The summit

"It is for these reasons that I am convinced that real glory inheres in those who can navigate such transitions with their identity in Christ more—and not less—established. This has to be our endeavour—to entrench and not diminish our identity as sons of God.

 

            There are many things yet to understand. Some seem counter-intuitive. The Great Why can be a damage to our souls. Such questions, and their kinfolk, are to be held in abeyance until God fully demonstrates Himself in the situation. The act of trust is to trust Him with our questions. They will be answered in good time.

 

            Rather, we are permitted to ask another question that God will always answer: "Lord, what do you want to be for me now that you have never been for me before?" It is a simple question. And yet I have found God willing and able to answer it every time. It is true that encounters with God—in the valley and pilgrimage as described in Psalm 84—are privileged occasions to experience God in a novel and profound way.

 

            In the great war of identity only God is allowed to define us. It is His sovereign prerogative to be the fulcrum of all things. How much more our life?

 

            We need to live in those immortal words of Rudyard Kipling: "If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster / And treat those two impostors just the same ... If you can make one heap of all your winnings / And risk it on one game of pitch and toss / And lose, and start again at your beginnings / And never breathe a word about your loss."

 

            I am not persuaded that God is not in control. I am unconvinced that He does not have a plan. If nothing else, this whole episode has produced the deepest desire I have ever had to know God well and to know Him intimately. All other attempts at success have failed; and I see that to know Him and to be like Him is arguably the greatest yardstick of success I ought to apply.

 

            For all the complexity of the situation and the plethora of dynamics and vectors, an oddly simple solution has emerged: To follow God is life's greatest prize.

 

            It was the man who passed through the dark valley of Psalm 23 that one psalm later scaled the greatest hill of them all and appeared before God to open the gates for all to follow. Valleys—by pure definition—are pre-cursors to mountain-tops of glory. And so I can say, along with the writer of Ecclesiastes: "The end of a matter is better than its beginning." For it is at the summit of knowing God that all of God's chapters close. That, in simple terms, is the journey of life."