Be Where Your Feet Are
Written by Rivers West, Fellows Class of 2026-27
“Who among you fears the Lord
and obeys the word of his servant?
Let the one who walks in the dark,
who has no light,
trust in the name of the Lord
and rely on their God.”
Isaiah 50:10 (NIV)
Back in January, the Fellows took a caving trip into Pettyjohn’s Cave in Walker County. We descended our way into the slippery opening and spent the next hour or so scrambling over rocks, squeezing through tight passages, and being careful not to lose balance over steep drops, guided only by the trust we had in the person in front of us and the yellow glow of our headlamps. The journey was a lesson in breaking out of the cocoon of our comfort zones and exploring aspects of God’s creation that we are typically not attuned to, and the majesty of the cave certainly reflected the might of who He is. We emerged into a larger cavern and had time to poke around before our guides asked us to gather around, turn all of our lights off, and take the time to be still in the deep darkness.
While we sat together in the pitch, one of our guides asked us to look ahead at the next stages of our life, post-fellows. “Does your future feel like this cave, where you can’t see a single thing, or does it feel like a wide meadow trail where you can confidently make your way forward?” In all honesty, mine feels like the cave, clouded and unsure, requiring careful footing every step. The obvious lesson here would be to trust God as we move forward in the darkness, knowing He has a plan laid out even if we can’t see it. And that is good and true. But what I took to heart is that sometimes, we need to find times in our lives to consciously turn off our headlamps and sit in the darkness, to seek it out instead of coping with it as it arises.
It is so easy for me to idolize my future. As I prepare for a new job, a place to live, and my grand 5-year plan, I long to fill my brain with the knowledge of what is coming next, to envision a perfect future where everything has gone my way and executed flawlessly. However, through the Fellows Program, I have gradually developed the wisdom and tools to take a step back and be where my feet are. To trust God, yes, and to be wise about planning for what’s next, but knowing that day by day, I can enjoy and take in just where I am and not hurry towards the next thing. To plan where I’ll live, but to find time to take a step back, pray and find comfort in a reality where the first choice doesn’t work out. Sometimes, we forget that we have already crawled through miles of cave to get to where we are and continue to crawl, focusing on goal after goal after goal. But I believe that maybe more often than not, we need to pause and sit in the moment. To know the beautiful future is dark and unsteady and to not rush to find any glimpse of light. To find comfort in the fact that even if we can’t see what’s around us, we can feel the slab of stone beneath our feet, the wall against our back propping us up, and rest knowing that God is holding us safe, not just in the future, but right now in the beautiful present.
“To find a stronger faith his own;
And Power was with him in the night,
Which makes the darkness and the light,
And dwells not in the light alone,
But in the darkness and the cloud,
As over Sinaï's peaks of old,
While Israel made their gods of gold,
Altho' the trumpet blew so loud.”
In Memoriam A. H. H. OBIIT MDCCCXXXIII: 96By Alfred, Lord Tennyson