In the Foothills
Walking the path of God's treasure
An excerpt from my journal, written in one of those bursts of midnight inspiration:
“The journey of manhood is to walk the foothills, along the path to a mountain we’ll never reach. By the time our lives are ending, we can look back and see that our foothills have become those paths trodden for future generations. The mountain, then, is only reached when we’ve realized that our journey itself was the destination of God’s treasure. We realize His true love for us as we lead our children along the path through the foothills of life.”
Much of manhood is a journey to find wisdom that we can pass along to our children, just as we received wisdom from our fathers and grandfathers. In that way, we trod the paths they laid. It is, however, the task of every man to eventually step off and start blazing a new path up the mountain. We do this to discover ourselves; to test whether or not we have what it takes. It is scary, but necessary.
By making our own paths, we begin to understand two seemingly contradictory truths. The first is that we are our own men. The second is that we are led by God to become the men he wants us to be. For when we allow God to lead us, we inherit the fullness of His love and enter into our own unique manhood
When I write of God’s treasure, I don’t mean the emotional wholeness that comes from a job well done. God’s treasure is the journey itself. It is the the stuff that is happening all around you. The daily graces you give your spouse. The hug from your daughter. The high five you give your son. The smell of flowers in the garden. The taste of a perfectly ripe tomato. We can get so deep into our responsibilities as men that we forget to rest and look back down the path. What we see is that our wives and children are right behind us.
If we rest in God’s grace, He will make Himself known. If we stop to savor the small moments along the path through the foothills, we get to know Him, and our families, better. When this happens, we can watch with joy as our kids get out ahead and realize their own potential. We can relish in the warmth of our wives hands curling around ours.
But we need to blaze the path. We may not all know how to do this to its fullest purpose. I certainly don’t. But if we feed off of the greatness of God’s love, we have the best chance of being all that we can be for our families.
I hope that all made sense.