I usually like to include pictures for the “seen on my run” posts, but this time you’ll probably be glad I didn’t.
On my last long run, I saw something rather than disturbing: four animal feet….and no animal. I couldn’t tell exactly what kind of animal it had been, but the feet had clearly been cut off and severed from the rest of the body.
In the thousands of miles I’ve run (and dozens of times on this same stretch of road), I’ve never seen anything like this, so inquired of the Lord, “What does this mean? What are You saying here?”
The question came back to me, “What do feet do?”
They carry the body.
But not these feet. Because they have been cut off.
Then it dawned on me, this is a metaphor for how we need each other in the body of Christ. If we are cut off from each other, we can’t fulfill the purpose for which we were created. The body can’t fully function without us…and we can’t fully function without the body. These feet were dead and lifeless. There was no life flowing to them.
It was a rather gory picture to illustrate the importance of community and a powerful reminder to stay connected!