“The bucket list item you never knew you needed!”

These were the words of my dear friend, Courtenay, in the weeks leading up to our Otter Trail adventure. I did not give too much thought to this claim. This was about to be my very first multi-day hike and I really had very little knowledge to draw up any kind of expectation.

It was an experience that pulled us into pure presence, into the here and now. Like children walking through the Candyland of nature, constantly in awe and delight. We played. We laughed. We swam. We shared stories, made up our own and even shared some poetry at the start of each new day. We certainly snacked well. And, we walked.

The experience for me was deeply moving. Something in me shifted, though I am not quite too sure what exactly. I guess when it comes to spirit, matters aren’t meant to be understood, or at least spirit doesn’t need to be explained in order to be understood. Matters of the spirit are simply, felt.

The closest thing I can describe it to is being in love. And doesn’t love just send us souring, yet keep us grounded at the same time? True love brings us home. On a handful of occasions, tears welled in my eyes, overcome with the beauty and sheer touch of nature. I felt wooed by the sights and smells, just through the power of her being. I recall a moment when we had put down our bags and walked off the beaten track to what is commonly referred to as quartz rock: a giant protrusion of rock and quartz, standing valiantly as the ocean swayed like a skirt at her base. Matt asked me to walk out a little further, step up onto a little peak as he tried to capture the magnificence, we were engulfed in.

I’ll never forget that moment. That feeling.

I felt simultaneously so small and insignificant while so alive and invincible to life’s trials and tribulations. Fearless too. The majesty and presence of the waves crashing against the shoreline below, calling to the forest that gloriously clothed the land as it ascended before me. The sky above and the vast space of freedom surrounded me. A shower of peace cascaded over me while I stood on the earth; on holy ground. And I believe that; that the trees are saints, the rocks my pew, the whisper of wind God’s voice.

The church is but a man-made construct, though, in the eyes of the heart, it is a place that only the spirit knows. And that place, well, it is anywhere and everywhere. Sacred practice does not only lie in the acts of Sunday morning worship or evening prayer but in the simple, everyday moments that make up each day; in both the constructed intentional moments as well as the messy unexpected ones. Especially in those.

Standing in awe of nature. How can that not be deemed a form of worship? An attitude of gratitude, a song of praise. Sometimes I think God looks down upon me with a cheeky little smirk, basking in the delight of this recognition. Not of his own, but a delight for me, that I have come to see and feel the grandeur, the miracle, the ineffable beauty of creation. And then He graciously says, “My child, the eyes through which you see, are the same ones with which I see you. “

A few days after the Otter Trail, I wrote a poem called “My Happy Place”. You can read it here: