When I was a little girl, I used to read 5-6 books in a week. Now I find it takes me months to read HALF of a book, and then I usually give up and pick up a new one. I’ve been trying to apply some self-discipline and focus on finishing a single book, so I picked up Hinds’ Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnad again. There are so many little nuggets of goodness in this book, I wish I could share them all with you, but here’s just one for today.
Hinds’ Feet is about a little crippled rabbit —> I think it’s actually supposed to be about a woman, but I mistakenly thought it was a rabbit for some reason in the beginning and find it more adorable to continue with my mistake… shhhh.
Anyways, this little crippled “rabbit” is named Much-Afraid who is a part of the Fearing family. She’s being forced to marry her horrible cousin Craven Fear, but she manages to escape with the Shepherd who sends her on a journey towards the High Places where perfect love casts out fear. Much-Afraid (still imagining her as a cute little bunny having trouble to hop?) is nearing the end of her treacherous journey when she comes to a dead end at the side of Mount Injury where the only way to get away from her enemies in pursuit is to climb up.
Where there seems to be no path, Much-Afraid looks up to see deer mapping out a path and leaping over jagged rocks and wide gaps in the path. Looking at her crippled foot, Much-Afraid panics and cries out,
“That path is utterly impossible. The deer may be able to manage it, but no human being [she means rabbit] could. I could never get up there. I would fall headlong and be broken in pieces on those awful rocks… It’s an impossibility, and absolute impossibility. I cannot get to the High Places that way, and so can never get there at all.”
Eventually the Shepherd shows up to calm her down, but Much-Afraid ends up telling him that she’s more like a jellyfish than a deer, and it is “too preposterously ABSURD” that he would want her to climb up this mountain in her condition. The Shepherd replies,
“I love doing preposterous things… Why I don’t know anything more exhilarating and delightful than turning weakness into strength, and fear into faith, and that which has been marred into perfection. If there is one thing more than another which I should enjoy doing at this moment it is turning jellyfish into mountain goat. That is My special work.”
I couldn’t count the number of times that I could replace the name ‘Much-Afraid’ with ‘Jenn Nibbe’ in this story, but this excerpt is a prime example. I’m looking at my preparations for the World Race as my Mount Injury, and I’ve been panicking and telling Jesus:
- Training camp for the Race is only 10 days away and I have almost NONE of my gear ready, but my bank account is suffering trying to find all my things
- There isn’t going to be coffee at Training Camp, but I’ve been having terrible caffeine headaches recently which make me grumpy… not cute.
- I still need to organize my finances and loans for while I’m gone, but I’m worried I’ll be too late
- It’s embarrassing how hard it was packing away my winter clothes until the winter of 2018. How am I supposed to live with only what I can squeeze into a backpack for a year when I get upset over saying ‘see ya later’ to my favorite wool sweater?
- At Training Camp, I’ll get to meet all my squad mates that I’ll be traveling the world with, and I’m sorta nervous about first impressions
- I still have 66% of my funds to raise within the next few of months, but I have no idea when I am supposed to squeeze fundraising into my schedule right now
I set my list before Jesus explaining that I am just a jellyfish and getting all of this organized in the next couple of weeks/ before August is preposterously ABSURD. Then, just like the Shepherd in Hinds’ Feet, Jesus smiles and says, “I love doing preposterous things…”
If you want to partner with Jesus and me to do some impossible things around the world, you can donate by using the orange DONATE button up above! Or ask me how else you can help because so far Jesus has been BLOWING MY MIND with his desire to bless this little jellyfish, and I just wanna share it all with you!
