Month: May 2025

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Part II, Section 5 – Running with God

“But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength;
they shall mount up with wings like eagles;
they shall run and not be weary;
they shall walk and not faint.”
– Isaiah 40:31 (ESV)

Running was never just about fitness. Not really.

Sure, I started because I wanted to lose weight and get healthy – and yes, I had goals like running a marathon or maybe even qualifying for Boston. But as the miles stacked up, something deeper began to emerge. Running became a space where I could think clearly – not in lightning bolts or sermons, but in the quiet rhythm of my feet on the pavement and the simple prayer that rose with every breath.

Each run gave me the gift of stillness. Not just outward quiet, but the kind of inner silence where I could hear the truth again – that I hadn’t arrived, that I was still in process, but that I was moving forward. I didn’t have to carry the weight of who I used to be. I could press on toward something greater – toward the upward call God had placed on my life.

Philippians 3:13-14 says, “Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal…”

That’s exactly what I had to do – not just once, but every day. I had to let go of old habits that weighed me down. The regret of wasted time. The cycles of defeat. I couldn’t carry that and move forward. The past couldn’t be changed, but today could. And that’s where I began – with today.

I remember weeks when I missed every planned run. I’d log the numbers: missed distance, missed goals. But I kept coming back. I kept pressing forward. I had to. Like Paul said, straining toward what is ahead meant starting fresh – not with flawless weeks, but with faithful steps.

Some days that meant walking more than running. Other days it meant celebrating a slow pace because it was still progress. The prize wasn’t speed. It was faithfulness. Every mile I ran was a choice to press on. And those choices, over time, reshaped my life.

There were still days I didn’t want to run. I was tired. The weather was miserable. My body ached. But I laced up my shoes anyway. That daily decision – to show up, to go out, to run the path before me – became its own kind of discipline. It was a way of casting off everything that weighed me down – not just physically, but spiritually. I was learning to run with perseverance, one step at a time.

Hebrews 12:1-2 says, “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, fixing our eyes on Jesus…”

Sometimes, I thought of my father and my siblings – the ones who ran before me. I thought of my sister’s encouragement, and the legacy of movement and effort that they lived out. And with them in mind, I kept going. I didn’t want to waste the chance I had – the breath in my lungs, the road in front of me. I wanted to run well. Not just physically, but spiritually.

God didn’t meet me in a grand, cinematic moment. He met me in the steady steps. In the ordinary discipline. In the decision to keep showing up, to keep letting go of the past, to keep pressing forward even when the goal still felt far away.

Running didn’t become sacred – but it did become clarifying. It reminded me that the real prize wasn’t the marathon. It wasn’t Boston. It wasn’t a number on a scale. The reward was deeper – a life reshaped by discipline, a heart tuned toward obedience, a soul learning to walk in step with something far greater than personal success.

Philippians 3:8 says, “What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord…”

The surpassing worth of knowing Him far outweighed any personal achievement I could chase.

That awareness didn’t always come with fireworks – sometimes it came with sore knees and slow miles. But it came. And it stuck.

I didn’t run to prove anything anymore. I ran because God was changing me, and running was one of the ways He helped me see it.

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I wasn’t an athlete. I never had been. I was the last kid picked for teams. But there I was in my 50s, running six days a week – not because I was gifted, but because I was determined. Each run, I’d whisper a prayer: “God, please keep me from getting hurt.” It wasn’t poetic or long, but it was honest. I ran because I needed it, and God knew why. That simple prayer became part of the rhythm. I wasn’t just training my legs. I was learning to trust Him in the small things – the mundane, the daily, the painful.

I love running because it clears out the noise. I spend my days surrounded by screens and signals – phones, computers, tech. But when I run, it’s just me and the sound of my feet on the pavement. That’s where my thoughts settle. That’s where I pray. It’s where the fog in my heart lifts enough for God to speak. Sometimes I pour out frustrations, sometimes I’m just quiet. It’s better than therapy. I don’t need pills or answers – just the rhythm of movement, the cool air, and the chance to be alone with my thoughts and my Creator.

I wrote that once in a blog post: “I cannot make an excuse. I just run.” It wasn’t bravado – it was surrender. Running stripped away the comfort of excuses. It reminded me that progress didn’t wait for perfect conditions. Whether it was hot, raining, or I didn’t feel like it, I ran. In that routine, God met me. He taught me to show up when I didn’t want to. To be faithful when it didn’t feel fruitful. To do the next right thing – and let Him handle the outcome.

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Over time, I realized I was laying down the very habits that helped me run this greater race – the one marked by endurance, by grace, by focus. The road reminded me to let go of what didn’t matter, to hold tightly to what did, and to keep going – eyes fixed where they belong.

And so I did. Not always fast. Not always strong. But always forward.

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Part I: The First Miles

When I first stepped outside to run, I wasn’t chasing a goal. I was testing a hope.

I had already lost 50 pounds, but I still carried the weight — physically, yes, but also mentally. There’s a kind of heaviness that doesn’t show up on a scale. Years of unhealthy habits, of shame, of feeling like I’d never get it right. That’s the weight I carried to the starting line. Not of a race — but of a quiet street in my neighborhood on an ordinary afternoon after work.

I remember standing at the edge of the driveway, dressed in shorts and a t-shirt that didn’t quite fit. I didn’t look like a runner. I didn’t feel like one either. But I had a small goal: run two miles without stopping.

It felt impossible and I didn’t make it. I ran one and a half miles and walked home. That was okay though. When I tried running 50 pounds heavier, I only got a quarter mile before I quit. So for me, one and a half miles was a win. 

The sun was still high, and the Alabama humidity clung to everything. I had just gotten off work — tired, drained, with every excuse in the world not to run. But something in me knew that if I didn’t go then, I wouldn’t go at all. So I started. Slowly. Awkwardly. Each step a mix of effort and embarrassment.

About a half mile in, my body was already protesting. My legs were tight, my breathing ragged. People passed me in their cars, and I imagined what they must be thinking. But I kept moving. Step by step. Breath by breath. And somewhere around the halfway point, a strange thing happened: I realized I wasn’t going to quit.

I wasn’t fast. I wasn’t strong. But I was moving — and I wasn’t going to stop.

That run didn’t change my life in one big cinematic moment. What it did was give me something I hadn’t felt in a long time: momentum. Not just the physical kind, but the kind that happens when you do something hard and realize you’re capable of more than you thought.

And then I did it again the next day. And the day after that.

My runs became a rhythm — not in the sense of easy repetition, but in the way they began to structure my life. I’d get home from work, change clothes, stretch out muscles that still complained, and hit the pavement. It became part of my day, like brushing my teeth or eating dinner. It became a habit.

That’s what changed everything.

I didn’t suddenly love running. In fact, for the first few weeks, I kind of hated it. Every afternoon, my body argued with me. But I kept showing up. Not because I was strong, but because I was learning the strength of consistency. I was building something, mile by slow mile. My body was changing — yes — but more importantly, my mindset was shifting.

This is where I began to understand the power of habits.

God didn’t meet me in a lightning bolt moment of transformation. He met me in the small choices. In the uncomfortable, sweaty, ordinary afternoons. When I ran even though I didn’t want to. When I chose grilled chicken over pizza. When I went to bed early so I could be sharper the next day. Habits became training grounds for growth. They were where grace and discipline met.

Those early runs didn’t give me Boston, in fact, at that time I hadn’t even thought about Boston. That said, they gave me something better: the realization that change wasn’t about intensity — it was about intention. About returning to the road day after day and trusting that what I was doing mattered, even if it didn’t feel heroic.

And slowly, things did start to change.

I was sleeping better. My energy improved. I felt lighter — not just physically, but emotionally. My confidence grew, even if only a little. My kids started asking me how my runs went. My wife noticed I was smiling more. And somewhere deep inside, I began to believe that maybe — just maybe — I could do this.

I could be the man who finishes something. Who shows up. Who runs.

And something else started to shift.

This rhythm of running — of lacing up my shoes every afternoon and doing the work — began to spill over into other parts of my life. I hadn’t planned on that. But it happened, almost without me noticing at first. Because when you commit to something hard and keep showing up, that commitment starts to shape you.

Suddenly, I was more organized at work. I was more present at home. I started sticking to other good habits — eating cleaner, drinking a lot of water, praying more regularly, even sleeping better. There was a momentum that bled outward from those afternoon runs. Running wasn’t just something I did. It was setting the tone for the man I was becoming and going to become.

Consistency in one area gave me clarity in others. The discipline it took to run when I didn’t feel like it made it easier to resist other compromises. I wasn’t perfect — far from it — but I was becoming faithful in the small things. And in that faithfulness, I was finding something important. A rhythm. A structure. A grace.

It felt like God was using these runs not just to change my body, but to build a foundation — brick by brick, habit by habit — for a life that was stronger, steadier, and more grounded than the one I had before.

I didn’t know it then, but I was laying down the tracks for the rest of the journey.

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278 to Boston – The book

I’m thinking about writing a “book” about my journey from weighing 278 lbs to training for the Boston Marathon. Not that I ever made that goal, but I found out that the journey became the destination.

Below is the introduction I’ve been working though. I don’t know that I have many readers on this blog since I started this blog so long ago and haven’t kept up with it over the recent years, but I figured I’d post this for myself and to keep me motivated. We will see where this goes, if anywhere.

Introduction: 278 to Boston

At 278 pounds, I wasn’t dreaming about Boston.

I was thinking about how to walk up stairs without gasping. How to feel normal in my own body. How to be here — present — for my family. I knew I was carrying more than weight; I was carrying years of habits, regret, and missed chances. But I also knew this: I didn’t want to stay there.

With the help of my doctors, I lost the first 50 pounds. That was the start. But what came next surprised even me. One day, I laced up a pair of shoes and ran a mile and a half. It wasn’t graceful, and it certainly wasn’t fast — but I did it. And something in me shifted.

My family had always been full of runners. My dad ran many marathons. So did my brothers. It was in our blood, somehow — I used that as my inspiration. But what pushed me forward most was my son. He looked at me one day and said, “We should run a marathon together.” That’s all it took. I wasn’t just losing weight anymore. I had a mission.

Somewhere along the line, Boston entered the conversation. Not because I thought I could qualify — I knew the time standards, and I knew my body wasn’t there. But Boston became something more than a race. It became a symbol. A direction. A way to measure effort, progress, and hope.

The way I kept going — through the plateaus, the setbacks, the long runs, and long days — was through habits. Small, daily decisions. Waking up early. Eating what fueled me instead of what numbed me. Logging miles when I didn’t feel like it. Writing it all down. I didn’t change overnight. I changed through consistency. God used habits to steady my heart and retrain my body.

That’s how my blog was born — 278 to Boston. It started as a way to track miles and meals, but quickly became something deeper. A record of struggle and progress. A place where I could be honest about what it takes to change. Not just physically, but spiritually.

Because through every run, through every pound lost and mile logged, God was there. Quietly calling me forward. Not toward a race, but toward renewal.

This isn’t a story about making it to Boston. It’s a story about what happened because I tried — and about the habits and grace that carried me farther than I ever imagined.