I shared this story a couple weeks ago with the young women I teach at Church. I thought I’d also share it here with you…
This summer, I signed up for a competitive mountain bike
race series. I couldn’t wait to compete in my first race a couple weeks ago.
After kissing my husband goodbye and thanking him for
putting the kids to bed that night, I was driving the 20+ miles to the race.
Shortly into the drive, I hit a massive line of bumper to bumper traffic. After
about 15 minutes of creeping along the highway, I began to worry that I would
be late.
Sure enough, I arrived to the race a minute or two before
start time at 6:30 pm. I dismounted my bike and rode like mad to the check in
table. To my disappointment, the woman waiting there told me I was too late to
receive a bib and timing chip. She did tell me I could, however, still race
with everyone, and that they were about to start right now, just up the road
around the bend.
I pedaled as quickly as I could up the gravelly country
road. The starting line was much farther away than I thought it would be. Way up ahead,
in the distance to the left, I could see the throng of bikers scattering up the
trail toward the mountains. The race had already begun. I chastised myself for
not leaving earlier and grumbled that I was so far behind now. But being the
competitive person that I am, I was determined to catch up to the group and
possibly cross that finish line ahead of a fair chunk of my competitors. I had six miles of uphill, rocky trail to do
it in, after all.
The ride up was tough. The Wyoming wind was especially
strong that day and it beat loudly against me. But I pedaled hard into it, determined
to catch up to the group.
Slowly, I began to pass other bikers. At first, it was just
kids. Then it was an adult or two. Then I found myself somewhere in the middle of the spread-out group.
At this point, I could see that I had almost reached the top
of the mountain. I was shaking with exhaustion and just about
spent. My water was about halfway gone, and I was ready to be done, if you know what I mean.
A rider who was
coming down the trail announced as he greeted us, “You are almost there! Just
around the bend!” I assumed he was a
race official.
I was just passing a fellow rider along the trail and asked
her, “Does he mean the halfway point or the finish?”
“I think he said we’re almost there,” she answered, not
quite answering my question.
When I had skimmed over the instructions online, I read that
there would be a downhill ride after the uphill– I still hadn’t experienced
that yet, so I assumed the guy meant “almost to the downhill” when he told us
“almost there."
In renewed strength, I pumped my legs up the rest of that
rocky ridge overlooking the grassy valley below. It was a gorgeous view with
rocks and trees and the glow of an impending sunset speckled along the
hillsides. I turned the corner around
the mountaintop and sure enough, the trail sloped into a long, glorious
downhill. At last! This break was much-needed. I whizzed down as fast as I
could, bumping over rocks and yelling out whoops and “Woohoo”s.
I kept looking ahead and wondering where the other riders
had gone. I concluded they probably just went so much faster going downhill
that they had sped far ahead of me. After all, there were a few bends in the
path and I probably just couldn’t see them.
I pedaled hard and whizzed even faster along the downward
slope. The finish line had to be somewhere close down below. I rode and rode,
breathing in the wind and enjoying the colorful clouds.
The next thought that entered my mind came when I noticed
the dried, cracked mud I was riding over. It appeared to still hold a small
amount of moisture, yet I didn’t see any track impressions. I shrugged it off,
assuming that the mud was just too dry to make bike tracks. This had to be the
way to the finish line. There hadn’t been any signs to say otherwise. There
hadn’t been any break-off trails – just one that had led right down here.
“Maybe I should see if that rider is behind me,” I thought.
I didn’t really want to take the time to stop and look
behind me, in case she was right on my tail. I still wanted to do my best and
finish strong, despite my late start.
I stopped just long enough to take a quick, sloppy glance
over my shoulder. I didn’t see her, and quickly kept riding. “She’s probably
taking her time down the slope because she might be afraid of going too fast,”
I decided.
I looked ahead. Away in the distance, the trail curved
around a bed. Surely, the finish line would be around that bend. Wouldn’t it?
The next thought that entered my mind was that I never
checked in. Because I was late and didn’t get a bib number, no one at this race
even knew I was here. No one knew my name, no one was waiting for me at the
end, and no one would know if I got lost. I looked to the west to where the sun
was setting. Soon it would be dark.
Suddenly, an eerie loneliness crept around me.
Then came, “Stop, Debbie.”
I stopped and looked behind me. Along the long trail back up to the mountain,
I didn’t see a single soul. I was completely alone, far far away.
I strained my eyes up and down the hillside again and again,
looking for any indication of another rider. My eyes caught a glint a little
ways down from the top of the mountain.
I squinted but couldn’t tell what the glint was. Maybe just
a rock, maybe a rider coming down the trail, proving this IS the right way?
I really wanted this to be the right way. It HAD to be.
I slowly got back onto my bike and pedaled forward
reluctantly. A dark feeling settled around me. Suddenly, I imagined myself
riding and riding into the dark, exhausted and without water, trying to find
the way back to the trail by myself.
Would my husband even know how to find me up here if I never
came home tonight?
Again, “STOP. Turn around.”
I stopped and searched for that glint again. This time, it
had popped above the brush to reveal that it was a helmet of another rider who
wore a red shirt. Although it was hard to see, I felt the impression that the
rider was looking at me, waiting for me, wanting me to turn around and follow
them.
Finally, I turned my bike around and faced that long, steep
uphill that I had foolishly bombed down, without listening to the repeated
promptings to stop.
Now, with shaking limbs, and barely an ounce of energy left,
I began the difficult ride back up.
In between heavy breathes, wobbly handle bar maneuvering,
and lugging one leg after the other, I frequently glanced up to catch a glimpse
of the rider in the distance. I could barely see their helmet bouncing above
the brush. I didn’t want to lose sight
of them. I could feel that they were stopping every now and then to be sure I
was coming. There was something so comforting about that distance figure in red–
I knew they were watching over me. The
fear of being lost dissipated. I knew
I’d be safe now that I was following them.
As they continued to guide me out of that pit, the spirit
whispered clearly into my heart, “Debbie, that rider is like the Savior.”
I couldn’t help but smile as I pondered this impression.
There I was having the worst start to my first mountain bike
race season, and God sends down an amazing visual of how this unfortunate
situation applies to life:
When life becomes an uphill battle, when unexpected trials
arise, when our pride or selfish endeavors lead us down a wrong path or when we’ve wandered far away from
God, Jesus Christ will always be there waiting patiently, yearning for us to
follow Him, and guiding us up the long and difficult road. If we don’t lose sight
of Him, if we keep putting one foot in front of the other and following Him,
trusting Him, and walking in his footsteps, eventually He will lead us back to
safety… Oh ya, and it’s NEVER too late to stop and turn around.
In time, the rider stopped moving and waited for me at the top of the mountain. Resorting
to pushing my muddy bicycle by foot, I finally managed to reach the top and
meet the person I couldn’t help feeling had just “saved” me.
I recognized her as the last woman I had passed.
After exchanging, “wow”s and things like, “Well THAT was an
extra workout!”, she explained that she
had followed me part-way down the mountain, but realizing it was the
wrong trail far sooner than me, stopped, and waited to see if I would ever turn
around.
She also explained that the place we were now standing was
the point at which we went the wrong way. I looked at the trail and saw that
instead of following it downward, I should have curved and gone back around the
other side of the mountain top, to where the finish line waited just ahead.
I had not even seen that the trail curved this way. I had
completely missed it. (There also weren’t any signs
After I thanked the woman several times for waiting for me
and sharing how much she helped me get back up the mountain, we headed down the
trail together, this time going the right way.
On the bumpy road down, I recounted all that had
happened. My spirits soared as I neared the end of my descent. The orange
sunlight shimmered on a beautiful mountain lake and all across the green
countryside. The winding Platte River came into view in the distance and the
red rock laced between the grassy mountainside was perfection. My heart was full.
How grateful I was to have made it back on the right path so that I could
safely return home!
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| A snapshot I took on the way home... Gorgeous sunset that night! |
