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Slipping my arms through the straps and then tightening the belt around my waist, I could feel the weight off a weekend’s worth of food, clothes, and camping gear as it settled on my shoulders.  Less tangible but even weightier was the burden I was carrying in my spirit, a sum accumulated over the course of the past couple of weeks. It wasn’t the pain of my own problems, but rather the pain of many other people who are very dear to me. The hardships of my friends, the suffering of my patients, the brokenness of relationships, the injustices in the world, and the millions of people who are trying to manage all this apart from Christ — it all began to pile up like bad news upon bad news, like struggles upon sadness.  As I started to walk down the trail into the woods, I knew that I would have to carry this heavy pack for miles over hills and across creeks. But my dad has taught me that backpacks are designed to help you carry weight correctly, and the secret is making t...

Sitting down on the warm smooth rocks, I dangled my feet in the cool, clear water. After a two and a half mile hike, my sister and I found this off-the-berated-path waterfall. Worth it. The sound of rushing waters drowned out the sound of everything except my thoughts. The calm I felt in the middle of this moment in this middle of this wilderness was so entirely opposite to the stress I lived under this past week. I took a deep breath of misty air and let out a sigh as I remembered how I had wrestled my chaotic thoughts and lost sleep over them. The stress was not linked to any one particular stressor but rather a thousand small ones that I just couldn’t shake off. All the things I needed to do. All the things I wanted to do better. It was that steady, low-lying undertow of stress that almost swept me away this past week. I watched my sister splash about playfully in the falls while I chose to soak up some sun and stay warm. My eyes lifted to the top of the falls. Right where the w...