Saturday, Sunday and Monday

Saturday morning I ran Town Lake with my Marianna (my sister-in-law) and her friend Jill. They are training for a half marathon in January and are both avid bikers. They ran from the First Street bridge to IH 35 and back. I kept going when we got back to First Street and went to the Pfluger bridge loop, which is by Lamar. I found myself walking some, which I don't normally do, but I think there were 2 contributing factors. First, I was talking while running. The second factor was the terrain. The parks around the house where I run are all flat. Town Lake, however, has several hills and a few ramps to get from lake level to street level. I think for next Saturday my goal will be to start at First Street, go to IH 35, then back the other way to MoPac, then back to First Street. I will walk the hills, ramps and steps, and run the rest to MoPac, walking from MoPac to First Street.

I found a great app for my Blackberry called Roadrunner GPS. It is a running and fitness tracker which works off the GPS on my phone. This app tracks my distance, mapping out the trail, gives me the total time for the workout, what my mile time is, average mph, and calories burned. It seems to be very accurate, and it should be a great help for tracking the progress of my runs!

Yesterday I rested. Well, I rested from running, at least. I preached about Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his commitment to his faith, even being committed to death by hanging for doing what he knew was right. The scriptural basis was Luke 12:49-56. I believe there is a crisis of faith in our nation. There are many who say they are religious, but they do not practice that religion. Bonhoeffer lived his faith and died for his faith. According to the doctor that witnessed his execution, “I saw Pastor Bonhoeffer ... kneeling on the floor praying fervently to God. I was most deeply moved by the way this lovable man prayed, so devout and so certain that God heard his prayer. At the place of execution, he again said a short prayer and then climbed the few steps to the gallows, brave and composed. His death ensued after a few seconds. In the almost fifty years that I worked as a doctor, I have hardly ever seen a man die so entirely submissive to the will of God.” May we all be so submissive to our God and our faith!

This morning's run was 4 miles. My goal was 3, so it was good to go past it. However, my time was way off. Maline started back to work today, so we had to get up and get going earlier then we are used to. We hit snooze a few too many times, but we finally got up and took care of business. Tomorrow we have training with Moe, then running Wednesday and Thursday.

Until next time, Live, love, laugh!