“You’re almost there!” “You can do it!”
I looked up from the dusty trail and into the faces of angels, I thought vaguely, on a long, long hike in the foothills of California.
My husband and I had just dropped off our oldest daughter at college, and we were exploring a nearby hiking trail to distract me from my accompanying emotions.
Some discoveries
Normally before setting off on a hike, we look up important things such as how many miles it is and how strenuous it is and pack the appropriate amount of water.
But this time, we didn’t.
Our minds on other things, we just started hiking, one foot in front of the other, over stones large and small, along a clear creek and through a sunbaked canyon on a meandering trail that wove its way uphill amid scurrying skinks and countless cacti.
The destination was a beautiful waterfall that filled a large basin of clear, cold water: A haven of relief after the tough hike to get there.
The oldest people on this particular trail, Daddy and I discovered we’re not quite as young as we used to be. We discovered that in the hot afternoon California sun, one can wither quickly without copious amounts of water.
With just two small bottles of water between us, we discovered we had to decide whether or not to press on without knowing the remaining distance to the destination.
Hope appears
We decided to keep going but wondered, with every exhausting step and every rationed sip of water, if we should turn back. The reality of nature — and our failing human nature — is relentless.
And at the moment I needed it most, hope appeared in the shining faces of two hikers coming back from the destination we desperately wanted to reach.
“It’s so worth it in the end!” they assured us. They had been through the trail, reached the waterfall, and the triumph of their journey shone in their faces.
It was just the hope we needed to press on.
Pursuit of holiness
Isn’t the same thing true in our spiritual lives? When times get difficult and all we want to do is give up and go the easy way, God places signs of hope in people in our lives and gives us the saints as countless examples of perseverance in the pursuit of holiness.
St. Paul says: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider Him who endured from sinners such hostility against Himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted” (Heb 12:1-3).
All we need
In our times of greatest trial on this Earth, in the moments we think we can’t take another step on the difficult journey of our lives, we have to stop looking down at the dusty trail before us and look up at the hope in the people with whom God has surrounded us.
Sometimes that’s exactly — and only — what we need.
It’s also called God’s grace.
Julianne Nornberg, mother of four children, is a teacher’s aide at St. John School in Waunakee.