Surprises

When I came to Beyond, I expected that being a guide would be spiritually challenging yet refining, exhausting yet life-giving, and emotionally draining yet encouraging. I knew that I came to serve. What I didn’t expect was that I would actually be having fun as well. 

Last week I headed out with my guide partner and campers to trek Long Pearkes. It was a grueling first two days. At times I felt like a slave driver as I kept telling the participants that we had to keep going even though they had blisters, tired legs, and were fed up with the branches slapping their faces. We got into camp later than planned and had less time than we wanted for planned spiritual content (Bible studies, quiet times, life stories, etc.). 

On day three everything changed. Due to a variety of factors, my guide partner and I decided we were unable to cross the Long Pearkes glacier and would need to change routes. As a mountain guide I felt defeated, dreading the time when I would have to tell our campers about the route change. I had to give up my own desire to test my physical limits and complete the epic route for the sake of overall safety. I had to embrace the mystery as my first trip became full of the unexpected. 

In the end, the situation turned out much better than I anticipated. For me, this had been a reoccurring theme associated with Beyond Malibu. God redeemed the situation and blew my mind with His sovereign goodness. The participants were overjoyed at the news of the route change; it meant less hiking and more time to be together and alone with God. This was the day that I started having fun as a mountain guide. I was able to be less task-oriented and more people-oriented.  With the route change, our group now had more time to hear everyone’s life stories, pray, laugh, cry, and overall be present with each other in some of God’s most beautiful creation.

As the week went on, I was pleasantly surprised to find myself enjoying the taping and re-taping of feet, purifying forty liters of water at a time, cooking amongst the seemingly endless bug swarms, and engaging in conversations on the trail, despite physical exhaustion.

In a few days I leave for my second trip as a guide. I’ll be okay if it’s not as enjoyable as my first trip. But I have a feeling that this whole guiding thing might really continue to be more fun than I imagined. Maybe that’s what God likes to do when we follow His lead into the unknown… surprise us. 

-Joey Hope