Running With Patience

I want to run the race with vigor...

The above line from Andrew Peterson's song Let Me Sing, has never meant more to me than it has the past few weeks. I recently took up running again. I say again, not b/c I was ever an avid runner, but I would have spirts or seasons that I would 'run' to get in shape, though most of attempts were short lived. Well, when I started back a few weeks ago, let's say that my endurance level was slim to none. I could hardly jog a tenth of a mile without getting out of breath. It was discouraging and embarassing to say the least, but for some odd reason, I have stuck with it. I have patiently waited for my endurance to build, and I am happy to announce that this morning I ran 2 miles without stopping (not trying to brag b/c I know to many of you, thats a meager distance!) Now was I hurting afterwards??? A little, but the pain doesn't compare with the sense of knowing that I ran with endurance, though, I have to attest that there are many hills that I prayed myself up. It was the Lord giving me the strength!
Isn't our spiritual life in Christ like that, though? The writer of Hebrews exhorts us to 'run with patience'. Many of lifes 'trials' (hills) seem so steep that we aren't going to get through (up) them faithfully (without stopping), but it is the Holy Spirit in us that helps us perservere through those times, to press on toward the mark, and even to grow in our endurance.
The Lord has been teaching me alot lately about pressing on. I don't think it is ever something that a person masters, but isn't that, sorta the point? In pressing on, what we are really called to is to press in... press into/rely on HIM.

Let us run with endurance the race that God has set before us.
Hebrews 12:1b
NLT

Celebration Pics and Quotes

I wrote a 'Celebration Entry' for my blog after I got back from Celebration, but I wrote it at school and my connection went down in the middle of writing it. (dumb connection!) Anyway, I saved it onto my computer there but haven't been back to school (go figure) since. So maybe one of these days I will get to post it. :) Until then, Check out some of the quotes used in some of the messages:

A Woman's Beauty Regimen - Displaying a Gentle and Quiet Spirit
by Carolyn Mahaney

"A gentle and quiet spirit is an inner disposition of humble contentment and quiet tranquility rooted in an unwavering trust in God and His purpose."
–Jeff Purswell

"As for His failing you, never dream of it – hate the thought. The God who has been sufficient until now, should be trusted to the end."
–Charles Spurgeon
Morning and Evening

Sovereign Grace
by C.J. Mahaney

"To know that from eternity my Maker, foreseeing my sin, foreloved me and resolved to save me, though it would be at the cost of Calvary; to know that the divine Son was appointed from eternity to be my Savior, and that in love he became man for me and died for me and now lives to intercede for me and will one day come in person to take me home; to know that the Lord 'who loved me and gave himself for me' and who 'came and preached peace' to me through his messengers has by his Spirit raised me from spiritual death to life-giving union and communion with himself, and has promised to hold me fast and never let me go this is knowledge that brings overwhelming gratitude and joy."
–J.I. Packer

More Quotes...

Order the Main Session Messages HERE

Workin' 9 to 5

Well, I have been on 'summer' break for a little over a week now. I have wanted to get a summer job and pay off some bills, as well as, keep busy, but I hadn't 'hard core' pursued anything, yet. Well, I happen to be serving at church this past Sunday doing power point. My friend Brian B. was doing sound and we were 'small talking' about summer plans. It just so happens that he was interviewing people that very next day for a summer position at his company. He told me if I was interested, to go to Kelly Services, and that I did yesterday. Long story short.... I interviewed for the job today and start working at Wyeth in Ridgeway (Martinsville) tomorrow! God is so good in how he provides. I was at home this morning thinking, man, I have GOT to get a job b/c sitting around here is making me sleepy, it was within that hour that the Temp Agency called me for the interview. :)

Renovations

Started reading Renovation of the Heart by Dallas Willard. Some things that I thought were note-worthy and well stated:

The instrumentalities of Christian spiritual formation therefore involved much more than human effort and action under our control. Well-informed human effort certainly is indispensable, for spiritual formation is no passive process. But Christlikeness of the inner being is not a human attainment. It is, finally, a gift of grace.

Love, we hear, is patient and kind (I Cor. 13:4) Then we mistakenly try to BE loving by ACTING patiently and kindly - and quickly fail. We should always do the best we can in actions, of course, but little progress is to be made in that arena until we advance in love itself - the genuine inner readiness and longing to secure the good of others. Until we make significant progress there, our patience and kindness will be shallow and short-lived.

Change Me!

From Rock of Ages
Be of sin a double cure
Save from wrath and make me pure.
-Augustus Toplady