….I wanted to be sure I was not running, and had not been running, my race in vain. Galatians 2:2
Did you know that commercials actually have names? You may be familiar with the Humana commercial portraying an older gentleman waking up at 6 AM to go on a run. His run through the neighborhood seems to have no rhyme or reason. He changes his path abruptly, making sudden turns, squeezing through gates, running through alleys, up a rocky slope. At one point he is almost run down by a dump truck! We can hear Ray Charles’s Love Notes playing as he runs. Finally, he makes it home. He takes off his smartwatch and downloads his activity tracker to a printer. He gives the piece of paper to his wife and we see the pattern of a heart imposed over a map. His wife adds it to a cork board of other maps with other love notes produced with the same seemingly haphazard pattern of running.
The commercial is called Love Notes. The seemingly haphazard pattern of running, with all of its twists and turns, actually reveals a labor of love that keeps his body, and his marriage, healthy. In spite of the seemingly unplanned and confused nature of his run, we can see that he planned it out. There was a purpose in mind. After that great change that took place in Paul’s life on the Damascus road, He spends years on what may seem to be a haphazard journey from Arabia, to Jerusalem, Syria, Cilicia and back to Jerusalem. He then lays out to the leaders what he has been doing, hoping that the pattern he has been following somehow makes sense. Our journey is never without its twists and turns, hills and valleys, and yes there are moments when it seems as if we will be run over by life. There are moments when the journey seems to make no sense at all. Our point of view may be myopic because the issues of life are so close to us that we cannot see the pattern unfolding. We lack trust in the process. Drawing nearer to God will build trust in the plan. Rest assured though, there is a process, there is a plan, and one day we will receive God’s love note with that beautiful pattern before us that has been unfolding all along.