Happy 2023...almost! We are celebrating the end of 2022 with inspiring stories from a pastor I know in NC who walks daily (25,000 miles in the last 7 1/2 years) and was diagnosed with cancer earlier this year, given 5 months to live. He has wisdom about faith journeys and motivational advice to help you get out of bed to do something for God and for others! And make sure to Subscribe to the "Run The Race" podcast as we head into the New Year.

(3:10) Jim Pearce, who just turned 66 years old, has walked 9 miles a day for more than 7 years now! It was kind of like Forrest Gump. He says God called him to do it, and the daily routine is the first battle of the day - "flipping the covers." The pastor calls it his drug of choice, and opportunities to draw closer to God while walking. (7:50) There are also fitness and health benefits. How can you stick with goals like this that you make for the New Year? Jim says Aim Low. He explains.

(10:55) At the beginning of this year, Jim was diagnosed with non-smokers lung cancer, which is normally terminal. The doctors told him he had less than half a year to live, but he's in the 5% that has a rare mutation that medicines can treat. (17:01) Knowing time may be short, he has a more directed purpose and focus in life...to finish well. And he lives by a famous line in the movie The Shawshank Redemption: "Get busy living or get busy dying." He looks at a t-shirt with those words every day, as a reminder.

After being a teen troublemaker into drugs and alcohol, (21:09) Jim Pearce came to Christ at age 16. He talks about the pivotal moment: an invite to a Christian concert, because he liked loud music and girls. Eventually, he went to seminary. Since then, he's led overseas missions trips to 40 different countries in the last 40 years! That included being a young man scared and smuggling Bibles behind the Iron Curtain before the Wall came down. Doing so much in the world has taught him...our faith is more alive when we are looking for it. He has advice on how to listen and watch for "God sightings," the supernatural happening among us. He describes it as "tuning your heart" with "spiritual antennas."

For the last 24 years, he's been the pastor of visitation at Grace Community Church in the Hendersonville, NC area. (31:03) How does he care for people in crisis, especially men who are struggling and don't want people to get too close? Men also bond over sports, and Jim was a runner for 20 years, doing so all over the world like Iceland and Fiji. He agrees there are many faith and fitness parallels.

(38:03) The cancer wakeup call has helped Jim Pearce try to live life to the fullest, reminding us that everyone has a role, no matter how small you think it is. You can do something important for God, who is not mad at you. We end with a quick chat about lessons from the holiday movie It's a Wonderful Live and (44:40) Jim's closing prayer.

Thanks for listening to the #RunTheRace podcast! Also, write a quick review about it, on Apple podcasts. For more info, go to www.wtvm.com/podcast/.

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