Pushing Forward

When I got home from camp, I knew I had less than eight weeks to train for my next half marathon. When I signed up for it in May, I thought it would be fine. But after not running for three months, I felt so stupid for signing up to run 13.1 miles in October. I told myself that I had to get up and train, even if I was tired and even if it was hard. The first three weeks back were awful. Two miles felt like 20 and I thought there was no way I'm going to survive this race. What was I thinking?! With the heat I was worried about when I would train..besides 5am..and tried to get myself to spend as much time on the treadmill as I could, but that was miserable. Surviving running for 30 minutes was a huge victory in my book. Being able to run three miles without stopping felt like a little goal but one that was difficult to reach. As the days passed I prayed and prayed asking God to give me strength and endurance to run for his glory. The last three weeks seemed more difficult than actually running my last half marathon but I told myself to keep pushing forward. You can do this. You will build up to more miles. Baby steps. Small victories. This last Saturday, I ran 6 miles. And it felt SO great!!! While it's not quite half the distance of what I will be running on October 13, I felt so much better after getting over the huge mental block that was standing in the way of me being able to increase my milage. I have learned what I mental game running is!
The last few days I've been thinking about running and how it has changed my life and how God has used it to teach me so much. Sometimes our faith and relationship with God is like the first few weeks of training for a race and you feel like there is no way I'm going to get through this or survive what I'm facing. But when we rely on God for our strength and trust him with all our hearts (even to help us survive those little runs), he will not fail us. He is constant and unchanging when we are a mess. Praise Christ!
Over the summer at camp, our staff theme was "Great call, GREATER GOD." This is something the Lord is continuing to teach me, even after the summer. Our. God. Is. GREATER. Than everything!!! God has placed a great call on my life to run for his glory. While this is a great call, I know I have a GREATER GOD who is by my side every step, every mile, every run, giving me the strength to finish. I have a God who is greater than losing sleep, squeezing everything into my schedule, and a God who is greater than the hills (physically and metaphorically!) that I face. As I continue to train for my race, I am relying on the strength of my GREATER GOD.