Heartland Spirit of the Prairie Summary
By Mark, 1st Servant, The Runners' Church
The Runners’ Church inaugural event, Heartland 2021, was a great event to launch this outreach ministry; RD Elden Gelano and his KUS staff were super-supportive of the launch.
Daron and Deanna, Lawrence, and Matt all flew up from the Church on MastersRoad (CoMR) in Manvel, TX and met me at my campsite in Cassoday on Friday afternoon. We enjoyed some great fellowship and hugs and prayer around my campfire. (There’s no-place better than a campfire to sit around and enjoy one another with God’s beauty all around!) But our time relaxing ended all-too-soon and we skedaddled up to the Cassoday Civic Center for packet pick-up.
We set up our Runners’ Church table and we were able to add some R.C. swag (i.e., R.C. stickers & temp tatts, & R.C. info) to packets. We met with a number of runner folk and crew and got to know people and let them know about the Runners’ Church and our planned pre-race worship service. Towards the end of the evening, my CoMR/RC crew returned to their motel 15 miles away, and I went back to my campsite in Cassoday to heat up shrimp alfredo I’d premade the day before. I was in bed and asleep by 8:30—a PR for me the night before a hundred—and I was communing with the Lord to guide and strengthen me to bring glory to His Kingdom.
Raceday alarms went off far too early (as they always do), and a couple little “I forgots” took me out of cooking my planned prerace breakfast of eggs and corned beef hash, and had me heating up shrimp alfredo with day-old coffee. Yum!
I joined my crew near the starting line and we scattered about the parking lot to get the word out for our prerace worship service. (Next time, we’ll have a canopy and maybe some music to draw more folks.) But at our first service, we kicked off with Amazing Grace with one runner and the five of us. I feel like I let the enemy get ahold of me in the distraction of pre-race hyper-activities all around and not so many folks joining us. I’ll do better next time! But we prayed and worshipped, and I read and spoke briefly on Hebrews 12:1-2, and how we runners aren’t quite finished when we cross our race finish line, that our race continues and we’re to “not grow weary in well-doing.”
We assembled at the start, and I joked with my crew, “Do I have to?” BANG! And we were off with the 100-milers, 100K-ers, and 50-milers all starting together. I could feel the effects of God’s handiwork right away: I felt like I was wearing lead slippers! So, after a hundred yards, I broke into a walk and drifted to the back of the pack quickly, and was first joined by Lynne from Colorado Springs, CO, who was walking, too. We chatted and walked for a bit, and of course, I told her about the Runners’ Church. When I saw the next person upfront of us, I excused myself and scooted up to them.
I asked their name, where they were from, and what event they were in. I told them about the Runners’ Church, and if I found they were also believers, I “encouraged them to love and good works”, and then eased up to the next person in front. I kept repeating this moving along the runners who were stringing out more and more.
The Spirit was upon me as I had more absolute joyous energy packed into this undertrained frame than humans should be allowed to have. I was doing what God had formed me to do from before the foundation of the world, and I knew it! I was with my tribe, man, and “…tellin’ ‘em about my Jesus…”, and the Runners’ Church! When I finally trotted in to the 1st aid station with my crew, I said, “Get the video.” When Lawrence started rollin’, I lit up with a big Kansas howdy to my Church on MastersRoad, and then reeled off about 15 names and where they were from of runners I’d already met as I Journeyed ON for the Lord! Out there, on the Heartland journey, in the long trek through the Kansas Flint Hills and tallgrass prairie, the Runners’ Church was ON!
Having a crew to make sure I ate and got the stuff I needed out of my drop bags in quick fashion proved invaluable. The amount of calories I was ingesting early on paid huge dividends later in the day, night, and wee hours of the morning. I felt like a NASCAR driver pulling in as they jumped in like they’d been doing this all their lives! It was nothing short of amazing, not to mention humbling.
As I was running out of the aid station at mile 25, I reminded my crew that Jesus promised our Father will give us the desires of our hearts, and I was living the desire of my heart and serving where God had me, in fields ripe for harvest. I got to see my crew just before they had to head back to Wichita to fly back in time for church on Sunday. Up to this point (~mile 42), I had been picking up the pace every segment of the course to see my crew that one last time before they had to vamoose; but after that, I needed something to hurt for, some reason to push through the pain. And then a still, small voice in my inner man said simply, “The guys up front need to hear about Jesus, too.
As I picked up other runners running either the 125mi., 100K, or 100mi., I continued to share and enjoy each encounter. One of them says as I left him, “Hey, you’re in 3d or 4th place now.” I pushed to the turnaround and passed Larry, also from CO, and I thought I was in 2nd or 3d then. He beat me out of the aid station, and I caught him again and we talked some more. We pulled out of the 58-mi. station together, but I had to return because I forgot something. Then I stopped to try to tinkle (unsuccessfully, which took forever), and I didn’t catch him until the next aid station. And again, I had to use the port-o-john; and while Larry up ahead got a good wind, I hit a low stretch.
By the time I lumbered in to the 75-mile aid station, I was s-str-rugg-ling. But surprise of surprises: My sister and nephew were there to see me for one stop. (Again, HUMBLED!) They helped me make quick and efficient work of the aid station and get everything I needed to finish, re-energized. My sister is also a cancer survivor, so it was really special to see her, even though I looked and felt like a troop from Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia coming back from Gettysburg; her coming all the way to see me just that one spot really fired me up. My nephew TJ pacing me for the 1st mile out was more bonus!
Coming out, I was amazed that I was feeling so good, just pickin’ ‘em up and puttin’ ‘em down, so I was super elated to run into Larry again (in 2nd place at the time), who said that the leader was just up ahead of us. However, Larry had just stopped and was worried about the unmarked intersection we’d both gone past, noting that there didn’t seem to be any markers past the intersection. At that point, we “married up” to try to figure out the right course. We ran down the wrong course, twice actually; and, long, lurid story short, we spent a good two-and-a-half hours and nine extra miles running and walking each of three possible directions until we finally got some other runners to call the map up on their phone and, sure enough, we’d both been going the right way in the first place!
Now let me point out here that I’d completed the Heartland 100 eight times before, and Larry had five completions underfoot—so we weren’t rookies. But here’s the best part: [drumroll, please…] Our bib numbers we each had pinned to our chests WERE HEARTLAND COURSEMAPS!!! Ugh!
It took me a few prayerful hours to reflect on this. The enemy wants me to call myself—to quote Will Farrell in the movie, “Elf”— “…just a cotton-headed ninny-muggins”, or some other such self-denigrating comment. And sure, that was a head-full-of-flint-rocks mistake. But, just like God putting on the lead slippers at the start to force me to the back of the pack to do His work, it was no mistake that God paired me up with Larry, a non-believer, for many, many hours. God loves Larry, too. A lot more than a “perishable wreath”. (RE: 1 Cor. 9:25) I pray Larry saw Jesus in me, saw the light within me, and comes to discover the truth and a full and abiding faith in our only source of eternal salvation, Jesus!
After seeing our second dawn of God’s spectacular sky-canvas, created as another one-of-a-kind, me and Larry trotted in the last half-mile tied for 4th/5th place. We stood while the race photographer from Mile 90 Photography snapped a pic of us pointing at each other (“It was his fault.”), caught a quick ride to our trucks, and sleepily staggered into our respective survival modes of recovering from nearly 30 hours on our feet. Hopefully, he’ll check out our website for Runners’ Church and will reach out to me since we were both too tired to exchange any other contact info.
God is so, soooo good all the time. He held me to the back of the pack to visit with as many people as possible as I worked my way all the way to near the front by mile 80. And because I had people loving on me the first half by stuffing me full of foods and encouragement, I was running strong—up to getting misoriented. God let me sniff what it was like to “run with the big dawgs”, but diverted me to a more important mission. Because He loves a guy none of us knew before, a guy who I hope I helped to journey towards the cross and a relationship with our Lord.
Runners’ Church is up and running. Run long and journey-ON!Mark
"Therefore, lift up your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed."~Hebrews 12:12-13
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