Last night, I stayed up too late watching a show about climbing Mount Everest. Let me first say that I balk at climbing the hill every morning on my way to walk the girls to school, so mountain climbing is like, the last thing on my list of things I want to do. Right below get a root canal and drill a hole in my head.
Still, it was fascinating to watch people who know what they’re doing make their way to the top. It was freezing and dark and they had all this stuff they had to carry. One man was battling a stomach virus. And at nearly 28,000 feet, they could hardly breathe. At one point, one of them said that the key is to look no further than your feet. Really? That’s the key? Because I thought the key might be take a crazy pill and wash it down with a glass full of Superman juice.
They reached the summit just before dawn. But when the narrator darkly announced that is only half the climb and the descent is more dangerous than the ascent, I turned it off. The only kind of mountain descent I want to see is on one of these.
This morning, I read in Habakkuk chapter 3, where even in the midst of great despair, the writer admits that the Lord is the origin of strength. He makes me as surefooted as a deer, able to tread upon the heights (v. 19).
Then, in one of my favorite devotional books, Jesus Lives, Sarah Young says this:
Awareness of your need for Me is what creates a strong connection to My Presence. My Power flows into you continually: It gives you strength to take the next step, strength to resist discouragement and despair, strength to know Me in intimate dependence…Though the way before you may be steep and rocky, it is nonetheless the path of Life. It is where you encounter My luminous Presence – radiating peace that transcends all understanding.
As crazy as those mountain climbers seem to me, perhaps we have more in common than I first thought.
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