Training for Ironman Texas 2022 - Weeks 12 and 13 - Holiday Hanging On

 Last week was Christmas week and it was a food orgy of sorts.  Trying to train some though all the bad food choices, reaffirmed how important daily nutrition is to sustaining a training program like this.  Week like the one past make me wonder is I am ironman material at all.  

This week I go on with a little more resolve.  Momentum is hard to come back. "A body at rest tends to stay at rest," and so getting this rocket ship off the ground is going to take a lot of personal and physical energy.  This week will more or less determine whether I go on with this or not. If I can't pull myself together and push myself through this, then I don't need to play "let's pretend" that I am an ironman.  

Of course, I have prayed about and I am hoping to hear back in the form of increased motivation and discipline and purpose.  I am hoping that is the case but if it isn't I can do that too.  

So, off to the trainer to get part of my planned workouts done.  God help me.

Ironman Texas 11th Week Training - As If It Were My Last Christmas

 Christmas is upon us, and training is muddling through all the interruptions.  But Christmas is important too.  I think of all of those in my life that have passed and how it would be nice to have just one more Christmas with them. Things would be different.  I would be different, I believe.  

If there is one thing that endurance sports have taught me is not to take the life for granted.  Don't take your fitness for granted. Every workout won't be great.  Appreciate it when they are, like appreciating the people you love in your life while we are here together in this life. 

When all this is over, no matter how this ironman thing fleshes out, I will still want those I love to be in close in my life.  And so, I muddle thankfully through my training and grateful for relationships and the spirit of this season.  I want to take it in deep, as if it were my last Christmas and let it resonate within me and be thankful to God for these people and these moments. 

Ironman Texas 2022 Training - 10th Week - Age 78 - Enjoying Absurd Hope

 Yesterday I turned 78.  It was a wonderful birthday in which I was treated like a fat old, spoiled king.  It was really nice.  However, it was a mountaintop, and the air is too rare to live there.   But the message of love and caring in the experience gives me more impetus to train though I am not sure why.  Yesterday I did some mountain bike riding with a brick run thrown in.  I did an hour hard indoor riding session and felt so great.  These are great times with the birthday, the holidays, and yes, the training.  

I am so blessed to have this absurd hope that at 78 I can do the training and I can finish the event.  Crazy thinking.  But at 78 there is so much less to lose.  Age related disability is chasing hard and gaining on me.  And fail or not, praise God, I can still try and have a sliver of a chance to succeed.  Happy Birthday to me.  I am truly blessed.

Ironman Texas 2022 - 10th week -

 Somehow I am surviving.  It's like the marathon I ran in cold rain once:  just keep moving forward.  You don't have to see too far forward, just keep going forward.  And of course, the biggest stumbling block on my path the Ironman Texas is that old nemesis: ME.  I am the one giving in to the temptations to slow or stop, to get turned aside.  I am the one who dreams up every excuse to avoid extreme effort.  I am the one blaming others for slowing my progress down.  I am the one.  "We have met the enemy and he is us." 

Last week was the best in total hours and workout qualitiy so far on  this journey.  For what overcoming I did to get there; thank you God.  For the good attitude that vibrates my being this morning: thank you God. 

And so, I move on. It is a slow start this morning.  Gave in to the temptation to revel in last week's sucess too long. Not it is time to get moving again into the experience of another week on the journey. 

Ironman Texas 2022 Training - Week # 9 - Age 78 - Another Attempt to Ice Skate

 Traction is hard to maintain with training as the holidays come upon us. Another holiday in the middle of all this - if you want to call it a holiday - is my birthday.  I will be 78.  As I train, I try not to think about being 78.  It scares me.  78 is too old to be training for and attempting an event of this length and difficulty.  The head-in-the-sand approach has been used with some success in avoiding  scaring myself off this ironman thing entirely. Ignore it and maybe it will go away.  , It's all I got.

There have been times I sucked it  up and  really faced this age thing. and look at it for what it really is.  It is always the same;  it is crazy to do this at this age.  Then, I just want to slack back and do sprints and such and age gracefully. 

However, I have never been all that graceful in much of anything I have ever done.  No reason to think I could age gracefully.  I tried to ice skate once and fell so often and cut myself up with the blades in doing so, that I bled all over the ice.  The owner/manager asked me to please leave.  

Is trying to grow old gracefully another  attempt to ice skate? 

Ok, enough of reality.  I don't want to talk about it any more.  Like a line from a song from somewhere, "when it's scary, don't look down."  The only time I should look down in going for this ironman insanity, is when I go to put my head back in the sand.

Ironman Texas Week # 8 - Thanksgiving

 There seems to be a pull toward nothingness in my training.  Yes, I am well aware that I live  in a motivational wasteland for things like endurance sports, but I have always seemed to do the "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" thing, and find enough inside to keep moving, eventually.  Eventually, is what I am hoping for.   I have read ironman stuff, seen motivation Ironman videos with all the rah-rah, and still nothing.  I am passing through a dead zone in my ironman quest.  What is surprising though is that when I do train, I find I am really doing well at it.  Strange things, we humans are.  

Perhaps with two months of this under my belt, it is God's way of making me relax and let it happen, stress less and enjoy this journey.  There may never be another for me at age 78.  

This week is Thanksgiving and I have so much be thankful for.  May I indeed relax, praise God for all He has made of me, and all He has done for me.

Ironman Texas Week #7- Pulse Quickeners

 The weeks are passing so quickly.  There has been a rhythm regained that I am so happy about.  This ironman training journey is yet again, a journey of self-discovery.  We booked hotel reservations today.  The race is sold out and though the even is six months off, my pulse quickens.  I am so blessed to have pulse quickeners in my life. So blessed to have something so important.  And I wonder does everyone have their pulse quickeners?  Or, am I among the blessed?  

Regardless, I am happy tonight with my training and happy with myself.  Tonight is a good place but I am sure that something is out there seeing all this and planning a train wreck for me.  

Maybe so but my cup runneth over tonight and no matter what happens I know I have been blessed.

Ironman Texas 2022 - Week # 6 - Determined

 I have determined to be more determined in my pursuit of Ironman Texas.  There are too many miles behind me to fear and dread the miles ahead of me.   The pandemic restrictions have sapped some spirit that I want back.  It is either quit this altogether or put myself altogether in it.  No more of the half-hearted, well maybe stuff.  

I made that  determination was made but first thing Monday morning the devil came after me.  It  was a wetsuit swim in a pool that they keep at 70 degrees.  This was my first wetsuit swim in a while and the first laps right away felt uncomfortable in the wetsuit.  My face and neck were getting cold. I was alone in the pool so I was just swimming round and round, simulating an open water swim. This is stupid, I thought.  The whole ironman thing is stupid.  Let's get out of this stupid wetsuit and go home where I can do something more meaningful, like watching the television or chatting on Facebook. 

Right.  That would be stupid waste of the gift of health and opportunity that God has provided.  "Not everyone has a chance to live like this." And, many that do, don't and won't.  And at my age, I often think about how I want to leave things.  My mission statement says, " I want to leave a legacy others will feel lead to emulate and God will be proud of."  So again I determined not to live like those that don't and won't and live like one who can and will try. I determined again to be  one out to leave such that legacy "others will feel lead to emulate and God will be proud of.  

I pushed on through the doldrums of can't until things began to more more smoothly and relaxed.  It turned out to be  a great swim. Something happened on that swim.  I determined to renew my commitment and live bravely again, hang the risk and the cost.

Ironman Texas 2022 Week #5 - The Beauty of Each Day

 Taking a sort of rest day. Had my first cramps in a while last night and have residual soreness in more than a few spots.  I think it might be the more intensive work on the indoor trainer, but who knows.  It could also be  that I am just too old and beat up for all this.  Word on the street says this is a big bite for an old man.  Last night I read that men 75-79 comprise only .7 percent of ironman participants.  I could say I am one in a hundred but it is less than that really. But, until I stop and find a reason to feel sorry for myself I really don't think that much about how old I am or my slim chances of getting through.  When it scary I just don't look down if at all possible.  Worrying about what's coming after me would only lessen the beauty of the present moment.  What is to lose that won't be lost eventually anyway? Why not be quite different?

The child in me is still  giggly at the prospect of actually finishing Ironman Texas 2022, and I am into protecting children from the world. In this case I protect myself as best I can by keeping my head in the sand about my age. This is my fifth week at this and I am still standing, "haunting the outskirts of my time," moving forward, however slowly and painfully with the beauty of each  day being enough. The hope that is freshened and inspired by this  morning time of my journey is God's adventure for me. 

IROMAN TEXAS 2022 TRAINING WEEK #5 Getting Lost

 Company here and so many distractions that the training for the fifth week was not that great.  There was a 60 mile bike ride with a 2 mile brick run following and later in the week a 2 hour run, but the passion seems subdued, in danger of more disruption from whatever personal wind might blow.  

This is ironman training at its best.  This is where its made or broken in the harder personal challenges that come against us;  to have to reach down and declare who and what you are about. Today I feel somewhat angry with myself and want to reaffirm not to let my calling down again. God help me to keep that promise.  God help me to live out my promise to Him, myself, and my wife to do my very best.  That hasn't happened yet, but I am determined to make it so.

I am tired of getting lost in the mire of everyday life issues to the extent that I lose sight of the journey I am on and what I am doing it for.  God help me to see the bigger picture of where this is leading and find my way to the whatever finish line He has in store.   Amen.

Ironman Texas 2022 Training Week #4 - Stagger Mode

 After a fairly good week, my training and personal momentum appear to  be in stagger mode.  Company is coming for several days and other family and personal stuff going on will  take me aside from myself.  My training is like a boat in the rapids that has gotten off course and it will be  a chore to get the vessel pointed in the right direction again.  After the next seven days are over, I think my craft will be in calmer waters and I can possibly move on down the river on my journey in the direction of my dreams

At the same time, it is not a good thing to wish it to be next week. That is, to wish pieces of your life away seems to be refusing the gift.  It would seem that all moments are worthy of living well in.  Not to do so might be seen as ungrateful for the moments God has given us, that we should wish them away; refusing the gift of the moment.   

The October Ironman Texas talk has me all excited and looking forward and I am so thankful for that.  So stagger mode or not, I am still moving forward this week, doing what training I can and thanking God for the time, the health, and the opportunity. Even in stagger mode, I am truly blessed.

Ironman Texas 2022 Training Week #3 - Sunday Morning - The Hope Within Me

 This training week is about over and it has been a good one.  The problem might be that it is I may be getting ahead of itself.  I don't want to be overcooked already in December for an event in April.  This coming week #4 is full of family obligations which should slow me down some.  So even an interruption may be good.  Getting started back may take some inertia overcoming though. "A body at rest tends to stay at rest."  

Yesterday was Ironman Texas 2021.  It was a lightly attended event probably for several reasons but at least they got it in.  That leaves me hopeful that the 2022 event has a good chance of coming to fruition.  It was exciting to share all the pre and post race excitement with the participants on the Facebook group and it left me hopeful for that same excitement in a bit over 6 months.

My test is to try to not get all heady and pumped up and put God off His front and center onto a back burner somewhere to be called if needed.  I need Him front and center whether I realize it at the time or not. The need is still there.  Of course, this is too big for me at age 78 to get through by myself.  I must take care always to realize what desperate straits I am in and not be led to believe otherwise by the glitz and excitement that is so much fun.  

This is all good and I can't wait to get back to the schedule after this coming week is over.  Thank you God for the Hope within me.

Ironman Texas Training Week #3 - Rocky Road

 Seems like every ironman venture gets to this spot in training and the dogs of war come out after me.  Lots of personal things that had to be taken care of have arisen, leaving me off my nutrition, behind on my schedule and a little exasperated.   Now, it is a chore to gather myself back up and make another effort forward on this journey.  This is where it is at: the real challenge is the day-to-day, in my opinion.  The event is full of inspiration and motivation to keep going as long as you possibly can, but the day-to-day, suffered out alone, for me is the biggest challenge of all:  the will to go on when you just are at your end before it even begins. 

My team is behind in this game and it is going to take a long drive to get it team rolling toward the goal line.  The saying that God will bring you through what He brought you to. I do hope He wants me to go on through,  because I really think that is where my heart is.  

Ironman Texas Training Week #2 - Trying to Get the Rhythm Going

 This is a transition time into the rhythm of ironman training.  The leftover mindset with it consequents habits still linger, slowing the training down and shifting focus.  It is sort of like breaking a horse.  It is hard to get the saddle on the days of training. 

I think it is sort of the way I think of myself.  It seems I haven't fully embraced what I am involved in here. It is quite easy and natural to drift only with life as before as I lose track that I need to get the days training in.  Consequently, I seem to always be catching up on my training.  

However, I have been doing really well sticking to my nutrition plan I made for this process. Winning some, losing some, some are a draw. So it is with my faith life.  I had planned to read a Bible chapter a day as means of keeping myself spiritually focused and committed to keeping God in the front and center of my effort.  Perhaps, I should do that first thing every day.  

"Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven and all these things shall be added unto you."

Ironman Training Week #1 - The Weekend - Planning

 It is a cool morning in the country and I should be out running or riding.  However, I don't have my training plan in place and have been working on that.  Looking at that mega-training next spring just scares me and makes me doubt, or at best wonder, can I do that?  Forget the event. Can I do that kind of training anymore.  A wiser person would pull the plug and get out of the danger zone as quickly as possible.  

And so I go on planning my training misery.   This is where I have decided to go and the only thing left to do is to "make straight the path."  Such is life as well.  "Those who fail to plan, plan to fail."  I have resolved not to fail due to lack of planning but only if my plan fails.  So, I ask for prayers in planning this adventure.  I ask for prayers to have the faith, the trust, and perseverance to complete this beasts, that is "run the race that set before me."

Ironman Training Week 1 - Something New - Bless Me On My Journey

 Day before yesterday I began another Ironman Journey.  This is to lead to April 23, 2022.  I will be 78 competing as a 79 year old and that doesn't look that good from here.  There is a good chance I will be the oldest one doing the event, but so what? 

Even if it comes to naught, I have before me 32 weeks of training and I love that experience.  It is a saga all its own.  It has gone well thus far.  Impediments to training have already surfaced and will have to be dealt with but they didn't catch me by surprise this time.  

I have resolved to lose about 15 pounds before the event which requires that I do without chips, cookies, refined sugar (except during training) and go to bed at a regular hour to get adequate rest.  I already eat a plant based diet (no meat, no fish, no cheese, no dairy, minimal sugar, and bad fats consuming lots of vegetables and fruits and nuts and whole grains. )  

I am also going to ramp up my morning strength/flex sessions in the mornings and be more consistent.  Already I do 60 push ups a lot of days plus some light weight workouts.  So, I am not coming at this cold turkey. 

And for personal and spiritual development, I will read my Bible every day and practice deep breathing and personal prayer and meditation.  I think I have have a good plan if I can just continue to execute it well.  This is not as fearful and apprehension producing as other ironman training attempts.  There is not much to lose and much to gain from this journey.  Bless me again.  

A Word From God

 

Heard from God this morning when asking for strength and guidance in this Ironman effort.  

You are doing really well...and I hope you keep it up.  But, the real tests are yet to come.  This is the easy part:  beginning.  My hope for you is that you will continue on with this training and  lifestyle after the newness is gone, after everyone has stopped saying, "way to go, you can do it," and after most people in your life take your training for granted, and it is no longer a big deal...Can you resist the temptations of the easier, more visible road and then to push through the training, break yourself down  regularly without applause except that applause from within, and from Me?  That is the test.  My wish for you is that you stay constantly in touch as you run this race I have set before you. 

love God

A COVID Compatible Dream - Phase II -IRONMAN TEXAS 2022

 OK, I am over the disappointment.  Today, my hope is rising from the ashes and though it is still dark I see glimmers of early dawn  along the blackened horizon.  

"A man is not defeated until he is defeated in spirit."  

And, God gave me a spirit akin to His.  I will not be defeated, no, not just yet.  I am going to go on and not huddle in fearful anticipation of some dread disease.  Huddling and fearing are dread diseases of their own already, and seem fatal to having a life well-lived.   

I am a really old guy and will be really, really old by the time this might happen, but I am going to train for Ironman Texas for next April.  I am going to "run the race that is set before me. In fact, I am 
 already signed up.  Yes, odds are I won't even make the training. Yes, odds are if somehow complete the training and  get to the event I won't be able to finish it.  Yes, odds are if by some miracle I do finish it, it won't be within the time cut offs.  

But, there is still that one far off dream,  not easily seen, and only distantly hoped for:  to finish Ironman Texas within the time limit.  That would be over the moon, other-worldly stuff for this then 78 year old.  And if I fail, I would have "failed daring greatly." Daring greatly in spite of the odds is one of the cornerstones of all breakthroughs. That is success in itself and that is my COVID compatible dream.

A COVID Compatible Dream

 

The COVID thing doesn't seem to ever want to go away.  Mask, don't mask, vaccinate, don't vaccinate and all the rest gets bantered back and forth and COVID moves on into folks lives like visitors who come and don't ever seem to leave.   Kona, the World Championship, the Golden Child of my sport is in jeopardy of not being held in October again this year.  Lots of other things are disheartening, but the feeling from that sort of sums up the attitude of the moment. 

What do I do with this journey; this journey that has staggered and fallen a lot lately:  an ironman deferred, a sprint triathlon I will miss next month  and a half ironman I will miss because of COVID.  And then there is my Ironman Texas in April. What are the chances? I live in the land of "who knows?"  

In this land there is not much motivation to have hope, to really go all in  for a "who knows" spring event.  After all these disappointments and setbacks over the last year and a half, right now, at this moment, I just want to stop worrying  about all of that and do something else; dream another more COVID compatible dream.  Of course, I can't quit training at least some.  I am addicted to it. And, I love it.  That is how I feel today and I am going to mine these moments to get all gold from this perspective and perhaps gain self revelation in the process and growth as an outcome.

An Angels Work

 It was a hot, humid, summer day in Texas much like today and I was set up for a long bike ride.  I had 7-8 bottles of water to get me through the long ride. It didn't go as planned.  Something broke on my bike that I couldn't fix out on the road and my ride was done.  I was angry as I had worked and planned for this long ride and needed to get this one in for my training schedule to stay on track.  But, there was nothing to do but get in the truck and take it home in a foul mood of frustration and disappointment.  That is where God showed up.

On a long stretch of road I saw a vehicle with the hood up on the side of the road.  I slowed to see what was going on to find an older black man looking  at his radiator hiss at him.  I stopped and walked over.  Other vehicles came along but none stopped.  The man was on his way to his daughter's house about 3-4 miles down the road and his old car couldn't stand the strain of Texas highway heat.  Those were before the days of cell phones and the old man had no money anyway.  

We talked a while - a really nice gentlemen- while his car cooled down a bit.  Then the idea came to me. I went to my truck and got all my bike bottles I had planned for my big, had to get done bike ride, and one by one poured the contents into his radiator.   The old man smiled when I told him I would follow him to his daughters house to see he made it without overheating his car again.   He made it just fine and I waved good bye to him and he thanked me over and over with a God bless you thrown in here and there.  

That day I did something for someone who couldn't do anything for me but make me feel really special for  being in place for God to use me to help the old man.  There was joy I felt in being obedient that is hard to describe. The well done I felt from God made me feel special like I done an angels work on that hot summer day.  

Seeking God

 Some days you may not feel like trying.  Why not just go with the flow like it seems most people do. Enjoy the ride.  Take in the scenery, rest, and relax. Sometimes the goal doesn't seem so worthwhile when you really don't feel that well or things are not going that great.  And you question yourself, your abilities, your drive, and the need for it all. Days like these can go into other similar days until there is a certain fatigued despair in the moments. These are seemingly the "dog days" of our lives; a bad patch you just have to live yourself through and come out the other side with renewed hope.

Sometimes faith gets like that but the remedy can be quite different.  Sometimes God just seems not to be listening.  Prayers drift into thinking about something else.  You just can't stay connected.  But I have found that during these disconnects, I am one not listening.  I am the one holding on to  a habit, a thought pattern, or even a sin that separates my heart from God.  When I ask God to "search me and try me" and really mean it, and really take it inside, I find it is I who is holding on to what causes the disconnect.  It is I who has moved away from this relationship.  

A lot of the time that revelation is on a long run or bike ride. We have to become aware of and remove the impediments keeping us apart from God and physical activity is not only good for your body but good for truly seeking God.

Living in Hope and Expectation

 Next week is a series of tests to see what may be wrong with my heart if anything.  I can't say I look forward to the next week and I hate not to be looking forward.  To me, looking forward is the essence of life well-lived. Looking forward is living in the hope God would have for us.  Living with sense of hope and expectation- why not? What is there to lose that won't be lost eventually here in this world.  No matter how high we climb, the time to come down will come.  No matter how forward looking we have in our hopes here, there will come a time when our hopes will have to be penned to eternity; our only true hope. 

But, knowing we win, because He won; that death was swallowed up in victory, we can live victorious in this life as well, knowing how the story ends- with a new beginning. Amen

Hold My Hand Lord

 

"When you start doubting yourself, remember how far you have come.  Remember everything you faced; all the battles you have won, and all te fears you have overcome.  Your greatest strength come in your weakest days"  

Today was a day of doubt; one of those weakest days.  Where can I go from here?  What can I do from here?  Who can I become from here?  

I was diagnosed with A-Fib -erratic beats of the heart, bringing with it the heightened possibility of heart attack or stroke.  The numbness caused by this diagnosis still has me in a numbed state.  Now it might seem my time to join in the little old men's pill lines to receive a bit a of life to wash down with a bit of water, then wait until lunch or dinner and the next pill line to shuffle to.  Not my idea of a life. 

The big suspense is how I will take this once the numbness of the diagnosis gives way to reality on hard terms.  I just don't know and I just have to depend.  Hold my hand Lord 

The Only Way Home

 

Miles of the Journey - Along your miles do you often contemplate the end of that journey?  Perhpaps at the death of someone you knew well, you seriously had a scary look at your own mortality.  Or, you vistited a cemetery and seen rows of stones and other type markers.  Did you wonder then, is that all there is to this journey.  Is life but the time between born and dead dates?  Does life consist of the dash between the dates? 

I don't want this journey to end, do you? But it must and I want to end well.  But I can see that that takes some real courage.  Despite all the religious noise we made along our journey of life the fabric of our faith will get  tested to its core. Do you have faith enough to step out into the waters of death without whining, I ask myself?  As my own health seems to be deteriorating, I still believe I do.  To be honest there is a sublimal anger, I think, that God is putting me through this and abandoning me.  At a time when I should be feeling closer, there is a strange distance in our relationship.   Maybe when I move myself closer to accptance, and give up my spoiled child attitude, we will be close again.  For now, I don't have any warm fuzzies to keep me warm in these cold times, and I have to have faith in the dark.  No fulfilled "bucket list" will navigate this lonesome journey we all have to take.  Yes, "nevertheless," I still believe:  God has the only way home.

.  

I Know That

 

Am I in an ironman rut?  I keep signing up.  It seems I am incurable of this ironman addiction.  What can I say?  Moving on would be a good option.  Why not? Hasn't there been enough time, energy, and resources expended on this ironman stuff?  

Despite all that, I find myself still in the ironman game; theoretically at least.  Recently I deferred Ironman Texas to Ironman Texas 2022. Of course, I will be too old then.  I'm too old now.  I have too old for ironman for a few years now.  Old guys like me trying to do an ironman are an anomaly, not having the self-respect not to go out and make a fool of oneself trying to outlive your time.  Just an old fool trying vainly, desperately, and pathetically to hang on to the shreds of athletic life.  I know all that.  But I trudge on unsure now that I have the drive to complete all the training, unsure my wife, who is older than I, will have the health to support me in yet another Ironman quest.   But yet, I keep going on, acting out the senility that comes with this age, I suppose. Like a robot, I just numbly keep signing up as if I were some robust thirty-year-old with all the energy and rah-rah necessary for this beast of a quest.

Maybe too,  my malady is an indication of an personal life vitamin deficiency, an indication of an incompleteness; a life that needs an ironman future to give purpose and fulfillment to it?   I don't know.  We all need a reason to get out of bed and go at whatever makes us purposeful and come alive, don't we? But,if that is true wouldn't you think that  I have  about used this ironman purpose thing up?  I don't know.   

Do I really want to go at it again with all that goes with that?  Do I want the dead-legged feeling in my life for a few months next year?  I don't know.  Do I want that brain-dead foggy mental feeling that comes from the long training?  Is the price too high for me this late in my game?  Can't I find, and be satisfied with some other purpose, some other  reason to get out of bed and have a go at life; something besides Ironman?  I don't know.

If things remain the same in family and personal matters, I could conceivably do the ironman training.  If things go really, really well, I might have a chance to finish.  If I finish it would be seriously been  a crowning achievement in my life.  And if others note that achievement, see my faith, my perseverance, they might become inspired to assume the risk and try to become all God intended them to be ; whatever that might me.   It's not impossible.  I know that.

There Is Still An Ember

 

We are burning a stump out on the place.  A fire of varying magnitude has been kept going on it for a couple of days and nights now.  This morning there was no sign of fire or embers.  Had the fire gone out?

A few leaves thrown on the ashes told otherwise.  It wasn't much but the fire was still there to be rekindled and be about the business of burning out the stump.

So it seems with the rocky year we have had in the year 2020.  Sometimes it seems there is no fire left in me or others.  But God has another plan.  Embers still beneath the ashes - though small right now - will bring the fire to our lives again.  Good is not through here.   Amid all the problems and conflict coming with the election and the COVID pandemic, there are still embers put there by God, that we might fan ourselves to flame yet again.

This may seem too optimistic to some, but  I envision a big roaring fire going on and in our lives in the future.  I see smiling, happy people, crowds, people  hugging one another fearlessly; laughing out loud, going places, doing things, and feeling more grateful than ever for the simple privileges of life that we practically took for granted before

May our embers be fanned to flame to become a catalyst that makes us one in joy.