Call me unoriginal, but just like everyone else, I find the mountains to be awe-inducing. Songs mean more. The sun feels brighter. I feel invincible.
I can’t help but thinking of cliche lines like: “I go to the hills when my heart is lonely. I know I will hear what I've heard before. My heart will be blessed with the sound of music. And I'll sing once more.”
I go to the hills.
What could be a place of danger becomes a place of hideaway, of retreat, of rest and of renewal.
The hills. I go to the hills. Then another poem comes to mind:
“I lift up my eyes to the hills.
From where does my help come?
My help comes from the Lord,
who made heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot be moved;
he who keeps you will not slumber.
Behold, he who keeps Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.
The Lord is your keeper;
the Lord is your shade on your right hand.
The sun shall not strike you by day,
nor the moon by night.
The Lord will keep you from all evil;
he will keep your life.
The Lord will keep
your going out and your coming in
from this time forth and forevermore.”
(Psalm 121)
He will keep your life. Then why I am ever so afraid? Why am I not deeply bold and deeply loving and decidedly steady? Here I am, deep in the hills, deep in thought, in the deep of night. And I’m praying that in this week, somewhere in these words and in this silence, I find strength and wisdom and renewal.