running with cicadas

"We are half-hearted creatures fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in the projects because he cannot imagine what is meant by an offer of a holiday at the sea." 

~ C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory

About a week ago, I rolled (...er, leaped ...) out of bed to a cross between Will Smith's futuristic I Am Legend and Ancient Egypt's ten plagues.  An early morning storm had strewn trees and power lines across my neighborhood and produced hail that massacred about a quarter of the insipient cicada population, leaving juicy booby traps everywhere!

After administrators discovered that it was difficult to teach without power, students and teachers were released early, and I decided that conditions were perfect for a run.  I took off on my standard three-mile loop in awe of the damage that my mind was surveying.  I was making ridiculous time until I hit the lake, where my nose alerted me to the fact that the geese on the lake had been scared literally shitless by the same storm that found me taking part of my sleep in our bathtub.  My focus shifted to the ground and I began being a little more strategic about which angle I took on the running trail.  I became increasingly aware of the cicadas I was crushing underfoot, and began trying to avoid those too.  Eventually, I found myself not running at all but tipoeing through the cicada graveyard formerly known as Shelby Park. 

It's funny: the conditions did not change much from the first mile to the second, but my perception of them did.  As I focused down on the details, my perspective changed; an exhilirating run became a gross gauntlet. I've noticed that I do the same thing with my faith; I become focused on where I fail rather than on Christ's glory.  I'm too distracted by my own "mud pies" as Lewis says - my own "dirt."  It is impossible to keep pace this way; in fact, it becomes impossible to run.  I have to recognize that I'm not going to avoid every mess, but the faster I run towards my destination the fewer I hit.  Christianity isn't self-disciplined sin management, it's simply a shift of focus, as Hebrews 12:2 says, to "look away to Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith."