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Hi, welcome to Redeem the Commute. I’m Ryan, your host for the daily challenges.  This week’s topic is part of our series called EPIC where we’ve been exploring how Jesus is found throughout the Old Testament part of the Bible. We’re reading some epic old stories from the Old Testament, some of which you might have heard before, some of which might be new to you. But our hope is that in each of them we’ll see how they’re part of one big epic story: the story of the Bible, the story of the world, God’s story.

Our daily challenges are meant to help you explore what it means to follow Jesus, even if you don’t have a lot of time. That’s why we have a rhythm that keeps us in sync, even if we’re not a community that meets together in person regularly. This means every Monday we introduce the week’s idea. Every Tuesday we study it in the Bible. Every Wednesday we see how that challenges transform our thinking on the topic. Thursdays we try to apply and live it out. Friday is a day for prayer and reflection before we take a rest on Saturday, and Sundays we meet together with other Christians in the community.

Mountain biking along a beautiful river in St. Catharines, I and some friends came to the bridge back to where we’d started on the other side of the river.  We still wanted to ride, and were pretty sure there was another bridge further along a river, so we skipped the easy way back, and kept travelling along the river.  

As time dragged on, it became clear there was no other bridge, and we had a long way to go until we could cross the river, much less bike back to our starting point.  

I don’t know about the others, but I was definitely conflicted.  It was my map-reading skills that got us into this mess.  We were getting low on energy and time.

We came to an old dam, mostly in ruins.  My partners claimed it was crossable, and I wasn’t so sure.  Even if we decided to cross, we’d have to make our way up an escarpment.  

In the end, we did it, it wan’t easy, and I ended up pulling a rock down onto my knee as we climbed the escarpment.   But we made it across the river, up the escarpment, and back to where we’d started on time.  

This week we’ll study a story in the Bible of God’s people, Israel, being brought safely out of Egypt, by a route many considered unwise, dangerous and even impossible.  But God was with them!

Question: What is the greatest obstacle you’ve ever faced?  How did you get around it?