Monday, June 24, 2013

Where are you going?

We're now less than 2 weeks away from our departure date on July 7th!  After a week up at Pilgrim Pines Conference Center, we'll hit the road!

Easily the most common question we get is this: "where are you going?"  We've intentionally planned our trip with a freedom of movement that will allow us to spend time as we see fit.  In other words, we have no time lines of having to be somewhere on a certain date, or for a certain number of days.  We're going to go, and experience, and serve as the Spirit leads us!  That being said, we do have a general iitinerary.

Here it is:
     -from Massachusetts we'll head west and head up the beautiful west coast of Michigan and up and over the Mackinac Bridge into the UP.
     -after a couple days of visiting friends on Hagerman Lake, we begin our voyage in earnest
     -across South Dakota to Bad Lands NP, Custer State Park (with its amazing buffalo herd) and the Black Hills
     -into Wyoming to Devil's Tower NM, Big Horn Canyon NF, Yellowstone NP and Grand Teton NP
     -north into Montana to Glacier NP
     -westward ho into Washington to Mount Ranier NP
     -southward into Oregon to the Pacific Coast Highway with maybe a side trip to Crater Lake NP
     -further south down the Pacific Coast Highway into California to Redwood NP, Yosemite NP, Kings Canyon NP, Sequoia NP, Death Valley NP and Joshua Tree NP
     -east into Arizona to visit family in Phoenix, then onto Sedona and Grand Canyon NP
     -north to Utah to Zion NP, Bryce Canyon NP, Canyonlands NP, Arches NP and Monument Valley
     -east across New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas...and if there's any time maybe down to Mississippi and Lousiana...before heading northward through Great Smokey Mountains NP, Shenandoah NP...and homeward

Of course, on the way we'll stop at all sorts of historic sites, tourist traps and anything that catches our fancy.  We plan on serving in as many of the National Parks areas as we can through local churches, non-profits and agencies.  It should be quite a trip!

What are we missing that we just have to see?  Any suggestions for us?

Friday, June 7, 2013

...so that...

When our first National Park, Yellowstone in Wyoming, was established back in 1872 by congress and President Grant, it was done so with recognition that these amazing and beautiful places are an incredible blessing for our country and the world, and that these blessings must be celebrated and protected so that they can be passed on and celebrated by future generations.

As we as a family prepare to begin our summer journey to visit the great National Parks of our country, we recognize that we are receiving a wonderful blessing that will impact each of us for the rest of our lives.  We will always remember this trip!  We know that not everyone gets this opportunity, even if they desperately want it...time off from employment...financial resources...it simply isn't easy to make it happen.  We do recognize just how blessed we are to have this opportunity, and so in response, we want to make sure that we are a blessing to others along the way as we experience this journey.

Psalm 67 says: "May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face to shine on us - so that your ways may be known on earth, your salvation among all nations."  It is so easy to think of blessings as "for us", when in reality we receive blessings in our lives so that we can in turn shine the light of Christ into the darkness of the world.  As we have reflected on the blessing of our adventure this summer, we feel the responsibility of those two small words: so that...and we pray that as we receive the blessing of Parks with a Purpose, that Parks with a Purpose might be a blessing to others in a way that reveals God's love for them and this world.