THE JOURNEY THROUGH THE NIGHT

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. Proverbs 3:5

It was a sunny day during the summer of 2018. My friends, Zack, Ben, Andrew, and I were riding through the mountains on our dirt bikes. We were ripping through the woods without a care in the world. We were riding as fast as possible and trying to see who was the better rider. We had been riding for hours. That is what we loved to do during our long summer days and this day seemed no different. It was about 5 p.m. and I was in the lead and out of sight. I was pushing myself, and the bike, harder than usual because I wanted to increase my lead and leave everyone behind. I was pushing myself so hard I started making mistakes and I was riding along this huge gully so there was no room for error. I was going so fast and I was not familiar with this part of the mountain. I missed a turn and clipped a tree with my handlebars and I flew down into the 20 foot deep gully. My bike was unrideable. When my friends passed, they did not see me and I could not get up because I was under the bike and could not move. Luckily I did not have major injuries so I finally got up and started walking back towards the house. I decided to take a shortcut, thinking it would be faster, but I got lost and did not know where to go. It was starting to get dark and I did not have my phone. It was about 2 miles back to my house. I was lost and started getting scared because I knew that there are mountain lions and coyotes on this mountain. After thinking and contemplating which way to go, I decided to go down the mountain, but something felt wrong. Without thinking, I started praying and asking God to help me figure out how to get home. I was so far down the mountain that I decided to just keep going, but then realized where I was and had to turn around and go the other way. Once I got home it was 1:30 a.m and no one was there, they were all out looking for me. I grabbed my phone and called my dad and told him I was home. At first I was very scared, but then I prayed and I felt comforted. I knew God was with me and he was not going to let anything happen to me. If I would have trusted the feeling that God gave me in the first place I could have been home a lot sooner and would not have scared my parents as much.

By: Mark Coleman ('21)

Hickory, North Carolina