This week my brother Ben and I are trying to cycle from St David’s in Wales right across the widest point of the UK to Lowestoft.
When I dreamed this Grand Challenge up in lockdown it seemed like a fantastic idea and made perfect sense, now as it begins today – none of it makes sense to me.
What’s a CVM Grand Challenge?
Essentially this is all about doing a charity fundraising event for CVM, raise a minimum of £1000 for CVM by doing a challenge that will push you to the limit and be a decent achievement for you personally.
So this is what we are doing, dressed as Batman and Robin we are cycling across the UK pulling a bathtub on wheels to make as much noise about the work of CVM as we can.
This 5 part blog series is all about endurance, challenge and spiritual fitness. Lets go!
Day 1 – Overload Principle
One of the training techniques for building an effective endurance programme is the overload principle.
Basically, this is about gradually increasing the load, difficulty or speed of any given event to increase your body’s ability to keep going, for longer and faster.
Previously I completed a Skipathon Grand Challenge (skipping non-stop for 4 hours), and I remember slowly building up the time for example from 10 mins all the way to a practice skip for the event of 3 hours. On the day of the event, even though there were still unplanned aches and pains, the 4 hours was achievable thanks to the overload program I had been working on in the background.
Now, putting a spiritual lens on, I think it’s fair to say that one of the things I have found to be true about being a Christian is that God uses the overload principle at times.
In the Bible, we can read about Abraham, a man who was promised a son by God but had to wait 20 years for that promise to be fulfilled. Abraham’s patience and faith were pushed into an overload principle, it was worked on, pushed and taken past any point of comfort.
From it, Abraham emerged as a man of incredible faith and patience, something God had shaped throughout his life for specific reasons and situations that God used.
Joseph, another man whose story is in the Bible also had this experience. Forgotten in prison after being lied about and unfairly put away – he was well and truly in the overload place and his head and heart must have been in turmoil. But Joseph emerges from prison a different man, a man of incredible patience and huge trust in God that God worked into the next level of his plan.
The point I am trying to make is, over the last 18 months of lockdowns, and uncertainty I have at times really struggled. My faith in God has stayed firm but now, looking back I can see something of the overload principle at work during this time.
Maybe you are in that place right now, work, family, health or a mix of all 3 feels like you’re being squeezed and pushed to the limit. I just want to encourage you that God works with his men in these places. He has the tools and the ability to use this moment to forge something in your life that needs that pressure around it. Trust him through it, talk to him and keep believing that he is working in your life.
If anyone else out there can support and cheer these guys on with a donation, please do – it makes a real difference!
