uphill, downhill

(it's like how your parents walked to and from school...uphill both ways)

Uphill, Downhill

The Sunday afternoon weather was fabulous, especially for February.  So I took the opportunity to take my run outdoors, away from the gym, the treadmill and the four walls.  Treadmills take you on a flat run by default; no hills are included unless you request them.  Not so on a trail.  Logic tells me that while traveling a circuitous route, that stops where it starts, every uphill change in elevation must be balanced out by a downhill change.  Funny how it rarely feels that way.  The uphill sections seem daunting, challenging and never ending.  The downhill section fade into your memory as soon as they are complete.

“So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, “… Then come, let us go up to Bethel, where I will build an altar to God, who answered me in the day of my distress and who has been with me wherever I have gone.” Genesis 35:2-3

Most people can easily name the worst thing that every happened to them…maybe even a top ten. We can even list all the challenges we see on the horizon for the near term.  Less certain is the ability to recount the times when things were easier, where the path was straighter and wider.  Or to quantify how much simpler the future is with God at our side.    That’s why Jacob’s altar is important…it’s built to remember God’s provision in both distress and good times.

I hope we can all find that balance too.

  

Thanks for all you do.

Brian

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Volume 7, Number 35