The Race

I love to run.  I love it from the moment you say, "now" and you get your iPod ready and start the stretches.  The excitement of looking out and planning your trail and how much effort you are willing to put into it - what you want to think about or plan for in the future.  It is an escape.
Life can be like running.  You hit it hard and just start running.  In the beginning you believe you've mapped out a trail.  You may have decided what thematic music you want playing to your life.  You might have even marked out a finish line and visualized the crossing through to the other side - all smiles of course with the look of victory on your face.
What happens when you are hitting the pavement at full speed and you've been going awhile and you look around to realize you aren't quite sure where everyone else went and where the finish line is suppose to be?
Do you stop and look around to see if you can hear or see anyone?  Or do you keep pounding the pavement with determination to get somewhere, even if it ends up to be nowhere - at least you will get there fully spent and exhausted?
I am not a psychologist, yet, but I think either answer must reveal some real drivers of our hearts.
I personally, am stopped in my tracks by the abrupt halt to my life when someone dies.  I have had it happen enough to recognize the need to identify the race and who is running it with me and where on earth am I going?
I first felt this way at age 15 when I lost my 17 year old cousin.  My life as a crazy, young teen was a rapid race in a cheerleading uniform practicing lines for the school musical and holding a seat as an officer in student council.  Her car accident brought a vicious HALT to a marathon I was running for being "somebody" at my school.  As I sat in a hospital waiting room at 3 a.m. on a Saturday night being told my best friend had not made it through the crash - I stopped and looked around.
The race dramatically changed.  The people running the race became the actual finish tape for me.  I stopped being as concerned with me being somebody and more concerned with expressing my love to the somebodies racing around me.  In some ways, I quit running and became a real sideline gal rooting those around me to pursue living and love because I knew it was brief.
I stayed in that state of mind for a long time.  Truth be told I probably used it as a cop out of running.  I created a new high school and college mantra, "do the minimum to get the maximum."
That mantra rang in my head for years until the next experience - my dad's death.
As he was dying, this talented man in his fifties, he spoke of regret - oh, the pain of regret for having not really raced in his heat.  He did a 5K when he was built for a marathon.
So, I emotionally quit filling everyone's water bottles and laced up my shoes.
Engaged in life - wrote a book, wrote a song, started a nonprofit - if it was a dream I had ever secretly desired in my heart - well, then I pursued it.  Oh, it felt good.  I loved running again.  Busy feet, busy fingers, busy - busy - busy.  Running, running so hard I could actually hear the wind singing in my ears.
Then, yet again, another death - my light-hearted, living free step dad who ran his own victorious race!
So, Lord, I stand before you on a track, looking around yet again - no runners in sight - no markers to find the finish line.  And I think I finally get it.  Jesus, you are the pacesetter running just slightly ahead with your balloons or flashing light letting me know that I don't need to know where we are going to end up.  I don't even have to know my own pace.  I just have to know Your pace and follow those feet pounding the street.  My days of standing on an empty track unaware of why or where I am going are over.  Jesus, You are the steady.  I will follow You until we go through the finish tape together - having run the whole race.