Christina's Running for a Cause

Some of you know that I am halfway through (week 9) with a training plan for a half marathon I’m running in October (Long Beach Run). This has both been a long-term dream and at the same time, something I wasn’t ever quite sure would actually happen. Reading an inspiring article about someone’s couch potato-to-marathon experience and having nice feelings about it is quite different from actually doing it, it turns out.

Needless to say, I’m really excited about this event and I want to celebrate it, but in that, I really don’t want that celebration to be just about me and something I’m doing.

I just finished reading Crazy Love by Francis Chan and am challenged by so much in it. One question asked in the book is “What are you doing right now in your life that requires faith?” Friends, when I asked myself that question, I didn’t have an answer. I knew that after finishing the book I had better come up with some action plans so that I actually did something as a result of what I read. This running goal is now one of those plans.

Back in the spring of this year, I went to the Catalyst West conference where I was introduced to One Day’s Wages. This organization was founded by a family who gave up all of their income for one year. A product of that year was the founding of ODW which seeks to have people choose to give an amount equivalent to whatever they would make in one day at their job. The premise under this exhortation is that poverty isn’t a hopeless battle against some indefatigable monster; it also puts “just” one day’s worth of our wages into global perspective. For example, did you know that:

• $20 can provide clean water for one person for 20 years.
• $10 can purchase a bed net to help prevent malaria.
• $45 can pay annual school tuition for one child.
• $100 can provide a woman with a sewing machine and job training.

I’ve always found the quote, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing,” inspiring, but I believe it is time to be more than just inspired with warm fuzzy feelings. It’s time to DO something. It’s time to move off that couch with me.

Won’t you partner with me and with ODW and be a change agent to the reality that more than 1 billion people live on less than $1 a day; that 25,000 children under the age of 5 die each day due to poverty-related causes; and that unsafe water and lack of basic sanitation cause 80% of all sickness and disease, and kill more people every year than all forms of violence, including war?

So here’s my leap of faith:

Please consider partnering with me on this race, to do something with our faith, and to love our mother, father, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins, and children in need. Feel free to donate your one day's wage, $13 (for a half-marathon), or any amount you feel compelled to give.

Help spread the movement of One Day's Wages. Start your own 'Campaign for a Cause' now and make a global & dramatic impact.