When the finish line becomes the starting line

I can't remember where, but recently I was reading something written by Brian McLaren on living the Christian life. He was comparing it to running a race. Recently, thanks to my "I'm Not 40 yet" workout plan, I've been spending a bit more time running on my own as well. So some of these next thoughts come from a recent run I took and a book a read.

Recently, I went out to run on the greenbelt next to my house. It was dark, cold, and had started to snow. The clouds were reflecting the glow of the city. I think this is a perfect time for running. For some reason I seem to like running more when it's the weather is doing something. Anyways, I started my run with the goal of running six miles. That is the farthest distance I have run since I destroyed my self and pride in a half-marathon about 4 years ago. So with my iPod blaring I started off running. In the beginning I was excited to get going, inspired to run farther, all pumped up because I was going to accomplish something. Miles 1-3 went by fairly smoothly. I was running because of the potential and because I was inspired.

After that, things started to get a bit harder. My legs started to get tired and my body/mind was starting to manipulate my will. "What are you doing?" it said, "You're fine. You've already run farther than you need to at this point, is six miles really that important to you? Just turn around now and you can enjoy your success. There's not point to continuing to push yourself. Don't you think six miles was a bit excessive? I mean come on, it'll be fine if you just stop here. It's not like anybody but you cares about this goal you've set for yourself."

But somehow, I just kept things going. I think music helps to drown out those voices in my head when I'm running. So miles 4 and 5 were more of a slogfest. I wasn't going very fast. And I really just wanted to turn around. At this point I just started thinking about the end. I was fixated on finding relief from the pain in my legs and relief from the endless mental assault going on in my head. All I could think about with each and every step was stopping. I was running just to get to the end.

Around the end of mile 5 though, I began to run for a different reason. My mind wasn't trying to defeat my will anymore. My body experienced a renewal of energy. The distance I had already come was so much greater than the distance I had left to go. Once I realized I was going to finish, I began to enjoy running. I could move past the pain in my legs much easier. I ran because I knew the hard part was over.

At the end of mile 6 a funny thing happened. I was enjoying running so much that I just ran straight past the finish line. I didn't even slow down. "What the heck do you think you're doing?!" screamed my head. "Running," I said "Isn't that the point?" I was now running because I could.

I ended up running 8 miles that night and afterwards I was left thinking about some pretty strong parallels between the way I ran that night, and the way I pursue my faith. You see many times I feel like I am living just to get to the end. Just to get to heaven some might say or in reality just to get to some different place in my life where things aren't quite as hard and life is fun again(or just plain easier). When I'm running this way, the joy in my life quickly disappears. Living for anything but relief becomes drudgery because I'm fixated on how hard things are and keep entertaining the temptations that keep boiling up in my head to just give up on whatever it is I'm struggling to pursue. I begin to think that the point of life or a specific hardship is to just get to the end. I can no longer enjoy the race. I can no longer love life or anyone in my life.

Just as running guarantees pain, love guarantees sacrifice. Many, many times I begin to wish that I could run without feeling the pain. I also begin to wish I could love God and others without making any sacrifices.

What if I began to see my life not as an opportunity to just get to the finish line. Because in that mindset I try to love as few people as possible without totally giving up on the race I'm running. What if I began to see my life as an opportunity to love as many people as possible. To run as hard as I could. Because the point was to run, to run for the joy of it, not because I had to, or because anyone else thought I should, but because I could. Because the point of life was to run the race; not just get to the end.

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. 2Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart."

If I get to the end someday, I have a sneaking suspicion that I will have only crossed the starting line.

Jayber Crow

I'm about to finish a book called Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry. Here's a page or so from it that I've been mulling over since I started it.

Jayber Crow is at seminary in this part of the story:

And so finally, late one afternoon, I went to the professor I was afraid to go to, old Dr. Ardmire. I was afraid to go to him because I knew he would tell me the truth.....

I knocked at his open door and waited until he read to a stopping place and looked up from his book.
"Come in , Mr. J. Crow" He didn't like it that I went by my initial.

I went in.
He said, "Have a seat, please."
I sat down.
Customarily, when I came to see him I would be bringing work that he had required me to talk with him about. That day I was empty-handed.
Seeing that I was, he said, "What have you got in mind?"
"Well," I said, "I've got a lot of questions."
He said, "Perhaps you would like to say what they are?"
"Well, for instance," I said, "if Jesus said for us to love our enemies-- and He did say that, didn't He?--how can it ever be right to kill our enemies? And if He said not to pray in public, how come we're all the time praying in public? And if Jesus' own prayer in the garden wasn't granted, what is there for us to pray, except 'thy will be done,' which there's no use in praying because it will be done anyhow?"
I sort of ran down. He didn't say anything. He was looking straight at me. Adn then I realized that he wasn't looking at me the way he usually did. I seemed to see way back in his eyes a little gleam of light. It was a light of kindness and (as I now think) of amusement.
He said, "Have you anymore?"
"Well, for instance," I said, for it had just occurred to me, "suppose you prayed for something and you got it, how do you know how you got it? How do you know you didn't get it because you were going to get it whether you prayed for it or not? So how do you know it does any good to pray? You woudl need proof, wouldn't you?
He nodded.
"But there's no way to get any proof."
He shook his head. We looked at each other.
He said, "Do you have any answers?"
"No," I said. I was concentrating so hard, looking at him, you could have nailed my foot to the floor and I wouldn't have felt it.
"So," I said, "I reckon what it all comes down to is, how can I preach if I don't have any answers?"
"Yes, Mr. Crow," he said. "How can you?" he was not one of your frying-sized chickens.
"I don't believe I can," I said, and I felt my skin turn cold, for I had not even thought that until then.
He said, "No, I don't believe you can." And we sate there and looked at each other again while he waited for me to see the nextg thing, so he wouldnt' have to tell me: I oughtn't to waste any time resigning my scholarship and leaving Pigeonville. I saw it soon enough.
I said, "Well," for now I was ashamed, "I had this feeling maybe I had been called."
"And you may have been right. But not to what you thought. Not to what you think. You have been given questions to which you cannot be given answers. You will have to live them out -- perhaps a little at a time."
"And how long is that going to take?"
"I don't know. As long as you live, perhaps."
"That could be a long time."
"I will tell you a further mystery," he said. "It may take longer."
He held out his hand to me and I shook it. As I started to leave, it came to me that of all the teachers I'd had in school he was the kindest, and I turned around. I was going to thank him, but he had gone back to his book.

Diametric Faces of God

“These days I own a Dellapple”

And He said to him, "'YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.”

How is it that two people can walk into a church and have such drastically different experiences? One person finds a life giving, inspiring, and inviting group of people that immediately enables them to relax and breather a little easier. They smile and energetically engage the people and place that they have just entered. The other person immediately puts up their guard, full of suspicion and critique. Not able to accept that the motives of these “nice” people can truly be real and sincere.

What do you do when you realize you are both of those people at the same time? Is that possible? When you see, that you are someone who finds identity and purpose in this community in which you have spent most of your life. Yet at the same time, you are someone who somewhere along the way has become cynical, wounded, and distrusting of the very community that you used to find life in.

I am that person and I am confused.

The threads of this “Christian” experience, both good and bad, have been woven so intricately into the fabric of my life, that I can no longer separate them without destroying the entire garment.

These days it seems like I have two gods’ I’m trying to worship and follow and I don’t know which one is real anymore. It’s like trying to please Bill Gates and Steve Jobs at the same time. One god is the god of tradition, of conservatism (whatever that means), and the god of the four spiritual laws. This god provides right principles, a bastion of safety amongst a crooked and depraved generation, and a systematic theology. This is the god that sees homosexuality and abortion as the ultimate assault on the purity of the Church and morality. This god is definitely a He.

As much as I tend to see things from this first god’s point of view, this god makes no sense to the other god I’m trying to follow. The god that values humanity, cares about things like social justice, the environment, the poor, and sees constrains to the love of God when faced with choices between red and blue. This god also makes no sense to my first god. To my first god, this god seems fickle and “blown by the wind.” Infected with new age ideas and gender confused. This god is he, she, both, and none of the above.

In an odd way I find myself reflecting on Matthew 6:24. “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other.” What if I have been tormenting over a choice I was never expected to make? I am beginning to think more and more these days that this struggle has been a war between lesser gods; one that has left my heart and mind bloodied as its battlefield.

More and more I know longer care if I’ve found the perfect face of God, because more and more my hope is in the scandalous love of a God that many days appears as absurd as the Dellapple I’m writing on. I may be confused about many things, but I am becoming more and more sure of one thing.

Sorry if you wanted to read something a little more lighthearted. You might check out this video instead "Baby got Book"

I'm not 40 yet:

I recently "discovered" a brand new workout plan unlike any other. It's called the I'm not 40 yet workout routine. This is how it works. Look in the mirror at yourself. Tell yourself, "Self, you're not 40 yet." Then ask yourself, "Self, why am I working out like I'm 40?" When the Self tells you it's because you're lazy and working out takes work (hence the name), not just 2 half-hearted jogs a weak, take the following steps:

Thank Self.
Get pissed.
Go actually workout.

This blog makes no attempt to discriminate based upon age. If you are over 40, all is not lost. Simply, replace 40 with a motivating number of your choosing.

Thank You David Crowder Band

Life makes it so hard sometimes
To know what's real
When I can't feel You there
When I can't see You there
When I can't comprehend that
You are there

You are there
You're everywhere
You are everywhere

Lyrics by David Crowder Band

I am enjoying my new CD today

Banff, Beer, and Dollars

I got to visit Banff, Canada recently for the NOLS Wilderness Risk Management Conference. It was a great time and that's where the picture above is from. I didn't get to do much exploring, but I didn't have to go far either to be surrounded by some spectacular scenery. I already want to go back and go backpacking or something.

A couple of things I found out while I was there:
12 cans of Budweiser cost approximately $24.
In case you didn't know the Canadian dollar is actually stronger than the U.S. dollar now.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police don't ride horses any more, they drive patrol cars. I liked all the Canadians I met.
If you get pulled over for going 50km over the speed limit, the police can take your plates off your car and put you in jail immediately. (I did not have this experience)

Snow in the City

From City of Rocks

I went to the City of Rocks recently to do some climbing. It was a wonderful trip. Here's a picture I took when we woke up and had 4 inches of snow on the ground.