Today, I’ll be in a car for about 9 hours as The B99 and I head north with family to see our nephew graduate from high school tonight.

It’ll be a long day, but the kind of long day that has the best payoff — hugs, smiles, and tears with family.

Long roads are best traveled with family and to see family.

They’re a great place to learn. We’re currently listening to a book I’ve listened to before, God On Mute, and that I’m happily listening to again.

Long roads are sometimes filled with questions, some of which may never be answered. Where did that guy get his driver’s license, and why didn’t they teach him how to merge into traffic?

Long roads test our patience. While being stopped for road work, the driver in front of us got tired of waiting, and peeled off, tires screeching. Where are the cops when you need them?

Finally, if you drive on a long road long enough, it will cost you something. For us, it was tolls and gas. For others, it could be a flat tire, or car repairs. But why would we ever expect to enjoy the destination without being willing to pay the cost to get there?

For my final post in this month of posting every day, may I simply remind you that all of us are traveling a long road? We all need family with us, all have lessons that need to be learned and patience that needs to be tested, and we’ll all find ourselves digging for quarters as we approach the toll booth.

For those who have journeyed this month-long writing challenge with me, thank you. Your comments, social media shares, and kind words in local coffee shops make me want to keep writing.

And so, I will. After all, we’re not yet at our destination, and the long road still stretches out before us. My greatest honor, if you would grant it, would be knowing that my words — simple as they may be — could be part of what helps guide you home.

This morning, I met a friend for a morning run.

Neither of us is a beginner runner, and as we started, we talked about how our running has been going lately. My friend told me the lessons he had learned during his recent 30-mile run.

Yes, you read that right. He got up one day to see if he could run 30 miles. As it turns out, he can.

I picked a strategic downhill part of the run and shared how my running has been so far this year. I started the year with a goal to run 100 miles in January and then increase the mileage by 5% each month. It’s the end of May, and I’ve hit my goal each month.

At this point, I was blown away at his 30-mile run, and he was blown away at my monthly mileage.

Funny thing about runners, though. Give us enough time, and we will absolutely begin to compare what we’re doing with what someone else is doing.

Case in point? By the end of our run this morning (which my friend killed, and which almost killed me), we were both rethinking our training strategies.

I run 5 times a week, and because this morning’s run seemed harder than I thought it should have, I was wondering if I should run less times each week. I mean, my friend doesn’t run 5 times a week, and he just ran 30 miles!

Ironically, my friend was wondering if he should increase his weekly mileage because the last few miles of his 30-miler were so hard (I mean, shouldn’t they have been???). Maybe running more would help him be more ready if he tries another ultra run like that again?

Lost in all of that comparison is what should be celebrated: he completed the 30-mile run, and I’ve run more miles each month this year. We’re both arguably in the best shape of our lives and feel great about where we are.

Comparison is a rabbit hole, y’all, and if you take it, you can find yourself so far off course that you don’t know how to get back to where you should be. Not only can it rob you of your unique purpose, but it can rob you of the joy that comes in the pursuit of that purpose.

One more thing: my friend and I both have a goal in common (but that’s for another time and another post), which means that even though we may train differently, we’ll have opportunities to celebrate at least one accomplishment together.

As long as we stick to what works for each other while celebrating how the other one works, we can each enjoy the fruits of our labor.

Even when, at least in my case, the runs actually feel like labor.

The running kind, not the birthing kind. Thankfully, nothing I do in training will ever compare to the birthing kind.

Let’s put this post in the “How did I miss that all these years?” folder. I was finishing up a book, The 10-Second Rule, by Clare De Graaf, in which he wrote about the breakfast Pater had with Jesus in John 21.

For those unfamiliar with the Bible, this was Peter’s first encounter with Jesus after he had denied even knowing Jesus. You can imagine how tense it might have felt. Jesus, not one to hold a grudge, built a fire on the shore and asked for some of the fish that had just been caught. He prepared it over the fire, and they all sat together to eat. The Bible doesn’t record any conversation during the meal, and having experienced several extremely awkward meals in my life, that seems about right to me.

Let’s pick up the story in verse fifteen…

“After breakfast Jesus asked Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” (John‬ ‭21‬:‭15‬)

I’ve preached this passage so many times and read it countless more, but somehow I’ve missed the end of that question. You know those word tricks where one word is written twice, but you can’t see it because your mind blocks it? Like that, only this time, as De Graaf wrote about it in the book, I saw it. Jesus didn’t just ask Peter if he loved him; he asked him if he loved him more than these.

What, or who, are these? The Bible doesn’t say, which means it’s entirely possible that Jesus, still chewing the freshest catch of the day ever, motioned with his hand and invited Peter to look around at all that could be seen as he posed the question.

The boat. The catch. The men. The crisp morning air and a hint of a breeze at the water’s edge. They were in their old stomping grounds, so their families might have been nearby, playing, laughing, or talking over morning chores.

“Peter, do you truly love me more than these?”

Is it any wonder that Peter eventually got very honest with Jesus and admitted that Jesus knew all things, and knew how Peter’s love for Jesus ranked among his love for everything else (see John 21:17)?

When this passage is read in the Greek (I can’t do that, but I do have the internet for research!), it becomes even more clear. Jesus uses the word agape the first two times he asks Peter if he loves him, but Peter answers with the word phileo. When Jesus uses phileo the third time, Peter is sad because Jesus knew the true extent of Peter’s love. The scope of his love had been exposed! Jesus knew Peter was a friend, but also knew that there was a deeper love that Peter would need to experience to continue saying yes to the painful road ahead of him.

“Paul, do you love me more than these?”

Do I love Jesus more than my hopes and dreams? More than my children, and The B99? More than my reputation? More than the balance in our bank account? More than the people I love deeply who may not understand my deeper love for Jesus? More than my life?

If Jesus would only ask us if we love him, the answer would be easy, wouldn’t it? Yes, Lord, you know I love you!!

But when he asks us if we love him more than these, our lives betray our answers, don’t they? All of us can see the numerous ways we choose other things over Jesus and, like Peter, become sad when we realize that Jesus knows it, too.

But the story isn’t over. The fire is still burning, and as the dry wood cracks and pops, Jesus does something that changes everything.

He gave Peter the greater call. Not just to take care of Jesus’ lambs or feed his sheep, but to prepare for the way that Peter would one day die. Jesus wasn’t calling Peter to love him only but, rather, to make loving him the priority. Jesus knows that the more we love something, the more we’ll love choosing that something, or, in the case of Peter, and us, someone.

In Revelation 2:4, Jesus called out the church for leaving its first love. The Greek word used for “first” is the word we get “prototype” from. It means “first in rank, honor, influence; first in any succession of things or persons.”

Jesus doesn’t want us to love him and hate everything else. He wants us to love him more than everything else. A deep, “known by him” type of love that can become the prototype for the love we give to everyone else.

When Jesus asks us if we love him more than these, and our answer, like Peter, isn’t the one we want it to be, then the solution isn’t doing more, but simply remembering who we love more.

Peter died for Jesus because one day on the shore, as they ate breakfast together, Jesus expanded Peter’s heart to be able to love him more than anything, and anyone else.

He called him, and us, to a love that says yes before we even know the question, and sets us free to love others more deeply than we ever thought we could, and more completely than they ever hoped we would.