SUMMIT

About a Week ago I hiked up my favorite mountain in the North East, Mount Adams. It is not high compared to the mountains you read about in magazines, or see in news reports but it is an intense mountain. The reason I like it is because along with being the second highest peak in the White Mountains of New Hampshire and part of the Presidential Range it is the only one that comes to a "pointy" summit. At 5,799 feet it peaks about 1,200 feet above treeline which means that the last mile or so of the hike is very exposed to the elements. As we approached the summit my comrades and I experienced winds sustained at about 60 to 70 miles per hour. What added a mystical element to our experience was that once we emerged from the trees we were above the clouds... yeah the skies were "under-cast" where we were. As the sun set it lit up the clouds. It was beautiful. What some people don't realize is that these mountains are some of the most dangerous in the U.S. The reason is because many people under estimate the conditions there in the Whites. Until a recent cyclone off the coast of Australia, the fastest wind speeds in the surface of the earth had been recorded in the Presidential Range.

As I stood there braced against the wind and biting cold on the "Airline" ridge I thought for a moment that there have been very few people who have stood where I was standing and have seen the view that I was seeing. Then I looked at a sign post and was reminded why so few people make that hike in the middle of winter to experience was I was experiencing. The high winds and extreme cold temperatures create ice formations like this one. What does it take to have experiences like this one. What does it take to have an experience that so few people have? The Answer is quite simple, by going where so few people go. By being willing to do what so few others are willing to do. By doing something difficult, that takes some effort, perhaps to the point of exhaustion.

One of the writers of the New Testament, Paul, writes about how perseverance will bring about character. "...we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope." Romans 5:3-4. So few people are interested in Character these days so few people persevere. Anything that involves our own sweat or effort or sacrifice is the sort of thing we put effort into avoiding. We would rather have someone else do it for us. The only draw back to that approach is that whoever does the work eventually gets to enjoy reward, or in my case the view at the top. Whoever perseveres gets the character growth. Not always right away but in the end your efforts catch up with you. No one can grow your relationship with God other than you. No one can put in the effort and get results for you other than you.

I could have sent some one else to the summit of Mount Adams and had them take pictures all the way, but I would not have seen it for myself, I would not have felt the wind on my face, or touched the snow laden branches with my own hands. I would have to settle for pictures. The real thing is so much better yet many times we settle for a two dimensional experience rather than a four dimensional experience. It is four dimensions because the real thing involves time and space, whereas three dimensions only involve space. The real thing with God is the kind of thing that can only really be experienced in person; temporally and specially. We cannot do it through someone else, not even our parents our friends, our religious leaders, or anyone else. Doing that takes personal character, to get character we must learn from and work through difficult circumstances. In order to learn and grow we must experience difficult circumstances... kind of like trying to stand up straight in 60 to 70 mile an hour winds.

So if you find yourself there, in difficult circumstances, and wishing you were somewhere else, like anyone would, hang in there, keep going, persevere. The view farther ahead is most certainly worth it.

Just a thought...

FIRST

Just a little while ago we had our first snow fall of the new year. I was of course thinking about Christmas time and having a white Christmas. You see, we had about six inches of snow on the ground but the day after Christmas it all melted away. All of it. As the snow disappeared what was left was an unattractive mix of brown sand from sanding the previously icy streets, and dead leaves, just a remnant of the once brilliant colors of Fall. Over the course of about 24 hours the world here on the north shore went from mostly white to browns and muted greens. It was pretty depressing the way a white Christmas on Friday became a brown Saturday afternoon.

Then it happened... a couple of days later little fluffy white flakes began to slowly drift to the ground. Before long there was a gentle white layer of snow covering the cold, dull colors of winter. It was the FIRST snowfall of the new year. What was once quiet and colorless, muted and silent, drab and dull was soon dressed in mystical white. The snowfall is a transformation that is hard to describe to someone who has never experienced a New England winter. There is something about the blanket of white that falls from the sky that somehow makes things seem to have new life. Take a look next time it snows at someone’s back yard before anyone has walked through it. The unbroken snow cover just after a winter storm is a sight to see; part of you wants to dive in, and part can't help but to stand in awe as you take it in.

Haven't you had dull or muted moment in your life at some point? I have. When the choice you made did not work out the way you thought it would, a relationship goes bad, a business partnership turns out to cost you the money you thought it would make you. Maybe you lost the job you thought was stable. Whatever it was it feels like the colors have faded. Everything seems to exist in muted shades, the prospects seem dull and drab.

In the Old Testament of the Bible there was a King whose name was David. This King who was a shepherd as a boy, and the leader of a militia as a young man was also a poet and song writer. He was a pretty intense guy who lived his life somewhat impulsively. One time after making an impulsive decision he realized that he had made a huge mistake. He basically looked after he leaped. Have you ever been there?? If you are breathing on planet earth you have. Maybe you made a quick decision you wish you could unmake; you made a comment you wish you could take back, you commit to something or someone you wish you could get out of or away from; the result?? You lose a job, you burned that bridge, you dropped the straw that broke the camel’s back and now the colors of life are dull and muted.

Well guess what... God controls the weather! He’s the one who sends the fluffy white flakes. This king who was a poet wrote these words: “Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.” - Psalm 51:7. Whiter than snow!! What a metaphor to describe what happens when we allow God into our space. Often we try to keep God at a distance but the reality is that once we allow God into our lives, those places that are dull and muted and seem to have no life at all are somehow covered and made beautiful. Those painful areas, those places where we have been hurt, those places where we have been let down or stabbed in the back., the places where we have royally messed up, the places we hide from everyone else because of fear of what some might say or think when they saw how colorless, how lifeless, how empty we can be. Somehow, God can look at those things and say, “I have something for that. I have love for your lifelessness, your dullness.” God takes those places and covers them with beauty that is whiter than snow. If we will allow him close enough to wash us he will cover us with a brilliant shade of whiter than white snow...

Just a thought...