It was August, but we could see our breath, and fingers
shoved into cozy mittens still went numb from the cold. It was 3am. Pitch
black. Walking in an endless row of people zigzagging up the steep
mountainside; awkwardly plodding along, occasionally climbing up rough portions
of the trail on all fours. This probably sounds like the beginning to some
horrible nightmare, but it was actually fantastic: my younger brother and
sister were visiting from the states, and we were going to make it to the top
of Mt. Fuji in time to see the sunrise.
We brought flashlights, but they were weak and the small
stream of light quickly faded. If we tried to make the hike in the dark we
probably would have tripped and found ourselves tumbling down to the base, or
at best been stuck in the freezing cold until sunrise. But in the pitch black,
even that puny penlight of a flashlight would have been enough to kind of get
by. Not ideal, maybe a bit unnerving, but enough. But because we were
surrounded ahead and behind with people who came prepared with powerful
flashlights and headlamps, we hardly needed our flashlights at all. Thanks to
their light, I could see reasonably clearly. Navigating the path in front
of me, deciding where to step, was no problem.
But if that had been it: climbing up a mountain in the dark,
then carefully making our way all the way back down in the dark, just to say we
did it…there is no way I would have gone, much less invited my siblings along.
What made it worth it, was hiking on with confident
hope of the sunrise. Because it happens every day! We knew that after all the
hiking and waiting and freezing, that glorious orange disk was going to slice
through the clouds, paint the sky with beautiful colors, and warm our chilled
faces and fingers. Not only was the sun itself gorgeous, in its light
everything else was beautiful too. We see the path clearly, and the
black sky and black mountainside and black valley of the climb up were transformed
into a beautiful landscape of reds and greens and blues.
This advent season, it’s dawned on me that life is kind of
like climbing Mt.
Fuji . Sure it’s
wonderful, great times, can be lots of fun and all, but it can also feel
ridiculously hard. And sometimes what I am equipped with feels like a
puny little flashlight. But it’s more than OK. Because the light is all around,
behind and ahead, and we are far from being alone. And best of all? Well, like
the sunrise, that’s yet to come. But I can hike, zigzag, awkwardly plod through
life with joy, peace, love, and confident hope. Because it happens every
day! Christ is risen. He came. He’s
coming again. He’ll never fail to show up. Emmanuel!