Living in Minnesota, I don’t see mountains a whole lot. I remember the first time I rode into Colorado on a bus with my high school choir as a teenager and saw the mountain line in the distance. Even from far away they appeared overwhelmingly powerful and mysterious.

As we drew near, I actually felt a sensation of fear. It was the same feeling I got as a kid at camp when I saw the moon and stars juxtaposed against the dark country night. Or when I saw the Northern Lights a few years ago. Freaky. (Did you see the movie, Gravity? Same feeling.)

Mountains are ginormous. You can move your dresser, but you can’t move a mountain.

Imagine with me for a minute. What if you were sitting on your porch in Leadville, CO, looking at the view, and suddenly you felt the earth tremble and bubble beneath you. Next, you hear a low rumble that grows louder and louder until the sound is deafening.

You jump up in horror as you realize the mountain range is cracking and crumbling before your eyes. As one mountain begins it’s terrifying descent toward you, the next one starts to fracture, and it’s obvious that the entire range is falling like dominoes.

Think Tsunami of earth. And you are an itty bitty nothing about to be obliterated under the unstoppable greatness of this catastrophe. Here one minute, and then gone forever in the blink of an eye.

We are awestruck by a mountain, but…

Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God. (Psalm 90:2)

We’ve all got mountains in our lives. Insurmountable obstacles that cannot be moved. And then, once in a while, those titanic earthen mounds do move. They begin to crumble, falling one by one, threatening to leave us devastated and broken forever.

But God. GOD!

The Creator of the mountains is a Rock. A ROCK much greater than any mountain.

For you are my rock and my fortress; and for your name’s sake you lead me and guide me; (Psalm 31:3)

For who is God, but the Lord? And who is a rock, except our God? (Psalm18:31)

Where would you go if you saw the mountains crumbling before your eyes? What if you could run to a tower? A fortress bigger and stronger than any mountain? That’s exactly what God wants us to do the minute we start hearing the rumblings. Run. Run for your life! Once you get safely to the Fortress, you don’t have to be afraid anymore!

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea. (Psalm 46:1)

So on the one hand you’ve got the mountains. Ominous. Immovable. And then the immovable begins to move, so you prepare to be decimated.

On the other hand, you’ve got God.

Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised in the city of our God! His holy mountain, beautiful in elevation, is the joy of all the earth, Mount Zion, in the far north, the city of the great King. Within her citadels God has made himself known as a fortress. (Psalm 46:1-2)

This Psalm goes on to tell us how KINGS feel when they see this Great Mountain that is the joy of all the earth. We read:

For behold, the kings assembled; they came on together. As soon as they saw it, they were astounded; they were in panic; they took to flight. Trembling took hold of them there, anguish as of a woman in labor. (Psalm 46:3-4)

They know what to fear. Do we?

I love this because it also reminds me of the fact that WHEN mountains fall, God is making a way for something new. It’s painful. It’s frightening. It’s easy to panic. But instead, run to the Fortress and wait until the catastrophe has passed.

Be merciful to me, O God, be merciful to me, for in you my soul takes refuge; in the shadow of your wings I will take refuge, till the storms of destruction pass by. Psalm 57:1

And then follow Him out into the “all things made new” of your life. This is almost always how God moves us forward.

This is how God moves mountains.