Keepers of the flame

Now, we've all had a lot of fun with the whole "May 21st is the end of the world and the Rapture" story. Two things have stuck out to me:

1) I have heard/read a lot of jokes on this from most people I know. Anyone who knows me knows that I'm all about jokes, but as usual, I had to take a slightly different approach to the story. I couldn't help but to keep wondering "What if they're right?" How many people would that have caught by surprise? Because, let's face it, not even most Christians thought that this was right. But I just sat down and thought about it for a minute - what would it be like to see Jesus return? If I had any inkling that it could be today, how would I spend it? I looked at my family and thought how grateful I would be to see them all in heaven. I wondered just how it would feel to fall at Jesus' feet and hug His neck and tell Him how much I've missed Him. I wondered what it would feel like to have the questions stop. I wondered how joyful it would be to never have to read another story online about a child dying. And I was kind of sad that Jesus didn't show up today. This story allowed me to see that day from another perspective, to actually give my heart a "trial run". And every time I heard someone make fun, I decided it was a great opportunity to share the fact that Jesus IS returning. I talked with a girl at work yesterday, she said "Well, it's to late for me to make it right." I tried to explain to her that Jesus has already made it right...

2) It amazes me how absolutely certain everyone I know is about the "end times". If people weren't laughing at the group, they were deriding them. Look, I have opinions about the end times just like everyone else. But I also don't hold very tight to them. Remember, the Jews had very specific ideas about what the Messiah would do when He came. He was supposed to fight a war, free His people, and reign for 1,000 years. Sound familiar? So whatever your preconceived notions are about what will happen during, precede, or postdate The Return, consider that you could be wrong. The nice part about whatever it is God decides to do is that I just want to be along for the ride. It doesn't matter to me if there is a Rapture, or if everyone goes all at once, or if something happens no one has thought of. I just want to hear that I'm in. Maybe I'm just simple, but it seems to me to be slightly arrogant to presume to understand God's plans. Even if He has laid them out in Scripture, we tend to only understand prophecy with the vantage point of hindsight.

This has not been in any way meant to put anyone down. I just noticed a couple trends, which I took part in to some extent, that I wanted to point out.

"Maybe tonight, Lord, maybe tonight..."

On Perseverance

So, I've learned something about myself over the last few months. First off, I've been meaning to write about this topic since the beginning of the year, but as it kept dragging on and evolving, I kept putting it off, and maybe for the better.

I hurt my knee mid-December. Nothing drastic, just what they call IT Band Syndrome. Take a couple weeks off from running and you'll be fine.

So I did.

The second week after I started back to running, I pushed it kinda hard. But I needed to; I was training for a marathon and needed to get back up to my mileage. I think the breaking point occurred during a 6-miler: I ran/walked the first 5 miles like I usually did, but then ran the last mile back to the house, and pretty fast. That Saturday I went out for an 18-miler and only made it 6 miles. My knee was hurting again.

For the next few weeks, I kept running. I would try to take it easy, but the pain never went away. As a matter of fact, it seemed to get steadily worse.

So I went to an orthopedist.

They do an MRI and discover only little things wrong: the IT Band Syndrome is still there, I have a small Baker's cyst on the back of my knee, and it looks like I have a tiny tear in my meniscus.

Rest.

At this point, I'm just hoping to run the half marathon. Anything, just please don't tell me that I've trained for 6 months and will have nothing to show for it. (Ok, sure, I lost a few pounds and made some friends, but I did have a goal in mind...)

One month off from running.

I join a gym so that I can do Spin class. I want to stay fit, increase my aerobic capacity, but I can't do anything that will involve impact on my knee. I start a stretching regimen. I HATE STRETCHING. I hate stretching the way Indiana Jones hates snakes. But I do it anyway, in the hope that I can run.

Three weeks before the (now half) marathon, I start back running. And there is still pain! And now it is shooting all around the knee! I'm beginning to wonder what I'm going to have to do to fix this...

Back to the orthopedist.

Where I find out that on top of all the above, I have now developed tendinitis and bursitis. I think I may be the only person to develop tendinitis while NOT ACTUALLY DOING ANYTHING TO AGGRAVATE THAT TENDON. So they give me a shot. It's given directly through the most painful part of the knee, straight into the joint. It is not comfortable.

But after three days, I feel fine!

I ran the half marathon. I ran it with a friend of mine, and did pretty well. My last two miles were the fastest miles of the day. I saw my family on the course. I passed someone on the very last straightaway. But there's a twinge of disappointment in only going half as far as I wanted to.

Oh, but there's more.

As I said at the top, I learned something about myself during those months. It came during one of the Spin classes. One of the teachers is a friend of mine; I've known her since I was a kid. She is brutal. She will shame you in a class, not by calling you out, but if you try to keep up with her, you better have brought your big-boy shoes.

Something she said in this particular class made me realize: I had been planning when to quit since the moment I got on the bike. Somewhere in my mind I had been thinking, right from the very beginning, how far I had to get before I could bail and not look like a pansy. The next time I ran I noticed the same thing: I may have planned on running 6 miles, but by the end of the first mile I was already trying to evaluate if I could cut this run short and just "make it up later."

I'm a quitter.
At least in my thoughts, if not always in my actions.

So, what makes me hold on? What makes me keep going when it's too tough? Why do I choose to persevere sometimes, and bail out other times?

A friend posted this on Facebook: "I would like to work out without having to work out." True.

Realization: I will only hang on long enough for everyone to think I've hung on long enough.

So, I'll set lofty goals for myself, but talk myself down from them not long after beginning. I'm the same way in my Christian walk. I want to be more like Christ, I want to resist temptation, I want to read my Bible, but I'm already planning my escape. I mean, how far can one man really go anyway?

I've begun to recognize those thoughts, and to work past them. Not just in working out, because the benefit from that is temporary. But in the rest of life as well. How long can you or I resist temptation? As long as we decide we can. It is as important as we make it.

I didn't have any problem running the half marathon all the way to the finish, because that was what I came there to do. I have problems finishing my training runs because it's hard to see the goal. I have trouble persevering under trials and temptation because it's difficult to see the end goal.

But I'm tired of my own excuses.

W(h)ine and cheese

Emotion never lends itself to an accurate worldview. Be forewarned. I think I write better when I'm very emotional, so this one could be a doozy.

I've had a frustrating day.

At the risk of sounding like "that guy", I feel that I have a lot of good ideas. And I'm not scared to pitch them. But man, does it seem like a lot (it feels like almost all) get shot down. What's worse is when, much later, you see that same idea come back around, but pitched by someone else as brand new. Then everyone else loves it! They prance around the plagiarizer (is that a word?) as if they have received a revelation. Meanwhile, I'm sitting off to the side wondering what made the idea so bad the first time?

I need a win.

I have said before that, as if I needed one more thing about me to be weird, I apparently have weird spiritual gifts. I didn't get faith, nope, nothing that blasé. I think I'm a good encourager, sure, but I wonder if my spiritual gift is dealing with disappointment. Because I sure seem to get enough thrown my way.

non sequiter

I've worked very hard not force my opinions or ideas on other people. In years past, I was in many, many situations where an opinion was forced on me, and I think I came to believe that was the only way to get your way - rhetoric, conviction, logic, and bombast. And something about it turned me off. Some would call it the mellowing of age; I'm not that old. I used to be completely concerned with getting my way, now I think I'm a little more concerned with getting along. Because I can lead all day long, but if no one is following, then it isn't doing much good. To this day I can remember how some people didn't like me as a teen because of my attitude; that arrogance of always being right, and being able to prove it. I don't like remembering that, and I've tried to change.

And that's not to say that I won't argue passionately for something I believe in, it's just to say that I don't place the importance on winning an argument or "being right" as I once did.

But I wonder if, in my desire to be more humble, I haven't allowed myself to become a doormat in a lot of instances. And that idea just pisses me off. So I think, what do I have to do to be heard? To have my opinion valued at the same weight that it seems others' are? Do I have to stake out a position and refuse to budge? To be louder than everyone else in the room? Do I have to demean others' opinions? Should I be so verbose as to simply exhaust everyone? Perhaps I should simply invent facts and situations to prove my point; I could even belabor the hypothetical. Maybe I should be/act offended or put out that someone else is getting their way.

No, I've chosen to (try to) be honest and mature.

So, once again, I'll swallow my disappointment (which tastes remarkably like bile) and hope for better.

One day.



They say that leadership should be collaborative, and that you should empower others. But no one ever talks about how to do that from the middle. Everyone is concerned with how to lead from the top. I don't have a problem with that. How does one lead from the middle of a team? Because I'm not the biggest, strongest, loudest person in the room. And I don't want to be. But I also don't want to be dismissed out of hand, or treated as if it's not a big deal to disappoint me, but it would be to disappoint others.

...and not a day goes by...

20 years ago today I made the most important decision of my life.

Now, I know many people who would say that about many different decisions that have been made. Who they would marry, where they would go to school or work, etc. But in my life, those decisions are dwarfed by another.

Today is my (Christian) birthday.

20 years ago I gave my life to Christ, and not a day goes by that is not influenced by that decision. Because every other important decision in my life is weighed against this one. My relationships succeed or fail based on this relationship. My path in life is authored by this path.

Looking back now, I understand that I knew next to nothing about what I was getting into, or what was really going on. But who does? Who has perfect, or even mature, knowledge of what they signed up for when they get married, or have kids? That's not the point. The point is that I knew enough to know that I was in no way a good person, there were consequences for my not being a good person, and Someone had paid my price for who I was. I remember the burden I had been carrying around, the guilt of all the things I had done that I knew weren't right.

And I remember the freedom when I came up out of that water. The pure exhilaration, the joy, the knowledge that those things didn't matter anymore, I was newborn!

I'm still a bad person, I guess I always will be. But I'm beginning to understand Grace, and freedom from sin, and the Love of God.

And I feel like not a day goes by that, if I walk with God, is not touched by Him to bring me closer. To who I could be. To who I should be. To Him.

Thanksgiving!

So, we knew we were having another holiday baby. We even figured that she was coming early. But we didn't expect it to happen quite like this:

3am on Monday, November 29th, was just like any other 3am on a Monday. Or so we thought. We have a fire alarm that is hard-wired into our house's electrical system. It is also the loudest thing I have ever heard. I say this because, when it went off at 3am on Monday, November 29th, I distinctly remember it being the loudest thing I have ever heard. I'm pretty certain it could be heard from space.

I didn't know what was going on; whether it was the burglar alarm or fire alarm. I fully expected to find someone in my living room. Then I'm crawling all over the attic and through the house to find the fire. None could be found, so then I tried to figure out how to turn off the alarm. Everyone in the house is now awake. Daniel looked like he couldn't figure out what was going on. DJ was yelling at me to make it stop. I'm taking the speaker off of the wall to "cut the hard line" when I remember that I can start flipping breakers. Finally it goes off, but now I'm awake. I had to get up at 4am anyway, so I figure I'll just stay up (besides, Predator was on AMC). And then Kellie tells me that she's having contractions...

I decide that she can go back to sleep and they'll go away. I am wrong. Kellie calls me at work around 8:30 to tell me that the contractions are continuing. The fire alarm from space has woken even my unborn child up.

We had a healthy baby girl, Dakota Brooklyn, at 6:07pm that night!

But, in true Sapp fashion, there's one last humorous story from that day.

We had Dakota at home. We also had Daniel at home, and it was a great experience both times. But it didn't look like Kellie was progressing as it got closer to dinner. So I called a friend of mine to see if he could wrangle up some grub. He orders delivery pizza. As Kellie's labor speeds up, I start to have a bad feeling of coincidence. Sure enough, just after Kellie pushes out Dakota's head, the doorbell rings...

I read somewhere that some OBGYNs who don't like homebirth had bumper stickers made that said "Home delivery is for pizza, not babies" - now it's both at the same time!

By the way, isn't my baby girl precious?

I just don't get it.

It's been an odd week.

First of all, let's start at the end of the week. As part of my training for the marathon, I have a 10-mile run first thing Saturday morning. That will be the furthest I have ever run (although, to be honest, every other week now is the furthest I've ever run). Then, in the afternoon I have a charity golf tournament.

I know, hard knock life, eh?

But I know I'll be exhausted.

I was supposed to go for a run on Tuesday night, but I looked at my wife and told her that I just didn't feel like I physically could run. One hour later I had a migraine. And it was a doozy. The only thing I have ever found that will cure my migraines is sleep. So I tried to sleep it off until it finally was gone about 4am. But it was one of those that has lingering affects for the next 24-36 hours. So I haven't been able to do much of anything as far as working out this week.

So tonight I decide to go for a run and it was NOT. GOOD. My legs hurt almost from the beginning, and continued to do so throughout. My hamstring was tight. My calves felt sore. My feet ached. I couldn't seem to get in any rhythm whatsoever. Thank goodness the music was good! But I've realized something as I've gotten physically active again.

I don't get a 2nd wind.
I never have.

I guess I don't have that part of my brain that triggers to release endorphins in the middle of exercise to keep me going. Which can make exercise, or martial arts (what I used to do), or running miserable.

Once again, I'm going to use running as an example for the rest of my life.

I can always find an excuse to quit. But I hate doing it. It's the weirdest thing; at any point in time I could tell you multiple reasons why I should stop running, or volunteering, or what's wrong with my job. But I can't quit. I will keep running long after it starts hurting, and long after I want to stop. It's almost like I have the gift of perseverance, but the implementation of that gift is torture.

I'm not saying that I persevere in everything I do. But in the things that I have trouble quitting, the process seems very difficult.

I wish that these things came easy, but they don't. I wish that I could catch a second wind, but it never comes. I wish that life wasn't hard, but that's life. I've just got to keep running.

No turning back now.

I am now officially signed up for my first marathon: March 5th, 2011!

And there's no refund policy, so I can't back out.

Apparently there is a phrase amongst marathoners: "PR or ER". Personal Record or the Emergency Room. I don't have a choice, it's going to be one or the other! I'm really excited now, though. I was starting to get a little aggravated with running all the time, and I think this was just the boost I needed to re-ignite the fire.

It's interesting, because I used this time of exercise I'm in as a spiritual example yesterday. I wouldn't be running like I am and training for a marathon if a good friend of mine hadn't talked me into it, and if I wasn't making relationships with the other people who are training. They are positive, encouraging, and seem genuinely interested in my success. We need that in our spiritual lives as well. If you aren't often around people who encourage you to live and love like God, then you're unlikely to persist for long. If they aren't interested in seeing you succeed and helping you to succeed, then you'll become depressed and quit. I know that sometimes in the Bible Belt we tend to look at church attendance as our "dues" as Christians, but there is a point behind it. Find a church that you can connect in, and the people will encourage you to be better, and you can encourage them. It is important.




On another note, I just realized that I had not announced to the world that we are expecting another young'un! And this time it's a girl! This is really late in coming; we are due middle of December. We are really excited!