Truly there is nothing as beautiful as watching a magnificent sunrise whilst nestled in the heart of the Rocky Mountains. Just the thought of seeing one makes my pulse quicken. My sister and I vacationed together several years back and we decided to get up early and go watch the sunrise. She scoped out a beautiful spot that served as a chapel in the woods set amidst the spectacular mountain view with the descending valley below. Just close your eyes and imagine the most beautiful tall trees, chipmunks and squirrels zipping by so close that you can reach out and touch them, the burnt orange hue of the sun smacking you in the face and taking your breath away, and lush valleys full of purple flowers that seem to melt all of your cares away. That was the view we hastened to that morning so we could just spend some time in nature with God.
We set out early that summer morning slowly making our way to the sacred spot. We happened upon a field of elk, which are really big, in case you didn’t know. As we approached them, a male with gigantic horns began to snort at us, signaling we were getting a little too close for comfort. I felt that fight or flight urge kick in and my legs burned to tear off into a full out sprint but my sister said, “Just keep walking and don’t look at him. He will stop.” Do you have any idea how hard that is? I somehow managed to keep my senses in check and not start hauling butt. To my surprise, they allowed us safe passage.
We continued on our journey walking through parking lots and meadows until we happened upon a sight that will forever send chills up my spine. I still retained some of my shakiness from the elk incident when lo and behold we came within about 200 feet of a bear rummaging through a trash dumpster. Yes…..I said we encountered a bear! There are no words to convey the sheer terror we felt as we proceeded to turn 180 degrees and haul butt! Wide open and over drive! I caught the bear in my line of sight barreling off in the other direction but the adrenaline in my system took over and I shot off like a lightning bolt homeward bound. Needless to say our little adventure was brought to an abrupt halt and I refused to journey again to the sacred spot.
The truth is I probably missed out on something beautiful because I let fear control my decision. All I could think about involved being mauled by a big black bear and my subsequent funeral. I envisioned the photo sitting atop my casket because I would be unrecognizable from the bear fight, the flowers cascading over my tomb of defeat and my poor family weeping uncontrollably in the background. Interspersed within the haunting funeral music I can hear someone giving a nice eulogy dripping with comforting words and the undertone of “Well, at least she tried.” Death by bear fight did not seem worth the mountain top view to me I suppose, so I passed on the adventure the 2nd time around.
My imagination convinced me that another quest to our little haven in the woods would result in my imminent death. Our imaginations are powerful agents in either pushing us toward something or holding us back from something. When our imaginations are governed by fear, our decisions will be safe, boring and we will never experience what could have been the greatest adventure of our lives.
Past experiences are the biggest predictor of how we will respond to a potentially bad situation. We will learn to stop taking risks if we experienced failure in the past in similar situations. We perceive failure as a slap on the hand to stop trying when sometimes failure should only be allowed into our lives as a teacher of what NOT to do to accomplish a task. We fail our way to success. We grow. We get better along the way. The trick is not to let our imaginations run wild envisioning all sorts of horrible endings causing us to not even try in the first place.
I pray we all develop the same attitude as Joshua and Caleb did, not once but twice. The first time around, when God told the Isrealites to take their promised land after He had miraculously delivered them from Pharoah, they both answered God’s call with confidence and obedience. Moses had sent them with a group of other spies to scout out the land that God wanted them to take. All of the other spies came back with negative, self defeated talk that convinced everyone else that the task would be impossible. But Joshua and Caleb displayed bold confidence and wanted to attack their enemies to take their possession. Of course, the nay-sayers had their way causing the Israelites to wander in the wilderness for 40 years until God could raise up warriors that believed He would fight for them. The 2nd time around, Joshua and Caleb were practically old men but they responded with the same enthusiasm as before, assured they could take their promised land in spite of their aged bodies.
What about David? When tasked with the colossal fight of his life against a giant, his initial response to Saul was that he had already killed a lion and a bear so the giant was nothing to him. We need some of that courage! That is the kind of imagination God wants us to have when we encounter obstacles that terrify us; a tenacious belief that God will give us victory and the fortitude to hold onto it when God requires radical obedience to accomplish the victory. Instead of being blinded and obstructed by our fearful imaginations we need to learn to fix our eyes on God and realize that the possibilities are endless. Just because we lived through a bad experience doesn’t mean it will repeat itself. And just because we seemed to fail in the past doesn’t mean we won’t get it right the next time. God never loses a battle so if He is telling us to move forward in an area we can rest assured that if we obey He will rally for us.
Oddly enough I had the chance to partake in a mountain view just this past weekend. My family owns a beautiful patch of land in the secluded mountains of Arkansas. I decided to go for a walk, but I’ll be honest, I knew that my little nature stroll might include a bear encounter. A black bear and her cub were spotted just a few weeks ago near our cabins. But I decided to not let fear dictate my decision and I walked in the beauty of God’s country. On a positive note, I did not see a bear.
My advice for 2017: Go all out and don’t let fear hold you back from walking out your destiny and all that God has for you this year! If you foresee a lion, bear or giant in your way, go after them in the power and strength of God and defeat them. Don’t miss out on the possibilities that this year could bring because of failure in the past. Don’t let fear hold you back one more year!
