Over the past year of thinking, writing, and the regular old raising of kids, I’ve had to make a handful of changes in direction. Oftentimes, I feel like I’ve walked myself right into a corner when I thought it was a clear-cut path, exactly where I was supposed to go. I thought I was doing all the right things because it seemed good and noble and required a bit of sacrifice. Then, alas, the door slams shut and I’m frustrated at my lack of clarity. I think I should be further down the road than I am right now, like I ought to have met more goals and checked more off my life’s to-do list. If only I knew what God wanted from me.
When we lived on the mountain, I met Kendall. She’d just had her third baby and, via some online meal-sharing website, I signed up to take her a meal. I didn’t know her, but her address was familiar and she seemed like a real, live human after I verified her personhood on Facebook. She lived on the mountain north of me. On a Tuesday, I strapped my babies and teriyaki chicken in the car and drove up the gravel road, tires spinning out on the steep, winding path that turned into rutted dirt. The house sat at the top of an even steeper driveway. Even my sturdy Subaru didn’t trust this incline as I pointed it up at what felt to be a 45-degree angle, our heads pressing back into our car seats.
Kendall and I crossed paths again several months later at a park. We became fast friends. Our upbringings were similar, and we had both found ourselves on a mountain because it offered affordable housing. We shared a lot of the same struggles–loneliness, raising babies, runaway strollers, losing every ball and toy our kids ever chucked down the mountain never to be seen again. But we also lamented on the more practical, serious hardships of living on a mountain, and her problems outweighed mine by a landslide. Her husband worked crazy shifts in law enforcement, leaving her worrying about his safety. She didn’t have studded tires–she had to chain up everytime she wanted to leave the house. She had a washing machine that lived in a little room on the outside of her house, no dryer. She draped wet clothes around the house, waiting for the heat from the woodstove to dry them. We both had to chop and stack wood for the pile in the winter, but she had the additional burden of hauling potable water and keeping the cistern full. It was inconvenient to drive all the way into town. We debated the merits of public school (where we would need to move mountains to catch a bus) versus homeschool (where we would undoubtedly feel even more isolated).
I suppose misery loves company. We forged a friendship in the wilderness and we can both laugh about the memories now. They are golden in our minds, wonderful times spent together keeping our gaggle of kids from falling off rocks, in streams, down rough terrain. We always had at least one child strapped to our back or front, always hollering for the more independent-minded to slow down and wait for the rest of us. We were young moms cloth diapering and commiserating our era of long-suffering. We were in the same boat and somehow it made it all bearable, and (dare I say?) enjoyable.
Eventually, we were able to move off the mountain and away from those primitive cabins that every man who ever watches Alaska Survival dreams about. Now when we talk on the phone, we reflect on our time on the mountain. How, in the moment, we were sure we were made for the struggle because that’s what we both understood as our calling. Frankly, I thought I had it figured out. God put moms like us on the mountain for some purpose, so we were going to struggle well. We were in it together.
Slowly, as our kids became school aged, each of us realized our unrealistic expectations of making it work. Kendall left first, a job opportunity moved their family to another town. Then our family sold our house and moved closer to civilization (at least closer to a gas station and school). Life suddenly became easier. I’d never been more thankful for pavement instead of mud and a garage to park my car. It was an abrupt, welcome, and sometimes guilt-inducing change of environment. The first winter I was giddy as I watched snow fall, unlike the pending sense of Donner party doom I’d had on the mountain.
This shift, from mountain to town, is the situation I remember when I get stuck in times of decision making. Should I stay right where I am, settle in to the wrestle, or is it time to pack up and leave the mountain? There is a purpose in struggle, but no struggle is the ultimate purpose. Sometimes God tells us we’ve done enough here and it’s time to move on. Could it be a hint of pride or self-assuredness that makes us want to stay and dig in our heels? We press into that hard spot, thinking we might make a dent in the rock, or at least prove to ourselves we have what it takes, that we are faithful.
Who knows why we do it, but I think maybe I often confuse endurance with obedience. I think if it is difficult, it is probably a sign that I’m doing the thing I was called to do. A touch of the martyrdom complex.
Maybe I fancy myself an Abraham, faithful, and God has led me up a mountain, asking me to put to death what I hold precious. I stand there and wait for the sacrifice to be slain, but God has already provided a different way and I refuse to go back down the mountain. I wait and wait and wait, thinking I’m on the mountain, doing everything God asked me to do…but when he points the way back down the path, I refuse to follow because I’ve tied myself to the altar.
I don’t want to be misunderstood–I’m not saying I think this is a typical scenario–after all, He told us we have crosses to bear. But He–Jesus–also advised on how we are to act in this world, being wise like serpents, innocent as doves. We are to be discerning and not carried away by what feels right. He told the parable of a shrewd manager, a guy who was worldly, lazy, and selfish–then proclaimed this guy was more discerning than people of the light (Luke 16).
Yes, he wants our obedience. To obey is better than sacrifice (1 Sam. 15:22). Obedience relies on our constant listening, asking, seeking, knocking. We are to pray without ceasing. But we also must realize we are in a world that throws wrenches in well-wrought plans. We are sometimes dominoes in a chain reaction. We get trapped in a cycle of people pleasing or cultural expectations. We know it isn’t good to overpromise–we are to let our yes be yes and our no be no, but we can convince ourselves that it won’t sync with our idea of Christian generosity or suffering, so we ignore the warning signs of overdoing it. We pave a path to martyrdom when God has never asked us to suffer for the sake of suffering.
He has shown you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.
Micah 6:8
We are well-meaning in our pursuit of righteousness and good deeds, but acting justly and loving mercy go along with walking humbly, which seems to be the first thing we kick out of the way. We swell with pride when others praise us for doing it all and keeping it all together, for staying on the mountain. However, it is the walking humbly part that might be key to understanding why Jesus ever brought up the shrewd manager as an example for us.
Our lives are really just a breath, a small matter of inhale and exhale. Gone. This is humbling to the point of disbelief, don’t you agree? Breathe in, breathe out. That is you, in the grand scheme of things (and sometimes I think my laundry pile is insurmountable).
Yet we waste away our days trying to insert meaning and a touch of suffering, martyrdom. Our lives are such small things and we try to fit enormous plans inside them, agendas that will fulfill our calling, whatever that is. Who hasn’t held their baby in their arms and hoped the child might grow up and change the world? What baby has ever changed it? Are we dreaming away our purpose?
Many of our days are wasted, even with good intentions. Jesus, speaking of the shrewd manager, said that only whoever is trustworthy with this tiny breath of life, with this tiny bit of worldly money, will be trusted with heavenly riches and real reward. Even people of this world are humble enough to admit our days are finite (both Tim McGraw and King Solomon suggested one ought to “live like you were dying”), but “people of the light” don’t seem to act so shrewdly. We imagine we are limitless just like God is limitless. We look for that ultra-special calling, and a touch of suffering seems like an indicator that we are on a higher path.
Our first mistake is forgetting our smallness. Our job isn’t to honor or wow Him or anybody else with our big plans, our big personalities. In fact, it is the opposite of honoring him when we try to attain something spectacular for even a smidgeon of our own glory.
In other versions of Micah 6:8, the word is “mortal”. Adam.
He has shown you, O mortal, Adam, what is good.
You and I, we are very tiny things. To recognize our smallness within the vastness of God, to lose our pride and allow Him to provide another way–sometimes this is the hardest part of faith to swallow.
Abraham didn’t stand there on the mountain, urging God to kill his son even after a ram was provided in the thicket. Abraham believed with shaky knees, lifted Isaac off the altar, and headed back down the mountain. It was the next step of obedience. It was a humble move! God wasn’t after Abraham’s suffering, He didn’t say I’ll really nail this old fool! He was after Abraham’s obedience. Do you trust me even if you might suffer for awhile? Do you trust me if I take the suffering away? Will you follow me, humbly, wherever the path leads?
May we struggle well when it is time to struggle.
May we be shrewd enough to recognize when it is time to leave the mountain.
