The South Pacific Walk for LIFE (2018)

I want to share my journey with you from my time during the South Pacific Walk for Life......

Matthew 5:14
You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.

The LIFE Runners race theme for 2018 is “Be the Light” Matthew 5:14, so when we started to plan the 2nd Annual South Pacific Walk for Life we chose to continue that theme. This year we were excited and expectant! Last year had been an awakening in our prayer lives and we were ready for God to ignite us in a whole new way! The South Pacific Walk for Life is a way for Fiji LIFE Runners to take part in the A-Cross America Relay by taking on remote Relay miles and a way to engage other Christians and our community as they come to join us!

When God put the vision of this walk on my heart I never could have imagined the way He would expand it and use it to touch our community of Christians! It is not uncommon for people of the South Pacific to take on 24 hour or more in prayer vigil, but never before had we asked them to pray and walk! There is something powerful about being poured out physically while you pour your heart out to the Lord! It draws you into your desperate need for Him to be in everything! When you haven’t slept for 24 hours, when you have walked miles upon miles, when the rain comes and brings blisters, when the mosquitos eat you alive and the heat of the day tries to tackle you and yet you still continue to walk and pray you will not walk away unchanged! 

I have learned the discipline of prayer during physical activity from my hundreds of hours of marathon training. I can tell you that there is a time to hit your knees in prayer and there is a time to take a stand and march around the “Jericho’s of our lives.” The South Pacific Walk for Life helps us to spend dedicated time doing exactly this! We reached out to God for our needs, our families needs, our friends needs, and for strangers prayer requests. We prayed for an end too abortion and its destruction. We had a bucket overflowing with the requests that had been sent to us and from us. Every time you picked up a request you were giving someone else your time and attention. Praying for strangers can be powerful. I heard many prayers were answered, many people were encouraged, healed and delivered and still we will never know the impact we made. I know that God was glorified, I know that He was on that field with us!

The morning of the walk I felt I needed to pledge a marathon for the 24 hours. I would walk 26.2 miles on no sleep and I would do it with joy in my heart. I have never cut a run short. Every time I step out to run there is a distance I will reach and I never go less, sometimes I choose to go more. As day broke after walking all through the night I realized that this would be the most challenging marathon of my life. The mosquitos had eaten my legs and the blisters from wet socks had taken over my feet. The night had been amazing, the peace, the solace, the sound of praise and worship that the youth carried on for all hours of the night. I was praying over all attending the walk, I was asking God to give me direction on how to lead them, I was praying for my family and others. Watching that glorious sun break through the night was one of the most beautiful sunrises I have ever experienced. I felt drenched in Gods love.

As the morning wore on and the day crew teammates arrived, I saw new life being breathed into the group. The night crew didn’t leave, most of us that were there through the night stayed the full 24 hours. I only left for about 2 hours total to take care of Ella Mae’s needs. With half of my miles done by midmorning I realized that this 26.2 miles was going to be hard to achieve. I am a runner! It takes far more discipline to walk these kinds of distances! I could run it in 5 hours but it would push on 9 hours of walking for me to complete! I started to question if it was possible, I started to doubt my commitment. My blisters screamed at me, and my body said just run! I began to pray, asking God if I could be released from my 26.2 and if 20 miles was sufficient….The answer was no! You can finish this, don’t give up, it matters!

As I started out on my last 10k I realized that my commitment to LIFE Runners, my commitment to the ones who were walking with me and my commitment to God was one of never giving up. As I cried out to God for them, for the prayer requests and the people who surrounded me, I ran a few laps. I felt alive in spite of being exhausted, I felt God urge me forward in spite of the pain, I felt empowered to finish what I had started, to tell the devil I wasn’t going to quit, that I won’t give up because God is with me and I will never stop serving Him as He calls me! As I began to alternate running and walking laps God reaffirmed in my heart that He would call me to go great distances, and that He would give me the ability to finish. I looked around and saw that as I ran, other teammates who are also runners began running. It was the peak of the day, the absolute hottest point and we began to run. I realized that I need to lead as God calls and that others will follow. That I need to stay close to the Lord so that I know where I am to lead this team. 

As I walked again I began to have concern for those walking around me. I could see that the heat was causing struggle. I looked to the sky and prayed for rain. As I walked and prayed for rain, I realized that I only wanted rain if it served Gods purpose, so I changed my prayer and asked God for His will. It was during my praying that I could actually see the rain with my eyes even though the rain had not yet come. I knew that the rain was coming. I thanked God and pressed forward. I started on my last leg of the session just in time for God to open the heavens and pour out upon us! It was glorious an refreshing! When we stand in prayer, and we are in agreement with Gods will, we need to visually see what we are asking for! See it done in faith! Speak it done in faith!

As the day finished and my miles were done I took time to rest with the others and listen to the beautiful praise and worship. Some of our night crew returned refreshed and ready just as the deluge of rain began. My heart was completely filled as I watched them, dry and clean, step out into the pouring rain to walk their legs again! In this day and age we don’t like to be uncomfortable, we don’t like to be inconvenienced but here were people who had already done beyond their committed miles and yet they chose to be soaked in the rain and join the others walking and praying! That is what it looks like to be sold out to God. Over that 24 hours over 100 people came and showed the community that they would do anything to get closer to God, that they would face struggle, pain, exhaustion, weather, anything that came to spend that time in prayer! I have never been so touched to experience something so powerful!

As we finished Pst Kami of Nadi SPEF gave a powerful message! He and his wife truly blessed us with their testimony and the word God gave him to speak! It was exactly what we needed to hear! You would think that we were all tired, but we were ignited in The Spirit! Heaven came into that hall and we all began singing and dancing and praising! We had just spent 24 hours being poured into by our Heavenly Father and it was glorious! The testimonies came, the praise came, the day closed and we all came together on that wet, mosquito infested field and Ryan closed us in a powerful prayer. Next year are are praying for 800 to cover the South Pacific Walk for Life, we are praying for dozens of churches to attend. 

Sunday morning as I opened the Bible to start my day before church God clearly answered me. God gave me 3 scriptures, one after the other! I have been asking Him what next, how do I carry this ministry forward? Where does He want me to go. Never has an answer been more clear. I will walk in the Spirit, I will continue to walk by faith, He will take me where I need to go!

Galatians 5:16
I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.

Romans 8:1
There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

Colossians 2:6
As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him,

Let us all walk in the Spirit, let us put aside the desires of the flesh and press forward into the will of God!