Lessons Learned and Dreams Inspired by a Great Book

I am reading this book Hinds Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnard, and I have been challenged by it in many ways. I didn’t think it was going to be a book I liked. The title alone seems a bit boring, and nothing about the cover convinced me otherwise. Even so, I sat and listened as my sister, Erin, read the first chapter aloud one morning to my mom and me during breakfast. What caught my attention was that the main character’s name was Much Afraid. That was actually her name. Much Afraid lived in the Valley of Humiliation where she enjoyed working in the service of the Great Shepherd. However, her name described her well and she found herself bound by the misery of her Fearing relatives. Aunt Dismal Forebodings, Gloomy, Spiteful, Pride, Self Pity, Bitterness, Resentment, and her greatest enemy, Craven Fear to name a few. Poor Much Afraid didn’t have much of a chance with a bunch of family members like that! Needless to say, after the third page I was hooked on this book.

Summary: Much Afraid has had it with the unbearable torture her relatives bring her each day, but almost dies of utter dread when she discovers she is to marry Craven Fear himself! She begs the Shepherd to keep her from her horrible fate and promises she will do anything He asks in order to escape. With much delight, He plants the thorn shaped seed of love in her heart. This is where her journey begins.

The book describes the journey of how Much Afraid receives a new name from the Shepherd and a promise to climb out of the Valley of Humiliation and develop the feet of a hind, or a deer, so she can easily jump and leap up the mountains. However, she cannot develop hind’s feet before she goes on a long journey with her two companions, Sorrow and Suffering. You see, the journey will be difficult for Much Afraid because she is, in fact, crippled by her fear. She has twisted feet which make it hard to walk let alone climb a mountain, and ugly facial deformities which make her feel unworthy to even think about traveling to the High Places. But despite her fear, she believes in the great Shepherd. She believes He is trustworthy and powerful and full of grace. She believes that He can make her feet like hinds feet to enable her to leap and skip up and down the mountains with ease and grace.

Much Afraid clings to Sorrow and Suffering, the companions the Shepherd himself picked out for her, and begins to rely on their strength to get her safely through the Shores of Loneliness, the Desert, the ascent up the Precipice Injury, the Forests of Danger and Tribulation, the Mist, and the Valley of Loss. You will have to read the book yourself to see what happens in the journey of Much Afraid and to learn what name the Shepherd gives her.

As I read this book, I couldn’t help but wish our lives, my life, was a literal journey. I know we are all on a literal journey, and that journey is called life, (yeah yeah, blah blah…I know) but wouldn’t it be awesome if we were born for the purpose of climbing out of an actual valley in order to receive the promises of a Shepherd we could see, touch, and have face to face conversation? In this story, Much Afraid simply has to call on the Shepherd and He will be standing next to her in an instant ready to confront her enemies and physically wipe off her tears. She can actually look into His eyes and see the compassion and power flowing from His gaze. Oh man how I long for this to be a reality!

Don’t get me wrong and think Much Afraid had it easy. She can visibly see the Shepherd, but this means she can also see Pride, Self Pity, Bitterness, Fear, an all her other relatives standing directly before her. They physically and verbally attack her and try dragging her away from the promises planted deep in her heart by the Voice of Truth, the Shepherd.

I know this story is a beautiful interpretation of the real deal. We might not be able to feel God wiping away our tears, but there have been moments where His compassion has stilled my sobs and I know that He is with me. He is my very present help in trouble. Still, this book makes me dream of the face of Jesus that much more. How glorious it will be when I finally can see His face and look into His fierce and lovely eyes.

I imagine the day I will hear Him call me by my New Name. This is perhaps, the most exciting part of all to me! The book says that Much Afraid learns after the long journey that the Shepherd never regarded her as such, but had always loved her as if she already was New. That, my friends, is love in its purest form.

“I will write upon her a new name, the name of her God. The Lord God is a sun and shield: the Lord will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.” Psalm 84:11

“I know that you have little strength, yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name . . . since you have kept my command to endure patiently, I will also keep you from the hour of trial that is going to come upon the whole world to test those who live on the earth. . . I will write on him the name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which is coming down out of heaven from my God; and I will also write on him my new name. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” Revelation 3:8, 10, & 12-13