Run For What?

My relationship with running is definitely a love/hate one. It's been on the hate side for a while now and every time I drag myself out there, or are dragged by my friends who love me and know that I need to train, I cannot wait to be done. I have asked my Father to give me the love for the sport back, the endurance I know I can muster, the stamina and hardcoreness to learn to push myself to my limits again. Yet, weeks and weeks went by and nothing changed.

The day before yesterday I ran hills with Jana. My legs are still mad at me for that. She said something though, that dramatically changed my workout this morning. I was out in the new-found track a mile or two from my house (this moving deal makes it interesting for exploring streets and parks and schools to run at) doing a tempo run. It was supposed to be six times 1k. Not bad. Well, I thought that after the first one, two more later and my legs were done, my mind was done, and I was talking myself out of running the last three. Then I remembered what Jana had said as we jogged down to the line that marked our last climb up-hill: "This is the last one, your legs are tired and we're just gonna touch the line, pivot and sprint up. Don't worry about your time, the key here is to push yourself when you are fatigued. Just push yourself, okay?" And so, I ran the last three. I discovered I have a finishing kick, but that's besides the point. What happened during those last three sets was prayer, as the realization that I could not do it set in.  I prayed for strength, for help. . . for finishing the race marked out before me, for going hard against all odds, against my own will and inspite of pain, to run my heart out.  It was then I realized I wasn't praying to finish the workout or to feel not so lame afterward, I was praying for my life.

Before that, I had been asking God to give me the tools to love and do well at running all somehow in my own strenght. Graciously, he didn't answer as I had expected, yet he went exactly to the point. It all came back to me. The reason I run is not because I am good at it (far from it), or even because it clears my head and is my release. . . I run because it reminds me what I am living for. It reminds me of my weakness and His strenght, it reminds me of the narrow way, the pain, yet the fullness of life found only in Jesus, the hope of Glory. This is how it started, how I grew to love running, as it carried me through the lowest lows simply reminding me why I was alive and for whom. It was a gift from God. Losing sight of the giver of this gift meant losing the driving force behind each stride. After all, it's true that "It is in Him that we live and move and exist" (Acts 17:28).