If Now Were Forever...

I just finished running three miles in the woods with Roxanne, my dog. I wore a 20 pound weighted vest, and managed to outpace her for most of the run, that's a first. I often get asked what I'm training for, and I usually answer, "Life." 

SEMO's track team thought I was especially crazy as my intensity days can last up to three hours with me jumping rope, striking a heavy punching bag, powerbombing my own heavy bag, throwing a 25 pound homemade medicine ball up a flight of stairs (once even through drywall), slinging a sledgehammer, swinging the kettlebell, and whatever strenuous exercises I can think of.

When I run through the woods, the first stretch is always the hardest as it's uphill. My legs aren't loose a yet, and my lungs and heart aren't quite ready for such a taxing rise right off the bat, and with each step I want to walk. 

But when I get it starts to level off I can keep running for the rest of the trail. And it doesn't get easier after that as rest of the trail is uphill, and there are trees fallen across it throughout, as well as thorns, spiders, and the typical outdoor dangers. Still, after having overcome that initial adversity makes the later steeper hills much easier to conquer. 

I hate running. But it's when I get to the lower pond with tired knees, sore feet, twisted ankles, covered in spider-webs, lungs burning, cotton mouthed, slashed by thorns, and hear the wind running through the tree tops and the honking of the water foul echoes over the still water, where I stop to rest. 

When I got there today I thought, "If now were forever, I'd be content." I write this on the one weekend where the most life ever happened. 

Before I went to the woods, I attended a visitation for an old friend. He was a year younger than me, and I didn't know what to say to his family, or how exactly I should feel. I remember thinking in the line, "I shouldn't be here." 

I didn't know what to think when my grandmother died in March. 

I believe the reason why these experiences feel so foreign to me is because we were never meant to experience such things. We weren't supposed to encounter death. We were made to glorify God and enjoy His presence forever, but we messed that up.

 In church this morning the series we are going through is entitled Genesis: A Glorious Ruin. 

That's a phrase Francis Schaeffer used a lot to describe humanity. Though wrecked and ruined by the fall and sin, we are still created in the Image of God and loved and pursued by Him. I've noticed this throughout the weekend. 

In the bulletin for the visitation, there was a poem written by the departed about his life and relationship with God. It was encouraging. 

Friday night at the wedding, as I danced with the bride's mother, she went on about how great God has been to her and her family. My family is testament to that as well, as we never expected my sister to have three kids. 

When my grandmother died, I remembered such ladies like Lee Benson and Virginia Paul, who loved me like their own grandchildren.

And much like that initial run uphill, as well as the thorns I run through, and fallen trees I have to hurdle, and the pain and strain I force myself to endure makes the serenity of the lower pond that much more savorable; it's in the experiences we were never meant to face, as well as the great triumphs where the presence of God becomes more evident as we reach our hands out to Him and go together through this incredible journey called Life.