Day 3 on the River: Big Rapids
I emerged from the tent in the morning to find old Sven walking around his campsite now with nothing on. I told the kids to stay in the tent until he decided to put those tiny shorts on again. That site would have scarred them more than the bear siting yesterday. That seemed like the Lord's answer to hop on the river take one turn at a time. Isn't life like that sometimes? The Lord was not opening doors for me to walk through and only gave me a line of site far enough to take one step. I didn't know how the day was going to end up and I prayed that He would be merciful with me. I am sure I was too hasty in my preparations and at this point just asked that He would not take it out on my kids.
We arrived to the take out point before all the big rapids and my cell wasn't working and there was not a soul in site. Surely there had to be youth groups on the river or someone. It became evident that The Lord wanted me to proceed down the river at this point and yet again remind me that being a man was to trust Him implicitly.
I had planned to pull the canoe on the side of the river prior to the rapids and let the boys walk down river. I could hear the rapids approaching. What started as the sound of wind blowing through the trees escalated to a roar and before I knew it the current had pulled me into the center of the river. This is the time when I wished that I would have read the reviews a little more closely. I now know what a "ledge" is. And they were very specific when they made that word plural on the map. All I could see in front of me was the river for another 50 yards or so and then it disappeared. Normally, you are supposed to check these things out and pick your route. There was none of that for us on this day. We were going over and I did my best to prepare the boys.
Going into a fearful situation illicited a very interesting reaction from each person. For Gabriel, he began asking me a million questions about what it was going to be like or what would happen if we tipped (as if I hadn't thought about all those outcomes all night). Jaden's response wasn't much more helpful. He began signing one of the most annoying Disney songs on the planet "Let it go" from Frozen. He only knows three words so he proceeded to repeat them over and over again. All I could get out before we went over the ledge was, "get on your knees and hold on!".
We made it over the first ledge while taking on plenty of water in the canoe. I wasn't sure if the ledge we just went over took off all the putty on the bottom of our rental canoe and opened the holes once again or if that was water from over the top. No time to figure that out because what I saw ahead convinced me that we would be taking on plenty more water before we were done. The river had three more ledges (each a 3-4 foot drop) in a row. There was no "picking your line" or paddling your way through this. We were going to hold on for dear life and pray that God kept our boat upright. After the first major ledge I noticed the carnage from previous travelers strewn in the tree leaning across the rapids. There were canoe paddles, soda bottles, coolers and other personal belongings that were irretrievable. We collided into just about every rock on the river in the next five minutes that felt like the were passing in slow motion. But God, in His mercy, took what could have been a really bad situation and used it to display His glory. We made it through the rapids and the boys were still in the boat.
Later that night we read about the incident when David went to Nabal and asked for some food for his 400 hundred men in return for the protection of Nabal's flock. Nabal yelled at David's messengers and suggested that they were theives. David, under what He thought was God's direction, was bent on killing Nabal and all his men. As David approached Nabal's home set on returning evil for evil, God sent a messenger to correct David's actions and show him the fault in his ways. Abigail was that messenger and dissuaded David from doing something equally foolish to Nabal's actions.
God did that for me too. I set out to teach my boys how to be men and felt totally justified that I had the purest of motives. Midway through I realized I had no idea what I was doing and that I was taking the lives of others in my hands. God's mercy prevailed though and He gave me an out just like He gave to David in Abigail. The Lord changed my perspective and taught me that being being a man was much more about complete dependence upon Him. Each of us, in our own ways tries to "manage" life. Gabriel does it with questions. Jaden does it with that stupid snow man song. I do it with trying to be in control (majority ownership, leading everything, etc) of every situation. What is it that you do that prevents you from experiencing all that God wants from you in a life completely dependent upon Him?
A man is one that recognizes his weakness and is desperately in need of a Savior every moment in his life. More of Christ, less of us.
I emerged from the tent in the morning to find old Sven walking around his campsite now with nothing on. I told the kids to stay in the tent until he decided to put those tiny shorts on again. That site would have scarred them more than the bear siting yesterday. That seemed like the Lord's answer to hop on the river take one turn at a time. Isn't life like that sometimes? The Lord was not opening doors for me to walk through and only gave me a line of site far enough to take one step. I didn't know how the day was going to end up and I prayed that He would be merciful with me. I am sure I was too hasty in my preparations and at this point just asked that He would not take it out on my kids.
We arrived to the take out point before all the big rapids and my cell wasn't working and there was not a soul in site. Surely there had to be youth groups on the river or someone. It became evident that The Lord wanted me to proceed down the river at this point and yet again remind me that being a man was to trust Him implicitly.
I had planned to pull the canoe on the side of the river prior to the rapids and let the boys walk down river. I could hear the rapids approaching. What started as the sound of wind blowing through the trees escalated to a roar and before I knew it the current had pulled me into the center of the river. This is the time when I wished that I would have read the reviews a little more closely. I now know what a "ledge" is. And they were very specific when they made that word plural on the map. All I could see in front of me was the river for another 50 yards or so and then it disappeared. Normally, you are supposed to check these things out and pick your route. There was none of that for us on this day. We were going over and I did my best to prepare the boys.
Going into a fearful situation illicited a very interesting reaction from each person. For Gabriel, he began asking me a million questions about what it was going to be like or what would happen if we tipped (as if I hadn't thought about all those outcomes all night). Jaden's response wasn't much more helpful. He began signing one of the most annoying Disney songs on the planet "Let it go" from Frozen. He only knows three words so he proceeded to repeat them over and over again. All I could get out before we went over the ledge was, "get on your knees and hold on!".
We made it over the first ledge while taking on plenty of water in the canoe. I wasn't sure if the ledge we just went over took off all the putty on the bottom of our rental canoe and opened the holes once again or if that was water from over the top. No time to figure that out because what I saw ahead convinced me that we would be taking on plenty more water before we were done. The river had three more ledges (each a 3-4 foot drop) in a row. There was no "picking your line" or paddling your way through this. We were going to hold on for dear life and pray that God kept our boat upright. After the first major ledge I noticed the carnage from previous travelers strewn in the tree leaning across the rapids. There were canoe paddles, soda bottles, coolers and other personal belongings that were irretrievable. We collided into just about every rock on the river in the next five minutes that felt like the were passing in slow motion. But God, in His mercy, took what could have been a really bad situation and used it to display His glory. We made it through the rapids and the boys were still in the boat.
Later that night we read about the incident when David went to Nabal and asked for some food for his 400 hundred men in return for the protection of Nabal's flock. Nabal yelled at David's messengers and suggested that they were theives. David, under what He thought was God's direction, was bent on killing Nabal and all his men. As David approached Nabal's home set on returning evil for evil, God sent a messenger to correct David's actions and show him the fault in his ways. Abigail was that messenger and dissuaded David from doing something equally foolish to Nabal's actions.
God did that for me too. I set out to teach my boys how to be men and felt totally justified that I had the purest of motives. Midway through I realized I had no idea what I was doing and that I was taking the lives of others in my hands. God's mercy prevailed though and He gave me an out just like He gave to David in Abigail. The Lord changed my perspective and taught me that being being a man was much more about complete dependence upon Him. Each of us, in our own ways tries to "manage" life. Gabriel does it with questions. Jaden does it with that stupid snow man song. I do it with trying to be in control (majority ownership, leading everything, etc) of every situation. What is it that you do that prevents you from experiencing all that God wants from you in a life completely dependent upon Him?
A man is one that recognizes his weakness and is desperately in need of a Savior every moment in his life. More of Christ, less of us.
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