paper—his son’s path. On his son’s fourth attempt, the beach ball went straight for several feet, and started to veer, but was kept on the path by an eager first-grader clutching a pool noodle. At the tricky turn, another student used an elbow to redirect the ball and keep it on course. To the cheers of the delighted crowd, the ball eventually crossed the finish line, and David’s son raised his fist in victory.

The note from the margin reads: The Christian journey is too difficult to travel alone. Christians need fellow Christians armed with elbows and pool noodles to help keep them on the path of faith. Those nudges are necessary though not always pleasant or appreciated at the time. Other times, Christians need to be the ones offering encouragement to help a friend finish the race. Today, let’s grab our proverbial pool noodles and look for someone to encourage and nudge along to the finish line.