Valley of Loss

My Rebecca and me, 2001
Shenandoah Valley, Virginia

"He makes my feet like hinds' feet and sets me on my high places." (2 Sam. 22:34)

         Born and raised on Lookout Mountain in northeast Alabama and now planted on Double Oak Mountain in central Alabama, this ole girl loves the mountains; and my favorite allegory of all times is Hinds' Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnard.
         In the late 1980s, when my Phillip's land and timber business went belly up, God used Hurnard's classic fiction to teach me that our loving Heavenly Father uses sorrows and sufferings to remove our ugly dross, refine His precious gold, and make us more like Jesus.
         When the publisher of my first storybook, The Schoolhouse, went belly up just as the book was released in 2012, our loving Heavenly Father led me to read again Hind's Feet's chapter 13, "the Valley of Loss." 
         There, the protagonist, Much-Afraid, for one black, awful moment actually considers the possibility of following the Shepherd no longer (pg.159). At the end of the valley, however, what the Shepherd had planned all along is very beautiful indeed. By way of aerial chair, the Shepherd carries Much-Afraid to the High Places - far above the point she had climbed before descending back down into the Valley of Loss (pg. 167-169).

         As we eagerly await Ben's and my Hoot Owl Hollow's availability at the online store of DeepSeaPublishing.com (next Monday, August 11th!), I feel like Much-Afraid seated by the Shepherd in the sky lift supported entirely from heaven above, waiting to be taken to places which have looked so impossibly out of reach (pg. 168).

O Heavenly Father, thank You that You are worthy to be trusted in Valleys of Loss. Today, I pray for my blog followers who are walking in difficult places. Please be the lifter of their heads and hearts, help them to trust in You, and Lord, please, do beautiful things at the end of the valley. (One more thing, Lord, please use Hoot Owl Hollow to minister to many, many, many children and their families.) In Jesus' name I pray, Amen and Amen!