“Those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion, which cannot be shaken but endures forever. As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds his people both now and forevermore.” (Psalms 125:1-2)
My wife and I have been on vacation this week and had the pleasure of spending a day visiting Providence Canyon State Park in Georgia. It is a State Park that I had only read about and had only heard about, but never visited. It is a beautiful park known as Georgia’s “Little Grand Canyon” with gorgeous rock formations and caves, along with a surprised deer or two and seemingly never-ending tree-lines.
During our time in the park, we made a choice to hike along one of their many available trails. This particular trail took us down a long and winding path gradually inching us closer to the valley at the bottom of the canyons. When we finally reached the canyon floor, we began to walk along a dried creek bed that twisted through the canyons sandwiching us between the multi-faced walls of rock formations on each side of us.
It was such an interesting feeling for me as I walked down the creek bed surrounded by this fortress of stone. The quietness of the moment was so peaceful and calm. The walls of the canyon gave me a sense of protection and strength. Even though I was walking in the deepest valley of the canyon, I felt calmer and more strengthened than I did at the top of the canyon. In fact, the more I walked along the valley floor, the more I witnessed and experienced the strength of the surrounding mountain walls.
At some point in your Christian life, you will face adversity and heartache. There will be times when you feel like you can’t carry on any further and you just want to give up. You’ll have those days when the world is seemingly against you and the valley you are in seems too deep to overcome. It is during those times, you should remind yourself that you are truly surrounded by the Lord both now and forever. Your valley doesn’t have to be a place of hurt and failure; instead, let it be your reminder of the strength and majesty that is God surrounding your life with a fortress that cannot be shaken.
