Ok. So this morning I decided to go running since I really need to lose some weight (by the way, I plan on doing this more than once). Considering the difficulty of my remaining stedfast in Christ, I noticed that there is a focusing quality in running for me. And perhaps I need to do it everyday, for spiritual reasons as well as physical reasons. I guess the focus comes in the fact that the difficulty of running for me highly parallels the difficulty of being a consistent Christian. May I share some with you? (I’ll assume you nodded your head)
1.) Whenever I walked onto the track, after having not exercised consistently since…high school, I was immediately motivated to run a whole lot, maybe like two miles or so. However, after the first two laps, I realized a very important truth. Start small. Since I haven’t been establishing a firm foundation (running consistently), it’s pretty unlikely (considering my size) that I would just up and run two miles out of the blue. Not to mention it’s probably pretty foolish and could result in me injuring myself. In the same way, I, in my spiritual walk, cannot expect to have the faith and determination of Elijah tomorrow. It is a process. And whenever I attempt to undertake some spiritual conquest that is beyond me, the result is generally the same - I try; I fail; I feel horrible; I return to the mud, and get deeper than I was before. Start small, and let God grow you bit by bit.
2.) After the first two laps, I resolved that I would only run one mile total. Interestingly enough, even after I had run those first two laps, I still tended to think of the whole feat in terms of the total distance that I would have to run (4 laps = 1 mile), rather than the distance left that I would have to run (2 laps). That seemingly slight variation in perception only resulted in me being more intimidated, because I looked at things in terms of what I had to accomplish, not considering it in terms of what had already been done and how that affects what I had left to do. I only needed to focus on what I had left to accomplish in the present and future. In the same way one must understand that, when running the race of life as a Christian, the focus is to be on the present and future, not the past. Jesus died for our sins (the past)…and because of that, there is now a transforming present and a glorified future. My focus should be there.
3.) Toward the end of my running conquest, I really began to struggle to finish. And immediately, a ton of reasons came to my mind concerning this conquest being beyond me, namely my asthma and my being overweight. So many times, my brother has chastised me about using my limitations as excuses. Thus, forgetting my limitations and committing to the cause at hand, I finished what I had set out to do. In the same way, the redeemed of God can never focus on their limitations in such a way that the ensuing lack of faith prevents God from being able to remove their limitations (progressively or immediately) and strengthen them in preparation for loving others and worshiping Him.
I hope that you learned as much from my running as I did.
SRay
