Please Help Me Run With Greater Purpose

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2 Samuel 22:33-34

It is God who arms me with strength[a]

and keeps my way secure.

He makes my feet like the feet of a deer;

he causes me to stand on the heights.

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I ran late in life. More than any other indulgence, vice, therapy, or risk I have embraced, it quiets the inborn restlessness triggered by turning 40.

I completed my first five and ten kilometer runs at the age of 47. My friend Lara Foster sensed that I needed a distant goal in sight to take it to the next level, so she entered me into a half marathon, the 2018 Freedom’s Run, October 6, Shepherdstown, West Virginia. Consider helping me run as I draw attention to the important work of Alderson Broaddus University Morrison Mission Fund, the account we draw upon to send delegations of students on spring break mission trips. I believe the scripture cited above: I will finish the race. Yet the question is, “can I compete?” Furthermore, “Can family and friends help make the 25,000 or more footfalls of a half marathon feel as light and agile as a deer’s run?”

If you would please pledge to sponsor every mile I complete under the average time for runners in my age bracket. Whichever mile marker I make by the two-hour mark are the miles you see fit to sponsor. If you pledge $1 per mile, and I have reached–Praise the Lord–mile marker 11 at the two-hour mark, then your contribution toward the Morrison Mission Fund would total $11.00. Do you want me to run faster than what would be expected from a middle-aged, bald and husky man who has been running for just one year? The faster I run, the more I earn for the Morrison Mission Fund. Everybody comes away knowing that their effort will be put to immediate use.

The broad community of AB and my friends who have an interest in cultivating the next generation of leaders will see the benefit in contributing to the Morrison Mission Fund. Through taking five missions to Nicaragua with students, I have witnessed students traveling abroad learn profound lessons on empathy, grit, global perspective, and a mature Christian worldview.

Traveling abroad, even on a short and spartan mission trip, is never cheap, and many of our students cannot afford the additional expense of purchasing a passport, getting the immunizations, and paying for their portion of the mission’s budget. Through all the significant changes that have transformed AB since I graduated in 1992, I have noted important consistencies: Our student body continues to be diverse, many of them are first generation students, and many of them come from families that have never traveled abroad. Therefore our students need the additional incentives and financial assistance to make a mission trip a reality. Your donation will be used immediately and will have a direct impact both for the people we will serve and the students who take the mission trip.

Thank you for your consideration. With great faith and anticipating the strength to run like a deer, I am setting my goal high at $5,000.

Pledge below or on Facebook. If you want to skip all that nonsense and simply hit the “donate now” button, then I promise that I’ll still run faster than what you would expect from me. Here is the link to donate.