What a failure. He died. Descended into Hell. Jesus a man of sorrow and acquainted with grief, embraced death as a friendly passage way back home to heaven. Death loses its sting and its apparent victory when we know that it is just a passage way not an enemy.
Grete Waitz failed in her fight against cancer on Tuesday, April 19th. She succeeded in living her life to the end in the way she lived. She was a woman of valor, vision, and victory. She did not fail at living she just failed at winning the battle against this horrible disease. It was not about her lacking faith it was about the courage of her faith, the conviction of her mind, and the compassion of her heart. These three qualities that are the essence of faith were in her in distinctive and distinguishing expressions.
I met Grete in 1988 during the height of her career. She supported along with Fred the idea of a “Worship Service for Runners by Runners”. A unique experience, at the INGNYC Marathon, “the race that is like none other”. Grete was a woman like none other.
In 1992 she ran the New York City Marathon with Fred Lebow who at that time had been diagnosed with brain cancer and given months to live. She wanted to run with him out of her love and compassion for the man who had put the victory crown on her head 9 previous years. A fete never paralleled in the running world. He knew and felt she had one more win in her. The number 10 sounded better to him, no doubt this was his competitive and caring part of and for her. She won this battle and ran with him. I joined them for a mile or two in the Bronx. She was helping her friend stay focused and her open heart for and with him was giving him courage and strength to finish the course. He did they finished hands stretched high, in victory.
Grete had been willing to sacrifice her potential win for the wonder of the courage a compassionate heart can give to a friend. She did not count the number of winning New York City marathons as anything compared to her being a present friend in his struggle to beat cancer. That was a winning moment in her life.
Grete herself said, “Fred really wanted me to win 10 New York City Marathons. But I say that race with Fred makes up for the tenth I never won” (Boston Globe, April 20th, 2011, pB13.
When Fred died she mourned but celebrated that moment so special so eternal in her heart. She became the first captain of Fred’s Team, a team of runners who run to raise money for cancer research at Memorial Sloan Kettering. Six years ago she contracted the same disease that took her friend. She lived and died with courage and compassion. These are the core elements of a spiritual person. They are the core elements that we see in Jesus. “Who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and so is now set down at the thrown of God. The true victory is in living free of anything mattering more than “courage and compassion” for other human beings. For Grete, that was true. Fred was one special illustration of there inner truth and spirit. She won a record 9 straight NYC Marathons. Her greatest victory was finishing with her friend in an expression of what really counts. Love for others and oneself in a balanced compassionate and courageous way.
She never did return to try for that 10th win. Not because she could not have done it.
She wanted to honor the greatest victory of all her finishes, crossing the finish line with a friend. The freedom to live in courage and compassion always triumphs over the imprisonment of competition and constraint.
“The willingness to sacrifice is the prelude to freedom” the ultimate victory over death is knowing that death is a passageway into the eternal presence of eternal love and peace. Grete is there with Fred and many others.
She is, this Easter Sunday, a great illustration of what Jesus died to lead us into: “living free from all that would constrain us, the extravagant loving” that he lived before us. As the apostle Peter said, “follow in His steps”. Grete did.
She was and is free and alive because she lived free and alive, the way of Jesus.
This is not the Jesus of any particular theology or church, this is the living Jesus who is the living sacrifice. The calls is the same to all of us: live sacrificially and fully. Grete did and is!
Thank you Grete.
Grace be to your family and all those who knew and know you.
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