Anyway, because of this next race, I have been trying to maintain my training schedule in order to avoid having to start all over again, and I must say that I have done a pretty good job. During the week, I try to do three shorter runs, usually in the neighborhood of 3-5 miles and then save my longer runs for the weekends. Well, today I was running with little Daisy girl at a park downtown that we frequently use for our week day runs. I guess I stopped paying attention to the path in front of me, because one minute I was running across a bridge and the next I was doing a sideways ninja roll on the ground to avoid smacking my face onto the wooden planks of the bridge. Ouch! Daisy just stopped, turned around and looked at me like, "What's the hold up, chief?" Very helpful. And the little old man who was walking toward me picked up his pace and asked me if I was OK.
Other than some scraped palms and a bruised ego, I was fine. So I picked myself up, dusted myself off and kept of running. About 50 yards later, my mind started telling me that I was well within my rights to stop running for the day. I had been injured! No shame in calling it a day, throwing in the towel. But there was a problem with that. I had already decided to run in a race. And in order to be prepared to run in that race, I have to stick with it, even when it is hard. Even when it hurts. Even when I want to quit.
So I kept running. And I finished my 4.25 miles today. And that means I am one step closer to be ready the 13.1 miles I will run later this month.
It didn't happen right away, but shortly after I got home, I realized that my falling today might have actually been a good thing. You see, we are sitting in the middle of another slooooow month. To my knowledge, there have been NO referrals during the month of April. And that is hard. There are days when that makes me want to quit. It hurts. There are days when I feel like we will always be adoptING and never be able to say that we adoptED.
Adoption, I am learning, will knock you down a whole lot. And it can be easy to let yourself stay down, but that is not what God wants for us. God is the One who laid adoption on our hearts; He is the One who called us to this. He has asked us to step out in faith and to do something that is incredibly hard, something that absolutely cannot be done apart from Him, something that is teaching us to have faith in Him in ways I could not have imagined before. He is the One who picks me back up when I get knocked down; I can't do it on my own. Believe me, there are days when I huff and puff and try my best to stay down, whether it be because I am angry or sad or tired or all of those things at once.
But I am so grateful to serve a God who will not let me stay down.
No.
He comes to me and picks me back up. He pulls me to my feet, dusts me off and gives me what I need in order to keep running.
This is a long race that He has us running right now. It is a race with no end in sight. Still, I know the One who charted the course, and I know that He is good and that His ways are higher than my ways.
So when I think about falling down at the park today, instead of thinking about how much it hurt, I think about how I got back up. How I kept running and how doing that has prepared me for what lies ahead. I pray that God will help me to do this in my spiritual life. It is hard. No doubt about it. It is the hardest thing I have ever done. But the Lord is right here with me, picking me up when I fall down. Never leaving me. Never forsaking me.
And each time He picks me up, He is helping me get one step closer to finishing this race He has marked out for us.
And each time He picks me up, He is helping me get one step closer to finishing this race He has marked out for us.
"Praise the Lord, my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all his benefits—who forgives all
your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the
pit and crowns you with love and compassion,
who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is
renewed like the eagle’s."
Psalm 103:1-5
Love,
Baylor
Baylor,
ReplyDeleteI've been doing a study in Genesis and this reminds me of all the patriarchs who were told to wait, on god's timing (and several of them who took things into their own hands and muddled them up). But in each story God was faithful. For Abraham it was the birth of Isaac, For Joseph it was finally being released from prison after the cup bearer forgot about him for 2 years. God's plans always tend to work out so much better than our own. I hope that the rest of the time you are waiting will be joyful and used to grow your already abundant faith. And I pray that he will place the perfect little boy or girl in your home. You are going to be an incredible mama, and it will be so worth the wait.
Thank you so much, Vanessa. Your encouragement is very well-timed!
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