Mount Sinai
A year ago…it amazes me how quickly a year can fly by while
still feeling like it moved as slow as molasses. Last year, I was in the middle
of the Sinai Peninsula hiking up and down what is held in tradition to be the
Mount Sinai. My trek up that mount was difficult, but the trek down has a story
of its own. I thought more than a couple times I would not be able to complete
the hike. It was a 3 mile hike each way with two and half of the miles going up
being done on a camel and the other half mile being 750 stone stairs.
The day before my trek up Mount Sinai I had climbed to the top of a pyramid in a squat position most of the way up and rode a camel…almost falling off said camel making me say I would not ride a camel again. Do you know how wide a camel is? Imagine horseback riding the berth of two horses when you have short legs. My legs were tired already before Mount Sinai.
We had gotten up at 3:30 AM the morning of Mount Sinai to get on a plane to the Sinai Peninsula. Then traveled by bus for two hours to our hotel to prepare for the hike. Our tour guide strongly encouraged no one to hike up Mount Sinai because it was such a hard hike. I was not eating much for fear of getting the runs as half the group had the runs already.
Before leaving for the hike I wrestled with God, because I knew hiking up mountains and me tend to not get along. I also had to ride a camel again after my experience of almost falling off the camel the day before. Turns out the camel ride up Mount Sinai would be a highlight. My camel’s name was Covenant.
After the camel ride came the hard part. I started off strong, but at halfway through I started to feel faint. There was a nurse in the group hiking with me. She told me to eat a protein bar, drink water, and sit for a bit. If you have known me for long, this advice might sound much like the advice I received hiking up the Coromandel in New Zealand.
I sat crying as the rest of the group passed me by to continue the hike. My goal was to hike up Mount Sinai to worship God just as Moses had down. What I did next was put on Christian music for my mind to think about worship rather than the hike. I got up and kept going to the top.
At the top I unplugged my headphones to let the hymns be heard by anyone who was nearby. I sang looking out over the valley. That moment it was just God and me. As I worshiped, I thought of how Moses had wished for God to pour out His Spirit on all His people (Numbers 11:29). Moses’ wish has come true. I got to stand on the same ground knowing the Holy Spirit rests in and upon me. God had so faithfully used Moses to pen the Pentateuch (first five books of the Bible). Moses walked with God leaving a legacy of faith for me to follow. The prayer I said was to be one faithfully walking with God that one day someone could say, “thank you for walking with God so I knew I could.”
Since it took me so long to hike up, I did not have much
time at the top before the sun would set. The rest of the group wanted to get
down the mount before it got dark. It got dark with about a mile left to hike.
Our guide, who was told not to leave us at any cost, was in a hurry to get down the hill to smoke at sundown because he had been fasting all day for Ramadan. Therefore, of the seven people in our hiking group three got left behind while the other four were able to keep up with the guide. I was one of the ones with the guide. However, I wanted to take one last picture. I stopped to take the picture. When I looked up, I was left between the two groups in the dark in the middle of Mount Sinai. I could not see the flashlights of either group.
At the beginning of the hike our tour guide had said people get lost all the time on Mount Sinai, so make sure you do not lose the local guide. From the beginning of the trip I was told to not be alone by myself since I am a woman. Men were always to accompany women in Egypt. I had not only lost the guide, but the safety of other people. Fear gripped my heart. The picture did not seem worth it.
I thought I cannot stay here, so I went on down the hill as best I could. After a little while I came upon a house where a man was half dressed switching between yelling in a phone and at a man walking outside the house in Arabic. I quickly walked by with my flashlight off trying to draw as little attention to myself.
The path I followed in the dark was one into a camel pen. I wondered why the rocks were making weird sounds and were hairy. To the best of my ability I back tracked trying to avoid the house with the men.
Next, I came upon a car with the door open where two men were sitting. One said to me in a thick accent, “Well, hello there.” Every action, scary, thriller movie came to mind. I called out for the other people in my group but heard no response.
There was a light in a direction away from the car that I started to head toward only to find it was a cave with men smoking. I came back out to what seemed like a five-way fork in the road. Three of the ways I had discovered were not the right way. I gave one last call out to the group. There was no response, and then one of the people in my group, a younger girl, cleared her throat twice. I followed the sound to find my group.
When I got to my group, I was relieved at first. However, true confession, I was so angry at the guide for leaving me. I was mad at my group for not hearing me call out their names and responding. Back at the hotel with my parents all I could share was my fear and anger.
As time progressed, I was able to share how unique the experience was. Like the Israelites I got lost in the desert even in for only forty minutes and not forty years. That day was unforgettable.
Time is like that. Something that seems so big at the time can be blown so out of proportion. I was terrified to have been left on the mountain by myself in a foreign country too far from the hotel to walk. I had told my parents I was not going to talk or sit with those in the group that had left me on the mountain. Yet, I had plenty of conversations and meals with the group members from the hike during the next two weeks of the trip. We shared a sort of badge of honor from the hike.
A year later the hike up Mount Sinai was one of my favorite parts of my Exodus trip.
All this to say this Covid-19 seems like a big deal right now. Sometimes we feel like we are all alone on the side of a mountain or in the middle of a stinky camel pen. Maybe there is a creepy voice try to entice you to come near. Fear may be gripping your heart. Anger may be your first reaction.
Give it time.
The whole time I was lost on the mountain I prayed. I cried out, yelled out, bargained with God, lamented. Just about any reaction/emotion I could show I did through my prayers. Psalms has become a big part of my quiet time in the past year. My words of joy, lament, anger, bargaining, etc. I cried on Mount Sinai are not that uncommon as I now read through Psalms. God is a big God. He can handle the wide variety of emotions we have. I believe He would rather we share it with Him than not talk to Him at all.
Covid-19 is scary. We do not know when our “day 15” will be, what I call the day we are past the 2 week quarantine of the virus and can “resume” normal life, or even what it will look like. It will be different for everyone. Do not judge the other person for the journey he or she is on. Some will sing with joy while some may be hiding under the shadow of the wings of the God Almighty. Give each other time to deal and walk through this season. You may end up down a wrong path, but you can back track until you find the right one for you. The Israelites wandered in the desert for forty years. Surely, we can wander Covid-19 pandemic for a bit, trusting our God will not leave us.
I pray that in a year you may find joy in looking back on this time. I pray you will find how special this time was to you and those around you. I pray that you may even long to have parts of this time to be present with you. I pray for your reflection of the time to be on the good and the bad. I pray you will see God is so much bigger than Covid-19.
The day before my trek up Mount Sinai I had climbed to the top of a pyramid in a squat position most of the way up and rode a camel…almost falling off said camel making me say I would not ride a camel again. Do you know how wide a camel is? Imagine horseback riding the berth of two horses when you have short legs. My legs were tired already before Mount Sinai.
We had gotten up at 3:30 AM the morning of Mount Sinai to get on a plane to the Sinai Peninsula. Then traveled by bus for two hours to our hotel to prepare for the hike. Our tour guide strongly encouraged no one to hike up Mount Sinai because it was such a hard hike. I was not eating much for fear of getting the runs as half the group had the runs already.
Before leaving for the hike I wrestled with God, because I knew hiking up mountains and me tend to not get along. I also had to ride a camel again after my experience of almost falling off the camel the day before. Turns out the camel ride up Mount Sinai would be a highlight. My camel’s name was Covenant.
After the camel ride came the hard part. I started off strong, but at halfway through I started to feel faint. There was a nurse in the group hiking with me. She told me to eat a protein bar, drink water, and sit for a bit. If you have known me for long, this advice might sound much like the advice I received hiking up the Coromandel in New Zealand.
I sat crying as the rest of the group passed me by to continue the hike. My goal was to hike up Mount Sinai to worship God just as Moses had down. What I did next was put on Christian music for my mind to think about worship rather than the hike. I got up and kept going to the top.
At the top I unplugged my headphones to let the hymns be heard by anyone who was nearby. I sang looking out over the valley. That moment it was just God and me. As I worshiped, I thought of how Moses had wished for God to pour out His Spirit on all His people (Numbers 11:29). Moses’ wish has come true. I got to stand on the same ground knowing the Holy Spirit rests in and upon me. God had so faithfully used Moses to pen the Pentateuch (first five books of the Bible). Moses walked with God leaving a legacy of faith for me to follow. The prayer I said was to be one faithfully walking with God that one day someone could say, “thank you for walking with God so I knew I could.”
Our guide, who was told not to leave us at any cost, was in a hurry to get down the hill to smoke at sundown because he had been fasting all day for Ramadan. Therefore, of the seven people in our hiking group three got left behind while the other four were able to keep up with the guide. I was one of the ones with the guide. However, I wanted to take one last picture. I stopped to take the picture. When I looked up, I was left between the two groups in the dark in the middle of Mount Sinai. I could not see the flashlights of either group.
At the beginning of the hike our tour guide had said people get lost all the time on Mount Sinai, so make sure you do not lose the local guide. From the beginning of the trip I was told to not be alone by myself since I am a woman. Men were always to accompany women in Egypt. I had not only lost the guide, but the safety of other people. Fear gripped my heart. The picture did not seem worth it.
I thought I cannot stay here, so I went on down the hill as best I could. After a little while I came upon a house where a man was half dressed switching between yelling in a phone and at a man walking outside the house in Arabic. I quickly walked by with my flashlight off trying to draw as little attention to myself.
The path I followed in the dark was one into a camel pen. I wondered why the rocks were making weird sounds and were hairy. To the best of my ability I back tracked trying to avoid the house with the men.
Next, I came upon a car with the door open where two men were sitting. One said to me in a thick accent, “Well, hello there.” Every action, scary, thriller movie came to mind. I called out for the other people in my group but heard no response.
There was a light in a direction away from the car that I started to head toward only to find it was a cave with men smoking. I came back out to what seemed like a five-way fork in the road. Three of the ways I had discovered were not the right way. I gave one last call out to the group. There was no response, and then one of the people in my group, a younger girl, cleared her throat twice. I followed the sound to find my group.
When I got to my group, I was relieved at first. However, true confession, I was so angry at the guide for leaving me. I was mad at my group for not hearing me call out their names and responding. Back at the hotel with my parents all I could share was my fear and anger.
As time progressed, I was able to share how unique the experience was. Like the Israelites I got lost in the desert even in for only forty minutes and not forty years. That day was unforgettable.
Time is like that. Something that seems so big at the time can be blown so out of proportion. I was terrified to have been left on the mountain by myself in a foreign country too far from the hotel to walk. I had told my parents I was not going to talk or sit with those in the group that had left me on the mountain. Yet, I had plenty of conversations and meals with the group members from the hike during the next two weeks of the trip. We shared a sort of badge of honor from the hike.
A year later the hike up Mount Sinai was one of my favorite parts of my Exodus trip.
All this to say this Covid-19 seems like a big deal right now. Sometimes we feel like we are all alone on the side of a mountain or in the middle of a stinky camel pen. Maybe there is a creepy voice try to entice you to come near. Fear may be gripping your heart. Anger may be your first reaction.
Give it time.
The whole time I was lost on the mountain I prayed. I cried out, yelled out, bargained with God, lamented. Just about any reaction/emotion I could show I did through my prayers. Psalms has become a big part of my quiet time in the past year. My words of joy, lament, anger, bargaining, etc. I cried on Mount Sinai are not that uncommon as I now read through Psalms. God is a big God. He can handle the wide variety of emotions we have. I believe He would rather we share it with Him than not talk to Him at all.
Covid-19 is scary. We do not know when our “day 15” will be, what I call the day we are past the 2 week quarantine of the virus and can “resume” normal life, or even what it will look like. It will be different for everyone. Do not judge the other person for the journey he or she is on. Some will sing with joy while some may be hiding under the shadow of the wings of the God Almighty. Give each other time to deal and walk through this season. You may end up down a wrong path, but you can back track until you find the right one for you. The Israelites wandered in the desert for forty years. Surely, we can wander Covid-19 pandemic for a bit, trusting our God will not leave us.
I pray that in a year you may find joy in looking back on this time. I pray you will find how special this time was to you and those around you. I pray that you may even long to have parts of this time to be present with you. I pray for your reflection of the time to be on the good and the bad. I pray you will see God is so much bigger than Covid-19.
Comments
Post a Comment