The Valley of Loss - from Hind's Feet on High Places

…Now instead of that the path was leading them down into a valley as low as the Valley of Humiliation itself. All the height which they had gained after their long and toilsome journey must now be lost and they would have to begin all over again, just as though they had never made a start so long ago and endured so many difficulties and tests….For the first time on the journey, she actually asked herself if her relatives had not been right after all and if she ought not to have attempted to follow the Shepherd. How could one follow a person who asked so much, who demanded such impossible things, who took away everything? If she went down there, as far as getting to the High Places was concerned she must lose everything she had gained on the journey so far. She would be no nearer receiving the promise than when she started out from the Valley of Humiliation. For one black, awful moment Much-Afraid really considered the possibility of following the Shepherd no longer, of turning back. She need not go on…Her sorrow and suffering could be ended at once, and she could plan her life in the way she liked best, without the Shepherd…During that awful moment or two it seemed to Much-Afraid that she was actually looking into an abyss of horror, into an existence in which there was no Shepherd to follow or to trust or to love – no Shepherd at all, nothing but her own horrible self…"No one, not even your own shrinking heart, can pluck you out of my hand. Don’t you remember what I told you before? ‘This delay is not unto death but for the glory of God.’ It is no less true now that ‘what I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter.’ My sheep hear my voice, and they follow me. It is perfectly safe for you to go on in this way even though it looks so wrong…Will you bear this too, Much-Afraid? Will you suffer yourself to lose or to be deprived of all that you have gained on this journey to the High Places? Will you go down this path of forgiveness into the Valley of Loss, just because it is the way that I have chosen for you? Will you still trust and still love me?"….The awful glimpse down into the abyss of an existence without him had so staggered and appalled her heart that she felt she could never be quite the same again. However, it had opened her eyes to the fact that right down in the depths of her own heart she really had but one passionate desire, not for the things which the Shepherd had promised, but for himself. All she wanted was to be allowed to follow him forever. Other desires might clamor strongly and fiercely nearer the surface of her nature, but she knew now that down in the core of her own being she was so shaped that nothing could fit, fill, or satisfy her heart but he himself. “Nothing else really matters,” she said to herself, “only to love him and to do what he tells me. I don’t know quite why it should be so, but it is. All the time it is suffering to love and sorrow to love, but it is lovely to love him in spite of this, and if I should cease to do so, I should cease to exist.”

I didn’t write this. It’s from Hind’s Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnard. I have loved this book since high school, and I read it probably about once a year. It’s an allegory – a work of fiction – but I love it because I see myself in poor Much-Afraid. So horribly disfigured and living with Fear. I want desperately to be made new, and yet the journey is long and hard with setbacks and mistakes on my part. Always, the Good Shepherd is only a prayer away. Much-Afraid has to learn to follow Him no matter what, to lay down her own will and desires in order to be made like Him. Through the night and early morning hours, I was wrestling with a situation in my life that I don’t understand, that just doesn’t seem fair. That seems so contrary to all that God has promised. Around 4:45, a phrase from the book popped into my head: “He has brought me here when I did not want to come for his own purpose. I, too, will look up into his face and say, ‘Behold me! I am thy little handmaiden Acceptance-with-Joy.’” I prayed that I will say that. I didn’t want to come down this road. I don’t understand it, but He has a purpose. I will accept it with joy and follow Him. Since I couldn’t sleep anyway, I got up, ran a bubble bath, and read the chapter that contains the excerpt above. It reminded me again of the passage from Psalm 73: "Whom have I in heaven but You? And besides You, I desire nothing on earth. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever." When will I be able to say this – not as a desire of my heart – but as a statement of fact? Besides Him, I desire nothing…