on lingering snow and mountaintops

At the top of a hill where drifts of snow still linger, my car came to rest.

We didn't know why we had come; maybe it was just to get away from all the noise and flashy lights. It is tiresome sometimes, this fast-paced world we're in. But now the world was at our feet. Senja and I exchanged glances, and rolled down the windows; felt the breeze brush our faces and dance in our hair. Soft sounds from the stereo melted perfectly with that moment. The world of city lights at our feet, and another world of lights in the sky above us.

I live for moments like those.

When I try to count the stars and get lost in the beauty. When the only light is the moon, and staring at the heavens feels like catching a glimpse at the face of God. When you have a friendship that is deep enough for silence, and real enough to know that sometimes there aren't words to speak.

I am blown away when I open my eyes to the wonder around me. That I know the Creator of it all intimately, and, more impressive, that He knows me better than I know myself. He knows my fears, my loves, my passions and my struggles. And the stars in the sky? That number I can't count to because I run out of fingers and toes? Those are the number of His thoughts about me.

It's always hard to leave a mountaintop in your life. I whispered to God that I would like the superhuman ability to stay in this moment forever; to stretch myself out under the expanse of sky and rest in knowing He made it all. But softly in my mind, I heard Him whisper that it was time to go.

I'm starting to realize that most of our lives will be lived in the valleys below; that mountains will be hard to reach and I might not always end up standing on top of the one I planned to scale. But I think He gives us mountaintops to prepare us for the valleys and the shadows; gives us glimpses of the Heaven that is our Home so we know what we are fighting for.

I wanted to linger a little more; to be surrounded by the traces of snow that are fighting the spring and to feel God brush my face in a breeze again.

But He's calling. And it's time to move forward.