my journey by the river...

...Every day is a new challenge. Although I've been on the same journey for so many years and I've climbed many hills and small mountains, I'm definitely in unfamiliar territory right now. I am climbing one of the biggest mountains I can imagine at the moment and I feel as if I'm in a fog during the greatest hike of my life. All of myself keeps me next to the river, following its path up the mountain to reach the top. But its not easy to stay there. Its not easy to stay beside that river with so many obstacles coming my way. Day after day, there is a new pull or push to come or go away from the river, the source of both my life and well-being and also the true guide to my destination. My strength is weakened with every new hit from that which comes against me. Yet somehow I've carried on for days, weeks, and months now. Somehow, even when I've given into the pulls and pushes and gone far from the river, it beckons me back with its constant hum of peace as it flows. It does not deter from its normalcy or somehow change its path to meet me on my untrue path, but rather it calls me back to where it lives and breathes life. It calls me back to its own journey, its own path, its own destination. Because ultimately its journey is my journey, its path is my path, and its destination is my destination. Oh that I may stay beside the peaceful waters that move faithfully and call to me over and over. That I may drink of life and know what steps lie ahead of me. Renew my strength, great river. Help me to keep walking. Push me on this journey to keep hiking through the thick fog up this great mountain.