We've been visiting family in Bear Lake for a couple of days to celebrate the New Year. Yesterday afternoon, on a brisk and clear day, we took the snowmobiles into the beautiful mountains near Bear lake. It was to be a short ride, we rode away with only two hours of sunlight left.
As we continued to climb and go farther back in the mountains, we broke above the haze that lingered in the valley and the bright, deep-blue sky appeared. It was brilliant as the sun reflected off the snow.
We continued to go farther and deeper into the mountains, I was comfortable because I was with my brother-in-laws who knew the area very well. As we climbed up through some trees and came out on a ridge, I noticed that all the fresh snowmobile tracks disappeared. As we continued through the trees and up the ridge, I was thinking to myself, "I'm glad they know where we are, because I certainly have no idea." The entire ride we had seen fresh tracks everywhere, now it was just our tracks. After a few minutes, my brother-in-law pulled up and said that he had no idea where we were, even though they knew the general direction we needed to go, we were lost. This wouldn't have been a significant concern, except that the sun was setting and darkness wasn't far away from enveloping us.
I suggested we follow our own tracks out and so we turned around and started back. We had only gone for a few minutes and my brother-in-law, who was in the lead, made a U turn. I asked what we were doing and he said the tracks we had started to follow had turned into someone else's tracks. We were definitely lost. We chose a couple of directions and went for a few minutes before realizing that we were just making circles. I had always wondered how it was possible for people to get lost in what were normally totally familiar mountains, this was my answer!
We decided to simply start "down" the mountain, but after going for just a few minutes, we came upon a steep ravine and couldn't continue on that path - once again we had to turn around. Now the sun was low on the horizon and we didn't have much time before it was gone. We decided to say a prayer. We gathered in a circle, said a quick prayer asking for help and guidance and then closed the prayer. My brother-in-law decided to ride around a set of trees and see what was on the other side, we rode for one minute and discovered a large set of fresh tracks pointing the direction we needed to go. We followed those tracks for less than two minutes and as we went over one more ridge, the valley we were looking for opened into view - we knew we had made it and were safe! It took us 30 minutes to ride back home and the sun was below the horizon when we arrived at the house.
When we were lost, I couldn't help think of all the symbolism in this event. We were closer to a very dangerous situation than we probably realized, especially because we had no survival kit of any kind (matches, flares, etc.) and the temperatures that night would be below zero degrees.
Sometimes in life we cruise along on a path we think is safe. We think all is well and we're quite comfortable with our current situation. Some people go through their entire life, thinking they're on the right trail, when in reality they're going deeper and deeper into the forest where the return becomes even more difficult. Sometimes, we look around and suddenly realize "all is not well", and we try to get back to the true path. Even when we begin to awake, we sometimes try to do it on our own. We look for the path, but end up going in circles. It's not until we sincerely look to the Lord, that he alone can quickly lead us back to the true path and put us on the correct course leading to eternal life. There are many deceptive trails in life, we can choose to follow any one of them, but only when we look to the Lord, will he illuminate the correct path.
I'm grateful for prayer and the quick and immediate answer we received yesterday while snowmobiling. I'm grateful for the lesson taught to me by the Lord. He is the master teacher. I came home and hugged our children, the outcome could have been very different. Let us all look to the Lord and live. Let's be careful about complacency in the gospel or we may find ourselves in a place we never expected to be.
Cool story hermano
ReplyDelete