no shortcuts

Today was one of those kind of beautiful days where it feels like you're getting a little tiny glimpse of heaven right here on earth. The weather was spectacular, the sun shone, and for the first time the promise of warm summer days was in the air. 

Something that I'm realizing more and more and perhaps have always known, it's how much of a free spirit I am. I've been told many times in my life that I'm a bit of a hippie. Are used to think it wasn't true but on days like today I can't help but acknowledge it. I'm the kind of girl who loves wind in her hair sand on her toes and warm sunshine at her face. I'm the kind of girl who likes to frolic in a field of daisies and fly kites. 

This week I bought a hammock.

This purchase makes my hippie soul sing. They came in the mail yesterday and I spent a tiny bit of afternoon off and I had reading a book there. This morning I washed my hair and then swung in my hammock was a breeze dried it. 

But this afternoon was my favorite. My built in bestie and I climbed through woods and sand dunes, found a lovely spot overlooking beautiful Lake Michigan and hung our hammocks in the trees. 

It was glorious. 

Days like this are good for the soul.

As we begin to trudge back over the sand dune in search of our car, we laughed over the hope that we would find an easier path back down the one that took us there. You see on the way to the beach we had attempted to take the lower path. It was one that we had hoped would be slightly less strenuous. 

In the long run it was actually much longer, and of course we still wound up having to climb over the top of the dune. 

As we walked I chuckled about the lesson in at all. if we want to get to high places, places of beauty, we have to be willing to walk the hard path. The low path we had attempted only took us from one parking lot to another, and it wasn't until we began to climb that we could see the water that we were trying to reach.

All of the loveliness that we were hoping to find was there, we simply had to walk a difficult path.

The same is true in life. We may know where we think we want to go, we may even know where we are supposed to go, but there are no shortcuts. 

 When we finally reach the lake and found a place to hang our hammocks, we did not regret climbing over the top of that sand dune. It reminded us that we were stronger than we thought we were and it brought us to a place of beauty and rest.

We will never regret taking the hard road with Christ. At the end of every path he leads us down there is beauty and there is rest. I'm praying that the Lord will teach me to stop looking for shortcuts and start just putting onbfoot in front of the other. I know that I will never be taking the hard path with my Savior.