Every day, try to take life in bite-sized manageable chunks. Whatever the mountain is in your life, it’s the only way to climb. God only gives grace for today.
I’m Joni Eareckson Tada with a story to encourage you today.
I heard this decades ago after my diving accident. It helped me then, and I trust it will help you, too. The story begins in wintertime at the Army Mountain Warfare School, one of the toughest military training schools in the country located in northern Vermont. The sessions are not for Army units, but for individual soldiers who must learn the specialized skills required for operating in mountainous terrain. The winter session is especially rigorous in the snow and the ice. From the time the soldiers arrive, they are assaulted by the frigid cold and strenuous training. Now I am told that the highest dropout rate is a multi-day hike up a snow-packed mountain. The soldiers have to switch back and forth up steep inclines, dragging themselves through snowdrifts – and they have to do it with a heavy sack on their backs and without the aid of hiking equipment. It’s just the individual soldier and his sheer resolve. In early morning when the hike was to begin, one instructor gave good advice. He said, “Men, if you keep looking for the top of the mountain, you will want to quit. But here’s how to make it to the top: when you are completely exhausted and ready to throw in the towel, look for the closest tree and tell yourself, ‘I’m going to make it to that tree and then reassess things.’ And once you reach that tree, catch your breath, find another tree that’s close by, and do the same thing. If you do this, tree by tree, you’ll get to the top of the mountain.”
Decades ago, when I first heard this story, it so blessed me because at the time, being recently paralyzed, I was a novice to my wheelchair. I was new to hard suffering [a lifetime of suffering]. I mean, while I was still at the rehab center trying to adjust, I met this young man who had come in for a checkup – and I had learned he had been paralyzed for eight years. And it was like, “What? Eight years? That’s forever. How in the world has he survived all that time in his wheelchair? I could never do that!” What I was doing, was looking at the top of the mountain. To me, living for what, eight years in a wheelchair seemed impossible. And there I was, ready to throw in the towel and I had hardly begun life as a quadriplegic. But when I got out of the rehab center, a couple of caring Christian friends gave me great advice. They told me not to “look at a life of total paralysis.” Rather, they told me to take life in bite-sized, small, manageable chunks. Take life one day at a time. Just focus on the morning, make it through the day, and then at night, thank God that he gave you the grace to do it. Jesus says after all in Matthew 6, "Don't be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble." In other words, God gives you grace to make it to the next tree, and then the next, and then the next. Not to the top of the mountain all at once. So, just look for that closest tree, strive toward it, and thank God when you make it.
Have I lived more than eight years in a wheelchair? Yes, I have. Many, many more. And every day I still take life in small, bite-sized manageable chunks. I can’t do it any other way. God only gives grace for today. And it’s my counsel to you as you climb whatever the mountain is in your life. And if you have a friend who could benefit from this message, share it on your social media platform, would you? It’s your hope-filled word today from joniradio.org. Make it to the next tree.
© Joni and Friends