Oh, Glorious Downhill!

So we decide to hike up a path to a waterfall and it is supposed to be "just right over there". Is anything ever like it seems? The sign for the little path said 30 minutes to the waterfall. Whose 30 minutes? Mine, or a large German Black Forest hiker guy? We decided to move on even though my foot feels broken at this point. I have never actually seen a waterfall up close, so it was worth the pain just trying.

The climb was deceptive, started off with barely an incline for the first 5 minutes and the rest of the 40 minutes was straight uphill (like a staircase). It was beautiful and serene, with alpine flowers growing in the middle of the forest path. We found our first bridge that overlooked this rushing little waterfall. It was breezy and pretty, but I was thinking "Wow, this is great, but is that it?!"

Well, it wasn't. After a few more bridges like that, we spotted a beautiful rolling waterfall. Small, but gorgeous. I was fairly impressed, but I had some shattered expectations of what a "glacial waterfall" should look like. Well, I saw a sign that looked like it pointed around a corner and I heard a faint rushing water sound. Even though we thought we had seen it all, I asked my friend if we could check it out. We turned the corner...

And I was completely deaf from the powerful sound of a monstrous waterfall. It was tall and massive, and sprayed cold, melted snow water on you. I was amazed that we couldn't hear/tell/feel this from just around the corner. We sat and prayed and worshipped and the all I could think of was the song from Delirious: "God...is bigger than...the air I breathe...the world we'll leave/And God...will save the day...and all will say...my Glorious!" After all of that, we decided to come back down to earth. But the Lord spoke to my heart through the waterfall. On the way down, those other look-alike bridges/waterfalls were nothing compared to the source from which they came.

God is not satisfied when we only soak and sit at the "edge" of His glory. He wants us to hike up--hurting feet and all--to experience the source. The point where you can hear nothing but the roar of the waterfall and feel nothing but its refreshing breezes. Suddenly the whole world disappears and it takes conscious, concerted effort to come down from the mountain back to reality. And suddenly the cares of the world and even religion have very little impression on you now that you've seen the source of all greatness.

I am different because of that waterfall. But, I'll tell you that my heart could only think of how glorious going downhill felt after an experience like that.