God’s Strength, Not Mine

At the end of every week at Beyond, we have club: a time where groups get to share about their week, we sing some songs and one of the Beyond staff gives a closing talk.  In the two summers I had been a guide, I had never taken on the task of giving a club talk.  Towards the end of my second summer, I decided it was time.  My talk was about Peter walking on water and how he began to sink; I emphasized that it was by God’s strength, not his own, that he had the ability to walk on the water.  I finished the talk by urging participants to remember that we need God to accomplish all good things and that when we get arrogant and think we can do it on our own, we too begin to sink.

I wrote and practiced this club talk over and over, even at the expense of guide planning with my guide partners for the upcoming week.  To make a long story short, the club talk went swimmingly, but I entered into the following week feeling, exhausted, unprepared, and all around discouraged.  By the second day of the trip I found that it was unexplainably impossible for me to engage--with content, with God, with participants, and with guide partners.  During a quiet time on the summit, on a scale from one to discouraged, I felt extremely discouraged.  I turned to God and said, “What’s the deal?”

I was instantly reminded of the club talk that I had given just four days prior.  I realized that I had stood in front of a crowd of participants and preached on something that I myself needed to hear.  I realized that it was I who had been trying to do it myself.  That I had forgotten that even as a mighty second year guide, it is God’s strength not mine that makes our trips in the mountains as powerful as they are.  It was a humbling experience to say the least.  Ultimately I never did engage with that trip the way I usually do, but despite that, it was one of the most painfully beautiful experiences I’ve ever had.

Cole Kopca - Mountain Guide 2008-2009