The Mountain

Memorial Box Monday Edition

I have always struggled with irrational fears. One of my fears has been of heights. When I heard my first mission trip working with our youth ministry would be in the mountains fear started to take root in me. I pushed it down and ignored it and continued planning. Driving up in one of the two vans, with Arlene behind the wheel, I knitted furiously, chugged chamomile, and tried to ignore my surroundings by watching movies on my laptop. At one point Arlene and the other leaders prayed for me at a gas station, asking for the peace that transcends all understanding.

After arriving we got busy and my fear started to subside a little as I got used to my surroundings. The next day after we finished our day's activities we were told we would be taken up to the top of the mountain to go swim in the waterfalls for bathing. I instantly pictured scary narrow roads almost completely vertical. We stopped at a local museum on the way and while we walked around my fear started to build. I remember walking up to a youth (my friend's son, who knew about my fears) and saying "pray for me im so scared" and he said "you dont have to be afraid, we'll protect you" and gave me a hug. This was enough to get me back in the car and head up the mountain.

While it wasn't quite the scary road I had pictured, the roads were indeed narrow, drastically curvy, and when you looked out the outside window it was straight down into rapids. We were also told stories of multiple cars going over the side, as the local missions director (G) raced around the corners. Then when we got there we had to climb down this cliff to get to the waterfalls where we would bathe. I am sure it took me like 10 times as long as anyone else to climb down and I was probably a mess by the time we left that day.

I struggled through the week but spent much time in prayer that kept me going. A couple days later we were driving back with the missions director from somewhere. He said to me "Kim - I don't know why but everytime I see you I picture a short bus." I chuckled thinking it was a joke and then immediately lost my breath and tears instantly came to my eyes. It was as if I had been sucker punched. I covered it well and no one seemed to notice the flood of emotion that came to me.

When G said that to me I got a picture in my head of the short bus I used to ride. Now before you start making jokes at my expense, I went to a private school, and they purchased old buses no longer used by public schools. They had purchased a short bus to pick up those of us kids who lived on the islands and called it the island bus. That was the bus of my nightmares. I asked G what he meant by that, and his response was somewhere around "do you think God is trying to tell you something about it? If so pray and ask Him to show you" I didn't need to ask though, I knew what it was about.

When we got back I went off to a quiet place on the property and prayed. I knew God was trying to tell me something about that time in my life. I was not a Christian on that bus, and I was very unhappy. I had struggles of my own in those years and the kids on that bus seemed to pick up on that and would tease me. This one boy in particular, Jamie, would pick and pick and pick until I started to cry and then they would ignore me. No one protected me. No one stuck up for me. I tried everything. I tried ignoring him. I tried giving it back to him. I tried joking it off. I eventually gave up and would just sit there until I cried. Every day for an hour there and an hour home and many many tears. I don't even remember all that he would make fun of me about. Whether it was my name, my height, or made up things. I remember at one time he started saying I was homosexual, and teased me for that. It was a very very sad time in my life. I started to hate my life, and school, and those around me who didn't stand up for me. 

My poor little sister probably got most of my aggression because I think I blamed her in some ways for not sticking up for me, or because I was jealous of her having friends. I seem to recall going home after that bus ride and picking on her, teasing her for her weight problem or anything I could think of. Like I said - I wasn't a very nice person back then. It makes me cry now to even think that I could do that. It was certainly not her fault that someone picked on me. She was younger, and as her older sister who wasnt very nice to her I can't imagine her putting herself at risk with Jamie to stick up for me. Anyhow... back to the story.

When I prayed on the side of this mountain in Tennessee asking God to show me what it is about this short bus experience that He was trying to share with me. I heard God speaking into my heart very clearly that he was there with me even then and that it broke his heart for me to hurt like I did then. That was perhaps the most alone I had ever felt in my life. The idea that I was possibly not alone hit me like a train. The fact that I didn't acknowledge him as God at that time, but he was there loving me and waiting for me and caring about me when I felt no one cared for me, yep it hit me like a train. That kind of love that I didn't feel like I was getting - in the hardest time in my life, was there and being offered by the king of the universe, even then. This intense feeling of how much the Lord loved me even before I loved him overwhelmed me on a mountaintop in eastern Tennessee.

The love was so overpowering that the fear that had crippled me the first couple of days of this 10 day missions trip to Appalachia was immeasurable. I remember practically flying the rest of the week, and even for months afterwards. I remember running down that cliff to the waterfall the very next day, the same cliff that had paralyzed me before. I remember actually driving one of the vans down those curvy roads laughing and singing along with the radio. I remember jumping off the rocks by the waterfalls and sliding down the natural slides with my friend, Arlene. The love that the Lord showed me that He had for me was so intense it took over every bit of fear.

this is actually a picture of me jumping into the water that week - graceful I am not

I had long heard the scriptures about the love that conquers all fear, and the peace that transcends all understanding, but never experienced it in such an intense way. I had grabbed a couple of the rocks on that mountain in TN and stuck them in my pocket. I have kept them to remember that Christ is my rock, and His love conquers my fear. That Christ will stand up for me, love me, and protect me, even when no one else will. So today I am putting one of these rocks into my memorial box!

For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.

2 Timothy 1:7