Countdown to Triathlon – 179 Days, 25.57 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 64 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

The Journey - Installment Sixty-Four

        A few weeks before the ride I was having some anxious moments about whether I’d be able to complete the ride or not because of my knees.  I had been attending a physical therapist for help with my ever-worsening knees.  In fact, it was recommended to me by the physical therapist that I visited that I should dispense with riding about a week before the ride.  That made me even more nervous because I wondered if that would have great implications on my ability to ride in the actual bike ride. The therapist outfitted me with some special knee braces and an electrical muscle stimulator which was battery powered that was to be worn the first day of the bike ride.  When I mentioned that I would be wearing this battery operated stimulator to my high school email group, they commented that they had their own “bionic woman”. 

One of the men in the email group, Rick  who lives outside of Denver, Colorado, wrote and said that he knew that this ride was definitely going to be accomplished because we have such a great and awesome God.  He reminded me that our Father owns the cattle on a thousand hills.  He told me he had even written a song about that Scripture from the Book of Psalms.  The origin of the song began in his mind after college.  During college, one particular time when either he or his room mate were going through a difficult time, his room mate who was a Christian, told Rick that he wasn’t worried  about the situation because his “Father” owned the cattle on a thousand hills.  Rick wasn’t a Christian at the time and thought to himself, “I wonder if his father really does own the cattle on a thousand hills?”  It wasn’t until years later after Rick had become a Christian himself that he came across that verse in Psalm 50:10 That led him to write the song, Cattle on a Thousand Hills”.  Rick sent me a copy.  His encouragement and his song were very dear to me and made the psalm (see below) much more special. . 


Psalm 50 

¹ The Mighty One, God, the LORD,
   speaks and summons the earth
   from the rising of the sun to where it sets.
² From Zion, perfect in beauty,
   God shines forth.
³ Our God comes
   and will not be silent;
a fire devours before him,
   and around him a tempest rages.
⁴ He summons the heavens above,
   and the earth, that he may judge his people:
⁵ “Gather to me this consecrated people,
   who made a covenant with me by sacrifice.”
⁶ And the heavens proclaim his righteousness,
   for he is a God of justice.^[a][b]
 7 “Listen, my people, and I will speak;
   I will testify against you, Israel:
   I am God, your God.
⁸ I bring no charges against you concerning your sacrifices
   or concerning your burnt offerings, which are ever before me.
⁹ I have no need of a bull from your stall
   or of goats from your pens, 

¹⁰   for every animal of the forest is mine,
   and the cattle on a thousand hills. 
¹¹ I know every bird in the mountains,
   and the insects in the fields are mine.
¹² If I were hungry I would not tell you,
   for the world is mine, and all that is in it.

        If God could own the cattle on a thousand hills, know every bird in the mountain and the insects (by the gazillions) are his then He could certainly see that this pitiful woman would complete the bike ride.