I felt so foolish and humbled. I was 16 years old, and was a leader of a group of younger guys in a group called Christian Service Brigade. We were camping out at a provincial park in Manitoba, and went hiking in the woods. Of course, when you go hiking with younger lads, a good leader will take every opportunity to teach along the way. “You see where the sun is in the sky? Keep track of your shadow. See that moss there? It always grows on the north side of the tree.” I was so full of wisdom in those days.

After about 90 minutes of leading these young guys through thick and thin, they began to wonder out loud where we were going, and when were we going to get back to the camp? I regaled them with words like “When the going gets tough, the tough get going” , “we’re not quitters” and other equally innocuous clichés. We managed to squeeze in another fifteen minutes or so of huffing and bluffing, when one of the older fellows piped up, “We’re lost, aren’t we?”

The sky had become overcast, and I had indeed lost my way. What do you do when you lose your way in the bush, and you have a group of boys depending on you to get out?

You can bluff your way for a while. I did, but it only worked temporarily. Eventually, someone will notice that “something’s not right”.

You can listen to the differing opinions of your followers and try to incorporate all of their ideas into a plan of action in order to please them for the time being, but that would only be a temporary measure. Ultimately it is only one applied solution that will get you out, and it needs to be the right one. Syncretism has no place in deep woods: (syn-cretism, n. a combination of varying, often mutually opposed beliefs, principles or practices, especially those of various religions).

You can admit that you are lost, and take action that will lead to a solution. What we did that day is not written in any boy scout manuals that I know of. Well, some of it is. We looked for the tallest tree, and sent one of our scampers up there to see what could be seen. He saw nothing but unending bush.

We hollered loudly to attract anyone in the area to our lost plight. To no avail.

Not being one to panic easily, I recognized that maybe God wanted us to learn a lesson here, so I said to our guys, “Let’s huddle around in a circle here, and let’s ask the Lord to help us out of this bush.” We gathered around. By now the younger ones were starting to show some fear. I led in prayer, and we asked God to help us out of this bush so that we would not have to spend the night with no supplies or shelter. As we said Amen to our prayers, I felt like we had to start moving again.

We walked for about another five minutes, feeling quite confident that God was going to help us, and sure enough, we heard other peoples’ voices. We had made it to home base. That was one night to remember. Those boys have a story to tell to this day, of how the Lord answered their prayer.

Of course there were some leadership lessons to learn from this experience. Wrongful pride will always get you in trouble. No matter how many people are following you, you may still be going in a fatal direction. It is amazing to note how fiercely pride will keep us on the wrong path, even after we recognize that we are lost. It may cause pain but it is always a healing sort of pain to admit to others that you were wrong, and to demonstrate your dependence upon God’s leadership and truthfulness. Even in a wrong situation, there will always be an opportunity to do the right thing, and God may turn it into something beautiful.