Move that mountain

Faith. Belief. Will power. Endurance. Persistence. Determination. Over-comer. Bull headed. Stubborn. Commitment. - Matthew 17:20

Saturday morning my son & I left to go to the local YMCA to hookup with our running group from Run for God. When we got there, only the leader of the group and her two young sons showed. Although she & her boys decided to workout at the gym instead, my son and I decided we would run the 5k route we've done several times on Saturdays prior.

It was cool, crisp and fall is in the air. A beautiful morning to run. Although we altered our route slightly, the hardest part was still predominately uphill. Great training conditions all added up. See map below.


My performance is improving and my son & I for the most part are sticking to the 5k training program's weekly metrics. We were finishing week #7. We started out slow and kept a rhythmic pace as we went. If I focus on enjoying the weather and my surroundings, the run seems to go much better and I don't struggle with enduring the run. However, my son is still struggling just to run 5 minutes let alone 8 minutes continuously. On the last leg of our run he stopped several times during the 8 minute run. This was discouraging but I had to push him and encourage him to overcome the mental and physical pain that his body was fighting. I myself had been fighting a stomach bug and full blown allergies for 2 days, so I was struggling too. As we went further, he produced more excuses to which I refuted with scriptures from God's word to strengthen him & encourage him to push beyond the limitations of his mind.

We were headed up a hill which seemed like a mountain, even to me. I know if we believe, we can achieve. Don't quit. Overcome. Endure. Push on. This brought to mind Matthew 17:20 which I quoted to my son. The other piece of scripture that came to mind was Hebrews 12:1 - "Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us."

In a nutshell, we have 5 weeks of training left until our race on November 6th, 2010.
We begin Week #8 today (Monday) and our first workout will be a 5 minute warmup walk, followed by a 20 minute jog, and finish with a 5 minute cool-down walk. I can only pray my son is able to endure and overcome, as well as complete this myself. Tonight we'll see. I just pray my son will lean on God & His word to persevere and overcome the mountain. Post to follow.