My running crew and I are gearing up to run the Pemigewasset (Pemi) Loop, a 30.3 mile trail in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. So, for the first time since training for the virtual 2020 Boston Marathon, I’m building up the mileage. And of course—as I make the transition into longer distances—those last couple miles of a long run can be tough. This morning, I was nearing the end of a 14-miler in a rural area and those last couple of miles were adding up. I was focusing on smoothing my stride, keeping my head together, my eyes up and trying to ignore the reality that this relatively flat run on the road is not even half the distance of the mountain run we’re planning to tackle late in June. Future aside, it also felt like an apt moment for the present: we are nearing the end of an unprecedented academic year, reaching the conclusion of the Easter Season and preparing for a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. We’re in the final stretch of a long, long run academically and spiritually. 

To help my focus, I found myself praying on the readings from this past Tuesday’s daily Mass, especially the concluding verses of Jesus’s four-chapters-long goodbye to his disciples and St. Paul’s words of farewell to the Church at Ephesus in the Acts of the Apostles. I still marvel at the fact that when we really listen, the Word of God tends to speak directly to where we’re at and the realities that we’re facing at any given moment.

In the gospel reading, Jesus reflects on all that he has done in the course of his mission up to this point, and, looks ahead to what he is about to accomplish through his passion, death, resurrection and ascension into heaven. Speaking directly to his heavenly Father and praying for his disciples (and all us who will follow them thereafter), he says: “I have finished the work that you gave me to do.” Similarly, as Paul addresses the presbyters of the Church of Ephesus, he reflects on what he has experienced up to this point in his ministry. He writes about how he served the Lord with humility even amidst trials and that he earnestly bore witness to repentance before God and to faith in our Lord Jesus. Paul then thinks about what lies ahead for him. “Compelled by the Spirit,” he prepares to go to Jerusalem (the path uncertain except for hardship and trials along the way) and should he survive, on from there to Rome. And then he writes something striking: “I consider life of no importance to me, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to bear witness to the Gospel of God’s grace” (Acts 20: 24).

For all of us who are feeling that at this point they are, literally running on faith, wouldn’t it be awesome if upon reaching the finish line of whatever long run we’re currently on that we could stand before God saying, with confidence: “‘Compelled by the Spirit’ I went where you led me. I finished the work that you gave me to do. I served you with humility amidst trials. I considered life of no importance to me, so long as I finished my course and the ministry that I received from you.”

As my stride quickened while envisioning that triumphant scene, a majestic red-tailed hawk soared by, just about five yards off my right shoulder. She flew swiftly and purposefully up the road ahead.

I’d like to think she was the Holy Spirit compelling me onwards towards the finish.