No Pain No Gain?

One of my birthday presents this year from my wife, Sue, was a "Sports Massage"! To be perfectly honest, I wasn't too enamoured with the idea when she first told me. I'm not too sure why I was so reluctant, but I was. Sue thought that after my exertions of running the Leeds 10K it would be good for me to have the massage.

The appointment was booked for this week, and I headed off in some trepidation. When the young man who was due to do the massage chatted with me beforehand, he seemed quite keen to let me know that a sports massage was unlike an ordinary massage, and could be "quite uncomfortable" at times. Those words didn't exactly put me at ease, but I obediently laid out and let him get to work!

I soon discovered what he meant, especially when he came to my calf muscles. It was all I could do not to jump up and run out of the room. When the man had finished, he gave me another warning that I would probably feel the after-effects for another couple of days! It certainly got me to thinking about the old saying, "No pain, no gain". I've said it myself many times over the years. I don't think that the saying is true in every situation, but it probably does have an element of truth about it. Certainly if I hadn't put myself through some fairly strict training (and some pain) over recent months I wouldn't have managed a P.B. in the Leeds 10K.

Maybe this gives us some insight into the apparently rather strange instructions of James in his letter in the New Testament: 'Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.' He knew very well that if life is always easy, a person's Christian faith can grow weak and flabby. It is in facing tough and difficult times, when a person's faith is tested and exercised, that faith grows stronger. Food for thought.

Not that I will be rushing back for another sports massage!