"Just Run"

As I write this, little Penelope, a 3-week old Angus heifer, is racing around the back pasture. Calves usually do most of their playing near dusk, but today is a cool 71°, compared to several days of high 90’s. Perhaps Penelope had so many naps in the shade of the cottonwoods that she got over-rested and needs to vent some excess energy! Of course, few things are more gratifying to cowfolks than seeing fat, shiny calves frisking about a green pasture.

I’ve been doing a bit of frisking myself . A year and a half ago, I hurt my knee twice within a week doing ranch jobs, and I ended up on crutches for a while, hurting the other knee in the process. They gradually healed enough for me to go for walks, for which I was very grateful, but I still had lots of soreness sometimes. I doubted that I’d ever being able to run again.

It bothered me that, although I’d stood on the promises of healing in the Bible, and others had prayed for my knees, I’d only been partially healed. One morning on my walk, I said this prayer: “Jesus, I believe the scripture that says, ‘By His stripes you are healed.’ I thank You that I can walk again, but why can’t I run? Is it that I don’t have enough faith?”

No answer. But every now and then when on my morning walk, I’d have this thought: Just run. I ignored it; my knees were too stiff and sore to run, and besides, I didn’t dare make them worse. Weeks, maybe a month, went by with no change.

One evening, I found myself waiting on Hubby in town with nothing to do, so I went for a walk. It was drizzling on and off, but I had a raincoat, and the air was refreshing after our long dry spell. I headed down a road out of town. Before long, the drizzle turned to serious rain; my jeans got so wet that I began to get chilled. A smarter person would have turned back, but I didn’t. A big hill lay a mile ahead, and I decided to throw caution to the wind and run up it to get warm. I did exactly that and have been running every other day since!

Every time I run, my knees feel stronger and move more freely. I’m shy and quiet by nature, but I feel like jumping, shouting, and telling the whole world that the Word of God is true and wondrously powerful!  

“But for you who fear My name, the Sun of Righteousness will rise with healing in his wings. And you will go free, leaping with joy like calves let out to pasture.”                    --MALACHI 4:2