I'm Gonna Need a New Pair of Shoes

This post will be less bloggy and more contemplative than most as I have had lots of "thinking" time this week while waiting for tantrums to subside or sitting in complete silence  hoping to calm my very agitated son. Damn medication...damn Angelman Syndrome....damn, damn, damn it all.

In one of my moments of silence I finished reading a book by Carolyn Custis  James, When Life and Beliefs Collide.  I have read several of her books and highly recommend all of them.

This particular book speaks to the individual paths we are all on.  A path that has been chosen and mapped out just for us. 

 

...And let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 

fixing our eyes on Jesus...

Hebrews 12 1-2

She states, " God has planned our race....Nothing - not principalities or powers, not the devil himself, not even we-can throw God  off his plan or prevent him from accomplishing his good purposes for us.  We run a planned race."

She also reminds us that God only has one plan...there is no Plan B for all of us there is only Plan A. 

Ironically, I read this part on the El from O'Hare airport on my way to my daughter's apartment.  I sat staring out the window as I tried to absorb the meaning and make some sense of it in my own life.  At the next stop a woman boarded the train and sat across from me.  Her clothes were torn, filthy and several sizes too small as were her shoes and God bless her she smelled horrible.  If that was not bad enough she was picking "things" out of her hair and throwing the "things"  on the floor all while having a conversation with someone only she could see.

As I sat observing her, my thoughts shifted from my own self analysis to her circumstances and I attempted to reconcile this woman's pitiful existence with what I had just read.  I could not then, or even now months later, even begin to formulate any kind of rational connection between my loving God and this poor lost soul sitting across from me. 

How could this be the race that God has planned just for her?

I could see the looks of disgust on the faces of those around her, not on every face, but certainly on most.  She was running her race and I was running mine and for some reason as part of God's plan A our routes intersected for about fifteen minutes on a specific Tuesday afternoon in September.  I have said many times before that I believe God places people in our paths at a particular time and place.  They are there for a very specific reason.  

I think of her often and wonder why our paths crossed that day.

Perhaps, I needed to be reminded that each person's race is not easier or harder than mine. 

Perhaps I needed to be reminded that even though my race is long and it is arduous that I have my husband, my children, my family and my friends to hold my hand and encourage me when I can't seem to take another step.

Perhaps I needed to feel a deep compassion for someone else's race in order to see my own race more clearly.

Perhaps I needed to remember this woman and her circumstances on terrible day like today...a day that is ending with me holding an ice pack on my bruised nose because I foolishly thought I could comfort my usually sweet boy as he battled the effects of his medication.

Perhaps these are all very shaky hypotheses. 

I am positive that this race I am running is not a sprint...it is a marathon and I don't know if I will ever see the end or cross the finish line, but I do know this for certain...

I'm gonna need a new pair of shoes!

I am a runner.

I run in rain or shine.

Night or darkness.

I run until I cry, collapse, or until I feel like I cannot go on.

And then I run another mile.

Because I am a runner.

I am unstoppable, unbeatable, untouchable.

(I don't know who wrote this but it seemed fitting)