What is Man?

From the LOCH A TUATH NEWS September 2000

For Emily's birthday this year, which fell during our holiday in Switzerland, we decided to go up in the world. One of the attractions of the area where we were staying is a train journey to the highest railway in Europe -- the Jungfraujoch, which is situated some 11,000 feet up on the majestic Jungfrau mountain.

Depending on the day, the place can be blacked out with mist, but someone was smiling down on us the day Emily turned 9, and the mountain tops were bathed with glorious sunshine, with the pure, white snow capping the peaks.

We took the safe route to the summit -- one of Switzerland's famous cog railways, four miles of which went through a tunnel in the neighbouring, Eiger mountain. The engineering skills evident in the construction of the railway were quite staggering, and the journey to the summit breathtaking. Special observation posts enabled us to see for miles around. It was incredible to think that we were just a little lower than the height at which the Stornoway-Glasgow plane flies!

What was perhaps even more breathtaking than the view of the landscape from the top of the Jungrau was the view of those who had chosen to climb the neighbouring peaks by foot. Silhouetted against the clear blue sky, the climbers were like ants making their slow way through the snow and ice to the summit. It was exhausting just watching them.

Mountain climbing is not my forte; it was enough to take the train to the summit railway station. But as I stood pondering the dedication, skill and technique involved in conquering these daunting and dangerous ridges, I realised that there was a parable in it somewhere. Life is full of difficult ridges to climb, and we are less than nothing. Sometimes our road is very steep, very difficult and very dangerous. Often we need courage, determination and discipline to reach the top. And only when we make it to the top, and overcome the obstacle, will we be rewarded with a view of life and reality that makes the climb all the more worthwhile.

We returned, as you know, from Europe to the news that Anne's father had suffered a severe stroke, from which he subsequently died. That in itself was another mountain that needed to be climbed and overcome. Emotional trauma, grief, bereavement and pain -- things that many of you have experienced before -- often form silent, lonely, difficult barriers that we can only conquer by a slow, daily, concentrated march to the mountain-top.

Those who overcome are rewarded with a vision of life that puts everything in its proper perspective. Against the backdrop of creation's grandeur and magnificence, with the glory of the Creator evident on every side, we have to say with the Psalmist long ago:

Then say I, What is man, that he
Remembered is by thee
Or what the son of man, that thou
So kind to him should'st be?

What indeed? Against the backdrop of this vast, glorious universe, our lives are nothing. Yet God has made them something, given us dignity and purpose and meaning. With him we can overcome. We can lift our eyes to the hills and say, "My safety cometh from the Lord, who Heaven and Earth hath made.."