Leap of Faith

Tag: endurance

  • TRADING THE URGENT FOR THE IMPORTANT: Redefining Endurance

    Photo by Volker Thimm

    This has been a season of both ridiculously intense stress and intensely deep growth. Several things have been redefined for me. One of these is the nature of endurance. Until I damaged my knees, I was a distance runner. I preferred running on a circular track. Because I didn’t have to worry about road hazards, I could focus my attention completely on my breath and let my mind and soul take flight. As often as not, my soul would find itself nestled in the arms of my loving Father pouring out my heart to Him. I would run until all the distractions, demands, and worries of life fell away and all that was left was peace.

    Running was a joy-filled encounter with the Jehovah Shalom. It was soulfully cathartic! In many ways distance running is a picture of endurance. Unlike sprinting, which relies on bursts of intense speed over short distances, distance running is about steady continuous movement and what it takes to sustain that movement, ideally without killing the runner. This is the heart of endurance; doing what it takes to keep moving forward without being destroyed in the process. Centering on, resting in, and communing with God is the foundation of that endurance process.

    Photo by Najman Husaini

    We are a world of sprinters these days. Like cockroaches with ADHD, we sprint in darkness from one thing to the next without ceasing, never seeing or experiencing beauty. As a result, diagnoses of PTSD and clinical burn out syndrome are accelerating at an alarming rate. Between the onslaught of personal and global trauma, too many of us find ourselves in a never-ending battle of trying simply to endure one thing after another. We subsist on a diet of distraction. This is slowly starving our souls to death. As an endurance strategy, sprinting isn’t cutting it. We must find ways to endure without losing everything that makes life worth living in the process. But how?!?

    Jesus and the disciples were at the home of Simon the leper. A woman came in and anointed Jesus with a very expensive perfume. Ignoring the loving intimacy of this act of worship, the disciples argue that the perfume should have been sold and the proceeds used for the poor. Jesus’ response is somewhat jarring.  “Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a good thing for me. For you will always have the poor with you; but you will not always have me (Matt 26:10-11).”

    Photo by Mareefe

    In reading this challenging passage, one could be tempted to interpret Jesus’ response as callus and uncaring towards the plight of the poor. I believe this is a gross misinterpretation of Jesus’ words. Rather I believe Jesus is alerting us to the difference between the urgent and the important. This is a critical distinction when it comes to endurance. It could be the difference between running the race set before us or allowing our souls to die.

    Anyone who has ever flown on an airplane is familiar with cabin depressurization procedures. When traveling with a child, I put my mask on first and then help the child. Is this because my life is more important than the child’s? Certainly not. The child’s situation is unequivocally urgent. However, it is critically IMPORTANT that I put my mask on first. If I pass out, we BOTH die. It’s the same with the continuous flow of urgent things we face every day. We must attend to the important before we can address the urgent. If we don’t, nothing survives.

    I am learning to identify and prioritize the important over the urgent. I have come to understand that I have to put on my air mask or I won’t survive to resolve anything, no matter how urgent. Like every good runner knows, long distance running requires sufficient oxygen. Jesus is our oxygen. I have to breathe in the Holy Spirit like my life depends on it!  Because here’s the reality, IT DOES!

    Photo by Ingrid Santana

    All of us who are weary and struggling with anxiety, depression, PTSD and burn out, need to come to Jesus to find rest for our souls! We NEED to be led by the Shepard to green pastures and quiet waters. We absolutely MUST cast our cares on Him who cares for us intimately and passionately. It’s ESSENTIAL that we dwell in the beauty of the presence of Jehova Shalom, the Lord our peace. Our survival hinges on having the kind of intimate relationship with Jesus that causes us to pour out the expensive and limited oil of our time and attention on Him. It’s the only way we will survive long enough to deal with the urgent.

    That doesn’t mean we ignore the situations in our lives and the lives of those around us. We don’t stop caring about the urgent. Rather, focusing on Jesus opens the door for miraculous to happen in our lives. It enables us to deal with the urgent in ways we wouldn’t be able to otherwise. When we trade the urgent for the important, we have the resources to meaningfully and effectively address the urgent. We can run the race that is set before us with endurance. We may even find joy in the running.

    Photo By Luna Lovegood

    And let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking away from all that will distract, focusing our eyes on Jesus, the first incentive for our belief and the One who brings our faith to maturity, who for the joy of accomplishing the goal set before Him endured the cross (Heb 12:1-2 AMP)

  • REDEFINING STRENGTH: Building on Solid Ground

    If you had told me that it would be this long since my last post, I would not have believed you for a millisecond. For me, writing is essential. It’s not just a creative outlet, it’s a deeply important aspect of faith. It enables me to give voice to God’s presence in my life. It allows me to converse with Him and pour my heart out. The fact that I stopped writing for so long speaks to just how devastating last year was. For most of it, all I could was put my head down and try to walk through whatever happened next.

    I wasn’t up to the task. Last year utterly broke me. It shattered me in ways I didn’t think possible! I felt like I was drowning and there was nothing I could do to stop it. Honestly, there were days that drowning was FAR easier than struggling to stay afloat. In January of this year, I was diagnosed with PTSD.

    I am a strong person. I have always counted my strength as an asset. Faith in Christ and my strength in the face of adversity formed the foundation on which I based my life and my hope. Last year made it abundantly clear that, as a foundation for life and hope, MY strength is little more than a self-aggrandizing delusion. Eventually everyone reaches the end of their capacity to withstand the pummeling and they hit the canvas.

    Face down on the canvas, praying that someone would throw in the towel, I was forced to reevaluate everything I thought to be true about myself and the way I operate in faith. The conclusion I came to is that anchoring any part of my life or hope in my own strength is one of the worst forms of hubris imaginable. It’s ludicrous!

    There’s nothing wrong with a positive self-image. It’s just not a good foundation upon which to build your house. Aside from being fragile, our self-image is constantly in flux as we change and grow. That may be fine for the walls in our building, but if our foundation is in constant flux, our walls will never stand. 

    Piece by peice, God is putting my life and soul back together. Part of this process has been spending time studying 2 Corinthians 11 and 12.

    Chapter 11 catalogs the adversity Paul endured in service to Christ.  It’s a morbidly impressive list. Paul got the crap kicked out of him and yet his response was “If I must boast, I will boast of the things that reveal my weakness” (2 Cor 12:5). WOW! Talk about turning my perspective upside down.

    In chapter 12, God makes it clear that human weakness is the channel through which His strength flows.  “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is being made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor 12:9). By boasting in his weakness, Paul allowed the power of Christ to completely enfold him and dwell in him. I like the idea of the power of Christ enfolding and dwelling in me. After all, my strategy up to this point has been a complete failure, so why not! I’ve got nothing to lose.

    Paul’s attitude turns the cultural value of self-sufficiency, and if I am honest, my attitude, completely on its head. Being pleased with my weakness is like living in a foreign country. However, as I have pondered the last year, I have concluded that having my life turned upside down, has given me the correct perspective from which to understand the heart of these chapters.

    I have come to believe that humility and an honest evaluation and acknowledgement of my weakness opens the pathway for God’s strength to manifest perfectly in my life. Operating from human strength is NOT an asset. It is a devastating deterrent! It blocks God from manifesting His power on my behalf. Acknowledging my weakness is the ONLY path to His strength and the ONLY way through adversity to victory.

    Now that I understand that my choice is between my little raindrop of strength and His ocean of power, I will gladly drown in His power every time! If I have to die to self to be present with God, bring on the grave y’all! So, while I never want to go through a season like this EVER again, I am learning to sing the Lords song in a foreign land. I am learning to be;

    “well pleased with weakness, with insults, with distresses, with persecution and with difficulties for the sake of Christ; for when I am weak in human strength, then I am strong; truly able, truly powerful, truly drawing from God’s strength” (2 Cor. 12:10 AMP).  

    I now KNOW, in the depths of my soul, that a foundation based on anything except God’s strength is a false hope that leads to only to death, hell and destruction. If the price of a truly solid foundation is weakness, then let me be as weak as a new born babe!