Nun danket alle Gott

It seems as if whatever wandering path I run in Highlands - both actually and figuratively - I can always hear church bells somewhere in the distance.  With the advent of GPS watches, we don't have to be tethered to pre-measured courses and mile markers (although we still have one or two of those), but instead we can run where we please.  And sometimes I find myself cutting through roads I have not run on in awhile, or exploring new paths. - as Tennyson would say, "Forever roaming with a hungry heart."  Sometimes I will be turning around at the end of Fifth Street and the beginning of the Kelsey Trail, with tightly-furled rhododendron rattling all around, or sometimes back around lovely unpaved Lower Lake Road with its ancient rock walls and lily-pads on the lake.  And it is not uncommon to hear the Presbyterian Church bells chiming out a hymn - they sound at 10:00 a.m. each morning, which is the hour I might be finishing up a six-mile run if I start at 9:00 a.m.

Today I had a very satisfying four-mile run, which included a final mile by Harris Lake and a 2:14 400-meter, which equates to a sub-nine-hour mile and the fastest I have run in several months.  This in preparation for a planned 10-K on Saturday, my first 10-K in a long time.  I was feeling especially thankful for healing and strength, for recovery, for the beautiful morning flashing all around, when I heard the old familiar hymn "Now Thank We All Our God" (that 17th century masterpiece often used by Bach, Nun danket alle Gott - see BWV 79).  As has happened more often than mere coincidence would make possible over the years, I heard this hymn just when I needed to.  And I let those calming words of thanksgiving roll over me:

Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices,
Who wondrous things has done, in Whom this world rejoices;
Who from our mothers’ arms has blessed us on our way
With countless gifts of love, and still is ours today.