running challenge

Oh WOW what a great run morning it was!  Cloudy, cool, breezy.  After 2 runs in a row in heavy, oppressive, liquid, hot air this was freeeeeeeeeeeeeedom!  Love it. 


My small group is currently doing a book called "Made to Crave"...really good stuff.  It's not exactly the path that I've followed in my "letting God teach me to love my body" adventure, but I've found it to be really sound.  I'd recommend it, if you need something more structured than my "listen to God and just do what He tells you" method.  There's a ton of stuff from it I'd love to share here, but I'm blogging from home and the books are on my desk at work (I do the homework on my lunch break.)  


In what I read there yesterday, the author (Lysa) shares about the beginning of her running journey, as she struggled with her unfitness and unwillingness and just forcing herself to do it daily (oh BOY I remember that part of the journey!)...and then came the day that the Lord challenged her to lean into Him and run as far as she could without stopping.  She usually ran something like 2 miles; that day she ran nearly 9.  Her point is not that you can run a long way, but that in the places where we lean hard into Him, He makes it possible for us to do much, much more than we would ever dream we could.


Which is how I became a runner after a lifetime of despising "exercise."


And how I turned into the lady who can (and LOVES to) do a 50-mile bike ride, after years of calling my brother crazy for doing the same.  


I'm so grateful for the timing of that reading.  I'm behind on the reading schedule.  But that little challenge...run as far as you can while leaning on Me....hit me just at the right time.  I'm DYING to get out there and try it.  

Maybe this weekend will offer me that opportunity.