Who Are You Traveling With?
We hear a lot about mountaintop experiences. It feels great when we have hit a period in our life where everything is just clicking. All cylinders are firing perfectly. Life is in some sort of perfect rhythm.
There’s a problem, though.
We don’t stay on the mountain top.
Something happens. Life returns to normal. We get back in a rut. Worse yet, we dive headlong into a valley. It’s not just any valley, either. It’s the valley of the shadow of death. We wonder how we’ve made it and how it can ever get good again.
I had one of those mountaintop experiences the other day.
My blog had more views and more comments than any day it has ever had. It was exciting. I was drunk on the wine of success. Except for one thing.
I realized that it was temporary.
I realized that it was really a timing issue.
It wasn’t me that people were excited to read. It was just the topic.
I even feared that there would be a day before long where no one would even read this blog.
I put the brakes on my plans to quit my job and become a full-time blogger and writer. It wasn’t quite time to start sell advertising on my blog.
I realized that pretty soon things would return to normal. It was just a blip. It was an anomaly. It was just part of the journey.
I headed back down the trail from the mountaintop, hoping to avoid the valley that brings fear, knowing that I have a shepherd who is with me on the trip. I have a shepherd who leads me beside the still waters. He comforts me with his rod and staff. I don’t have any need to want. He gives me a table right in front of the enemy. He anoints my head and my cup overflows. Goodness and mercy follow me all the days of my life. We’re headed toward His house (I hear it’s a big, big house) where I will live the rest of my life.
Where are you today? Are you in the valley? Or are you on the mountaintop? It doesn’t matter if it’s in your job or in your marriage or anywhere else you are. You will travel up and down the trail between the mountain and the valley. The difference is in who is walking with you.
Who is traveling on this journey with you?
I think I am somewhere in between. Certain areas of my life are flying high. Certain others are below the radar. I know it will change. I also know I have an unchanging Father who loves me as I am.
It’s awesome that He does not change.
Larry, I used to have a real problem with this. I was always searching for the next mountain top and I was missing the beautiful, incredible life that I have the privilege to live right now!
Great thoughts – especially as I come off of my mountain top experience to Guatemala. I know who I’m traveling with!
Jon, glad He traveled to Guatemala with you.
Thanks for the shout out in your post. Oh. Wait. The Shepherd you were talking about was God? I need to re-read this thing now. I kid, I kid. Seriously, good thoughts today.
Rob, you are who I was thinking of.
im kinda in a valley right night…no where near the shadow of death…but still a valley…looking up at the others on the mountain top a little jealous i might feel too…
but God is till good and right…and he is still with me!!!!
Praying for you, Arny
Great reminder. Some days are great and others are difficult.
And He is there.
I often call it a roller coaster Larry. I think there are HIGH high’s and LOW low’s. Who’s in it with me? My true friends. Those relationships that i have built. Those folks often help encourage me. And, oh that one IMPORTANT part I like to forget about sometimes, God. If I’m writing for His glory, not mine, I truly believe God is with me.
Amen, Jim
Good thoughts. My life is somewhere between the mountaintop and the valley. And I’m not sure whether I’m going up the mountain or heading to the valley. But I know who’s traveling with me – Jesus, my family, and my friends. Those three are constants in my life.
Those are most important.