First Place Honor is No Honor

First place honor is no honor.  The honor is found in he or she who tries.  God loves tryers, people who get back on their horse and ride back to their personal battlefield, people who fall and fail over and over again.  Those who finish, especially last, impress God.  The real honor is found in tryers and those near the back like single mothers and the suicidal, who are bruised and wounded and struggling.  This is where Jesus is, walking among the sick and they who need a physician, not in the houses on the hill.  I saw Jesus in the ghettos of Milwaukee, by the sick in hospitals aside their tubes and excretion bags, and next to the heartbroken and the lost.

I have been in second or last place in nearly every accolade of my life and so I can relate to you and your perceived failures.  My little league baseball team got second place, I failed class after class in middle and high school even though I tried really hard, I am a Life Scout for life, I quit job after job, my high school class graduated without me, I almost quit the first week of my mission and struggled to stay, my business ideas failed or never panned out.  These were made worse by people close to my life who magnified my failures and shortcomings and stood on me as I seizured in the mud.

But among these failures and shortcomings, I witnessed firsthand that true honor is not with the first place finisher, but with the last place tryer and all the average joes and janes in between who don’t give up.  Honor lies between the cuts and the callus, among the B students and the bravery found in the turmoil of the trenches.

I may not have graduated high school on time, but I did finish and get a diploma.  I may not have achieved the Eagle Scout rank, but I did perform a lot of service to earn the BSA’s second-highest rank.  I may have almost quit my mission the first week in the field, but I did stay and finish the whole two years despite all the excruciation, tumult, and pain it took to serve others.  A lot of other things I gave up on in my life, but the things I did finish I finished second or last, and I’m proud of these achievements and all the sweat, blood, and mud I got covered in earning them.

The atonement of Jesus Christ is centered on failure and being in second place.  God knew we would have to fall and fail and make charges to the credit card of Jesus’ atonement to learn and grow.  Muscle has to rip before it can be filled in with protein.  My mother was the bravest fighter I’ve ever known, and she faced overwhelming failure and fear with confidence, tenacity, and fury.  She died at age 37 – fighting.  Honor is found in those types of individuals even though to the outside onlooker they may seem like just another one of the seven billion.

I encourage you to keep trying, to not give up.  I know you can make it.  As an accomplished failure and finisher myself, I testify of God’s love for and confidence in you in your current situation.  I know that there are Jesus threads in the blankets you sleep under by night, fingerprints of God on the windows through which the sun shines on your skin by day, and angel arms from heaven that hug you when you are alone and desperate and worried and crying prostrate on the Earth.  Please read this poem and know that first place honor is no honor, but he or she who tries.

The Race

by D.H. Groberg

“Quit!” “Give up, you’re beaten!” they shout at me and plead,

“There’s just too much against you now, this time you can’t succeed.”

And as I started to hang my head in front of failure’s face,

My downward fall is broken by the memory of a race.

And hope refills my weakened will as I recall that scene.

For just the thought of that short race rejuvenates my being.

A children’s race, young boys, young men; now I remember well.

Excitement, sure, but also fear; it wasn’t hard to tell.

They all lined up so full of hope.  Each thought to win the race

Or tie for first, if not that, at least take second place.

And fathers watched from off the side, each cheering for his son,

And each boy hoped to show his dad that he would be the one.

The whistle blew and off they sped, as if they were on fire

To win, to be the hero there, was each boy’s desire.

And one boy in particular, his dad was in the crowd,

Was running near the lead and thought, “My dad will be so proud.”

But as he speeded down the field, across the shallow dip,

The little boy who thought to win lost his step and slipped.

Trying hard to catch himself, his arm flew out to brace,

And ‘mid the laughter of the crowd, he fell flat on his face.

So, down he fell, and with him, hope.  He couldn’t win it now.

Embarrassed, sad, he only wished he’d disappear somehow.

But, as he fell, his dad stood up and showed his anxious face,

Which to the boy so clearly said, “Get up and win the race!”

He quickly rose, no damage done, behind a bit, that’s all.

And ran with all his mind and might to make up for the fall.

So anxious to restore himself, to catch up and to win,

His mind went faster than his legs.  He slipped and fell again.

He wished he had quit before with only one disgrace.

“I’m hopeless as a runner now, I shouldn’t try to race.”

But, in the laughing crowd he searched and found his father’s face.

That steady look that said again, “Get up and win the race!”

So, he jumped up to try again, ten yards behind the last;

“If I’m to gain those yards,” he thought, “I’ve got to run real fast!”

Exceeding everything he had, he regained eight or ten,

But trying so hard to catch the lead, he slipped and fell again.

Defeat!  He lay there silently, a tear dropped from his eye.

“There’s no sense running more.  Three strikes, I’m out...why try?”

The will to rise had disappeared, all hope had fled away.

So far behind, so error-prone, a loser all the way.

“I’ve lost, so what’s the use?” he thought, “I’ll live with my disgrace.”

But, then he thought about his dad, who soon he’d have to face.

“Get up,” an echo sounded low, “Get up and take your place.

You weren’t meant for failure here; get up and win the race.”

With borrowed will, “Get up,” it said, “You haven’t lost at all,

For winning is no more than this – to rise each time you fall.”

So up he rose to win once more.  And with a new commit,

He resolved that win or lose, at least he wouldn’t quit.

So far behind the others now, the most he’d ever been.

Still, he gave it all he had, and ran as though to win.

Three times he fallen, stumbling, three times he rose again.

Too far behind to hope to win, he still ran to the end.

They cheered the winning runner, as he crossed the line, first place,

Head high and proud and happy; no falling, no disgrace.

But, when the fallen crossed the finish line, last place,

The crowd gave him the greater cheer for finishing the race.

And even though he came in last, with head bowed low, unproud,

You would have thought he won the race, to listen to the crowd.

And to his dad, he sadly said, “I didn’t do so well.”

“To me you won,” his father said, “You rose each time you fell.”

And now when things seem dark and hard and difficult to face,

The memory of that little boy helps me in my race.

For all of life is like that race, with ups and downs and all.

And all you have to do to win is rise each time you fall.

“Quit!” “Give up, you’re beaten!”  They still shout in my face,

But another voice within me says, “Get up and win the race!"

--

The Mormon Examiner

Title:  First Place Honor is No Honor

Author:  Austin Skousen (poem by D.H. Groberg)

Section:  Manna Inspiration Chest

Originally Published:  Monday, August 19th, 2014

Last Updated:  Thursday, September 11th, 2014

Source:  mormonexaminer.blogspot.com