People who travel the Camino de Santiago recognize several symbols representing a spiritual journey. These include symbols familiar to anyone who follows Jesus, pilgrim or not, and a one unique to this pilgrimage.

An Open Rucksack

A pilgrim shares with others and receives back. Often receiving is harder than giving, but we all have needs, and we need good people to walk alongside us. Look for opportunities to freely share and receive as you journey. A rucksack can symbolize our heart’s openness to giving and receiving

A Scallop Shell

This shell has long identified pilgrims. It was worn on the chest or hat, and also served as a spoon or a cup. How do we identify ourselves as followers of The Way, The Truth, and The Life today?

The Pilgrim’s Passport

A completed passport, issued only by the church, is necessary to receive your Compostela (completion certificate) in Santiago. You need at least 2 stamps per day to prove you walked at least 100 kilometers. Every kiosk or restaurant or hotel along the Camino stamps passports. It’s important to mark our road through life, and remember those who helped us along the way.

A Stone

Many pilgrims carry a small stone as a symbol of their sorrow, burden, pain or loss. After wrestling with these issues before the Lord, they lay the stone down somewhere along the path. What are you carrying that God might be inviting you to drop from your hand?

In Conclusion

As we begin to walk this week, I think of the words of Jesus when he told a crowd, Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light (Matthew 11:29-30).

We face a physical challenge as we walk 70 miles this week, but for most of us our spiritual, emotional and mental burdens sink much deeper. Thankfully, Jesus’s yoke applies here first and foremost. Pull his gentle yoke across your neck and humbly learn from him.

That’s the way of the pilgrim, wherever we might walk.

Camino de Santiago 2023

Photo by Jon Tyson

As my wife and myself make our way to Santiago de Compostela, we pray this prayer for the group we’re leading, and for fellow pilgrims we will soon meet for the first time along the way. This old, old invocation was written especially for pilgrims:

God, you called your servant Abraham from Ur in Chaldea, watching over him in all his wanderings, and guided the Hebrew people as they crossed the desert. Guard these your children who, for the love of your Name, make a pilgrimage to Compostela.

Be their companion on the way, their guide at the crossroads, their strength in weariness, their defense in dangers, their shelter on the path, their shade in the heat, their light in darkness, their comfort in discouragement, and the firmness of their intentions, that through your guidance they may arrive safely at the end of their journey and, enriched with grace and virtue, may return to their homes filled with salutary and lasting joy.

We all walk a challenging journey through life. These humble thoughts are too good to keep only for a specific pilgrimage, but make for good praying for all who follow the way of Jesus.

Many blessings as you walk your path today.

Camino de Santiago 2023

This week me and my wife and a group of soon-to-be friends embark on the Camino de Santiago. We will hike the final portion of the trail, covering 70 miles in 6 days. This is our fifth group to lead, and we’re super excited. Long days of unhurried walking make for unique bonding experiences.

For twelve hundred years, people in search of God walked this same path. As the years passed, Psalm 121 became known as the Pilgrim’s Psalm:

I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber or sleep.

The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand. The sun will not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all evil—he will watch over your life. The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.

The words of the psalmist sink deep into the heart of a pilgrim, walking mile after mile towards an unknown destination.

Of course, you don’t have to walk the Camino de Santiago to appreciate these verses. We all journey as a pilgrim through life, and it’s good to remember who to look to for help.

Camino de Santiago 2023

Photo by Beth, a friend and past pilgrim

Have you ever practiced selective listening? Certainly as a teen-ager, when parents gave detailed instructions, some of which were immediately ignored. At work this occurs regularly, and in a marriage—honey, what was that you said again? The house is on fire?

I don’t believe Solomon practiced selective listening when David exhorted him to build a temple to the Lord. Perhaps selective remembering better describes Solomon’s life. Here’s David’s charge on the eve of his death:

My son Solomon, acknowledge the God of your father, and serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the Lord searches every heart and understands every desire and every thought. If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will reject you forever. Consider now, for the Lord has chosen you to build a house as the sanctuary. Be strong and to the work.

Solomon followed through on the temple construction, creating one of the wonders of the ancient world. But Solomon lost his way in regards to devotion. With the temple project complete, the riches of the world and his fascination with foreign women turned his heart.

Which do you think the Lord preferred? A magnificent temple dedicated in his honor, or the heart of a king fully devoted to him?

Guard your heart. It matters more than cathedrals.

1 Chronicles 18 in reading the Bible in 2023

Photo by Diane Picchiottino