Struggling through snow

Snow is one of the great joys of the Northland.  Snow seems to create a culture of its own, from snowman to snowmobile.  Yet in the same breath we say we love snow, we also curse snow.  One of the struggles with snow is its removal.  It seems that as much as I love to watch snow fall and enjoy the wonder of God's frozen beauty, the nagging thought in the back of my head is I have to go shovel soon.

Not being one of those mechanized northerners I don't have a snow blower.  As much as I want one, I just can't justify buying one yet, even though it would save a lot of time.  My wife keeps telling me of all the health benefits from shoveling, but I'm the only one out there shoveling.  Though I hear people complain about shoveling and struggling with the snow, I rather enjoy it.  It is usually pretty peaceful out when shoveling.  While shoveling, all I have are my thoughts and of course plenty of snow.

Even being a joyful shoveler, the task is labor intensive and easily wears you down.  As you get worn down physically and mentally, you wonder if the snow is multiplying and if there is an end in sight.  I had one such discouraging episodes of shoveling the other day at the church.

Being the pastor of a small church in the northland does involve wearing a lot of hats and gloves.  We have an emergency exit from the basement to the back of the church.  The problem, it always gets buried when it snows.  It seems that the drifts of snow just love to block off the door.  This exit is particularly important as it is the exit right next to the nursery and children's area.  This path has to be cleared; I love the little ones in our church.

Well as I begin digging from the parking lot to the back door, I start to wonder how long this will take.  It was heavy wet snow and I started to struggle early.  It didn't seem like I was making any progress.  Then as I neared the door a 3 foot drift was in my way.  As I shoveled, I got mad.  There has to be an easier way.  I shouldn't have to struggle to reach my goal of clearing the path.  In that moment of struggle, God hit me with a thought like a ton of bricks.

Path to the back door of the church

"...But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and reaching forward to what is ahead, I purse as my goal the prize promised by God's heavenly call in Christ Jesus.  Therefore, all who are mature should think this way."  Philippians 3:13-15

In order to press on to reach my goal, I have to struggle.  The struggle is the most important part of achieving a goal.  My nature is I want goals and achievements to be easy, no struggle.  But that goes against everything God wants to teach us.  God is more concerned about the struggles along the path of spiritual mature, and then He is about us achieving spiritual maturity.  Don't get me wrong, God wants us to be mature believers in Him.  But in our pursuit to follow hard after Christ, the struggle is the best maturing tool God has to shape us.

I could get a snow blower and zip through this path in 10 minutes.  But I wouldn't have had time to struggle and hear God speak words of encouragement to me.  The fact is there will be more snow to come this winter and there will be plenty of times my faith is challenged.  If I don't take the opportunities to learn from the struggles and get stronger, I will miss what God wants to teach me in the smallest of everyday tasks.

Keep on shoveling and keep on struggling.  God is here to get us through the coldest and toughest of times.  Don't forget to enjoy the snow!

Unburied back door

Height of the snow

Winter moon and my girls

For my first blog I want to describe a wonderful northland adventure that my girls and I experienced.  Monday night we had the chance to go out to dinner as a family.  The girls had a blast and they even got their faces' painted at the restaurant's special event.  Since we ate early, we decided to run some errands.  We went to the church, grabbed the donations for the local food bank that the church members collected, and headed off to downtown Duluth.  Of course in Duluth the sun goes down very early in winter, but this night was a little different.

After we dropped off the food, my wife noticed how clear the sky was and that the moon was out shinning on Lake Superior.  We of course got into a debate as to what color the moon was.  She said it was pink and I said it was orange, the matter was never solved.  But as we argued over the color, the girls in the back of the van keep saying, "We can't see the moon."  As I pointed, they keep saying, "Daddy we can't see gets us to a place we can see!"  The adventure was on.

I knew a perfect spot they could see the moon, enjoy the darkness of the night, and feel the winter chill of snow and ice under their feet.  Off I was to Brighton Beach.  As we going away from downtown, finally I heard it, "Daddy we see it!  We see it!"  Then my wife chimes in, "Where are you taking us?"  I laughed, "You'll see."  As we got closer to Brighton Beach my wife looked at me as if I was crazy, but I wasn't.  In fact there were several other northlanders that had the same idea.

As we pull up to the ice covered beach on Lake Superior the cold was ever present and the moon shined proudly, even though we still debated the color of the moon.  I did a quick survey of who was going out to the ice with me.  My wife was out, Grace was asleep, and Abigail didn't want to leave the van, but Sarah and Rachel where up for the cold.  As we stomped through the snow, I thought I would loose one of them in the deep crunches of my foot steps.

We finally get to the edge of the ice and this is the view we saw.

Winter moon on Lake Superior

I know my iPhone camera doesn't do it justice, but with the low light darkness and the bright moon it was beautiful.  Then we move to the very edge.  I ran up the hill and almost slipped on the ice.  It is a good thing I have my ice lover legs, otherwise I would have ended up in the fridge waters of the Lake Superior.  This story would have definitely had a different out come.

The girls wanted to follow me, but being the protective dad, I only let them get so close.  I did of course have to scare Sarah by pretending to push her over the edge.  They want to remember this moment and insisted I take another picture.  As you can tell the wind was blowing and they did look like they were starting to get cold.

Winter moon and my girls

I was so proud of their adventurous spirit.  We had fun in the cold, but it was time to head back to the van.  I am so thankful to God that I can share these little moments of His beautiful creation with my girls.   I am thankful that they get to experience the wonderful northland that I enjoyed as a child.  I am even more blessed that God has called us to the northland to share His love and healing forgiveness of Jesus Christ with those in this beautiful land.

Lights of Duluth in the winter night