The Sun is Coming Up on the Ocean

It is hard to believe that this semester and this year at school are almost over. This has been the best semester that I have ever had at ACU. It has also seemed like the longest one. So many of the people that I am so close to now are people that I only really started to get to know this semester, but it feels like I have known them forever.

Current Listening: "Being There" by Wilco.

These past 5-6 months have been a time of tremendous growth for me. If someone would have told me back then that I would be at this point and with the people I am with now, I never would have believed them, but perhaps that is why I am not in charge. I would silently scoff when people throw out the cliche "things will work out for the best", but they have. So many of the people that I have met this semester, so many of the things I have been involved in, and so many of the things that I have learned have come together without my will or knowledge. The road seems impeccably prepared.

There have been many significant events in my life this semester, but I think the marathon has come to mean the most. Through a process of commitment and devotion to a singular task, I was able to see results. The marathon became much more than a single event on a single day, but a way that I looked at life. I focused on what I ate, how much I slept, what the weather conditions were on a given day, and other things that I had not really spent much energy on in the past. Everything began to relate to training and the upcoming race.

As I stand now, with 2 months of perspective after the race, I wonder about what this kind of devotion could mean in other parts of my life. When I make the analogy of marathon training to my faith training, I come up woefully short. Do I consider every action or deed in terms of its impact on my faith and spiritual well-being? Do I take into account whether certain things are going to bring my closer to God or further from him? The work of becoming a disciple is not simply working for a single race on a single day, but looking at the world in an entirely different way, and considering things that once seemed irrelevant.