all things are new - revisited

Spiritual resource to share: fresh starts


Our backyard

Up here in the very northern hemisphere, the new year has been welcomed in with an abundance of snow. Conditions at my favorite cross-country ski park are listing it as "fluffy." This is another way to describe it as ideal. The beauty of the season, the crisp cold, the blanket of snow covering the upcoming spring, all this makes it an ideal backdrop to think ahead and prep for the year ahead. Here are four areas I feel are important for me:

Rest.
Although this seemed like a funny way to start off, I am intrigued with rest. It certainly is nourishing, and it is based on ( or rests on) a profound trust - that God is governing all: all systems and functions of the body, of organizations and of nations. "God rests in action" makes me think of my activity as productive, efficient. During yesterday's skiing, I constantly reminded myself to rest in each stride which helped me relax into the movement and release any tension. Resting in action brought more fluidity and grace.

Be alert.
Just so the "rest" part doesn't fall into sleep, I am adding alertness. Alertness is sharp, is keen insight and means we stay open to experience more of God's infinite goodness. We are engaged, a part of life - not mere by-standers.

Work.
Once we accept an idea of God (like goodness, abundance, companionship, and so on) as already present, we can then get to work at demonstrating it. You know, like once you have accepted that 4+6 is 10, then you can find all sorts of ways to work with that idea by managing finances, baking, figuring out the mileage to your cousin's, etc. Likewise once we accept that God is All-present and All-good, we can get to work at seeing this goodness everywhere. Working diligently, striving and patiently persisting just throws off the baggage of chatter and puts us in the honest, naked pursuit of demonstrating spiritual being.

Love.
Connection. Redemption. Celebration. I wholeheartedly agree with MBEddy's statement about Love: "What a word! I am in awe before it. Over what worlds on worlds it hath range and is sovereign! the underived, the incomparable, the infinite All of good, the alone God, is Love." Yep. Love is something I'll be exploring eternally. MBEddy goes on to say:

Love is not something put upon a shelf, to be taken down on rare occasions with sugar-tongs and laid on a rose-leaf. I make strong demands on love, call for active witnesses to prove it, and noble sacrifices and grand achievements as its results. Unless these appear, I cast aside the word as a sham and counterfeit, having no ring of the true metal. Love cannot be a mere abstraction, or goodness without activity and power. (from Miscellaneous Writings, p. 249)

Please feel free to share your ideas for renewal!


To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

a band of rowdy angels

Spiritual resource to share: victory

We are never alone when overcoming challenges.


I’ve written a number of times about my experiences with whitewater kayaking and stories with my kayaking buddies. One time, in particular, stands out. There was a big rapid under the bridge and we were all trying to surf the wave. The river was such that you could stand on the shores as well as be up by the bridge and watch all of the action. So when my friend's turn came to surf the wave, we were all cheering and encouraging her as loudly as we could. And once she caught the wave and surfed it, we all whooped and hollered!

When my turn came, it was the same thing. It was like we had our own crowd of rowdy angels cheering us on. Any trepidation I felt, any doubt as to my ability to actually have enough skill and balance to do this – and in front of all my friends - just vanished in the raucous joy of it all. The blatant denial of fear and anxiety, the blending with the awesome power of the river, the shared experience and triumphant satisfaction of accomplishment was just heady stuff.

It made me realize that anytime we are facing a challenge, we go through some sort of maze of doubt and fear that we learn to overcome by blending our thought with the power of God, Truth and Love. We are emboldened by the cheers, prayers (and testimonies of healing!) of others until finally, the limitation is broken and some supposed law of impossibility is shattered.  Then we stand as God’s own image and likeness – free, whole, and satisfied.

Whether it is a wave, or a rescue or a healing….. every challenge we undertake puts us on stage to demonstrate that all good is possible. Every challenge we overcome is met with joy and adds to the great momentum that good is possible, that imprisoning sorrow’s days are numbered and that a restoration to home and health is inevitable. We hasten on that day when we are no longer afraid that we can ever be separated from God, Love.

And this band of rowdy angels keeps cheering us on to greater demonstrations of God’s goodness and peace and provision.


 

good is not helpless

Spiritual resource to share: true power in organizations

These statements have persistently intrigued me: that good is not helpless; truth always triumphs and love never fails. The power behind these absolute statements forms the basis for their expression.

So - I have puzzled - how do you engage with organizations that seem to fall flat of ethical and noble goals? Who have told outward lies, blatantly disregarded laws? Quitting those organizations is one option. Staying with and trying to bring about change is another. Both responses to these moral dilemmas are difficult.

Once a group hired a non-professional musician who was earnest and consistent and, as one friend said, "he plays most of the right notes most of the time." This grateful and compassionate approach helped me to see how I could engage with other groups where I didn't always agree with how they operated. I could see the good that they do and work with that.

But this went deeper. This wasn't a Pollyanna approach.

I understand that good works are born of honesty, commitment, dedication and selflessness and are powerful. In fact, these are the only qualities that accomplish anything worth accomplishing!

Deeply understanding the fixed nature of good trumps the mesmeric and discouraging aspects of greed, selfishness and even criminal thought that would bring on apathy and a sense of hopelessness.

Understanding the nature of good also heightens our awareness of good so that we don't mistake well intentioned efforts incorrectly.

I realized that it doesn't matter how many people are involved in an organization or how many differing opinions arise in the operation of an organization. Good will prevail.

Tangled bureaucracy, rumor mills, gossip and lawlessness do not have an absolute or spiritual basis. They can't stand.

Like a blade of grass pushing up in a desert - Truth, Life and Love - all elements of good - are insistent. Truth slices away at the tons of conflicting opinions like sand dunes drifting back and forth. Love plants its roots deeply. Life continues to create and perpetuate Life.

I continue to apply these ideas to my own life, the smaller groups I belong to and those larger groups that are fighting genocide, are encouraging earth stewardship and global efforts toward peace.

A human organization with noble goals is working its purpose out as surely as I am understanding and fine-tuning my life purpose.

Compassion, patience and an absolute hold on the power of Truth continue to guide me and remove any baggage as surely as it is guiding each of those organizations that I am committed to. I found I need to be as patient and persistent with these groups as I hope others are with me.

This can only bear good fruit. Love never fails; Truth always triumphs; and good is never helpless.

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

celebrating Black History Month --- a story

Spiritual resource to share: spiritual identity

At the heart of an article about the heart of celebrating Black History Month, there is a story within a story in which two African-American men meet and talk that I wanted to share with you all. It is from spirituality.com. Enjoy!

While snacking on a boat ramp one day, we met someone I’ll call Mr. Wilson, a black man and grandfather from Texas. He was fishing and suggested I buy Ayoka (my daughter) a fishing rod because she looked so comfortable near the water. We struck up a conversation....

Mr. Wilson opened up about an experience when he was given a ticket by a white police officer who accused him of speeding during a heavy snow storm. He explained to me how difficult it would have been for anyone to speed in those weather conditions. When Mr. Wilson told the officer he didn’t have any money to pay for the ticket, he was put in jail.

I thought about how Mr. Wilson’s modest example echoed the plight of enslaved Africans and the subsequent institutionalization of racism in the US. Mr. Wilson had exemplified many wonderful spiritual qualities. We continued to talk for a while.

As we shook hands and parted, Mr. Wilson got in his truck and waved goodbye. He gave Ayoka and me a really big smile. As I waved goodbye to him, I was so moved by our conversation and how he’d expressed the promise he saw in my relationship with Ayoka. “Now that’s black history,” I thought.

And that’s when something clicked for me.

Mr. Wilson had exemplified many wonderful spiritual qualities resplendent in a child of God. He was warm, gracious, strong, wise, loving, eloquent, and persistent. These spiritual qualities shone forth stronger than the pain and humiliation of his speeding ticket incident.

It occurred to me that those same spiritual qualities Mr. Wilson expressed had been the very catalyst that had ended slavery and furthered a dialogue on civil rights that continues to heal and better our society.

“And that’s what we celebrate about black history,” I thought to myself— resilience, courage, poise, and progress despite seemingly insurmountable obstacles.

To read the article in its entirety, click here. Please feel free to share how you celebrate this month in the comments section!


Photo by J.Falls
copyright All rights reserved
Anyone can see this photo

those things that never change

Spiritual resource to share: constancy





I have just read a thoughtful article “Oldest Holocaust survivor tells a story of faith and courage that's out of the ordinary.” It’s about Leopold Engleitner, considered the oldest Holocaust survivor today. His recent appearance at the Frankfurt International Book Fair brought further attention to the life of an ordinary man made extraordinary under extreme conditions.

The one constant throughout his life, whether it was making skiis, being a farmer, or living in a concentration camp, was his love for God and his love for honesty and goodness.

“Darkness cannot put out the Light. It can only make God brighter” wrote an unknown author. And this was the case for Leopold. Many of us will never experience the extreme conditions that he did. But his experience showed me how important it is to nurture those elements of love that he did throughout his life: to love one’s work, to care for the details, to stand up for honesty, to have integrity, to do good things.

Each of life’s experiences will draw out from us our reservoir of spiritual qualities whose source is God. Those spiritual qualities make up who we are. They are changeless. And whether we have a high profile life whose actions will impact many or have a quiet life with more modest aims, we can always base our actions on this reservoir of spiritual qualities. And it is our practice of these spiritual qualities that makes us ready and able to meet any of life’s challenges, however big or small.







To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

Rise up!

Spiritual resource to share: a higher hope

Hope. Change. Freedom. It is not surprising in an election year how powerful these words are……and how often they are used.

But these words can be used to generate fear and division and ridicule as much as they bring out the most cherished human ideals. So how to sort through the emotions on the human scene in this campaign season in the US - full of news headlines of division and lack and fear?

We rise up - letting our thought rise to the level of what is spiritual. Then we see that there is a spiritual basis for hope, for change and for freedom.

MBEddy writes under the heading of “Higher hope:”

The human mind will sometime rise above all material and physical sense, exchanging it for spiritual perception, and exchanging human concepts for the divine consciousness. Then man will recognize his God-given dominion and being.

Check out this article that explains more about a spiritual basis for hope in "The power of resurrection brings hope" from spirituality.com.






To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

being strong and beautiful

Spiritual resource to share: new views of strength and beauty

Taew performing traditional Thai dance at international youth conference

As one of the host parents to our newest daughter, Taew from Thailand, I have been amazed and inspired at how much our new daughter has taken on. The more I talk with her, the more I realize the vast differences in cultures that she has bridged, and just how courageous she is!

I've been inspired while seeing how wonderful it is to blend our lives with those whose cultures have previously been unfamiliar to us. The bottom line of what is learned may seem trite, but it is true. We are one universal family - incredibly diverse, but each one of us expressing qualities that are universally beautiful and strong.

Just today, we had a wonderful example of this! Taew ran in her first track meet ever. Prior to the meet we talked about the beauty of women also being expressed in strength.

Taew wasn't very familiar with girls in sports. She claimed that she was not an athlete (which her track coach readily confirmed), and she spent most of track season on the sidelines, not wanting to get too involved for fear that she wasn't good enough. When she told her mother that she was doing this, her mother was concerned because it might mean that she would become more muscular and turn darker in the sun. (Paleness is preferable to the sun kissed faces here.)

Perhaps it is the whole ideal of beauty here that is different than in Thailand, or the whole expectation of what girls can or should do that was so different. She told us how she almost cried when the coach said that she was going to do the 400 meter run. But, she said emphatically, "My coach told me 'Yes, you can do this!'" And so she did. She went on to say that she got second in two races and last on the 400. And although her overall showed her more at the bottom than at the top, she just beamed and laughed when telling me this.

This was a huge step for Taew. She just soaked up the confidence her track coach had in her, the camaraderie of other girls cheering her on, and her own personal victory in doing something she never thought she would ever do!

Taew was able to experience a little more of her strength and her power. She was so happy, exhilarated even, that she proved she can do things WAY out of her comfort zone, and proved to herself that strength can be a very beautiful thing!

The inspiration is obvious. We can go beyond our accepted definitions of beauty and strength that we are comfortable with, and push to new heights: a more spiritual and lasting idea of what it means to be the infinite expression of an infinite Mind*. Taew rocks.

*Immortal man was and is God's image or idea, even the infinite expression of infinite Mind, and immortal man is coexistent and coeternal with that Mind.







To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

making self-righteousness be still

Spiritual resource to share: releasing the heart

This is a tricky one. Self-righteousness can be such a tangled mess. But getting out of that mess is such a JOY!

It sometimes starts like this: I have a question about the rightness of an activity - usually it is the rightness of someone else's activity. I pray about it and come up with a conclusion that seems reasonable. I start studying and find all kinds of quotes and rules that support my view.
I make my stand. There is a subtle (or sometimes blatant) sense that others' behaviours need to change. I come to feel that by making this stand I am doing the only right thing. And that, if I don't make this stand, the world would be compromised.

So what is wrong with this picture? There is no God in this picture - except as a back up to justify my pre-conceived right way to do things! There is no humility, listening, dropping all sense of self, and willingness to change. This picture hides the unspoken fears, the pride of position and prejudices. Somehow it feeds the small ego into thinking that it is very important to be the one who can right this wrong. It also suggests that by restricting or controlling the behaviours of others, we are doing the right thing.

Here are some ideas have come to my rescue when I have struggled with this: "...humility... is the genius of Christian Science (Miscellaneous Writings by Mary Baker Eddy). Cast the beam out of one's own eye. (See Luke 6.) Let go (of ego) and let God. All of these ideas have helped me break the back of self-righteousness from time to time.

I once worked in a traveling performing group. Our schedule was tight with a show in a different city almost every night. The five of us were together 24/7. When little tensions would flare up, we dealt with them fleetingly, but enough so that we could get back to work. Finally at one point, the tension and pressure of the performance schedule fueled with self-righteousness and a growing frustration led to one very alert member to call for a time out.

What happened next was lovely. After one of our shows, we all met in the back of our traveling RV. We all agreed that we needed to talk.

We first established that we loved each other and that we appreciated each other. This was a surprising and delightful thing to do! It helped to disarm any self-righteousness any of us may have felt. We kept it up until we felt that we firmly had a foundation of love, trust and respect.

We openly talked about our hopes and our motive to make our whole adventure a blessing to others and a support to each another. Even though we all understood what the mission and purpose of our adventure was when we signed up, we needed to re-fresh that and affirm what we were all about and what noble goals we had hoped to achieve. It was in this atmosphere of a unified purpose that we could go forward.

It was only then that we brought up some things that were a concern to us. Then and only then could we go into removing what were becoming increasingly heavy burdens to our work. Being sure to not accuse anyone of wrongdoing, we were able to impersonalize the errant actions and re-establish our trust of one another. Then we each stated individually how certain actions made us feel.

Gone was the sense that if a person felt a concern about something, then they obviously didn't know enough about God! (Doesn't that even sound silly?) Gone was the sense that one person had to carry the whole group. (Whew!) And what was revealed was a sweet kindness that we had always had toward one another, but had been temporarily buried under the pressure of the schedule, misunderstandings and hurt feelings.

The tour went on very successfully. But even more so, I walked away with a major lesson on how to make self-righteousness be still. It is that can be constantly fine-tuned!








To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

Taking in the bigger picture

Spiritual resource to share: the inevitable progress of God's creation

The impossible is possible. This is the theme of one of the many short talks presented at the TED conference. [This annual conference "brings together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes)]. "

In a remarkably animated and clear argument, Hans Ronslings takes the issue of poverty on - proving that there has been steady progress in the alleviation of poverty. How does he do this? Simply, he gives his consent that what was thought impossible is possible and then he shows us what has been possible by taking us into a bigger picture of what has been happening. (Click on the screen to load video.)




It's an encouraging and thought provoking disussion.

I have found that giving my consent to the infinite possibilities of God and looking at the bigger picture have also brought - not only enouragement and inspired thought, but inspired action.

For example, on a much smaller but equally important scale, a friend was struggling with anxiety. As we talked, it was evident that there was something more going on. The bigger picture was that there was a deep hunger for growth in grace. Recognizing this higher view, we could give our consent to the biblical promise that says: "Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled." This hopeful view replaced the anxiety with the expectation of good.

I think it is all about the ultimate big picture: seeing ourselves as God sees us. And in this light, we can see all sorts of possibilities for good and for healing, not only in our own lives, but in our communities and our world.


Fr more information about Hans Ronslings, visit ted.com

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

The Wilderness Experience

Spiritual resource to share: horizon-opening experiences

Today, I want to talk about the wilderness experience and how outright refreshing it can be.

I have had numerous wilderness experiences, both literally and figuratively. (You have had these too, as you will recognize further on down the blog).

My literal wilderness experiences have included those moments on mountains, whitewater rivers or lakes in the middle of nowhere. Experiencing the stillness and beauty of the northern lights, howling winds at high altitudes and whitewater stair cases have shaped me and have strengthened and inspired me.

There are always two sub-types of experiences in a wilderness experience and MBEddy captures them perfectly in her definition of Wilderness:

WILDERNESS. Loneliness; doubt; darkness. Spontaneity of thought and idea; the vestibule in which a material sense of things disappears, and spiritual sense unfolds the great facts of existence.

There is the first experience of loneliness, doubt or darkness. You feel separated from good, you don't believe you an accomplish anything, or the absence of light feels a little more real than light itself.

But, seeing through that experience, there is then this second experience of spontaneity - even playfulness with the universe! The material, limited sense of life falls away to reveal startling beauty, or a purifying rush of clean - of new beginnings and fresh starts, or an altitude of thought that makes all of the tediousness of human strife look, well, tedious and small and inconsequential in the light of the magnaminous nature of creation and its Creator.

This has been played out in my life like so:

• Doubting my ability to run a whitewater rapid in a kayak, and then doing it, resulted in the thrill of dominon over fear and humble awe of the ability to play with a power so beautiful.
• Being fearful of an impending storm on a mountaintop, but then overcoming that morphed into being a part of an amazing rescue effort that resulted in everyone's safety, and increased camraderie and joy!
• Feeling very isolated from civilation and from our base camp while paddling across a huge lake with my husband when strong winds came down on us against the direction we needed to take. We persisted, shouted out enouragement to each other, and kept going, not letting up one second lest we lose more ground as we made our way, inch by inch to our base camp across the wide lake. And we did it! We were exhausted, happy ...and safe.

But it has also played out for me in my more unconventional wilderness experiences, where I felt I was alone, abandoned or too down on myself: like when I was alone in a foreign country for the first time, or starting a new job, struggling with a persistent challenge, or recovering after a traumatic situation.

In each of these experiences, I had to walk through that illusionary wall of self-doubt, fear, and loneliness to see that there is an answer. Some "great fact of existence" was there reminding me that good is not helpless, that God's ideas cannot exist alone or that there are infinite resources that God has with which to bless mankind.

So what does this mean for you all? You probably recognize a wilderness experience or two that you yourself have encountered. Or maybe you are in right now. I hope you can take heart, that the material, limited sense of things - or those suggestions that you are separated from good - are not based on God's reality. These things have a short shelf-life. They will fall away.

Open yourself up to the spontaneity of God's infinite goodness. Start with one fact based on God's love, goodness and abundance. Opening that door will lead you into blessings, healing and peace. And your wilderness experience will "blossom like the rose!*"

Some fav quotes to leave you with:

* The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. -Isaiah 35

As long as there are young people with the light of adventure in their eyes, or a touch of wildness in their souls, rapids will be run. -Sigurd Olson

Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul. -John Muir

Keep close to Nature's heart...and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean. -John Muir





Top photo by Gabe Korinek - copyright 2006

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

the confidence of Christ

Spiritual resource to share: serenity

I am so very impressed with the story of Jesus raising Lazarus. (Click here to read this story.) This account, in particular, was one of his last acts and is instructive in the way he overcame numerous obstacles in order to raise Lazarus. Some of these obstacles were:

• Jesus' dearly loved friends (Martha and Mary) were grieved and burdened by Lazarus' death
• the misunderstanding and disbelief of the resurrection and its practical possibility now
• the Jewish thought at that time said a person dead for more than three days was beyond resuscitation
• the growing hostility from Jerusalem's leadership
• the crowds of people standing by including professional mourners and others who probably generally did not believe that a resurrection was possible.

And what did Jesus do when he got to the gravesite? He gave thanks - not for God's sake, but for the people around him, so that they might believe.

When reading of accounts like these, I like to juxtapose another verse from the Bible from Philippians 2:5 "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus" and consider what Jesus was seeing and feeling at that moment? Jesus must have felt profoundly the ultimate confidence in God as life, the certainty of his mission and unquestioned expectation that God's will is done.

Bible stories like these give me time to ponder the promise that we, too, can feel God's presence and feel a confidence that comes from the proof that God's guidance and love are a tangible force in our lives.

Resurrection is a present possibility. Whether we are dealing with confusing relationships, a lack of direction in our lives, oppressive poltical situations, doubt, terminal illness, death, or simply feel we can't get our own footing in the noise of materialism today, we can look to Christ Jesus' example and draw from his confidence in God. Even if we can take a small step in that direction, we can make progress and see more light day by day by day.

All the mornings of the World by Sonja Maneri. Click on art to go to her website.




To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

Loving those uphill climbs!

Spiritual resource to share: persistence

(updated!)

Thank you everyone for the inspiring ideas you shared in the last couple of blogs! I prayed with and sung each one of them while racing the Birkebeiner last Saturday!

A little background on the day:
The weather conditions were not good. At all. There were rumours that the whole race would be called off. Limited snowbase and warm weather created both dry and icy patches. What resulted was that the race officials decided to cut down the length of the major race from 50k to 23k; the Kortolopet from 23k to 18k and my run, the Prince Haakun run, from 12k to 7 k. One of the elite men's racers, Mike Manley of Milwaukee, had skiied the course the day before and shared that it was dangerous in spots due to the sheer ice. Many of the top competitive skiiers decided not to race - due to the race being shortened and that only the top tier of racers would be timed.

I was going to race with my friend Janet and her friend Mary. We talked about what we should do. We knew our motive was to challenge ourselves, have fun, and just be surrounded by the joy of skiing and being out in the snow and the forests. This was our first time doing the Birkie, but I couldn't see coming here to just do 7k. So I decided to join my friends and do the Kortolopet which was now 18k, instead of the Prince Haakun run, which was now 7k.

Up to that point, I had only gone 11-12k at any one stretch. That morning at breakfast with my son and friends, about an hour before we were to start, I seriously started to doubt the wisdom of this whole idea.

• We were all new at this.
• I never did 18k at one stretch.
• Conditions were far from ideal.
• Everyone else looked Nordic, in top form and looked like they had been doing this for years..

So what turned it around?

• I knew our motive was good.
• I knew I had incredible support. The ideas many of you shared, combined with the fellowship of the women I was with, encouragement from my son, and the knowledge that with God, all things are possible moved me forward.
• We were prepared physically and metaphysically.
• I prayed and it felt right to go ahead. That doesn't mean I wasn't nervous, but I knew I could overcome whatever challenges I would meet.
• I have had some amazing life experiences and every time I have turned to God, these experiences have taught me more and more about God's goodness and love.
• I love opportunities where I get to learn more about God's goodness and love.

And so we began. Because the course wasn't being timed, people were welcome to put transponders which would track that we started and ended ( thus we have a record that we actually did the race), but people could start any time they wanted. So my very experienced son and I and my two friends all started together. I can honestly say that my son and I raced together, even though it was only a nanosecond. He finished in one hour and 45 minutes. We three finished just short of four hours and were the second to the last group to finish. And we finished just as they were taking down the finish line sign.

This didn't phase us at all ! We were ecstastic! When we were 100 yards to the finish line, the three of lined up side by side, held hands and crossed the finish line together! Our names were called out on the loudspeaker as we approached. People cheered! Because it was our first time, we were given medals. We were laughing out loud, people were clapping and congratulating us!

There is nothing like facing a challenge, persisting and overcoming obstacles. God's inspiration, the love of fellowship and pure joy move us forward to seeing new views of ourselves, each other ...and of God's majesty. What could be better!




To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.