One of the best movies I’ve attended this year is a movie called, “Secretariat.” Not only is it beautifully shot, and the story told with great style; as a powerful lesson, this stands out.
Penny Tweedy believed in Secretariat even before he was born. You can watch the movie to get the storyline in detail, but this story is so much like so many other success stories I’ve seen; not only in movies and books, but in real life. Everyone who succeeds dramatically, boldly, bodaciously has something inside that moves them forward: a hunger, a desire, a drive. And while that’s not unusual, the unusual part is they’re the only ones who sees it.
The only person who believed in Secretariat was Penny Tweedy; not her husband, her family, her brother, anyone else, just her. She had a “knowing.” And a knowing is far different than a belief.
Jesus had a knowing. Study His life and you suspect that He knows something you don’t know. He knows not only the beginning, the middle, but also the end of the drama that was His life. I do believe that God gives us a knowing, a thing, an idea, a dream, a wrong to right, a load to lift, a hurt to heal; something dramatic that we can make of our lives. This knowing isn’t earned. It is a gift. I believe it is a gift that we all get somewhere in our lives.
So the question is, “Why aren’t more people doing amazing things? Why don’t we see more Secretariats?” I truly believe it’s because 90% of us ignore or deny our knowing. Why? Because it is so big, and bold and beyond us, that once we ever let it see the light of day, everything and everyone in life conspires to kill it.
I am in a weekly Bible study with James Ryle, one of the co-founders of Promise Keepers. I asked James this morning, “Did Coach Mack and you and the others at the core of Promise Keepers have a knowing?” And he smiled and said, “Absolutely.” And he could take me back to that place and time where that knowing was shared among a small group of people. I knew it. Everything begins with a knowing.
You don’t need a lot of money, degrees, and you also don’t need a large group of people to believe in you. But you do need a knowing; something you know, something that’s so deep inside of you, so compelling, a passion that drives you so relentlessly that you do not need anyone else to know it, to know it.
Maybe more than a new husband or a new life, or a new job, or makeover, you need a knowing. What is it that you know, or that you pursue with a relentless dedication that looks like insanity from the outside?