What's the Point of Walking or Running During the Jesus Virtual Challenge?

Key Takeaways 

• The virtual Jesus challenge has two pillars: daily time in God’s Word and daily movement. 

• Walking every day creates intentional space to slow down, step away from distractions, and spend time with Jesus. 

• Jesus lived an active, intentional life, often doing ministry on His walks and stopping to engage with people in between locations. 

• Care for your body is an act of worship to God. We can practice physical movement as stewardship of what God created. 

• Forty days builds discipline and faithfulness through small, daily commitments. 

• Walking creates a necessary brain break in the middle of a stressful, hurried world. 

• Daily physical movement gives your spiritual growth an outward expression. 

Why does the virtual Jesus challenge ask you to walk or run every day? What do you actually lose if you just sit in bed and read your Bible? 🤔

Seriously. Why can’t we just curl up under the covers, press play, and call it good? 

Well, yes. We could. And some days we do! 

But if we did that every day, we’d miss out on a crucial aspect of the Jesus virtual challenge, one of the very things that makes it so powerful. 

When I designed this Christian virtual walking challenge, I narrowed it down to two very simple pillars: 

1. Getting into God’s Word every day 

2. Moving your body every day 

Why these two specifically? 

Why not read God’s Word and eat healthy? Or encourage a friend every day? Of all the possible pillars to choose from, why pair physical movement with reading God’s Word? 

And no, I didn’t include walking (or running) into the Jesus challenge to sneakily trick you into exercising. 😆 It’s very intentional! 

One feeds your spirit and soul, and the other engages your whole body and mind. 

Heart, soul, strength. (Sound familiar? 👀) 

Body, mind, spirit. 

Let’s look at what daily movement specifically adds to our experience of the virtual Jesus challenge. (Turns out it’s quite a bit…!) 👇

1. Jesus Didn’t Lead a Sedentary Lifestyle 

Let’s start with the obvious: Jesus walked. A LOT. 😂 

Much of His ministry took place in between locations: on roads, pathways, hills, through towns, and between villages. His disciples walked with Him. People walked to find Him. Hours, days, just to get the chance to speak with Him or look at Him. 

Please don’t misunderstand; I’m not saying, “Jesus walked, therefore every good Christian must walk.” That is not the takeaway here. 😅 (If that were true, we’d also need to start eating dinner around campfires and find donkeys to ride on.) 

Jesus lived at a much slower, more intentional pace than most of us do. EVEN THOUGH He was literally the Savior of the world. (And we’re not!) 

He wasn’t constantly rushing to the next thing. I imagine He was actually late, pretty regularly. 

🚶 He noticed people. 

🚶 He stopped for the ones no one else would stop for. 

🚶 He listened with full attention and presence. 

🚶 He was interruptible. 

What about us? How does that picture compare to our daily lives? 😬

Walking naturally creates a little of that same margin in your life. You step away from the usual rush and slow your body and mind down. And suddenly you notice things and people you never saw before. These are the things God is doing, constantly, but we’re usually so glued to our tasks and phones and schedules, we don’t notice. 

So we don’t walk in the Jesus challenge just because Jesus happened to walk a lot. We walk to intentionally make room for Him and hopefully develop a habit of setting aside the hurry to engage with Him. 

2. Our Bodies Are an Important Part of Worship 

Sometimes we can forget that following Jesus doesn’t mean we only take care of our souls and completely ignore the bodies carrying them around. 😅 

God made us as whole people, in His image. Body, mind, soul, and spirit. Every part of our being is an opportunity to channel our worship to Him and bring Him glory. That includes our bodies. 

1 Timothy 4:8 reminds us that physical training does have value, even while spiritual training has greater value. They go hand in hand. 🤝

In other words, your body is not an annoying little accessory to your spiritual life. It matters to God, and you have the amazing opportunity to worship Him through it. 

Now, that doesn’t mean every Christian needs to become a marathon runner! And it also certainly does NOT mean that exercising earns you any kind of extra holiness points. 

Taking care of your body is an act of stewardship. 

👟 Whether that’s taking a walk. 

💪 Strength training. 

🤸 Stretching. 

🍗 Eating more protein. 

🚶 Choosing to move even when you’d rather stay on the couch. 

Your body actually belongs to God (wild to think about!), and He’s entrusted it to your care for this short time on earth. 

The goal of moving and taking care of your body is not to chase a certain appearance or prove something to God or ourselves. We steward our bodies with movement because they already belong to Him, and we get to worship Him through that stewardship. 

3. It Helps Us Practice Discipline and Faithfulness 

The virtual Jesus challenge gives you a very tangible way to practice a deeply Scriptural value: faithfulness. 

Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness, fasting and enduring temptation. Our 40 days of walking or running are NOTHING compared to what He went through, and we’re definitely not trying to recreate that experience. 

But there’s a plethora of lessons to be learned from it. 

40 days gives us a stretch of time to practice discipline, perseverance, and simple obedience in the middle of our ordinary days. 🤲 

You get up. 

You put on your shoes. 

You go. 

Even when motivation is absolutely nowhere to be found. 

THIS is why the physical movement is such a crucial and valuable part of the Jesus virtual challenge. 💪

Instead of just thinking about faithfulness as you read God’s Word, you physically practice it with your body. Walking or running every day for 40 days gives your spiritual growth a physical expression. 

This habit of discipline becomes the framework for how you practice faithfulness and carry it into the rest of your life. 

Following Jesus rarely stems from one giant heroic decision. It grows out of a thousand, tiny, private, ordinary decisions to show up, do the thing, and obey. It’s so simple. (And so hard. 😂) 

4. Walking Creates Restorative, Valuable Quiet 

My brain is tired. Anyone else? ✋

We carry around a ridiculous amount of noise all day long. Notifications. Emails. Errands. Work. Kids. Podcasts. Music. To-do lists. 😵💫

Many of them are really good things, but the sheer amount of them is overwhelming. 

And the second we get a spare moment, what do we do? We fill it! We grab our phones, check something, scroll something, turn on a show. 

We are so rarely totally quiet. 

When you get out and walk, you LEAVE. You physically remove yourself, body, mind, and spirit, from the demands and distractions and give your brain 20 minutes to breathe. You can walk, pray, listen to God’s Word, think, notice the trees, watch clouds, and just BE with Jesus without accomplishing anything at all. 😌 

We spend a lot of time asking God to give us wisdom, direction, peace, clarity, but much of the time we’re so busy and noisy we don’t step away to hear what He’s saying. 

The virtual Jesus challenge builds this restorative quiet space into your every day. It’s not another complicated spiritual practice where you have to accomplish or work through something. You can just be. 

Give yourself the gift of walking away. It’s SO refreshing, so healing, so life-giving. 

So Is Walking Really Necessary in the Virtual Jesus Challenge? 

Could you technically still do the Jesus virtual challenge from your couch? 

Sure! 😀

But now you see why walking or running is such an important component of this challenge. 

You’re not out to hit a certain number of steps, or turning into a fitness freak, or somehow earning extra points with God for sweating through 40 days. 

Moving every day gets your whole self involved in your surrender to God. 🧎

Even without physical movement, God still speaks through His Word. His Word never returns void. But here’s what you miss: 

• 🚶 Movement: getting your body involved in whole-self worship 

• 🧠 Mental space: a needed break from the noise 

• 🤏 Margin: the bandwidth to see the gifts and opportunities God places in front of you 

• 💪 Discipline: practicing faithfulness even when you don’t feel like it 

• 💞 Presence: learning to move slowly and be interruptible, as Jesus was 

• 🫡 Perspective: stepping away from your normal environment to let God reset you 

You don’t need to be a runner or in great shape. It just takes one step today. Then another tomorrow. The hardest part is just getting out the door and taking that first step. 👏

I invite you to join our sweet community of Jesus challenge participants. We’d love to have you join us and give Jesus the chance to transform you, body, mind, and soul. 

Reserve My Spot in the Jesus Challenge