The Future Is In Good Hands
by Royce
“Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these.” — John 14:12
The 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Olympics just wrapped up, and I found myself deeply moved — not just by the competition, but by what kept happening after it.
These athletes train for years, sometimes their entire lives, for a performance that lasts minutes. They sacrifice more than most of us will ever know. And yet, over and over again, the moments that went viral weren’t the victories. They were the embraces. The tears shed for someone else’s gold. The rivals cheering for each other across national lines, across years of competition, as if the medal was never the whole point.
Chloe Kim is an American snowboarder — born in California to Korean immigrant parents — and one of the greatest female snowboarders in history. Two-time Olympic gold medalist, three world championship titles, eight X Games golds. She had dislocated her shoulder in training just one month before these Games. She came anyway.
Choi Gaon, eight years her junior from South Korea, had only just turned professional. At the start of this season — her very first as a senior — the Olympics wasn’t even on her radar. And then, month by month, competition by competition, she surprised everyone — including herself — until suddenly she was here, in the final, competing for gold in her first Olympic Games.
Their shared Korean heritage gave the story an extra layer of tenderness — a Korean-American champion who had quietly spent a decade building a path for a girl in Korea who dared to dream the same dreams. Hospital visits when Gaon was injured overseas. Meals. Coaches. Words spoken into her life across years, across borders, long before any of this was possible.
Gaon’s first run ended in a crash. Her second run was better, but a fall on a crucial landing cost her. Two runs gone. One left. The gold she had spent a lifetime not-yet-dreaming-of was slipping away in real time.
Between runs, Chloe Kim — her idol, her mentor, and also her competitor in the same final — leaned over and said: “You got this. You’re a badass snowboarder.”
Let that sit for a moment. Chloe was in the same final. She needed Gaon to fail. By every logic the scoreboard understands, silence would have been the rational move. And yet.
Gaon’s third run scored 90.25. It was the best run of the final. It dethroned her mentor. The moment the scores were confirmed, Chloe Kim sprinted across the snow and wrapped Gaon in an embrace. Later, she posted: “She’s not so little anymore. I feel like a proud mom. The future of snowboarding’s in good hands.”
This is where it gets uncomfortable for marketplace leaders. Much of what passes for leadership development is really power preservation dressed in the language of mentorship. We invest in people — but keep them close enough to be useful and far enough to be non-threatening. We build teams while quietly ensuring we remain the most indispensable person on them. We grow followers instead of leaders.
Jesus modeled the opposite. He confined Himself to one small region for three years. Never wrote a book. Never built an institution. And then Paul — someone He poured into — crossed continents, planted churches across the Roman Empire, and wrote letters that became the intellectual foundation of Western civilization itself. You will do greater things than these.
Consider Roger Federer’s speech at the 2024 Dartmouth graduation. Across his entire career — 20 Grand Slams, 103 titles — he won only 54% of all points played. Nearly half, lost. Success wasn’t to win more points. It was to understand how to play each one. The players who last aren’t the ones who win every point. They’re the ones who’ve mastered the art of letting go.
For marketplace leaders, the point you most need to release might not be a lost deal or a missed quarter. It might be the need to remain the best player on the court.
Chloe released her point. She cheered for the run that dethroned her. Jesus released His. He built people who would outrun Him across continents.
Your greatest legacy isn’t your medals. It’s being able to say when the time comes — the future is in good hands.
Personal Reflection
- Is there an invisible ceiling in how you develop people — a point where your investment quietly cools because their growth starts threatening your position? What would it look like to remove it entirely?
- Who in your sphere might God be calling you to invest in the way Chloe invested in Gaon — not to serve your vision, but to surpass it?
Prayer
Lord, I confess that I have sometimes called it mentorship when it was really control. Forgive me. Give me the security to build people who surpass me, to invest without ceiling, and to call it victory when they go further than I ever did. Send me into the marketplace not to protect my position, but to multiply Your kingdom — one person at a time, further than I can see. Amen.