Eagle Brook Church Blog

The Great Divide

When I lived in Colorado, one of my favorite places to get away for extended times of solitude was the Glen Eyrie conference center in Colorado Springs. This phenomenal canyon is nestled at the north end of a park called The Garden of the Gods. I learned a valuable lesson about choosing solitude on one of my extended retreats.

It was early in the morning, pitch black outside my cabin door. I decided to bask in the sunrise from a peak of the rocky canyon wall separating Glen Eyrie from the bustling city of Colorado Springs. I began my upward hike in the dark.

As I neared my target destination, I sensed I was heading for a great divide. Minutes later, I found a saddle-type seat and straddled the protruding rock wall like a mosquito riding an elephant. To my left I looked down on a shadowed, peaceful valley rolling with lush green lawns peppered with wild deer and brushed with a rising blanket of opaque fog. To my right, the bright morning sun splashed over a parade of bumper-to-bumper traffic zipping at break-neck speeds to rush sleepy employees off to another day at the office. A steady hum of revving engines studded with intermittent blasts of the piercing horns of angry drivers wafted up the city side of my rocky mount.

As the sun made its arc in the eastern sky and the shadows around me shortened with each passing moment, I sat in the stillness with a birds-eye perspective, taking in the two worlds below. As I reflected on my experience, I was impressed with the reality that I have choices. I can live every moment of my life, dazzled by the high-speed pace of a world that never slows, or I can follow the example of Jesus and “go off to a quiet place and rest for a while” (Mark 6:31).

I’d like to say that since that day I’ve made solitude a regularly scheduled practice. Truth is, the attraction of the busy world has such a grip that each time I’ve crossed the great divide into the realm of solitude I’ve had to wrestle myself free and fight for both time and space. But each time I’ve journeyed across the divide, I’ve experienced a deepening of my relationship with God.

I’m convinced that solitude is a choice…a good choice that I should make more often.