the only reason to run in jeans

Who knows where I had to be or why there were only fifteen minutes to squeeze a bit of outside inside the day. What I remember was the pressing need to take a walk.

So I booked it.

With both arms swinging mall-walker style, I tore out of the house to catch the last warmth of a bewilderingly temperate January day. If I hadn't been wearing jeans, I might've bolted into a run. Because you know what Dodge and Nike and all those other franchises advise. Carpe Diem. Grab Life by the horns. Just do it. Run in your jeans...

Or, yeah...something like all that.

And, yeah, it's true that those words genuinely generate kinetic energy though their strategic motivational bravado might annoy


But to be compelled continually? It requires more than swooshes on your shoes and a Dodge truck trampling Texas dust to spur a person on.
We need more than even the highest, most inspirational words to do that.
       We need One Word which outweighs the rest.We need more than just the ideal setting of sidewalks and a clear day to exercise our hearts.
       We need our hearts to be reset by the exercise of Beauty.


This day, in itself, did shine truly beautiful. But left in isolation it was simply a lovely day. Had it been the anticipated January norm, it would've even settled into a pile of monthly synonyms, days marked less than notable because of their sameness.


You don't nearly sprint in blue jeans for the joy of another monotonously beautiful day.


No, I near about split the door hinges because this untainted blue sky followed the heels of deep gloom and cold. Just the sight of sunlight burned relief. Because the dark sometimes crowds out memory of what is

True,

Noble,

Just,

Pure,

Lovely,

Of good report,

Praiseworthy… (Phil. 4:8)


...but though it crowds it can never lessen nor negate.


One particular Old Testament prophet teaches me this as the Lord keeps reintroducing me to his grieving figure whom no one really knows. This Habakkuk, a man heavy with the context of his world,
      compelled to cry out and yet to hope
      all in the same vision.

In fact, in the NKJV, the book opens like this:
      "The burden which the prophet Habakkuk saw…"

The word for "oracle" (from the Latin "orare", to speak) can be interpreted also as "burden". Speaking is a weighty thing whether I act accordingly or not, and even past that obvious conclusion is the heavier: when the Lord compels us, He will press.

He will never press us into a state of confusion or despair or abject misery. Though the hurt shouts, "O Lord, how long shall I cry, and You will not hear?", and the calendar reads like a square compilation of shootings and typhoons,


He will weep alongside,

  and press through our anguish with a Word. With the heaviest Word that is at once       perfectly Light.


"And the Word was with God and the Word WAS GOD" (Jn. 1:1)…

Yes! He is the Word which He gives us!
Jesus Christ Himself presses through every violence and burdens us
with glorious news of His reconciliation.

Habakkuk knew it even in the middle of tempest tears:
       "YET I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation. The Lord God is  my strength; He will make my feet like deer's feet, and He will make me walk on my high hills" (3:18-19).



That "yet" is the incalculable treasure of Christ in us, beautiful friends. His "yet" is a burden light and a vision easy. It is Him Who causes us to run without stumbling, Who compels us by His love.


He IS the vision.


Whoever reads It will run straight out the door and into a Hope that cannot lie, into
an eternal calendar of days numbered entirely in the ink of His blood.


Let's leave the door swinging on our way out. Even if we're running in our jeans.


"Then the Lord answered me and said:

'Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it. For the vision is yet for an appointed time; but at the end it will speak, and it will not lie. Though it tarries, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry' (2:2-3)".