The hydra in me

"Fire feeds on obstacles," said Marcus Aurelius.  Ovid renarked, "Difficulty is what wakes up the genius." Chew on those a moment. The last few years I've felt like I've been climbing up a steep, rugged mountain, skinning my knees, stubbing my toes, and getting plenty of dirt under my fingernails and up my nose.  I can't say I was ever tempted to turn back - I think I knew that it wouldn't be a leisurely walk down, that it would be a slip-sliding, free-for-all with me winding up broken instead of simply battered. For me, trite as it sounds, there is only one way. Up. During this excursion, I've found myself wearily pulling up on a ledge, thinking I reached a milestone and could catch a break only to look up and see the end still far further than I had hoped OR even worse, got hit by an errant falling rock while catching my breath and nearly loosing the foothold. Still, there is no turning back and one certainly can't just "sit" and make half-way there some settled-for goal because there is a reason in every climb, even if it is just for the incredible view. There is something in knowing the success of effort, of clawing and scratching, the thick of a battle that makes victory much more rewarding.

Sometimes the climb and the struggle aren't to achieve a goal, but to stay on the right track in a world gone very wrong. 1 Corinthians 4:7-10 "But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body." In that battle, it is awesomely satisfying to know that He is our fortress, He is our very present help in trouble.

In Greek mythology, Hercules is tasked to go and kill the Hydra. If you cut off the hydra's head, two grow back in its place. It is pretty much indomitable. Even after Hercules manages to find a way to "kill" it, it lives on when Hera places the Hydra in the sky, forever as a constellation. One existence ended and a new, better one endures. Instead of being a hated monster, hunted down, it lights the sky and provides beauty in that starry canopy. We are never given any insight into the character of the Hydra. It seems to me that its existence just annoyed other people and it used the defenses that it had to preserve its life. I love that it was equipped with the ability to keep coming back and that what was meant to hurt it made it more able to defend itself.  I know some would balk at using Greek mythology in describing a faith-based concept, but the trials that are put in our paths generally strength us and give us more tools to equip us for later battles.  I like that the Lord God put a bit of Hydra in me.