Toboggan of Life

A life changing weekend at FCA is our saving grace at the moment.  Things learned there somehow made a difference in the same message – just delivered in a new way.  So….the tide flows again with new goals, new hopes…..then why am I so weary?

When I was young, in Winnipeg, Canada at this one park close to our home in St Vital, we'd use our 5-6 seater aluminum toboggan and would haul it up wooden steps to a loading ramp, the more you put on it - the further it went. Barreling down in the guidance of ice walls beside us.  Everyone, when it would stop, would jump off quickly and dash up the hill so the last one off had to pull the toboggan back up.  I'd slowly pull it back up and look at the ice guidance walls, sometimes seeing blood from someone who got bumped and maybe had a nose bleed - oohing at the grossness of fresh red blood on white snow and ice.  Such awesome memories of hours of exhausting fun.

I feel like I’m pulling the toboggan up to slide once more, the exhilaration and joy of the ride ends when you have to trudge up the hill with a toboggan in tow, each time it feels heavier, each time the wind in your face pushes you to push harder to get there for the joy in the ride….eventually you are too cold, too tired and you go home…..seeking warmth, dryness and nourishment.

I’m weary of my toboggan – I think I need a long rest….  God is my strength pushing me from behind to rise up that mountain over and over....to look and experience the joy of the ride when joy can be found and cherished.

I read this quote by Brennan Manning:  “Suffering, failure, loneliness, sorrow, discouragement and death will be part of your journey, but the Kingdom of God will conquer all these horrors. No evil can resist grace forever.”

Isaiah 54:17
"No weapon forged against you will prevail..... This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and this is their vindication from me", declares the Lord.