Rescued Chilean miner prepared for New York City Marathon

Oh wow! These miners have been a great testimony. In fact I just shared this story with a dear friend who is suffering depression.  The miners always believed that they were rescued through the gospel. For anyone who is suffering or know someone suffering depression, psalm 88 has said it all.

http://www.joymag.co.za/newsitem.php?newsID=90

I am counted with those who go down to the pit;
I am like a man who has no strength,
Adrift among the dead,
Like the slain who lie in the grave,
You have laid me in the lowest pit,
In darkness, in the depths.
You have put away my acquaintances far from me;
I am shut up, and I cannot get out;
My eye wastes away...
LORD, I have called daily upon You;
I have stretched out my hands to You.
Will You work wonders for the dead?  (Psalm 88: 4-10, selected portions)

G'day Spring Fragrace~ All the time those guys were down there, I was thinking Psalm 40.vs 2-3
 
He lifted me out of the slimy pit,
out of the mud and mire,
he set my feet non a rock
and gave me a firm place to stand.
He put a new song in my mouth,
a hymn of praise to our God.

HAZEL:  I left your answer on Yesterday's Page .......

typo! not non ON
 
Yesterday~ Thanks, JALOPKIN~ for the comprehensive reply to my question.
 
The suspense is killing me - did Zenyatta win?
 
Our clocks turned back an hour last weekend. I'm focusing on the expectation of the first snowdrop in January. Winter is not my favourite time. Due to exceptional weather, most of the leaves are still golden on the trees, so it still looks & feels like autumn, except it's dark too early.
 
I love watching the London marathon - get up early to buy the Sunday papers, make a big pot of coffee, make bacon & egg butties & go back to bed to watch TV. By lunchtime, my bed is a disgrace & I'm quite exhausted by all the athletics by proxy. The amateur & fun-runners raising money for their chosen charities are great - & it's such a good natured event as there are no "sides" everybody who takes part is a winner in some way. Interestingly, there is very little petty crime such as pick-pocketing, mugging, etc while the race is on, there seems to some outbreak of goodwill.
 
 
 

Hazel....yah! There's a Hillsong song The Stand based on psalm 40. (though I'm ambivalent about Hillsong).

This week though, I came across this old song, The touch of the Master's hand. Its based on a poem first written in 1921 and it fell into my path coincidentally, TWICE this week. I thought it was really strange...and I'm thinking maybe someone out there needs to hear this. My son stumbled upon me searching it and because he plays the violin, immediately sat down to hear the song. He rushed out later to download it and I saw him tearing. It always had that effect on me too.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoBueoUnrIY

Spring Fragrance~ I heard that song earlier on FB, so it tapped me on the shoulder twice. Not really my thing, but  I'm happy to hear the ways & means by which people's spiritual lives are enriched.
The Marathon - none of those runners is bothered if the person alongside them is a Jew, a Gentile, a Moslem, a Catholic, a Protestant, a Hindu, a whatever ..... Stand on the sidewalk and listen to that determined slapping of trainers onto tarmac - a fellowship of runners, raising money for different causes. The person next to you has to run their own race.

I love any sport where it is the individual challenging oneself either on a grand scale like a marathon in NYC or the middle age man aka Me catching a small wave all alone. The human spirit working with its own physical body to say "yes I can". The Special Olympics and the stories of returning disabled Veterans as well as those sleek Kenyans from remote villages who run with pure unadulterated joy make me proud to be a flawed mixed up childlike human who loves to play and I shall sing along with Neil Young "long may you run."

Tommy TYpical: Long may I know you, sir. You are a good man who makes me want to be a better man!
 
JaxZ: On your recommendation, I have ordered the as yet unreleased book UNBROKEN and look forward to reading it. Also, thanks for the reminder to set the old clockaruni back...here i was fat and happy thinking it was an hour earlier...I'm glad we don't have to reset the calendar.

LATER! not earlier, I think. Anyway, you get what I'm trying to say. In the presence of such awesome intellect I feel like a one-legged man at an asskicking, but don't worry about me...I'll get over it. :>)

GH-... and vice versa by George! Blessings Podnuh!

Zenyatta lost. She's 19 and 1.
Let's see if that miner can win today.

I think all of the rescued miners have already won ..... beginning with a second chance with each new day being recognized as a blessing and opportunity. Be well

PETER LAKE:  I couldn't help thinking what a HERO that one Miner is ... Telling the Rescuers that he wanted his Girlfriend waiting for him, NOT his Wife of fifteen years, the Mother of his Four Children, not the woman who spent almost every day up top, waiting, Praying, Supporting, encouraging ....... What a PUTZ !!!  Guess the closest I can get in Meskin is, CULERO !!!
 
A Bad Apple in every Mine Shaft .......

I was a bit forlorn at missing church, having had an o'dark:30a.m. delivery of the Captain to the airport, but I find there was plenty of food awaiting in the posts this morning.

George, I'm looking forward to sharing thoughts on the book! Bert has ordered it too so we should have a cozy corner near the fire to discuss our favorite bits.

We used to be a regular source of laughter to friends because every year we snuck in an hour late (or early) to church having once agin forgotten the time change.

Unless they are themselves running in the Marathon, mayhaps Julia and DPR
will treat us to an EyE witness report.
 
Hazel, It was Little Joe.  Little Ben was the replica clock tower in
Virginia City.  

GEORGE HALL:  Every Body Counts, Bubba ... You just jump your ass right on in there when ever you're a mind to .......
 
 
"A Chicken In Every Pot ..."
 
Every Chick With Pot ...
 
Potted Chicken Sandwiches For Supper ...
 
Chicken In The Bread Pan Pickin' Out Dough ...
 
Chicken Chow Mein ... The Only Surviving Kamakaze Pilot ...

IVAN .... as you say .... there's always one that might not take advantage of the gift of being literally and figuratively, above ground again. Sometimes circumstances and challenges make the man, sometimes they don't 'cos there just isn't enough to work with.
 Be very well my friend

I've always admired and respected marathon runners. I'm more of a sprinter. I sprint for a variety of reasons; charging Big Horn rams and bull Elk, coiled, vibrating rattlesnakes, skunks, things that went bump in dark woods, angry poker opponents, and a foot-high wave of jet fuel rolling towards me while I stood with a lit cigarette surrounded by very large armaments made to go boom.
The competitors seem much more friendly in these long haul runs, though the stamina is beyond me. Don't think my heart could take it.

They just don't seem to be having a very good time .... no one is smiling after the firstfew blocks.  I respect them and will  join them ... if only vicariously.

For goodness' sake, Ivan, being trapped down a mine for a month & being hauled up into the spotlight doesn't turn anybody into a saint. He's just a lucky to be alive guy with the potential to make a load of money out of his circumstances. His domestic & extra-marital affairs are the stuff of the gutter press & I would have thought beneath your bothering to comment.
korthal~ Awwww- it would have been great for that horse to win.
paolos~ Ha! Little Joe! Oh, to be back in the innocent days of virgin fantasies - and know what I know now! The USA exported (or maybe deported) a comedienne, Ruby Wax, who said she was very miffed to dicover that Big Ben is a clock.

JaxZ~ don't even think twice; those people are CHASING YOU-RUN!!!!   .   see how that puts a lil more giddeup in your gallop

RY, that is a brilliant perspective. I have actually used that sort of imagery once while climbing a huge rock wall. It worked. I don't need to do it (the wall part) ever again. ;-P

Many of us are so abundantly blessed that, in a way, we win the marathon without having to really run the race.

Some are not.

Example:

We live on a circle on the edge of a college campus. Marathon runners, who are raising money for charities, often jog around our pleasant, tree-lined street, since it is part of the marathon route. We live not too far from the marathon finish line.

I usually wait until long after the marathon runners have left our street to set off on my errands by car. I do not want to get in the way of the runners. One morning, I did this as usual, only to soon come upon the last of the runners.

She was well into the winter of her life, her days of optimum physical strength obviously long behind her. She was bringing up the rear. She was struggling to try to finish the marathon, her legs painfully wobbling more and more as she slowly put one foot in front of the other. Surely she was exhausted. But she would not quit. She kept at it. No doubt she wanted to stop. Still, she kept at it. She knew what she wanted to do, had to do.

A police motorcycle officer patiently followed ever-so-slowly behind her, escorting her, protecting her, weaving the motorcycle -- its red and blue lights flashing -- from side to side across the street, to keep it balanced.

Watching her as I crept along behind the protective motorcycle police officer, I thought she surely would have to stop, to limp to the curb to sit, exhausted.

To surrender, to give up.

I was wrong. She kept pushing, one slow, shaky step after shaky step. Somehow, she eventually made it to the finish line -- where the marathon winners already were proudly holding their ribbons, where all the other marathon finishers were rejuvenating their tired bodies with their hard-earned refreshments.

The escort police officer gave her a snappy salute, then went on his way. The marathon runners who had long since finished and who were standing along the finish line curb cheered her on and then rushed into the street to greet her, to congratulate her, for they understood full well the heavy price she had paid to get there.

To be sure, she finished last.

But in the hearts and minds of all (and I feel blessed to have been one of them) who saw her complete the race, albeit last, she finished first – well ahead of the pack and then some.

lotlot~ it is that story, and you for telling it well, that keeps me coming back here....

I was particularly touched by one of the miners when he said: "Down in the dark, I saw the devil and I saw God, I reached for God"

Spring Fragrance, there is a much more touching version of "The Touch of the Master's Hand" done originally by Wayne Watson, as a way of teaching his children about God's love for us and how his touch, the master's touch, can convert Saul to Paul, sinner to saint, and his (Mr. Watson) version is sung with such parental love, it moves me to tears. I've been the one dollar violin and God's touch brought me value, value to him.

Anyone else that might be interested, Wayne Watson also has a song called "Water colored ponies" about your children, the changes they go through, all from the perspective of a loving parent. I've never been able to hear it all the way through without choking up. I'm a man who loves his children, and let me tell you, this song sings to every man, woman and grandparent. It's on youtube, look em up and grab some kleenex.

The only running I've got left is:

1. The runs.

2. Running off at the mouth.

3.Run an errand (in my truck).

That's it. Low and Slow for me.

RoadYacht, thank you, and we are happy that you and all of the others in this space are there.

Lotlot- awesome telling of that story, I can see you from behind the wheel as the race is winding down, cheering for her. I really enjoyed the policeman's salute at the end. Terrific.

HAZEL:  Its just the idea, Sweetie ... I suppose I am very Pro the Sanctity of Marriage, Good Values, and the Full Meanings of Vows ... Not so much that I am Bothering With It, as I am Bother'd By it .......  Thats the kinda thing that makes women think that all men are alike ....... Its just a Ratty thing to do ... If she were and EX-Wife, it would be an entirely different story .......

Ummgawa~ You big softie! Virtual hug across the ocean x
lotlot~ Thanks for that lovely story.

JALOPKIN~ Perish the thought that all men are alike.That would suggest that all women are alike. I would not aspire - or even perspire- to emulate many specimins of my gender.

Viva le differance, hazel!

haze, thank you for reading it.

LOTLOT.....absolutely wonderful story.........hubster just left.........we are lonely w/out him, so it was a delight to read. Thank you.............

HAZEL........ain't that the truth!

Done that waking up in the middle of the night & can't get back to sleep thing. BBC News tells me the Brazilian miner completed the marathon, so Well Done, that man.

I'm not that awake, Chilean, not Brazilian.

HAZEL:    Bless You Hazel !!! Only a woman could make that Leap .......
 
PETER LAKE:  Very Well Put, Peter Lake, Very Well Put indeed .......
Thank you for the Good Wishes, and consider them RE-Doubled and pour out upon you too ...

bebe, appreciate your comments.