Really Believe

So last night after the Gathering I took a walk. I ended up down the
road at a dead end. I walked off the road a little and found a little
spot to sit and stare at the full moon that was perched over the
glistening lake, that I could kind of see through the trees. The view
didn’t really matter.



My conversation with God was mostly one sided and a reiteration of
conversations I’d already been having with God. I’ll give the
highlights. I asked for more adventure in my life. I prayed for a friend
to have adventures with. I asked for better health. I asked for time to
exercise, and more specifically that God would push me beyond my bodies
limits. There was more, but that’s enough to show you that God loves to
answer prayers.



As I was driving home from work tonight I got a text from Robby asking
if me and Amy wanted to take a walk. She had plans tonight so it was
just us. In my mind I pictured the kind of walks that I used to take
with my parents in our neighborhood. They were nice, easy going walks.
This was not.



First, Georgia is not like Indiana. The hills are ridiculous. So almost
immediately I was panting and sweating. Then as we talked we realized
how we both love adventure and decided to take a chance at having one
tonight. We weren’t disappointed.



We made our way through the streets and eventually found a good place to
cut through to the lake. We were greeted by an older woman and her
yappy dog, but she was gracious enough to let us walk through her
backyard to the lake, so we proceeded. What we found was disappointing.
The part of the lake that we were at did not put us in the right spot to
be able to walk easily back to the nearby park, which is what we were
going for. If we were to walk around the lake we would have had to swim through it, and that sounded like a bad idea.



So we turned around and went back. We finally came back around to a
crossroads of sorts. A street that lead to rest, a place to sit, and
water, but instead the words that came out of my mouth were a little
strange. I said, “let’s go this way, it’s the street I took last night
and it leads to the lake.� Did I mention that the street went
up…again?



At this point I was worn out. I had already needed to list the things
that I was thankful for because I was complaining about how steep the
hills were, in my head. My complaints usually came out as grunts and
uphs.



I don’t know where we were in the walk when I realized that this was
exactly what I had prayed for. A friend to adventure with, check. Better
health, check. More exercise, check. Exercise that pushed my body
beyond my normal limits, check. Adventure, oh it’s coming…



We made it to the dead end and trespassed through a yard to make it to
the lake. We walked around trying to make it to the park. I say trying
because every so often there were cables cutting across the shore, that
held the docks in place. It was about twilight so you really had to pay
attention OR get tripped, gutted or strangled. I let Robby lead, he was
way better at paying attention and then pointing them out.



But then we came to the place that we had to make a decision.
It really wasn’t my decision, I was up for anything, but there were
weeds involved and Robby’s highly allergic to poison ivy and poison oak.
So I said a prayer of protection over his legs and I guess that’s all
he needed because he pushed forward.



When we got to the other side we realized that there was a stream that
was just large enough that it would have taken a lot of effort to go
around on dry land (and through more weeds). Going back was NOT an
option. So the only other option was to take off our shoes and swim
across.



It smelled bad. It was dark and the murky water didn’t help. Plus, it
was deeper than I ever imagined. But we made it to the other side,
soaked. We were kind of excited that we only had to walk through the
park, down the street and through the neighborhood again. But what is
normally a two minute or less drive, is a longer walk especially when
drenched.



We walked with bare feet, trying to avoid the glass shards. We passed by
tennis courts on which many of our friends play. We hoped that someone
would have been there, but they weren’t. Then we made it to the entrance
of the neighborhood and the steepest hill of all!



I dragged myself up that hill. As I began to grunt and groan again,
Robby simply stated, “you prayed for this.� Awesome. All I could do was
laugh and tell him, “thank you for calling me out!� I finally made it.
And I remembered how much I love pushing myself beyond my own minds
limits.



Thank you Robby for the small adventure and for the great reminder.



Thank you God for answering prayers.



I will pray Bold, Dangerous prayers.



I will ask for things and REALLY BELIEVE that God is answering them.