Are there any avid runners out there? Maybe those of you who are pounding a little extra pavement in this quarantine time? How about any fair-weather joggers? You are coming into your season! Or “oh-my-gosh, I’ve got to do somethin’” folks who are just needing to move their feet to help themselves embrace the truth of knowing they are still headed somewhere in these stay-at-home days? I have been all of ‘these’. Although the “oh-my-gosh” running days were the days when my children were three, one and newborn, because let’s be honest, those were indeed a similar set of quarantined days!
This morning provided the opportunity for me to go out and pound some pavement. I’m extremely cautious because of my past, and my triggers associated with jogging. On the occasion of heading out for a run I practice blessing my time before I start and accessing my body upon my return. My running days of the past were very much a coping mechanism and I probably danced the line of being addicted to “it.” While jogging can be beneficial it also can aid in deterioration. In my learning of this, and then following through with a spinal fusion a few years ago, I knew to not even entertain the idea of heading out until my body let me know I’d be okay. Not only that, I desired to stay acutely aware of my tendency to over do it. I knew getting to experience the joy of a jog again may insight the old drive in me (which wasn’t for me!) to run to achieve something. My new days enjoying this old gift are meant to be just that, a gift. I will remain grateful and I will lay it back down if and when I know to.
Back to this morning… I found myself saying out loud, “Jesus, I am breathing in Your peace, and I am breathing out Your love… I am breathing in Your peace and I am breathing out Your love.”* I said it over and over and over. As I said it I realized I was using it not only to let my heart remain free but it was producing a cadence. A cadence which is important while jogging. From my avid running days I know to use my breath as a gift. My breath should not sabotage my jog but because jogging is an intermittent exercise for me, it could, if I am not paying attention to it. As I am breathing in His peace, His calm, all through my nose, I then breathe out with such ease His love, through my mouth. In through my nose, His peace filling my lungs completely, out through my mouth, almost as a full sigh. This is a sigh of His goodness for letting me be out in His creation without pain in every stride, I am exhaling, sighing out His love.
As I continued I thought about how it was becoming slightly harder to breath in. Not the peace part, just the mechanics of breathing mid-run. I react to certain pollen so I have an ever so slight (thank you Jesus it’s not worse) congestion, causing my inhale to be a bit more challenging and because I am not running daily it’s just my lungs being tired. Matters not, for it’s still ever so important for me to keep my breath being ‘in through my nose and out through my mouth’ to keep sinkin’ side-stitches at bay. As my feet carried me on and on, I thought about how in years past there were times in my life when breathing in His peace, especially while enduring a longer than desired challenge, was harder. It was not that His peace wasn’t there, it was, but either my breathing was shallow because of the swirl of chaos in my days, or maybe, I had placed a mask (definitely relevant nowadays) over my nose and mouth. The mask I wore in my past was sewn with threads of lies meant to suffocate me. The threads were that of my beliefs, thoughts like: my days are supposed to be like “this,” my marriage is to be like “that,” my children like “this,” our house like “that” and all the ‘this’s’ and ‘that’s’ were not what was. Why do we let our breath become shallow and why do we put on self-suffocating masks? We know His peace is full and able to bring abundant life -- period. His peace and love are not circumstantial. There is NO “if I this,” or “if I that” which will bring a greater measure of His peace. It already IS. May we sit with this thought for a moment, and if you dare, join me in setting a 3 minute timer and let yourself breath in His peace and breathe out His love.
I also noticed if I wasn’t breathing in properly, I could not breathe out effectively. Again in a jog, total self-sabotage! I'm venturing to suggest the same is true with peace and love. If we do not breathe in His peace and let it fill us completely, we cannot breathe out His love. This was certainly true for my jog and since then every three seconds or so with each breath, I’m keenly aware of the gift of His constant and transformative peace available to me. It can fill me, if I let it. Then... by breathing in His peace the easy exhale of His love almost has to happen. I don’t know what breathing out His love could mean for you, for me I first let it be a gift to my soul and my relationship with Him meditating upon His forever presence then out of this abundant and felt truth, I am able and asking of Him to let my remaining breath be a gift to those around me.
May we live our days fully saturated with His peace and then be forever able to easily exhale His love, speak His love and even sing His love <3
*”Breathe in His peace and breathe out His love” were the perfect words an author friend of mine, Cara Murphy, spoke this past Wednesday after I had shared a previous experience in my life. Letting those words remain close to my heart has proven to be an ongoing gift, thank you Cara. We are currently participating in a weekly zoom session together with a few other precious friends to traverse through more of her beautiful words shared in her newly released book, The Inquisitive Christ. Through her study of Christ’s questions she skillfully offers each of her readers the potential for new life as they sit with her among His most powerful, shocking and endearing questions. I will gift a copy to the first person who requests it in the comments here on the blog and for the rest of you, do consider getting your own copy and let yourself be present with Jesus in a rich new way!