Friday, November 6, 2009

Straight and Narrow


The straight and narrow path was a pretty easy choice when we lived in the jungle, the options weren't that appealing. Take the photo above as an example; walk on the logs or step off into boot eating mud. Wander too far off the path and you find something that will eat you, boots and all.

Walking the straight and narrow was a no brainer in the jungle, but it wasn’t near as much fun as flying it! You see, for every 1 hour spent walking on a well groomed trail as pictured, the same distance could be covered in 1 minute in a small airplane. Hmmm, take a 20 minute flight to the nearest clinic, or spend 20 hours hiking.

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Descending to go even higher


This past August (2009) I had the opportunity to do some climbing in the Crestone mountains of Colorado. You should know several things:


1. This was my first trip, and I’ve never attempted anything so far out of my comfort zone before as climbing.

2. I can’t say that I have ever been in particular good physical shape at any point of my life.

3. Heights don’t bother me so much when I have a metal airframe with at least a couple hundred horsepower of lift strapped on by a 5 point harness….otherwise they do.

On this particular day, 4 of us set out to climb one of the “14k” peaks known as Kit Carson. The weather was beautiful, the friends were great, and we had food and water. Regardless of the fact all four of us were guys, we even had a written description of the route to take and we actually read all of the directions!
The plan was simple: scramble up a slope and traverse to “Bears Playground,” continue until we come to the “false summit,” climb that and descend a few hundred feet down the other side and climb up Kit Carson. In reality, the simple plan turned quickly into a marathon of will power by the time we made it to Bears Playground (not even halfway). We continued on up and down and finally reached the false summit…but we weren’t sure by that point if it was the real summit or the false one. Ankles were starting to swell, and the oxygen was getting thinner as we crested the mountain only to realize we had one more hurdle to go. Looking at the summit of Kit Carson across the way did not present a technical challenge as much as a psychological challenge. You see we had to descend 300 feet to cross over to where we could climb back even higher than we were starting from in the first place. Needless to say, we pressed on and reached the top of Kit Carson to enjoy a view that would be impossible to describe with words.


The parallel to the emotions that are faced in ministry are amazingly similar. The plans are good, the people are wonderful, but struggle to take another step gets difficult at times. Yet there are times when you reach a place where you see what God has done, and it would be impossible to describe with words. I look at the challenges ahead for Proclaim and it seems like the summit of stability is across a deep valley…needless to say, we will press on!