The Man in the Shoes

Last week I was at the Hartsville YMCA walking and jogging on the indoor track. I passed another man several times who was also walking on the track. One time as I passed him he said, "I need to move like that. What kind of shoes are you wearing?" Without slowing down I responded, "Oh, they are just a pair of walking/jogging shoes." As I distanced myself from him, I heard him say, "It's not the shoes on the man. It's the man in the shoes."

I don't know the man's name and don't think I have seen him since at the Y, but he was exactly right in his observations. It is always the person in the shoes. The only exception I can think of to this observation would be Michael Jordon, one of the greatest NBA basketball players who ever played the game. Endorsing Nike shoes made him lots of money without having to wear them. He may have worn them, but his NIL in the commercials made him the money.

I think all of us could benefit from answering the question, what kind of person is filling my shoes? For those of us who are professing Christians, when we made a profession of faith in Christ as our Savior, did we believe that the gospel shoes we were figuratively putting on would propel us forward in the Christian life without any dedicated effort on our part. The words of Jesus in Luke 9:23 would tell us otherwise. "Then he said to them all: 'If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.'"(NIV) From these words of Jesus we know that the Christian life is no magic carpet ride where you hop on and when the ride is over you land in heaven.

Wouldn't it be great if someone could manufacture shoes that you could just put on your feet and just wearing them would transform your body and give you peak physical fitness and health! No more hours exercising and no more sweat! Just lean back in your easy chair for four hours and watch that favorite TV program. Presto, you are now lean and mean. Don't hold your breath on this, my friend.

In our world of cons and schemes I'm surprised that someone has not tried to sell some of these magic shoes that gives peak fitness just by placing your feet inside the shoes. I can just hear the words now blaring from the TV. "The shoes make the man!" "What kind of shoes do you have on your feet?"

The better question for us to consider is, "What kind of person is filling my shoes?" I pray that my answer to this question will be a person who is wholly committed to Jesus Christ and willing to submit my life to Him in active faith and obedience.

Romans 10:15 says, "And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news'"! (NIV) The fact that we are sent negates the magic shoes that does the walking for you. We have been commissioned and sent to spread the good news of the gospel. Let's go! Let's be the person in the shoes that God wants us to be.