Prayer Running, Part 1

6:30am. I park at the trails and double check my double-knotted Asics. The sun is just peeking over the horizon, casting an orange glow over the path. I love my morning route: a winding river-side trail that goes on for endless miles. I always start my run heading east toward downtown, it makes sense to run into the sun before it gets to hot, then have the sun at your back for the last bit of mileage. But if I had to be honest, the sun has nothing to do with why I run east….in the early mornings the sun shines through the high rise buildings causing light to glint off of the chrome skyscrapers that frame downtown. Sunrise and skyscrapers combine in a prismic effect that adds some serious magic to my run. And I am all about having as many distractions as possible to keep my mind off blisters or sore muscles.

6:35am. I usually warm up with a five minute jog, which also allows me to recalibrate my Nike chip to get an accurate reading on today’s run. I am in serious LOVE with my Nike iPod chip. It tracks my pace, mileage, and time. Once my calibration is set, I hit play and run toward the sunlight. David Crowder pounds through my headphones: Here is our King, Our Love is Loud, Wholly Yours, God of Creation, Undignified, All This for a King,The Glory of it All. And suddenly, I am alone. Gone is the background noise of traffic, the squawking of birds hoping to be fed, the whiz of cyclist passing to my left. Even the pounding of my own feet has disappeared. It’s just me and Jesus.

Running is my time with God. Don’t get me wrong, it doesn’t take the place of reading scripture, memorizing the Word, or going to church. But running is when Jesus and I talk. The iPod effectively blocks out the world (don’t worry Dad, I stay alert to would-be predators). Sometimes I start out the run with a specific burden on my heart. Sometimes I picture my church and pray for every face. Sometimes I pray for my family. Running is my time of intercessory prayer. I have tried to be a “good Christian” and do all my prayer stuff during my quiet time, but I find myself distracted by random noises, by the phone ringing, by the to-do list taunting me from the kitchen table. I can’t focus for long periods of time….unless I am running. When I first begin to run, it was serious work. It hurt so much, I was so out of shape – I was desperate for anything that would get my mind off of the pain of beating my body into shape. So I begin to pray. Soon I found that I would get so focused on praying that an hour would fly by without me realizing it. And I was able to really invest in my church, my family, my friends marriages, and in lost souls by praying for them.

Running and Jesus became so intertwined that I looked forward to running (no matter how many miles were on the schedule for that day) because I got to run with Jesus. And I loved praying because it improved both my spirit and my body through running. It was totally win/win. I was excited when people asked me to pray with them because I could tell them with absolute certainty that I would pray that night during my 10k run, or the next morning during my sprint workout.

7:15am. My runs aren’t just time for me to talk with God; they also provided the perfect platform for me to listen to Him. In case you haven’t figured it out, I am quite the talker. And that transfers into my prayer life as well. I generally talk to God way more than I listen to Him. Which is completely backwards, since He kind of knows everything about, well, everything! But somewhere around mile five, my brain shuts down. The first two miles are always torture, no matter how in shape I am, so that is when my prayers are the most focused. By mile five I am in the zone; I am in rhythm and have settled into my stride. Running isn’t effortless, but it is no longer excruciatingly hard work. My brain no long needs to force my legs to move, they do it on their own. So my brain shuts down, which means that whoever I was praying for when I hit the shut-down point gets prayed for over…and over…and over… or I stop praying. And when I am finally quiet, God begins to speak. He convicts me of sin, He brings Scripture to mind and teaches me about it, He challenges, inspires, convicts, and encourages me. He teaches me what to pray and how to pray. Mileage after the five mile marker is the sweetest, most inspiring time I have with my Lord and Savior. Eight out of ten blogs that I write come from times running with Jesus. Book ideas, Bible study insights, and revelation of His nature come in those final miles. Makes me want to run distance every day just so I can meet Jesus. Not that I cannot experience the same thing at other times of the day, the only thing stopping me is my own lack of discipline to focus on Jesus alone. What works for me is combining the discipline of running with the discipline of prayer (both talking and listening).

I run with an iPod. And not just because of my obsession with the Nike chip. I run with music to prevent myself from being distracted. Especially when I know God has something to tell me that I don’t want to hear, or a sin to convict me of, or He wants to call me to greater holiness. If I can distract myself from hearing something I don’t want to hear from God, I will. So I eliminate distractions with my iPod. I only run to worship music. And I don’t like most Christian artists, so it is pretty much me, David Crowder, and Jesus. The worship songs keep me focused on Jesus. Anytime my thoughts start to wander or I try to ignore what God is saying, David Crowder says something like “Take my heart, I Lay it down, At the feet of you whose crowned, Take my life, I’m letting go, I lift it up to You who’s throned. And I will worship You, Lord. Only You, Lord” and I am back on track, listening to God.

8:30am. I have run the day's race and met my Lord. Running is no longer just about making the day’s mileage, it is about running to meet Jesus and get my heart in line with His.

“Is the Son of God praying in me, or am I dictating to Him?....Prayer is not simply getting things from God, that is a most initial form of prayer; prayer is getting into perfect communion with God. If the Son of God is formed in us by regeneration, He will press forward in front of our common sense and change our attitude to the things about which we pray.” --Oswald Chambers

Prayer running: using the discipline of running to inspire the discipline of prayer.