Chad Arnold Blog

My friend Chad has started a blog…This is my friend who recently went through a liver transplant. The back story is heartbreaking, but even in the sadness, there is hope.
Would you please visit, read, join the conversation and allow your life to be changed?

I feel like I’m a walking contradiction sometimes.

One day I wanna see an action movie, but then the next day I want to watch something to make me weep.

I usually love my stilettos, but wow I love sliding into my flip flops.

I love dressing professional but then again, I can’t get enough of casual Fridays.

I am super super affectionate with my kids, but not usually super affectionate with other people.

I love screaming my lungs out at ball games, but then again, I really do like the theater.

Isn’t that just funny how we are? Full of contradictions and oppositions. Think how boring we’d be if we never had variations in our taste and desires.

What’s a big contradiction in your life?

We had another crazy storm here in Colorado last night. I don’t know if you guys have these where you live, but you can stand at the doorway and watch the rain come pouring straight down…Literally in sheets, then, next thing you know, there’s hail falling all over the place. For a minute you try to think of how you can possibly save your garden from the damage of the hail, or if you have a car laying outside, you sacrifice your noggin to get your car in and away from the hail damage.

Soon enough the storm passes and you’re left standing there staring at the newly vibrant looking grass, trees and flowers. The air is immediately cooler and you can sense that everything is clean.  I love walking outside after the rain. I am able to breathe just a little easier and drink in the freshness of everything around me.

I’m thankful for  Colorado rains… just like the earth, my soul is refreshed after a good rain.

There are two people in my life who make me laugh every single day of my life: MY KIDS!!!

I feel like you should know this about them…they are HI-larious.

They make faces, they crack jokes. They know when to be funny and when to make others laugh. Most of all they know how to make me laugh.

Today, I am so thankful for my silly, funny kiddies…my sweet babies.

My sweet kids

There’s this place that we pseudo athletic types (and real athletic types too) in Colorado Springs like to go called the “Incline.” It’s the remains of an old roadbed from a scenic railway. It’s not that long of a climb…just a little under a mile of straight climb…actually, it’s got an average grade of a little over 40%, but the steepest section is at a 68% grade. So, when you stand at the bottom and look up, you think how hard can it be? Well, when you realize that you will gain over 2000 ft in elevation in less than a mile…well, lemme just say, it gets your heart pumping!

Bottom of the Incline

So, the other day I “did” the incline and as I was climbing it, I was really seeking God’s wisdom for my life. I was in a mode of climbing in every sense. There were moments where everything in my body was burning from exertion, but I felt like I had to keep going. Since I’ve done this little hike a few times, I know that there’s a false peak that you see from the bottom. I also know that there are people doing this climb for the first time just trying to summit the false peak thinking they’ll reach the top.

Looking down from the false peak

I’ve been on a steady uphill climb in my life for a while now, so often when I’m in the mountains, God really uses those times to show me the life analogy . It hit me hard that day that God allows me to climb each step, sometimes with excruciating pain so that I will appreciate the true peak when I finally reach it. There have been lots of false summits in my life in the past few weeks…actually the past few years. Some of these false peaks have shown up in my life through family, work, finances, personal, even spiritual issues. Along with the false peaks have been false truths. Stuff I’ve told myself, sometimes stuff others have said about me or to me…those things have become the stumbling blocks as I’ve been trying to climb…getting in my way, setting me back, making me question why I’m climbing in the first place. Sometimes I catch myself wishing to get to the false peak so that I can then give up and quit by selling myself short and saying, “well, at least I tried.”

I’m telling you, I’m in a strange place in my life because that last climb showed me so clearly how the false summits and false truths set me back for a time and possibly even for a season, but the reality is that God is still God. The same one who created the mountains is making the way for me by allowing me to take my direction from him one step at a time. People may offer explanation or discounts or even blame, but the reality in my life is that God controls my life. I will make it to the top, I have that assurance because God’s truth will always prevail, and when I get there…the view will be so worth it!

View from the top

“Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, your justice like the great deep. O LORD, you preserve both man and beast.”
Psalm 36:6

“Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,”
Psalm 46:2

I was thinking about my childhood today and remembering how we never took vacations. We went on trips for relative’s weddings or we would go sometimes to conferences, but we weren’t a family that went on vacations to the beach or camping trips to wherever. We never went to Europe or The Mediterranean and we certainly didn’t spend ski holidays in Vail or summer weeks in Aspen. Actually typing that out makes me want to laugh out loud.

This all came into my mind because I was thinking of how people in poverty don’t take vacation from their lives. They have no options to escape to or from.

We were poor. My family came to the US when I was 5 and my brothers worked in restaurants washing dishes and taking whatever work they could find. They worked hard to help make ends meet for our family. My mom had a day care and my dad was a pastor. Everybody had a job and everybody worked to make ends meet and help the family unit survive. We were the oh so typical hard-working immigrant family trying to realize the American dream.

We never thought of going on vacations. It wasn’t an option. We never dreamt that people went away for days at a time to do nothing. How would the bills be paid that way? We prayed for God to provide and then we worked hard to make sure we did our part.

Here I am as an adult needing, no, wanting a vacation! I’ve come a long way from being that child who never went on vacations. I’ve traveled to amazing places in the world because of Compassion International and I’ve seen spectacular beauty, breathtaking views and absolute poverty.

So, I guess I have brain issues because I still have difficulty justifying my need/want for a vacation when I know that poverty never takes a break.

I’m just sayin.’

The last full marathon I ran was in November of 2008. It was a humbling experience for me. What most people don’t know is that I was walking through some of the hardest days of my life during that time as well. The race presented some huge learning moments for me…really an allegory to what was happening in my personal life at the time. I’ve really only shared these thoughts before with a handful of people, but at this point in my life, I feel it’s time to start sharing this for others as well.

So, to explain briefly, my right knee stopped wanting to work at mile 12 of the marathon…

There was really nothing I could do at that point since I was already past the turn off for the half, so I started walking and praying. I started questioning God and why He was allowing this hurt(really it was an echo of the hurt that was taking place in my personal life as well..all the why me’s, what did I do wrong, how could this be happening, etc). As I was questioning and doubting God’s love for me, I felt an intensity to be thankful for that moment and the hurt and all the stuff that came with it and to thank God for that opportunity to be there and to be His child. So, I started just mentally thanking God and saying that no matter what happened, I knew that He didn’t make me to be a quitter and he didn’t bring me to that place to leave me or to watch me fail, so I was going to choose to take the steps ahead of me(seriously, this was the precise moment I realized this in my personal life as well). I was having this crazy/amazing mental gratitude time and I decided that I was going to start running again and I was going to believe that God would allow me to run, so sure enough I started again and it hurt momentarily, but it went away and I was able to run for another 7 miles. Over and over again, I repeated the words, “when the darkness closes in Lord, still I will say, Blessed be The Name of The Lord.”

I’ve slacked a bit on this idea, but I’ve been reading, I promise!!! Have you been reading? Tell me, tell me, what have you read in the past week?!

Okay, so does it count to listen to a book on tape? If so, the latest reading/listening was of:

Pay It Forward- by Catherine Ryan Hyde. Let me just say, it doesn’t end happily ever after, but it’s sooo good!

Currently working on: The Sin Eater- by Gary D. Schmidt

I’m in one of those moods where I feel like I should just focus on the things that I love in my life. My daughter did this in one of her blog posts recently, so I’m taking her lead in this.

I love:

lazy mornings…especially when my kids come and crawl into bed with me and everything is just right in the world.

waking up to the smell of the coffee brewing  from self-timer mode.

finding and trying new  recipes.

opening my eyes and seeing blue sky outside my window.

playing board games with my kids…especially games that make us look and sound goofy.

going to the library and finding great books that I don’t know anything about.

impromptu dance parties in the kitchen.

our silly dog who loves to dance with us and thinks she’s a child as well.

playing football with the kids outside.

jumping rope.

running in perfect weather.

I love that I’m currently squished by my boy who has decided to come and lay right on top of my arm.

Okay…guess that means it’s time to go…..hope you all enjoy a few of your favorite things today.

Once upon a time, I was the 10 year old girl in the red bathing suit with the white polk-a-dots and ruffle around the waist. Unfortunately all the other kids in my class were 6. Disparaging to say the least, but I wanted to make my dad proud, so I didn’t complain and went to all my lessons. Unfortunately for me, there weren’t too many opportunities to swim in my life after that, so all the lessons from age 10 went out the memory window.

I took a lesson last summer, but it was a little remedial and I didn’t learn much, so now it’s time to proceed with finding a new swim instructor…Have I mentioned I’m a big baby and think that I could drown at any given moment?

So, I read this poem tonight and it made it all sound lovely, and I wanted to share with you.

First Lesson by Philip Booth

Lie back, daughter, let your head be tipped back in my hand.

Gently, and I will hold you.

Spread your arms wide, lie out on the stream and look high at the gulls.

A dead-man-float is face down. You will dive and swim soon enough where the tidewater ebbs to the sea.

Daughter, believe me, when you tire on the long thrash to your island, lie up and survive.

As you float now, where I held you and let go, remember when fear cramps your heart what I told you:

lie gently and wide to the light-year stars, lie back and the sea will hold you.

So, let me know if you have any swimming tips for me! I’m all ears.