Monday

Okay, I realize tonight is Wednesday night already. However, I'd like to back track to Monday for a few moments to record two events for posterity.

Monday morning, I headed into the weight room just like any other Monday morning. After lifting for awhile, I started cardio on the stationary bike. Usually, I just stay on one machine, but for some reason, the treadmill looked enticing. (I had some negative vibes to sweat out and the bike just wasn't getting it done.) So I cranked that thing up to 9.5-10 mph and got in a quick mile and then was ready to head to the stepper. I backed the speed down and then pressed "stop." The machine continued to slow down and I thought it was slow enough to step off.

Uh, yeah, about that.

It wasn't.

The floor felt kind of hard after flying off the machine.

In the past, I would have been pretty mortified by this little situation. However, I just got up and head over to the stepper. It was kind of comical really.

Fast forward to Monday night after class. I was heading south from campus and it was sleeting. I was droving slow because of the slippery road. However, despite the caution, the headlights from the car behind me were not reflecting in the rearview mirror. No, they were shining right into my eyes. In an instant, my car had rotated 180 degrees and was still in the correct lane. So I checked the other lane, turned the car around, and headed on my merry shook up way.

These two events were pretty powerful reminders to me. I needed these events. They reminded me that some things are beyond our control, that life is fragile, that sometimes it is necessary to just get up and get going again, that sometimes it can feel like things are going in completely the wrong direction. However, the enemy - whether it be embarrassment, guilt, shame, even death - has been defeated.

We sang this great song from Hillsong last night...

The enemy has been defeated
And death couldn't hold You down
We're gonna lift our voice in victory
We're gonna make Your praises loud