Olympic dreams and God's dreams
The Olympics of 2008 take place next month making this a particularly vulnerable season for me, maybe even more so this year, as the Games take place in China. It was here in Hong Kong, China in 1967, over forty years ago, that my own Olympic quest began in earnest.
I had recently received the Omega Cup for ‘female athlete of the year’ for secondary schools in Hong Kong, along with it came my own personally inscribed Omega watch which is one of a few earthly treasures that I keep carefully protected in a camphor treasure chest, also from China, and given to me by my parents when I was a child.
Following this, came an invitation to train amongst a select group of athletes with the USA Olympic team members who were touring Hong Kong and giving a track and field seminar. I had magazine articles and newspaper articles written about my potential along with an invitation to represent Hong Kong for the Asian Games.
From here things kept building and during my university years, I was recommended to switch universities so I could train with the US Olympic women’s coach who was gearing up athletes for the Olympics in Munich in 1972.
My hopes were high as I left my friends and ventured on to what I hoped was in line with the Olympic Motto: “ Citius, Altius, Fortius” ~ Swifter, Higher, Stronger. About six months into the training though, the fateful day came when I was called into the coach’s office and told I would not make the team cut. I swallowed hard and disappeared down the hall as rapidly as I could, trying to avoid being seen with hot tears flowing down my cheeks. How do you face this realization after eight years of focused, disciplined training which had taken precedence in my life over all else. After all, there had been articles written, watches given, trophies lining shelves, miles traveled, schools transferred….
1976, I am now sitting in the lecture hall of the King’s Mansion during my DTS. It is worship time. I am not worshipping. Something is wrong. Others around me seemed to be freely raising their arms and singing “He is Lord”, but I could not and would not. I didn’t have it in me and I refused to be a hypocrite. I hadn’t had anything in me for several years now and not knowing a definition for it, I probably had been living in serious depression for the past five years.
So I sat down, head in my hands, silently explaining to God that which He already knew so well. Gradually out of the silence I heard a ‘chinking’sound, a very familiar chinking sound. Since we were singing He is Lord, I thought maybe the Lord was going to give me a vision of Himself being nailed to the cross. But it wasn’t that at all. In the very personal manner in which the Lord lovingly reveals His compassion for each one of us, the chinking sound became clearer and ever more familiar to me…the nails were going into my starting blocks at the start of the 400 meters! Yes, it was Jesus, his white robe a blotchy charcoal smudged from the track, and hammer in hand, as I glanced over my shoulder, He stopped the chinking sound, wiped his brow and looked straight into my eyes. Breaking into a wide smile, his fingers closing together in an OK sign He was assuring me that He understood fully and all would be well
At this I broke, FINALLY someone understood my pain, my sense of failure, my years of loss and now the healing could begin.
Why am I sharing all this with you? Because we each have our own journeys, our own stories and no matter what they are or for what length of time we have carried them on our own, there is One who is willing and waiting to carry them for us and to express in equally intimate ways His understanding of our pain.
Look over your shoulder and listen…I’m sure He’s there and I know He cares.
“For I know the plans I have for you, plans for welfare, not calamity, to give you a future and a hope.” Jeremiah 29:11
All this happened in the spring of 1976, prior to the start of King’s Kids International in July of 1976. I had thought my life was over, but it had yet to begin…It is now 2008 and I could never in my most imaginative hopes or dreams ever ever have come up with a plan for my life that would be anywhere near what it has been to this day. God is such a faithful healer and fulfiller of the best plans imaginable. Yield to Him and allow Him to fulfill His dreams for your life. Then get ready for an adventure that will take you to places unknown all the while showing you how trustworthy and loving He is ~ one day at a time.
Carol Kauffman