In one way or another
we, who are born into the Spirit creative and courageous,
climb life’s rugged cliffs.

Whether agonizingly alone
or kind-hearted companions alongside, life’s adventure
requires loss, demands sacrifice.

It is not an easy journey we make –
those of us who dare to do more than congregate
in the valley of shadow.

We all reach some point,
exhausted in body or soul, troubled in mind or heart,
when we sink to our knees.

Beneath an unforgiving sun,
we beg for healing rain, plead for some beginning again,
some other way.

There are those who fall and do not rise,
who become hopelessly lost in the forest of their own fear,
who refuse to go on like this.

But somewhere high in the mountains,
those who walk on, by faith if not by sight, will find
an everlasting stream.

By the cool waters, we will kneel
to drink and we shall thirst never again.
We shall be made complete.

Into the river we will flow as one,
and every weighted stone shall be removed from our hearts;
every grief washed clear.

Hope will be restored; love reimagined. Joy will gush
from Spirit streams, our source. This world’s journey ended, we shall come to rest – and be born to life again.