Mountain Biking.

Since I was eight, Summer's Best Two Weeks has helped define my summers. My favorite part of camp is wilderness trips. We hike or cave or climb, eat around the fire, and sleep in tents. Love it.

However, I always looked on one trip with fear and successfully avoided it for 17 years: mountain biking. I remember campers returning, waddling like ducks and covered in gashes. I picture the broken arms and legs; I hear the horror stories. Don't sign me up for that, please and thank you. Throw me in a cave, over white water, or on a cliff, but don't make me ride a mountain bike.

This was my attitude coming into trip leader training this summer. So, of course, I end up on the staff mountain biking trip. Our fearless leader loves biking, and he decides to take us through every trail on the entire mountain. We hop on the bikes without a thorough lesson and commence trail riding. I caboose it, not desiring to cause a 16 bike pileup or tire the rest of the group with my sighs, groans, and muttering. These are not beginner trails, to say the least. The rocks, logs, and roots create mazes I clunk over. Bruises multiply on my shins at the inverse rate of my positive thoughts about life, camp, and said fearless leader.

I don't want to hit that rock.
Clunk. (Cue bruise on right shin.)
I can't believe Goodie is still making us do this.
(Repeat cycle for the next six hours.)

We finally come to a smooth-ish patch of trail. I ride my bike like a normal kid. I take a deep breath of mountain air, look up, and see a small gully. Not a cliff, not a fjord, but bigger than a ditch. Nestled at the bottom of this gully sits some shrubs and a tree, probably a red maple, but I wasn't focused on the leaves or bark. I was focused on not wanting to hit it.

I really don't want to fall down this gully and hit that tree.
I really don't want to hit that tree.
I really really really don't feel like hitting that tree. 
I hate mountain biking. I don't want to fall down this gully and hit that tree.

I promptly fall down the gully, hit the tree, and get a bruise the size and shape of Texas. Fantastic. Garrett Holt and Summer (not-currently-so-happy-or) Luckey lift the bike and upright me.

I am left without a choice. I hop back on the bike and continue for the next two hours; weary legs, gashes, bruises and all.

I learned something, though. We hit where we focus. I don't want to hit that tree. Crash. I don't want to end like my parents. Bang. I don't want to... I hope I don't... I won't... And we set ourselves on a collision course.

"We must get rid of every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and run with endurance the race set out for us, keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. For the joy set out for him he endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God. Think of him who endured such opposition against himself by sinners, so that you may not grow weary in your souls and give up." Hebrews 12:1b-3

We hit where we focus. Let's keep our eyes on Christ.








P. S. I went mountain biking again with campers, and I absolutely loved it and want to go all the time. But, that's a story for another blog.