What is the Object of Your Focus?

Today I'm re-listening to a podcast from last week's Let My People Think broadcast. Normally Ravi Zacharias is the teacher, but last week one of their other team members, Arun Andrews, talked about "What's Love Got to Do with It?" One of the points that he brought up is something I hadn't thought about before, and I'll try to summarize here. After God created Adam, he said it wasn't good for him to be along and put him to sleep. He didn't need Adam to be asleep for Him to take one of his ribs to use in form Eve—so why was Adam asleep? It was likely so that, after Eve had been created, the first person she would see, the first object of her focus, would be God.

That is how we still should be living. God is the one who created us. He knows us better than we could ever imagine, and He alone is worthy of praise and honor and adoration. I am not always diligent about remembering that, but this has been such a good reminder lately: God should be the first object of my focus.

Marriage is not standing apart; it is standing together, and transparency is the key.

At the end of the message, he prayed that God would help each marriage "celebrate transparency, trust, and teamwork." What an amazing prayer, a wonderful thought about what marriage is supposed to be--a representation of the eventual perfect relationship between Jesus (the groom) and the church (the bride).

As far as training went today, at lunch I headed to DHY for my favorite version of 5 minutes of work. First it was lunge, which I've started doing in the kiddie pool. It's amazing how much help 1.5 feet of water can be but how hard you still have to work to pull hard and keep your back knee off the ground. I was focused on getting through the entire 5 minutes, each leg, and this time I moved up closer to the 1-foot mark. I have 2 weeks until the outdoor closes, so that's my motivation to get up to actually doing 5 minutes of work, each leg, no support from water. After that and a walk around the pool deck, it was on to standing ham. The ground was hot, hot, hot, but I made it through 5 minutes without stopping to put my sandals back on. I like doing this all on the pool deck because I still have to work super hard but I also get outside and enjoy the sunshine.

I also managed to get a run in between the many patches of rain we saw. It was OK, nothing super fast, and ended uphill. I can't really avoid that, I just decide that it will make me stronger in a race that ends uphill.

8-18-10 (home); 8-12-10 (DHY), 8-10-10 (MFY); 8-09-10 (MFY)

• 58:25, 6.20 miles, 9:25 pace (6:50 best), 167 HR (187 max), 738 cal
  52:44, 6.20 miles, 8:31 pace (6:34 best), 172 HR (185 max), 744 cal
  51:31, 6.20 miles, 8:19 pace (5:59 best), 170 HR (185 max), 743 cal
  53:14, 6.20 miles, 8:35 pace (6:41 best), 165 HR (181 max), 741 cal
  
• Mile 1: 7:58; Mile 1: 8:04; Mile 1: 8:38; Mile 1: 8:40
  
• Mile 2: 8:25; Mile 2: 7:47; Mile 2: 8:03; Mile 2: 7:58
  
• Mile 3: 10:23; Mile 3: 9:30; Mile 3: 8:09; Mile 3: 8:38
  
• Mile 4: 8:24; Mile 4: 8:25; Mile 4: 8:19; Mile 4: 8:46
  
• Mile 5: 8:55; Mile 5: 8:37; Mile 5: 8:15; Mile 5: 8:11
  
• Mile 6: 12:45; Mile 6: 8:51; Mile 6: 8:23; Mile 6: 9:18
  
• Mile 6.2: 1:31; Mile 6.2: 1:28; Mile 6.2: 1:40; Mile 6.2: 1:39