Simply Follow Him

Learning to walk everyday with Jesus is not an easy thing. It takes trust and devotion and a new measure of awareness of His presence in our lives each day.

Simply following Him was a lesson I learned while on one of our marathon training runs.

“Turn here. This looks good.”

or

“Let’s try this road. I bet this is a good one.”

or

“I’ve got a great run planned for us today… you’re gonna like this one.”

These are things my husband frequently says on our runs.

We run so many miles right now as we prepare for this marathon that we easily get bored with our normal routes.

Add in that Jeremy doesn’t like to run the same routes too many times, and we have to get pretty creative in our route planning.

We as in, more accurately, Jeremy’s route planning.

I would get us so lost.

I do not possess the same inner GPS that Jeremy has been gifted with. He can find his way through pretty much anywhere without too much trouble. One glance at a map, and he has it stored in his head.

This is beneficial on our runs because he can map out a long course and then guide us as we run.

I just have to trust him.

Trust his directions, his leading and his inner map.

Now, you know and I know that in marriage, we always trust our spouse. #wink

In theory, in a perfect world, in our truest heart goals… we trust them.

In the day to day, real life? Do our day to day actions SHOW that we trust our spouse?

Do our words express that we trust their motives, their guidance, their opinion?

or do we insert our desire to control, plan and take over?

ouch.

Well, in all honestly and transparency, I answer his dialogue with things like, “Are you sure you know where we are?” and he replies, “Yes, Jen.”

Then I say, “I feel like we are running in circles… did we just go this way?” and he replies, “No, Jen. We’ve never been here before.”

He makes a turn onto a hill and my blood pressure spikes… “Why are you taking us this way? Are you trying to kill me?” and he replies, “No… it is good training. Come on…”

I’ll say something like, “Shouldn’t we have turned back there? How many more miles is this way adding to our run?”

or “If we get lost in this park, we will have to run even more!”

Oh, I can be such a whiner on our runs!

Jeremy is SO patient and SO kind. He listens to me all the while pushing me to keep going, to keep running and to trust him.

He always gets us home. We always have a good run. We always get in the miles we need.

We don’t take the route I thought we would and we rarely take the turn I thought would get us where we need to go.

Again, I would have gotten very, very lost on my own. and I for sure would not be ready for this marathon.

Not only would I get lost if I tried to create new runs each time… if left on my own, I would run the SAME BORING run every single time. I would pick a road, run down it and then run back. No turns, no twists and certainly NO new paths.

But in the moment of these new runs, I have a hard time remembering this.

I get frustrated and annoyed that I don’t know where we are going.

I get mad that I can’t picture the path in my head.

I get bogged down with “How much longer?” and “How much farther?” and “Are we on the right road?” instead of simply following, simply trusting and enjoying the run.

But, I am learning.

When I let go of the questions, the whining, and the wondering, I can simply follow and enjoy.

I can bask in the wonder of getting to see new places, run new roads, experience new journeys without any of the stress.

But so many times I choose the stress and the questions.

Are you getting the spiritual applications of this? How this effects our everyday with Jesus?

I am getting it.

It has hit me hard recently.

Trust. Follow.

Simply follow God. All the days of my life, all through the journeys and the hills and the new paths.

Trust. Follow. Everyday with Jesus.

No questions, no worries, no stress.

Follow.

God knows the path we are on in life. He sees the route. He has it all mapped out and planned and figured. He knows the hills and the side streets and the short cuts and the long straight paths. He knows the number of miles we need and the new places we should see and the new lessons we must learn. He has a training plan and a fabulous goal in sight. He knows.

We can trust that everyday with Jesus will be one that He has planned for us!

We don’t know.

And that is okay because then we can just trust and enjoy the run. Enjoy the race.

No stress or worries or whining.

When, everyday with Jesus, we just let go and choose to trust. follow.

Simply follow.

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