The Testimony of Wilma Rudolph

When Wilma Rudolph was four years old she was diagnosed with polio, which causes people to be crippled and unable to walk.  To make matters worse, her family was poor and could not afford good medical care.  She was from a large family. She was the 20th child of 22 children. Her father was a railroad porter and her mother was a maid.

Her mother decided she would do everything she could to help Wilma to walk again. The doctors told her that Wilma would never be able to walk.  That did not stop Wilma’s mother.  Every week she and Wilma took a long bus trip to a hospital to receive therapy. It didn’t help, but the doctors told Wilma’s mother that massaging her legs daily might help.  She taught the brothers and sisters how to do it, and they also rubbed Wilma’s legs four times a day.  By the time she was 8, Wilma could walk with a leg brace. After that, she used a high-topped shoe to support her foot. She played basketball with her brothers every day.

Three years later, her mother came home to find her playing basketball by herself bare-footed. She didn’t even have to use the special shoe.

A track coach encouraged Wilma to start running. She ran so well that during her senior year in high school, she qualified for the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne, Australia.  She won a bronze medal in the women’s 400-meter relay.

In 1959, she qualified for the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome by setting a world’s record in the 200-meter race. At the Olympics that year she won two gold medals; one for the 100-meter race and one for the 200-meter race. 

Then she sprained her ankle, but she ignored the pain and helped her team to win another gold medal for the 400-meter relay!

Wilma retired from running when she was 22 years old, but she went on to coach women’s track teams and encourage young people.

She thought God had a greater purpose for her than to win three gold medals so she started the Wilma Rudolph Foundation to help children learn about discipline and hard work.  She died in 1994 of brain cancer but her tenacious spirit lives on forever.

“He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.  By his wounds, you have been healed.” I Peter 2:24

Thank you Ms. Rudolph for being the living testimony that God’s report is much louder than the doctors.