Retracing Steps: STONY2012

Psalm 91:11-12

For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways.

They shall bear you up in their hands, lest you dash your foot against a stone.

2012 has been my happiest and best year, but a road trip US hiatus through 4500+ miles for work, family, and friends left me worse for wear for most of March.    As I crossed familiar miles over 13 states, I couldn’t help but think about my worst days in each one… each holding a solid chunk of stony ground in my life story.

• Iowa had a chilling memory of my coldest winter.
• Oklahoma had a ridiculous heartbreak.
• Louisiana teased me with that nuclear family feel it always promised but never delivered.
• Mississippi whispered the lines of the collective lives and deaths of the major players of my youth.
• Alabama reminded me it had fileted my soul with the loss of my parents’ marriage in the 80′s and my first full time job 20 years later.

And Florida was quick to remind me where I’d slept 6 of our first 12 months together: on a church floor.

I dashed my feet against so many stones in those states.  Those moments, those days, those years…. full of clumsy trips and falls over unapologetically hard rocks.  Thoughts entered my road weary mind.  Where were those angels then?  My feet hit those stones…in most cases my face soon followed with a thud.

Then a look in my rear view mirror reminded me.  These same feet that tripped so bad over those stony days of the past were now walking over them, carrying a toddler and pregnant wife happily in tow.  I’m living my best and wildest dreams.  The stones were still there, but they’d sunk down, gone from stumbling blocks to foundations.    Thinking back, I had stumbled.  Fell hard.  And it was the stuff of heaven- angels and saints and a Savior- that picked me up.

To commemorate being home at our mission house in N.Ireland, I’ve decided to conclude with this blessing inspired by those hard miles.