The Unseen Things

Every mountain has a slog. I mean that both literally and figuratively. As an avid mountain climber, I get to experience all the ways that a mountain illustrates various truths of life, shedding on them new light, and giving me something to think about. One does not need a mountain to illustrate truths of life. We can read about them or experience them firsthand. I venture to presume that anyone who has lived longer than a few years on this earth can guess pretty quickly at my figurative meaning in my assertion that every mountain has a slog. But if anyone has actually climbed a mountain, they will understand in a new and intimate way the literal and figurative harmony of my statement, and the practical life truth, which everyone knows, will come alive with new meaning. That is what I mean when I say that a mountain sheds new light on the various, accepted truths of life. It brings those truths to life in the soul and mind of the climber, and they make sense like never before.

But for the reader who has never set foot on a mountain, never experienced what I am trying to get at, I will attempt to make it happen for you in my writing, and so shed new light on what you’ve always known or experienced to be true. That is, if you can close your eyes for a moment and carry your imagination with me to a mountain . . .

We must begin, of course, with the necessary question: What is a Slog? A Slog, by literal definition, is the part of a trail up a mountain where there are no longer any views, any fun, any excitement. There are only trees and trees and more trees, and hunger and sore muscles and a feverish awareness of one’s existence.

But in order to really understand a Slog, one must actually experience it. If you, reader, can help me out a little bit with your imagination, I will try to let you do that. Imagine that mountain climbing is something you enjoy. Imagine slithering out of a toasty bed at 2:00 in the morning into a dark, freezing world. Imagine pounding out the first few miles up the trail in the dark, energized by the cold, captivated by twinkling stars, mystified by silent spruce trees. Imagine the building excitement as the sun first sends rays creeping over the horizon, the rosy glow behind the snowcapped mountains, the sparkling snow and frosty air. Imagine the joy and freedom of reaching tree line, leaving behind the tall, secretive spruce trees in their brooding silence.

Imagine too the heavy labor, the burning muscles and gasping lungs. Yet the toil is all for a goal. You and your companions are working together, striving together for something worthwhile.

Imagine the exhilaration of that first step onto the summit, that thing that you have toiled and suffered for for so long. For miles around, jagged snowy peaks stretch in every direction as far as you can see, and you are lost in a sea of desperate beauty.

And yet, your moment of exultation is just that—a moment. A touch of splendor, an instant of triumph—and you must turn around. You must descend. You must put the fierce beauty and wild freedom behind you, and turn your face to the dark spruce wood. There is no exultation that lasts forever. There is no summit meant for us to remain on. There is no triumph without pain, no satisfaction without a struggle. There is no mountain without a Slog.

The dark, brooding spruce wood seems to cackle in cruel glee as it engulfs you in its grasp. The cloying, nauseating stench of spruce sap fogs your mind and shrivels your nasal passages. Seconds stretch into minutes, which stretch into hours. Hour after hour drags slowly by. There is no more hope, no more striving, no longer any summit in view. Life is drab. Existence is merely a—Slog. And the worst of it is that it will go on forever.

And yet, it will not go on forever. No matter how you feel, deep down inside of you is that semi-conscious awareness that somehow, sometime, the Slog must end. And at the end of the Slog, rest. Good, hot food. A glorious hot shower. A soft warm bed. These things are far away, a flicker of a dream in the farthest recesses of your mind. But the flicker is steady, an ongoing spark of hope, for you know that all things, even the seemingly eternal Slog, must come to an end at some point, and before you know it, the reward will be yours.

And now for the practical life truth which I hope to have brought to life for you through your imagination. Every mountain has a Slog. Life has its high points. We dream and we strive, working fervently to accomplish our goals. We see success, we grasp what we have toiled for, we exult in our grand moments of triumph. But it never lasts. We can never stay on top of the mountain. We must descend into the valley. And then comes the Slog.

There is no hope for the future, no attainable dream, nothing new. Life drags on, hour after hour, day after day, week after week. There is no more hope, no more striving, no longer any summit in view. The road is dark, the future bleak. And the worst of it is that it will go on forever.

And yet, it will not go on forever. Not if your hope and trust is in Jesus. As a Christian, no matter how you feel, deep down inside of you is that semi-conscious awareness that somehow, sometime, the Slog must end. And at the end of the Slog, rest. True rest. Perfect peace and joy. A land where there are no tears or pain or betrayal. A Savior Who loves you and gave Himself for you. These things are far away, a flicker of a dream in the farthest recesses of your mind. But the flicker is steady, an ongoing spark of hope, for you know that all things, even the seemingly eternal Slog, must come to an end at some point, and before you know it, the reward will be yours.

So what do you do? Keep going. Put one foot in front of the other. Don’t turn back—there is no hope or reward in that. The Slog will end, for nothing on earth is eternal, neither the grand summit nor the miserable Slog. Every mountain has a Slog—but at the end is the reward. If you don’t give up. If you keep walking—you’ll never make it to the end if you stop. And the reward, unlike anything on earth, will never end. The Reward is eternal.

“Your sun shall no more go down, nor your moon withdraw itself; for the LORD will be your everlasting light, and your days of mourning shall be ended.”

Isaiah 60:20

“The LORD is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who seeks Him. It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD.”

Lamentations 3:25-26

“So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.”

2 Corinthians 4:16-18

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Scripture quotations are from the ESV^® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version^®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers, Used by permission.  All rights reserved.