Pioneer Trek: Our ancestors' trials vs. our current day trials

My daughter left this morning at 7 am for a four day pioneer trek. She,and a 100+ other teens will be re-enacting her pioneer ancestors' trek across the plains in search of religious freedom. They will camp out under the stars at night, and pull handcarts through the hot Wyoming wilderness during the day. I'm sure she won't even come close to the hardships her pioneer ancestors endured, but it will certainly be harder than anything physical and emotional that she's gone through before. If she can endure it, I'm sure she'll come away from the experience a better person.

The difficulty of the hardship our ancestors went through has given me some food for thought. We often look back an marvel at what men and women of the past endured and tell ourselves "I could have never survived." But dare say that if our ancestors could have looked forward, and saw what we have to endure on a day to day basis, they might likely have said, "I could never survive that."

True, we don't have to give up our homes and livelihood, place a minuscule amount of possessions--just enough to survive--upon a handcart, and walk a thousand mile to a desert wilderness to start our lives over again. But we have to endure more subtle dangers. We live in a day when the prophesies of Isaiah are coming to fruition. Everywhere we turn people are calling evil good, and good evil. Days where no one cares about marriage--unless you are gay. Days where God is a dirty word. Days where murders are set free, yet people making honest mistakes have their lives ruined. Yet we can survive, and this world can survive, if we remember two things:
1) Love the Lord with all our hearts
2) Love our neighbor as ourselves

Danielle dressed in her pioneer garb. 

(Notice the piles of unwashed dishes and groceries waiting to be put away, all neglected yesterday as I furiously sewed the entire outfit she is wearing--it doesn't pay to procrastinate).