When we come to the Table of the Lord like this, we are not coming to receive any kind of reward. This is not the laurel crown for winners at the end of the race. This is the meal you eat before the race. And all are invited equally to partake of this meal—indeed, since, if you are baptized, you are registered to run the race, then you are summoned to this meal.
Do not waste any of your time comparing yourself to any of the other runners. What is that to you? You follow Christ? He feeds you. He nourishes you. He strengths you.
You may want to turn it into a trick to improve your performance, relative to others. But this is to miss the point. You do want to improve your baptism. You do want to do better. You do want to walk worthy of the name by which you were called. But you don’t want to do any of it with sidelong glances at anyone else. To do this is to stumble.
But how are you to strive in your growing if you don’t compare? There are two things to note. First, you can compare how you are doing with how you were doing. And it is hard to develop vainglory when your rival is the “you” of last June.
Second, we are called and created to imitate others. There is nothing wrong with this; indeed it is impossible to avoid. But we are not called to imitate as rivals, to imitate competitively. You daughters should want to be like your mothers; you should not want to surpass them and draw attention to yourself. You sons should be imitating your fathers self-consciously; but you must not be striving against them.
These are difficult things to understand, and to master. We are so caught up in imitative striving, it is so much the air we breathe, that we have a hard time even seeing it. But God strengthens you here. He feeds you here. He summons to you to grow up into His goodness. The spirit in us does tend toward imitative envy, but God gives more grace. This is one of the places He gives it.