Couch Potatoe Christians Can't Run

Hey readers look, I'm on time!

Sunday sunset.

Since the group of twelve American exchange students arrival, I have been busy participating in activities with them. My German high school has a partner school in Michigan. The Germans went to America in the fall, and now it’s turn for the Americans to come to Germany. The Americans don’t know any German, because it’s not an offered language at their school. On Saturday, the students, teachers and host parents enjoyed a small brunch at our school. I received a rescue bag of Skittles, Starbursts, and Reese’s. I gave out the Skittles, and Starbursts but kept the Reese’s for me! One of the American teachers brought me a cookie mix to make classic chocolate chip cookies for my host family. I’m so excited to make them, considering all of my recipes have been a disaster, except for the fact that I ate the bag of chocolate chips…so my host family will be getting sugar cookies! The American students thought that I was a German student, that could only speak 'ok' english. They were shocked, totally shocked, when they found out I was from the States. After brunch, the students and their German partners all took the train to Hamburg. It was the first time ever riding a train for the most of them.

We mostly wandered around the city, like all over-sized tourists groups do. It’s hard to ever accomplish anything worth taking note of, unless you travel with one or two friends. Big groups move slow, and fail to ever have a set of destinations. Nevertheless, our last stop was the Hamburg Fair which I had never been to. French fries, arcade games, chocolate covered fruit kebabs (I had to Google that word), small rollercoasters, and people trying to convince you to buy their stuff. It was all there. I went on a small rollercoaster,  that started off like a kids ride then turned into a chiropractor’s nightmare. At least I can check off rollercoaster on my list of things to do in Germany.

Chocolate Kebabs. I had a pineapple/apple/banana/grape one.
Mmmmmmm.

Mime Man in the center of Hamburg



Win an overstuffed animal! I saw a young girl win a monster sized
chihuahua. It was so big her mom had to carry it for her!

The next day, I went to church service with a school friend and his American exchange partner. I ended up translating the entire sermon for the student sitting to my left. It was hard because 1) the speaker didn’t give any pauses 2) German is complicated to translate, it involves reforming entire sentences and 3) I didn’t understand some parts myself. At the end of the service, a sister of one of the members gave a short speech. She was from a small village in the mountains (I didn’t catch the exact name). She spoke in her native tongue, and her sister who has been living in German translated for the audience, and I translated from German to English. It was quite a moment to be talking about God’s glory in three different languages.

After service, I went back to my school friends’ house to enjoy lunch with his family. His mom prepared curry coconut soup, meat with a yummy sauce, and a strawberry yogurt dessert. As we were driving home, she asked if I had a minute to take a short detour. Before she finished her sentence, I said ‘Ja!!’, which means ‘yes!!’. Apparently, there is a small village called Heidel that has a completely different landscape. You’ll be driving through green country side, then all of a sudden its hilly, the shrubs are dark purple and there are patches of electric green moss. I ran to the top of one of the hills and I guess you can see a small part of Poland on the Horizon.

Sitting in the green moss.

The next stop was a ‘throwback’ village. That’s not what she called it, but to me it made sense. After this village, there is another that’s house architecture is exact that of England’s in the late 1800’s. A whole block of houses are built completely different from normal German houses. This was during the time of the German Industrial Revolution which was very close entwined with England.

I believe this house was built in 1878,
can you imagine how much it would cost to heat??

When I got home, I was surprised to find fifteen of our baby birds hatched and already fuzzy. They are extremely curious little birds. If you tap on the side of their box they’ll all come running over and start tapping where they hear the noise.

I have yet to name the little guys. They're staying in a crate in our livingroom
until it begins to warm up outside. I play my guitar for them everymorning and they all
try to crow along!

The next day was Monday, the first day of school for the Americans. Instead of going to history, my teacher encouraged me to go to breakfast with the two American teachers to share experiences. When we got back to the school, the principal was waiting for us to give the welcome speech to all of the exchange participants (including a newspaper guy taking notes on the side). I turned to leave, and he asked me to stay and translate for him. He told me he couldn’t speak English very well, and I told him I can’t speak English very well. The standard of ‘speaking well’ to a German, is grammatical perfection. I turned to leave, but he insisted that he needed me so I pulled up a chair. After all of the students were quiet, he began speaking for a minute then looked at me.

‘He said that he is very excited to all have you here at his school. He knows that the Germans have made a lot of preparations to make your stay comfortable…and because I was busy translating the first two sentences I spaced out on the second two, so I’m going to let the English teacher do the second two!’ The room filled with light laughter. She translated what I missed, but I did the rest of the speech. After he was done and awarded with his thank you gift, I couldn’t help but smile too. I was honored that he allowed me to do that for him, and also that I was able to do it.

Bed of flowers in the woods behind my house.

Come Monday night, I was exhausted. Exhausted. One minute English, one minute German, then back to English, and then back to German. My head was spinning. So, I took today off to calm myself out. After sleeping thirteen hours, I woke up and had a much needed slow breakfast. The sun was shining and the wind wasn’t ice cold, so I decided to go for a run. The day before, I had a conversation with my history teacher about running. We agreed that you can think of ten different excuses not to go running, before your about to go running. Your mind thinks of how strenuous it is for every muscle, and how painful side cramps are. The couch calls out your name, and the warm blanket says ‘come, let’s take a nap!’.  If you can get past the island of syrene’s, calling you to be lazy and actually go running, it’s worth it. She told me, not until she gets home and takes her shoes off does she realize how fantastic she feels. The same goes for me. Sometimes, even during my run I consider stopping and walking home. It was a fun conversation, but later during my prayer time a Bible verse from Paul came to mind about what we had said.

2 Corinthians’ 9:24 ‘Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain. And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible.’

And Timothy 4:5-7 Paul writing to Timothy ‘But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry. For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith’.

Sunset from a hill.

Paul exhorts us to run. But the truth is, that too many of us don’t get past the couch that is calling us to sit and relax, to actually put our sneakers on and go running. Here are some thoughts on a physical level of running. We think of how painful it could possibly be, and how much energy it would require. And isn’t the couch just so comfortable and easy? I don’t have to go out of my comfort level at all! Apply these to the spiritual level now. Many think of how painful living for God could be, how many Sunday’s they would have to ‘sacrifice’, how many gallons of gas they would use up and how much energy it would all require.

For a couch potato, those are legitimate excuses. But couch potatoes won’t get into the Kingdom of God. How can you win a race if you never started running? How could you be more than a conqueror, if you have never fought a battle? There is no better time to start studying the Word of God than now, no better time to give your life to Him than this moment. Another verse that may be haunting for some, is a question posed by one of the disciples to Jesus. Luke 13:23 ‘Lord, are there few that be saved? And He said unto them, Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able.’’ The words ‘strive’ and ‘seek’ are essential in this verse. According to the Greek and Hebrew dictionary, strive means to struggle or fight and seek means simply to look without actual intent of pursuing.

Sitting on the bench, giving myself time to be still and listen.

Many people are bystanders of the Christian life, many merely seek. Jesus came to give us life , and life more abundantly. But we have to run the race, in order to win. And we have to fight so that God can be victorious through us. Like I said, we won’t run if we never get running. You can’t enter the Kingdom of God by simply looking, you have to strive to enter in. I was thinking about it on a totally basic level. Would I want to allow someone into my Kingdom so easily? Would I accept someone that never proved they really wanted to come in? We have got to want this more than anything, because we only have this life to prove we really want in.

Your fellow runner, Genevieve