The Last Six Miles -- Again

After eighteen weeks of training and 26.2 grueling miles of the race last Saturday, the marathon was over.  The next morning worshiping at Fellowship Memphis church, I could feel my phone buzzing in my pocket.  There were missed calls from two of my brothers.  Not even twenty-four hours after the race, I found myself in yet another marathon, faced with a situation beyond my strength.  My vulnerable 89-year-old father in Florida was in a crisis situation. “Get down here now,” one of my brothers said with desperation in his voice.  I was on a plane the next morning.  “Please pray,” I texted several friends.  “I am headed into a storm.”  I  did not know how to handle the emergency, nor did I want to.  There was a confrontation coming closer by the minute, my strength had made a fast exit, and I was sorely lacking in wisdom.  “Help me,” I prayed out loud.

Down in Florida on my brother’s pullout couch, I lay awake all night, tossing and turning, going over and over in my mind what had happened, what I was going to say, and what I needed to do, as if I was writing the dialog of a screenplay on steroids.  Finally just before 4 am, I turned on the light and read my Bible, grasping in both hands the verses that God revealed to me.  Now almost dawn and needing to get up in just over an hour, I turned off the light, prepared to remain awake and meditate on what I had just read.  Immediately, I sunk into sleep – equipped, assured and covered.

“It is I who answer and look after you.  I am like an evergreen cypress, from Me comes your fruit.”  Hosea 14.8

The next few days were tough, no question about it.  I was scared to death.  God led me right up to the edge and back again.  But it seemed strangely familiar.  And I recognized that I was running the last six miles again when my strength was not my own, so far beyond what I could do on my own steam.  That was right where God wanted me to be, so that I would rely on Him.  It was exactly what I faced in the race, and I was thankful that reliance was still so fresh in my heart.  I had no idea what God would do.   I just needed to follow Him into it.

Looks like the training wasn’t just about the race after all.