I Run:Lesson Six

So, now I run, I swim, AND I bike. I love incorporating the other sports, but the training schedule is brutal. I'll be honest....I will be VERY glad when August 8th has come and gone and the finish line is behind me. In the meantime, I'm having to buckle down and learn how to work through one of my most difficult lessons yet.

Lesson Six: Injury is inevitable. How you respond to the injury says more about your character and faith in God than anything else.

My injury....plantar fasciitis in BOTH feet. What does this feel like? Well, back in mid-June, I'm pretty sure it all started with some sort of torn ligament in my right foot. This felt like knives sticking into the side and arch of my foot every time a stepped. That went away, but was replaced by a dull, throbbing ache in the mid-arch of my foot, tender to the touch. This dull ache has never gone completely away. For a month, I lived in pain. I don't think I really realized how much it was affecting me physically and mentally until I just broke down one night and cried and cried and cried.

Now in the running world, this type of injury--I'm finding--is referred to as "Plantar," but you must emphasize the word and say it with contempt like a pirate would say, "Arrgh!" Got the picture? Every runner I know sympathizes, and they all offer advice, but really it just boils down to a simple matter-of-fact: the only cure is rest. Rest. For someone in the middle of training for a race, this word is like a death sentence. I would love to rest. I would gladly rest, but I have a race to finish. A goal to meet. A call to heed.

Now everyone has "injuries" in life with which we must deal--mentally, physically, spiritually, emotionally. Some are like my "Plantar", constant, just under the surface, distraction causes the pain to fade, but at the end of the day sometimes you just have to cry yourself to sleep. Other "injuries" are more public. Maybe you bleed for all to see, or there's a scar that you just can't cover up. Regardless, of what your injury looks like or feels like, it's there, and you have to deal with it.

Now, I don't know enough to argue whether a sinful world is the cause of our injuries, our sinful selves, or God gives us injuries to test us. An argument could be made for all, I think. Fact is probably somewhere in the mix of all of these lies the truth. Regardless of the why, I do believe that God's sovereignty allows these things to happen, just as much as he protects us from other circumstances. Again, why? We will have to ask Him that one day, but I suspect, as in all things, He just wants us to depend on Him and not ourselves. He knows that our only true fulfilment, peace, clarity, success, and protection comes from being dependent upon Him--completely.

I took a cortisone shot in each foot to help me continue training to finish this race. I HATE needles. I wanted to run out of that podiatrist office and never run again. I wanted to give up. But, it was almost like an out-of-body experience, or I should say an in-body God experience. I looked the doctor in the eye and said, "Give me the shots." I felt God's hands on top of my clinched ones as the burning liquid filled my feet. I felt a peace, even as the tears trickled from the corners of my eyes. This is what I was called to do.

You must be willing to make the sacrifices needed when following what God has called you to do.

How do you respond to "injury"? What is your pattern of response when things get difficult? Do you quit? Do you try to find a way out? Another path? Do you doubt God's calling? Do you ask yourself, "Did God really say that, or was it just me?" Do you try to change your circumstances instead of riding out the storm? OR

Do you grin and bear it? Do you pray and go before the Lord and seek His face and beg for strength and wisdom and endurance? Do you push through because God's original calling was a true one, a wise one, and to doubt now would only make you weaker, expose your belly to the enemy? Do you educate yourself? Do you follow the Great Physician's instructions?

How do you respond? And what does that response say about your character and your faith in God?

For me, it means I rest more. Instead of barreling stubbornly through my training program despite it all, I consider my ways. I listen to my body and the Holy Spirit more acutely. I cut back on my running, but I still run. I still swim. I still bike. I train harder on my pilates video to strengthen the core of body to help support the rest of me, to hopefully prevent more injury. I follow my doctor's instructions: stretching, icing, Rx ibuprofen. I pray daily and speak against the enemy of fear. I tell myself and prepare mentally that if I have to walk....it's ok. I will finish. God is my Redeemer, my Healer, my Coach. He would not call me to complete anything He has not already equipped me to accomplish.

2 Timothy 3: "10 You (my readers), however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance, 11 persecutions, sufferings—what kinds of things happened to me in Antioch(5k training), Iconium(10K training) and Lystra(Sprint Tri training), the persecutions I endured. Yet the Lord rescued me from all of them.

12 In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted,

13 while evil men and impostors will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. 14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, 15 and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting

and training in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."

Sometimes it helps to make scripture truly personal, so you can literally see God in your daily life. Now, in no way does my small experiences of running and training compare to the persecutions some of you face on a daily basis. But if I find these promises to be true in my own life, in what is a seemingly meaningless daily venture...then Oh! How much more will our Big God make this true in your own life for the truly unbearable injuries???

Keep running. Keep training. Keep believing God. No matter what.