Recently my wife and I joined a Hiking Club. We had been lacking in fellowship and looking for a way to make new friendships. A friend of ours invited us along to her Hiking Club. Her oldest son has brain cancer, so she finds hiking therapeutic not only for herself, but for her whole family. It gets her son out of the house and away from the computer and gives him some healthy exercise. It keeps her busy without her mind on her problems. She is able to have positive conversation and fellowship while hiking along an inspiring mountain path.
My wife and I decided to give it a go and found it very inspiring, everything that our friend Fernanda had argued and more. However, waking up at six-thirty on Sunday morning was not my idea of a good time. I would have to see if it was really worth it. The first hike we nearly missed our ride by being late. The couple who were to give us a lift to the hiking location waited to the last possible moment before deciding to leave without us. My wife had been making the arrangements the night before on Facebook, but did not have their phone. Fortunately, we saw them at the last intersection leaving town and flagged them down. We parked our car, got in with them and were on our way to a new adventure.
I was shocked when we arrived at eight o’clock at the meeting place to find nearly fifty people ready to drive another thirty minutes or more to the hike’s starting point. What was it that would cause these fifty people to sacrifice their Sunday morning sleep-in to attend? We saw Fernanda and her husband and children and waved hello as the cars pulled out in single file. In about thirty-five minutes we were all exiting our cars, some friends were extending warm greetings while others were standing solitary, waiting for the commencement of the hike.
At the given moment the guide called everyone together to form a giant circle. Saying hello to everyone, he explained the course of today’s hike, its length, and various points of interest both historical and cultural. At the end he asked a female assistant to read a part from a famous Portuguese poem exalting nature and her beauties. We all clapped hands and then followed quickly behind the guide as he led us off into the nearby hills.
I couldn’t but feel that the hiking phenomenon had a religious element to it. It was almost as if we had said a little prayer to the Goddess of Nature asking her blessing on our intrusion into her domain. In the absence of the traditional church service and obligatory attendance people were seeking spiritual input here in the beauties of the mountains. Walking along the paths surrounded by gorgeous views of nature or pastoral farms or scenes, one absorbs the peaceful, calming effect of being in nature’s embrace.
I asked one of the hikers why he enjoyed hiking. He replied, “It gets me away from my problems for the day. I spend a beautiful day in nature, seeing some wonderful sights, having some positive fellowship with others, and getting some good physical exercise and fresh air. It is not that my problems go away. They are still there when I get home, but it somehow gives me strength to confront them once again. I get strength of spirit from these mountain walks. It helps me to stop thinking and worrying about my problems.”
His mountain walks had become his place of spiritual refuge and refilling. They had become his amusement or pastime. The word “muse” means to think, to ponder, to dwell upon. The “a” in amusement is a negative like the “a” in atheist. A theist is a person who believes in God, while an atheist is a person who does not believe in God. So amusement actually means to not think, or ponder or dwell upon. Like a football game or a television show, an amusement distracts us from thinking about our problems. It may also distract us from our work or thinking and preparing for the days ahead.
Because church service has failed to fulfill the spiritual needs of its flock, especially here in Europe, today’s generation is seeking for the spiritual in these mountain walks. Not only in the various hiking clubs that have sprung up around Portugal, but the interest in Reiki, Buddhism, meditation, and yoga show that the old-time religion has failed. The people seek a new thing, a new way to fulfill the spiritual void they feel within. Because of the churches failure to feed its flock, Christianity has fell on hard times. Many have disserted the message of Christ as a result and go aimlessly searching for truth in these other “isms,” not realizing the dangers and lies that wait to entangle them.
My daughter and I have just returned from a ten day one hundred and eighty-eight km hike to Santiago de Compostela. Although the hike is supposed to be a religious or spiritual exercise for members of the Catholic Church, we found most people hiking were not church members. Many were not even believers. But along the mountain paths one feels the presence of God even if you do not believe in Him. He imparts His peaceful and calming effect to all those who pass within His presence in nature.
Man’s spiritual search has not ended. Sadly, because of the Church’s failure to transmit the truth, men are looking elsewhere. Even in the Pilgrim’s Hostels along the way to the great Cathedral in Santiago de Compostela, you can get a massage by a Reiki master for ten Euros. You might even have a spiritual experience in the course of it and get “enlightened” or spiritually enhanced not knowing the power or energy is a counterfeit and coming from the dark side.
As mankind rejects Christianity because of the Church’s failure to impart truth and the spiritual, a new age of Darkness looms in the foreground where today’s “isms” will be tomorrow’s creeds. Darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people, but those that know the Lord and His truth shall shine as lights and His presence shall be upon them.[1]
Will you be strong in those days, doing exploits and enlightening the masses to the true God?[2] Or will you also sit in gross darkness because you have abandoned the true light for a cheap imitation? Jesus said, “If the light that is in thee is darkness, how great is that darkness.”[3] In other words, “If what you believe is light, is actually darkness, you are really deceived and are in great darkness.” Jesus said, “I am the light of the world: he that follows me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.”[4] “And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.”[5]
Are you walking in the light? Or has the god of this world blinded your mind so that the glorious gospel of Christ is hid from you?[6] Has the serpent beguiled you through his subtlety, so that your mind is corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ?[7] Have you forgotten your maker and gone after false gods, false “isms” that satisfy not?[8] For if Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light, is it a great thing if his ministers also be transformed as ministers of righteousness?[9] Have you departed from the true faith which is in Christ and given heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils which have a form of godliness, but deny the divinity and power of Jesus Christ?[10] Will you call upon our Lord and God in Jesus’ name that he may recover you out of the snare of the devil, even though you were his willful captive?[11]
The choice is yours. Our spiritual adversary walks about as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.[12] Are you in his clutches? Call upon Jesus and He will come running. Where there is life, there is hope. Time is still on your side. Call upon Jesus today. Tomorrow may be too late. The true freedom and love and happiness you seek is in Jesus. He’s just a prayer away. Call upon Him today.[13] You won’t be disappointed.
Footnotes:
[1] Isaiah 60:2
[2] Daniel 11:32,33
[3] Matthew 6:23
[4] John 8:12
[5] John 3:19
[6] 2Corinthians 4:4
[7] 2Corinthians 11:3
[8] Hosea 8:14
[9] 2Corinthians 11:14,15
[10] 1Timothy 4:1, 2Timothy 3:5
[11]2Timothy 2:26
[12] 1Peter 5:8
[13] Romans 10:13
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