The young man stopped at the base of the mountain. He gazed at its snowy peak thrust into the low hanging clouds. At the beginning of a road that spiraled upwards, disappearing into the mountainside, there stood an old house. The stone path leading to the front porch steps was worn smooth by years of constant traffic. They young stranger knocked on the door. In a few seconds he was greeted by an old man. His timeless face was free from worry lines. The corners of his eyes and mouth were crinkled from years of smiling. Kindness exuded from his deep blue eyes as his soft voice asked, “May I help you?”
“Yes,” replied the young man. “I want to travel to the top of that mountain.”
“Well, that’s easy,” replied the old man. “Just follow that road and it will take you all the way to the summit.”
“But, I don’t really want to take that road.”
“Why not?” asked the old man.
“Well,” the young stranger began hesitantly, “it’s difficult to explain. Let me just say that I’m adventurous and I don’t like using the same roads that other people travel.”
“Hmm,” the old man mused. “Well, if you want to get to the top, that’s the only way unless you climb up the face.”
“Thanks anyway…I’ll just find my own way up.”
With that, the young man left and went back into a nearby small village. For the next several years, he tried to discover another way up the mountain, but to no avail. It became an obsession with him. Night and day, his mind was plagued with ideas of how he could go up to the summit a different way. He spent most of his income on research and failed attempts to forge a new path.
Then one night an angel appeared in his bedroom. Although he was at first terrified, his fright soon turned to joy. The angel revealed in great detail that there was another way up the mountain. The only catch was that the road would not be opened until sometime in the future. However, he would be free to tell everyone about it now.
The young man was ecstatic. He could not go back to sleep, so he spent the rest of the night trying to write down the angel’s instructions. However, the angel had put a lot of information into his mind in a short amount of time. It eventually took several weeks for him to write it all down. When he was finished, he published the book and ordered thousands of copies.
When the book was offered for sale, all the copies were sold in a matter of days. Thousands more had to be printed and people bought them to give away. Eventually, a society, called the New Path, was created to promote the new road that would be revealed in the near future. For some strange reason no one asked the young man to provide evidence that his claim of a new road was valid. Also, no one stopped to consider that a new road wasn’t needed since the old one was completely adequate. However, many people quit traveling the old road to the summit of the mountain, but instead waited for the new road to open.
As time passed by, fewer and fewer visitors stopped at the old man’s cabin. Multitudes had journeyed to the place where the new road was supposed to be opened in the future. They built homes and established a large city. Eventually, no one was allowed to even mention the old road. One day after many years of not one visitor, the old man placed a sign the beginning of the old road that read, Road Closed.
It was an otherwise peaceful summer night when the folly of their dedication to the New Path was revealed to them in a terrible, catastrophic event. Not long after midnight and hours before the sun would poke its bright orange face over the mountain peak, everyone was asleep. The only noise was a nearby gurgling river and the faint hum of electrical generators that powered the city.
The explosion was deafening and followed immediately by a distant rumbling that sounded like tons of boulders and wind rushing down the mountain. In a few seconds, people were awake and trying to grasp what was occurring. Roofs began to blow off the houses. Immediately, their homes started filling up with hot ash. Their breathing was stifled and many people suffocated while still lying in their beds. Other people began to run, but to no avail. The entire city was engulfed as hot molten lava rained down in huge globs. In less than five minutes, there was a huge smoking lava mass where a city once stood. A dormant volcano had come to life. Bursting through the side of the mountain, it had collapsed in a fiery heap on the sleeping city.
Early that same morning, on the other side of the mountain, the door to the little house creaked open. The old man walked down the worn path to the old roads entrance. His wizened old hand clutched a hammer. First, he broke off the boards of the sign that read Road Closed. Then he worked the posts back and forth until he could pull them out of their holes. After packing the empty holes with dirt and gravel, he went back into the little house.
It was not long before there was a knock at the door. The old man, his timeless face still smiling, greeted the visitor with, “May I help you?”
“Yes,” replied the young stranger. “Is that the only way up the mountain?”
“That is correct,” replied the old man.
“Thanks,” replied the young man.
He turned to walk away, and then stopped. As he turned to face the old man again, he asked, “What’s the name of the road?”
“It’s called Truth,” replied the old man.
“Has it been there long?”
“Yes, it has been in the same place for a great number of years.”
“Well, who built it in the first place?”
“It was built by a man named Jesus.”
“But, what about other ways up the mountain?” asked the young man? “Are there no other ways that lead to the top?”
“None,” replied the old man. “But a few people have claimed that there were. I can tell you for sure that this is the only one.”
The young stranger thanked the old man and started down the path again. As he went out the gate, he paused to ask the old man one final question.
“What is your name, old man?” he asked.
“My name is Wisdom,” replied the old man with his constant smile.
(Proverbs 14:12 NKJV) There is a way that seems right to a man, But its end is the way of death.
I like this!….a good reminder for all of us! Thank you.