By Traci Rabenstein, director of Mission Advancement
“Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.”
-Matthew 4:1
During my junior and senior years in high school, I joined speech club. We would select readings (whether original pieces or stories, published articles, or famous poetry) to present for a panel of judges who would critique our delivery. Competitions were placed in categories, and the one I fell in love with, and participated in the most, was poetry reading.
While in speech club, I found Robert Frost. He had a few poems published in the US in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, but it wasn’t until his family moved to England that he wrote and published two books of poetry that were successful immediately. In 1915, he returned to New England and continued to write. He won four Pulitzer Prizes for poetry and became the Poet Laureate Consultant for Poetry for the Library of Congress from 1958-59. He recited his poem “The Gift Outright” at the 1961 inauguration of President John F. Kennedy. Out of all his work, my favorite was (and still is) “The Road Not Taken.”
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
In the September 2015 issue of the Paris Review online magazine, David Orr wrote a review of the poem in which he said, “Most readers consider ‘The Road Not Taken’ to be a paean to triumphant self-assertion… but the literal meaning of the poem’s speaker tells us … the road he will later call less traveled is actually the road equally traveled. The two roads are interchangeable.”
I see parallels of this in my own journey. There are times when I stand before two decisions, two roads, and have to determine which one to take. Sometimes, after making a decision and heading down one pathway, I wonder what might have been if I had made the opposite decision. Would it have been easier to travel on the other road?
Over the past several months, we have found ourselves on a road not traveled often. One where we have had to shelter-in-place, wear masks when we are in public places, and learn how to stay connected in new, virtual ways as families and congregations. For some, this has been a season of slowing down and reflecting, taking time to identify what is most important. Some of us have been taking measures to slow down after realizing that the pace we had been living pre-pandemic was not the road we necessarily wanted to be on.
I’ve also been thinking about the road Christ journeyed. In the 40 days after Jesus’ baptism, he traveled into the wilderness and was tempted by Satan. Matthew and Luke provide examples of how Satan tried to entice Jesus into revealing himself as God’s son before the appointed time. I marvel at the willpower he had as someone who had been fasting and wandering alone in such a solitary place. Satan tried to divert him to another path, but he stayed the course of preparing for what was to come and taking the road “less traveled.”
In our own lives, when the hardships of humanity seem to hold us back, pressuring us to take “the other (road), as just as fair / And having perhaps the better claim / Because it was grassy and wanted wear,” we can look to the temptation of Jesus. From him we find how to address the stresses of life, face daily temptations, and find solace. By following the path of Christ, we remain near to God and find strength and hope to stay in tune with his will and recognize his movements in our lives. This is the road, the “one less traveled by,” that makes all the difference.
The Office of Mission Advancement works to cultivate passion for the missions and ministries of the Church of the Brethren. If you have any questions or if there is any way they can support you in this season, please reach out to MA@brethren.org.
(Read this issue of eBrethren.)