The story focuses on Faye, a five year old girl, who climbed Ben Nevis in a blizzard to raise money for Glasgow Children’s Hospital. But if you read this and other articles they says how her dad, Craig, is an experience ice climber, meticulously planned the route and made sure he had all the necessary kit needed. This does not detract from Faye’s amazing achievement but she couldn’t have done it without good fathering. And I suspect a father she trusted, who encouraged her and who she’d done lesser climbs with beforehand.
This, to me, seems to fit in with the last two posts of mine. If we “yoke” ourselves to Jesus and trust God knows what’s going on we can scale any difficulty. God has done all things before us. Like with Craig, God isn’t surprised when bad things come our way. We just need to tuck in behind our perfect Father/Parent and know they will not let us come to any harm.
Looking at Faye’s face I suspect she wasn’t worried at all because she knew she could trust her Dad not to let her come to harm. I am suspecting Craig gave her words of encouragement to keep her going; words she could hear because she knew he meant it. Even though it was an arduous climb in bad weather Craig knew they had the right kit and the right stamina and knew they could do it and so he passed this on to Faye.
Too often we get to a place where the going looks too tough and we stop listening to the voice of God encouraging us. Some of that, I suspect, comes from parenting we’ve received where we haven’t been encouraged, where at times our parents are the ones who’ve put the limits on us, passed on their fears and worries, not walked that path so don’t want us to because we might get hurt.
I know as a parent I was guilty of doing that but that came from me not listening to God as I parented. So I put in my fears, my limitations, my expectations, etc on my children instead of trusting God with parenting my children and letting myself take on that easy yoke that Jesus promised.
We could all do with being more like Faye with our heavenly Father and trusting that they know the route, have got the kit that is needed, and hear their words of encouragement so we can make it to wherever we are meant to be going without fear.
rewrite but am not sure if the words will come again 😦
and the feeling that at times I feel like I am ready but am not sure I have anything in reserve, but as I wrote the piece that I have lost I have realised that I have more in reserve now I don’t have boundless energy than I did when I could keep going for days.
to remember that I am an introvert and so being with people will exhaust me and I need to take time to be alone. It is one reason why I love the Anglican service because it does just do the same old same old and it can wash over me and revive me. I also need to realised that I have friends I can check in with.
Aspirational Adventures 