A Good Ride

Saturday morning was always my favorite time to go for a bike ride. I would be up, dressed, and out the door before the first rays of sunshine began to peek over the horizon. There was just something about feeling the cool morning breeze on my face and pushing the pedals as the sun rose. Those mornings contain some of my favorite memories. I can remember where I was the first time I rode over thirty miles. The same for when I broke through the fifty-mile-ride limit. The first forty-five miles of that ride were a lot of fun. There was just something about pushing my body a little bit further than I thought it would go. On those mornings, as I rode home, I knew I had had a good ride.

In many ways, this journey to beat lung cancer has been much the same. There were times that I just had to push my body a little bit further than I thought it could go. And the times that I thought I could not make it any further, friends and family would lift us up. Sometime they would come in person, and sometimes it was in their prayers. I have lost count of the times that DeLayne, the boys, and, I have been blessed by the giving of others. Perhaps, the most surprising thing has been the many times we have been blessed by opportunities to give to others. It has been a long journey that would not have been possible without the grace of others and the grace of God.

Yes, this journey has been a long one. There were twist and turns, never knowing what lay beyond the next bend in the road but learning to trust that Jesus would be there waiting on us. It has taken us places we never thought we would have to go, both physically and spiritually. Now my earthly journey has come to an end; I now know what lay beyond the last bend in the road. I am finally home resting in the loving arms of my Savior, Jesus Christ. I have had a good ride.

Salt

I have been on a low-sodium diet for several months now. It was hard to adapt to at first, but now that we have gotten the hang of it, things come much easier.

How did we accomplish this? Well, we started with the obvious. The salt shaker got put away. I was so accustomed to adding salt, I did it without noticing. After that, things got tougher. Salt is in everything. Don't believe me, check the sodium contents of about everything you buy at the grocery store. Who would of thought that finding "No Salt Added Ketchup" would be seen as a small victory?

I have gotten to the point now that the other day I took a bite of something that had salt in it, and it was a shock to my system. All I could taste was the salt. A big key to getting to this point is finding other spices to substitute for the salt, and I don't mean just pepper of some kind. Who would have ever thought I would reach this point?

I sat and thought about this the other day and realized that my journey to become salt free mirrored the efforts of society to become Christian free. We are taught in the Bible to be salt, but back in the 1960s and 1970s there were some people that thought society would be better off if Christians were silenced. They went after the salt shaker first and before we knew it, there was no prayer in schools. The Christians were okay with that because you could find Christian teachings everywhere, but before long, the Ten Commandments were gone, and it just continued.

We have reached the point now that whenever a tragedy occurs, we Christians try to rush in and show Jesus to those involved. We are met with skepticism and often pushed away. It is a shock to the system of society. They just can't handle the whole salt shaker being thrown at them at once.

I am beginning to believe that things would go better if we Christians would start being a little salt daily in our neighborhoods.