Moving in Opposition

There are many times as Christans that we are called to do things opposite to what seems intuitive. Love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you.... if you have a need, give. The last shall be first. If you want to gain your life, you must lose it. Forgive those who hate you, turn the other cheek

There are many things in our Christian walks that seem to be contrary to what makes any sense, and so over time I have come to look beyond the details and see the bigger picture and see what else might be at stake. This principle was illustrated to me very clearly this week. I have been running. I have some goals and I have blogged about what my running has meant to me. 2 weeks ago, as we were achieving our biggest goal, just as we hit that mark, my knee started to twinge. Granted, I am not the youngest person around, and I work on my feet, so a twinge-y knee isn't that big of a surprise. But what happened next was.... I decided (wisely, I think) to take it easy on the knee. To give it some time to recover. Keep in mind that there was no injury or explainable event. For 2 weeks I have been icing it, and carefully walking on it-and missing my runs! I never thought I would be THAT person who was itching to get out running! But I didn't want to permanently damage anything.

I voiced my concerns to a friend who is no stranger to pain, and to working through that pain physically. He suggested-as a 'testosterone based life form' would-to power through the pain, "it's just a little wear and tear".

Having nothing to lose (and the last class of my running clinic being tonight) I decided to put this advice to the test. I was a little nervous about running for only the 2nd time in 2 weeks. I was worried about getting out on our run and then having to bail out, and walk home. And worse... as I drove to meet my running group my knee, which previously had been sore only in one spot, began to twinge in others, and then the other knee began to twinge, and then my wrist..... it was then that I realized that this was not what it seemed. I was sure that this was an attack. That the enemy was attempting to derail my progress. That in his desperate need to keep me from reaching my destiny, he had targeted the place of my biggest potential victory. As I was making this 'discovery' I realized that the last 2 weeks have been a quagmire of insecurities, and backward steps. That I was feeling defeated. I cannot do what God is calling me to without being able to run. Period. There is a vocational requirement to run, so I was being targeted for destruction.

As I sat contemplating this possibility, I knew that I had to take a gamble. I am tenacious enough to be able to power through the pain, yet I know that to run on an injury can make it worse. So I prayed. I declared that no weapon formed against me shall prosper, I declared that the lies I was getting bombarded with were not the truth, and I urgently prayed that God-the great Physician- would fix/protect/heal my knee if there was anything actually wrong with it. I know that He is big enough for all those things!

Long story short, I ran tonight, it was hard because I hadn't run that distance in a while, but the whole time I was running, my knee didn't hurt at all!

Sometimes the greatest struggle is just before the breakthrough.