Praying Through Sorrow by Chris Jackson & Dutch Sheets

Author:Chris Jackson & Dutch Sheets [Jackson, Chris & Sheets, Dutch]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2012-03-13T18:55:38+00:00

9

Pursue

Alexis graced my world. This morning Jessica, Amber, Madelyn, and I wrote love notes to her and attached them to helium balloons that floated, hopefully, to Heaven. We hugged and kissed and cried and marveled how we could have lived so long without her. For a few moments, I felt such pain that I wondered if I have healed at all.

Today is May 14, 2003. It's been exactly seven years since I know at some point we have to get back in the saddle. We are not destined to hurt for eternity, and we will, eventually, experience a desire to run again. I'm not quite as fast as I used to be. I don't enlist for new assignments with quite the same level of zeal I had in my youth, but I am ready to settle into the starting blocks again. Perhaps you feel that way too.

For those of us who have passionately pursued and come up short, there are some keys we should ponder before we set out in pursuit again. Pursuit is seldom inspiring. Sometimes it's downright excruciating. Despite the pain of pursuit, however, it is still possible to see the Lord perform exploits through our lives. In fact, King David had a comrade that lived this truth. I think I see him now.

Snowflakes settled softly on the forest floor carpeting the cold earth in a fresh blanket of purity. The air was still, allowing the gentle flakes to flutter, rather than fall, from the evening skies. A gentle hush permeated the forest as if any noise might shatter the pristine beauty of this wintry landscape. To an unhur -ried traveler, the snowy scene would appear beautiful—almost dazzling—in its brilliance. Almost.

On the forest floor amidst the trees, a fresh set of lion tracks was being buried by the snow. Watching the animal's trail disappear, the hunter cursed the snow as he quickened his pace along the tracks gliding as a noiseless phantom bent on pursuit.

He was Benaiah, a renegade warrior and comrade of David, the young shepherd, singer, giant-slayer exile whom he had met in the cave of Adullum. Benaiah was alone in the forest. Alone, except for the lion. He wiped a palm, sweaty despite the cold, gripped the hilt of his broadsword more firmly, squinted into the snow, and continued in hot pursuit.

Tracking the lion was easy. Its wide prints lay deep in the soft earth, and occasional flecks of blood still appeared along the trail despite the snow. Was this lion wounded, or was he stained in the blood of his latest victim? The question scarcely registered in Benaiah's thinking. All he knew was that he intended to go down and kill a lion in a pit on this snowy day.

He had overcome great odds before. Once, he slew two lionlike men from Moab. They were the true champions of their nation (some called them the lions of god), yet he had bested them with the skill and savagery of a desperate man. At another time, he slew an Egyptian giant.

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