The Worst of Times…and the Best

It was the worst of times I have personally known. This year, 2011, began in the emergency room in Colorado Springs, when a second stroke on New Year’s Eve left Mother-in-law completely immobile.

Her existence as a rational human being really ended Aug. 27, 2010, when her first stroke, in my presence, left her 99% blind, with only occasional fleeting, foggy memories of who she was and no recognition of her own home. She could not even remember she was blind, and would get up from her bed or chair at all hours of the day or night to go she-knew-not-where and fall down.  It required 24/7 alertness, and sleeping in shifts, to stop her before she hurt herself. We were not always quick enough.

One night prior to her final stroke, after I had helped her to the bathroom for the umpteenth time, we sat alone on the edge of her bed and she asked, “Who are you and why are you so good to me?” And, “Who are all these other people in the room?” Heartbreaking.

Her stout heart finally gave out in the late afternoon of Feb. 28, 2011, at age 90 1/2. Karen and I each held one of her hands on opposite sides of her bed as her breathing slowly and peacefully got more shallow and intermittent until it was no more.

We were exhausted from 6 months of sleep deprivation and stress. My high blood pressure, a family trait, was in the stratosphere. There was no funeral, in accordance with her wishes. For me it was a devastating end, having prayed for her salvation while witnessing a catastrophe unfolding in the life of someone I loved.

Another family trauma began at that same time. My little sister up in Denver had to quit work a few months short of retirement age due to dementia. Her decline was dramatically quick. Less than a year after being diagnosed, she was institutionalized and unable to communicate beyond “Yes,” or walk without assistance. This Christmas she is in the hospital, having fallen at the assisted living facility, and developed blood clots. Hers has been a most difficult adulthood, and surely her dementia is stress-related, but she is a devout Catholic and we can only hope and pray that her uncommunicative mind knows the peace that passes all understanding.

But by His grace we were afflicted…but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair… (2 Corinthians 4:8). My experience is pretty insignificant compared with Job in the Old Testament, but I, too, still know, with battle hardened conviction, that my Redeemer lives, and I will see Him in the flesh on the other side of death (Job 19:25-27).

The year has not been without its joyous blessings—the best of times even. Three weeks after mother’s death the Isaiah 6:3 Tour resumed and we found ourselves camped in endless fields of glorious wildflowers in the Southern California desert. What a wonderful part of God’s magnificent creation for rest and recuperation! Then we eased north to enjoy spring in the snow-capped Sierra Nevada Mountains amid towering Sequoia trees and the spectacular waterfalls and rock formations of Yosemite National Park.

Mid-summer found us three-quarters of a continent east, by way of the north rim of the Grand Canyon and the Black Hills, living in the neighborhood of our southern Ohio grandkids for 6 wonderful weeks in a new, relatively palatial RV—a changed lifestyle with more family and less movement, and a first-ever grandchildren sleepover at Grandma’s house on wheels.

After a fall season among gorgeous Appalachian autumn colors and dear friends in western North Carolina, we are now ensconced for the winter near grandkids on Florida’s southernmost gulf coast. Earlier this week we babysat the grands, ages 6, 9, and 11, at the beach on a beautiful day. Love and peace abounded and all we had to do was enjoy their company and “ooh” and “aah” over seashells discovered and sandcastles built. The day ended on their sofa, with three hot little bodies draped over and around Grandpa, watching a Christmas classic on his Kindle Fire propped in his lap. All the near-catastrophes and assorted trauma of parenthood are a small price indeed to pay for grandparenthood. What a joy!

We are worshiping regularly in the same church now (something we greatly missed while traveling) and it is full of young families! The pastor is much younger than my son, but gifted way beyond his years in passionately communicating God’s Word.

By His grace I’ve recovered from the caregiving wear and tear, reacquired some self-disciplined eating habits and can easily slip into my 45-year-old flying suit, and generate a blood pressure reading in what my fellow codgers in this 55+ RV Park call the disgustingly healthy range.

The Holy Spirit is hovering over the stagnant waters of my self-indulgent, slothful retirement, and I am pondering a number of ways I might be useful, motivated by my re-emergent fitness and a sentence from Matthew Henry’s Bible Commentary that hit me like a ton of bricks: “All Christians should earnestly desire that their last works may be their best works.” Only God knows what that might be, and He’s in charge. I eagerly, prayerfully anticipate His direction. Here am I, send me (Isaiah 6:8).

This Christmas Season our world’s desperate need for a Savior has never seemed more painfully obvious to me, not only because of what I feel with my finger to the wind, but, more importantly, what our Creator makes plain from another year’s immersion in His Word. As you tear the bright wrapping off your Christmas gifts, remember that Christ-child in a manger, wrapped in rags, is the only gift you need. And if your church has canceled services this Sunday/Christmas Day, you are most cordially invited to come to ours.  And if you have an ereader or get one for Christmas, here’s my Christmas gift to you, the first time it has ever been available free (till Dec. 31, 2011).  Use this coupon code on checkout: KY44C  To borrow a dying wish from Martin Luther, burn all the books I’ve ever written after I’m gone…except this one.

Dear friends, in this upcoming New Year fraught with ominous global uncertainty, may our sovereign God’s truth reign in your mind and His peace rule in your heart.

A Palace On Wheels

I wonder if I still know how to write, it’s been so long since I last posted. Well, there have been a lot of distractions since my last blog post in May from California (we are now in Virginia by way of Colorado and the Black Hills of South Dakota and a delightful month near grandkids in southern Ohio), and there has been a general lack of inspiration to blog. Somewhere, probably in the blogosphere, I read a Churchill paraphrase applied to blogging that sure hit home with me: something like…never have so many words been written about so much insignificance by so many for so few. Only a few of my closest friends—the kind of dear souls who probably would not tell you the truth if they thought it would hurt you—communicated any concern over my blogging hiatus.

For two years and two months, as we traveled the country, we literally turned sideways as we  met in the aisle/living room/dining room/bedroom of a 25-foot travel trailer—the living area was actually a 23’ by 7.5’ aluminum-framed fiberglass box—but, boy, did we enjoy ourselves. We came to the conclusion that we really like this fulltime RV traveling lifestyle in God’s magnificent creation, and we’d like it even more if we had a little more space. And now it feels like we live in a palace, though still on wheels. The pic above reveals the difference in size between to two. The new one is a 35.5’ by 8’ split-level (a fifth wheel) with three slideouts that literally double the width and significantly extends the length to include a separate bedroom with full size walk-around queen bed. On these cool mountain mornings in the Blue Ridge an electric fireplace knocks the chill off in our expansive living room.

Of course it required a bigger truck to tow it, so for the first time in my life I’m a diesel trucker. This workhorse 2011 F-250 can’t tell a steep mountain road from level land, even though it’s towing 6 tons of fifth wheel. I’m pretty sure it could pull a bigger plow than the John Deere A I learned to drive on 60 years ago. I’m still marveling at how it lets me climb any mountain now and enjoy the scenery without worrying about whether or not I can make it over the next ridgeline without redlining some critical engine or transmission function. It does that with 30 per cent better fuel mileage than my half-ton gasser towing 2.5 tons of travel trailer. There is one new thing to watch out for: overpasses, tunnels, and overhanging branches in campgrounds. So my co-pilot has added a new checklist reminder in addition to “swing wide.” “Look up!”

The new fifth wheel is made by the same folks who made our travel trailer—Warren Buffet’s Forest River, Inc. He earned our continued business with that little entry lever white-walled throwaway that never let us down in some of the remotest places in America. The new palace on wheels is called a Sabre and I am as passionately in love with that inanimate object as I was the swept-wing supersonic version I went to war in—an F-100 Super Sabre.

God is so good to this unworthy sinner and I’ll try to regularly remind you, dear reader.

A Magnificent Memorial Weekend Venue

What a magnificent Memorial Weekend venue: Sequoia NP in the Sierra Nevada mountains of CA! There is more awesome beauty here than just the world’s biggest trees—actually the world’s biggest living things. Number one on the tree list is the General Sherman, a Sequoia 31.5 feet in diameter at the base and 275 feet tall. A couple of those behemoths fell well over a century ago and they decompose so very slowly that they carved a road tunnel through it which we drove through. Another one, hollowed out by an ancient fire (the two foot thick bark is very nearly fireproof) was converted to a saloon for19th century tourists and later used as a horse barn by the early park rangers.

The Marble Fork of the Kaweah River roars thru our backyard in Potwisha Campground, about 15 miles, a dozen 10-mph switchbacks and 4000 feet msl down the mountainside. In fact sometimes our portable home, and the ground on which it stands, trembles from the roaring force of that whitewater. And it does a wonderful job of muffling the happy shrieks of two families of ankle-biters across the street who are enjoying this paradise at least as much as we are.

Acres and acres of Elegant Madia
and a few dozen other varieties and colors

The wildflowers here (between 2000 and 7000 feet msl) are more brilliant and abundant than anywhere we have been in California. And blooming trees!

California Buckeyes blooming, near and far

California Buckeyes with 8-inch-long tapered tubular clusters of white blooms are a heavenly feast for the eyes and the olfactory nerves. Flannel bush trees (yes, its a tree but its proper name is bush) have a deep yellow bloom shaped like dogwood blossoms that provide divine accents amongst the multiple shades of green on the mountainsides.

Flannel Bush blossoms and buds

We have not seen the variety of birds that we have elsewhere, but the ones we have seen are the most beautiful and (apparently) the happiest, from the sound of things—Western Tanagers, Acorn Woodpeckers, Black-headed Grosbeaks, Bullock’s Orioles, Red-shouldered Hawks.

A truly awesome landmark that loses out to the uniqueness of the giant Sequoias when visitors tell their tales is Moro Rock, towering over the Kaweah River valley and the snaking road up to the giant Sequoias. We arrived well ahead of the holiday weekend and climbed to the very top of that rock, 4000 feet above the valley floor and 6000 above the ocean. A long ago thoughtful park superintendent ordered steps cut into the rock—360 of them—and handrails provided, and it was still a bit scary, but we had it all to ourselves early one morning. My-oh-my, such breath-taking views! The whole earth is full of His glory (Isa. 6:3b).

Moro Rock above the Kaweah River

A closer view

Karen atop the Moro Rock.
On Christ the solid rock she stands.

The High Sierra to the east from Moro Rock

View of the valley (west)
where we are camped from Moro Rock

Karen waving from the top of Moro Rock

Our Sovereign God Still Reigns

Last Sunday morning, in a campground outside Yosemite NP, we awoke in the predawn twilight to the sound of gunfire immediately overhead. A late season, unexpected super soggy snow fluttered down in silver-dollar-sized wafers on the newly leafed out deciduous trees surrounding our portable abode. The battlefield sounds of breaking tree limbs were followed by the swoosh of limbs brushing the sides of our trailer on their way to the ground, or worse, our whole little house shuddering as branches hit the roof. I hurriedly dressed and climbed upon the roof to clear it of limbs and check for damage and to grab drooping snow-laden tree branches still attached to shake the snow off them—and on to me—before the weight could break them. Miraculously, there was no damage to our RV and I did not slip off the roof.

Five days earlier, in a lakeside campground a little further down this Sierra Nevada mountainside, we sat out a short violent afternoon rainstorm, watching through our dinette window as driving rain fell nearly horizontally. A 25-foot tall oak tree about six feet from our window blew down before our eyes. Had it fallen another 120 degrees clockwise, we would have been homeless and perhaps hurting. Add all this to our experience in the Mojave a few weeks, where we endured a night of rocking and rolling and prayer without ceasing in turbulent winds in excess of 50 knots (they felt worse—I’m guessing), and you might say California has not been kind to these two RV’ers. Or you could say that our sovereign God still reigns and you would share my conviction!

Actually we feel blessed. We had three sunny and high 60’s days in magnificent Yosemite NP, where it snowed two days before and two days after we were there. We have fallen in love with the Sierra Nevada Mountains even though, as Coloradans, we are mighty hard to please when it comes to purple mountain majesty. The last two days we’ve been waiting out snowfall up in Sequoia NP, biding our time in a lovely COE campsite at Horseshoe Bend CG on the banks of Lake Kaweah. It is so easy to wait on the Lord when you have no deadlines! (A strong internet signal is also helpful.) With a sunny and high 60 degree day today in Sequoia NP, and the same forecast for two more days, we’re pulling up stakes and towing our home up to the banks of the roaring Kaweah River inside the park. It will be several miles beyond the nearest internet signal, but our Lord will make his presence known there among the lush forest, rushing water, blooming Nolina (similar to yucca), gigantic 2000-year-old Sequoias and heart-palpitating snow-capped vistas of the Sierra Nevada’s. No one needs more than that. And if the weather man is wrong and it snows and/or blows while we are there, well, our sovereign God still reigns. The General Sherman Sequoia, earth’s largest tree and the star of the Park, has been withstanding the vicissitudes of onshore Pacific weather on the Sierra Nevada’s western slopes for 2,200 years, and it will stand not one minute more nor less than God wills. Neither will I.

If You Could Visit Just One National Park…

We’ve not seen all 55 national parks in 23 months of the Isaiah 6:3 Tour, but I think we’ve seen all the ones that folks rave about. And as far as we are concerned, Yosemite NP takes first place by a wide margin, even considering the crowds of people you have to deal with. If you cannot see the face of God at every point of the compass in the Yosemite Valley, which is the heart (and only flat spot) of the entire park deep in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California, then you are a desperately lost soul. It was impossible to get a reservation in the three campgrounds in the Valley, even though it is just short of the busy season, so we camped outside the park and commuted 50 wicked mountain miles one way for three days.

The Sierra Nevada’s got so much snow this winter that the waterfalls are flowing several times their usual spring flow. They do not look like falling water, they look like falling steam from afar, and from up close like millions of white phosphorous bomblets trailing white smoke. Some smaller falls totally vaporize before they reach the valley floor. Yosemite Falls, at 2,425 feet high, is the highest waterfall in North America and fifth highest waterfall in the world, and this spring it’s roaring like an F-100 flying low overhead.

The rocks are just as impressive as the waterfalls. El Capitan, rising 3,600 feet above the Merced River on the valley floor (4,000 feet msl) is the world’s largest monolith of exposed granite. Climbers come a from around the globe to challenge its imposing face. Half Dome, the other famous peak in the park, rises over a thousand feet higher than El Capitan. There’s also Sentinel Rock, with the seventh highest waterfall in the world—Sentinel Falls, and Bridal Veil Falls just below Cathedral Rocks. All these magnificent creations can be seen from the multiple points in the valley, many of them at the same time in a narrow valley that is only 14 miles in circumference. Just takes your breath away!

Shirt pocket digital cameras cannot begin to capture the splendor, but I’m going to post a few pics anyway. The God’s eye view of the valley below from the peak at Glacier Point is missing because the road to it won’t be cleared of snow till early July this year.

As Jesus’ disciple, Nathanial told his brother, “Come and see” for yourself. If you could visit just one national park in your life, make it this one. It must have been a Garden of Eden before mankind discovered it.  Come in the spring when the waterfalls are the most beautiful and beat the worst of the crowds. You’ll get a bonus of bountiful giant pink and white dogwood blooms and the new spring green of ancient oak behemoths amongst the even more ancient gigantic cedars, and 150 bird species celebrating spring will sing their hearts out for you. It’s a sanctifying experience.

Yosemite Falls

El Capitan

Bridal Veil Falls
and Merced River

Half Dome

“Tunnel Viewpoint”at western end of Yosemite Valley.
El Capitan on left, Half Dome at Center horizon,
Bridal Veil Falls below Cathedral Rocks at right.

Exuberantly blooming pink dogwood

The God Who Made Mt. Whitney Died For Me This Day

The God who made Mt. Whitney died for me this day two millennia ago, that this unworthy soul might spend eternity with him. What an awesome God, what an awesome mountain, what Amazing Grace. I think we’re going to sit here in the shadow of this highest mountain in the lower 48 states (14, 494’) —Tuttle Creek CG (BLM)—and ponder this view and that great truth for a week. No more important thought can run through the mind of man.

In the beginning was the Word [Christ], and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. (John 1:1-3). And he became a man and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth—the eyewitness account of one who knew him as well as any man (vs. 14). John saw Christ die in agony on the cross that first Good Friday, and heard his final words: It is finished, the work he came to do, to atone for the sins of those he loved so that they might glorify him and enjoy his company for ever. He did for sinners what we could not, would not do for ourselves. What amazing love! May such divine love fill your heart this Easter, and may his death and victorious resurrection engender a gratitude in your soul that is eternal.

Click on this link, then minimize that page while the audio continues and open the blog on a new page, enlarge the picture above of this majestic mountain and watch it as the hymn plays, and let this truth overwhelm your heart and soul with joy…and give thanks.

Lonesome 2-Lanes & Claustrophobic Canyon Hikes

This week we finally moved on from Joshua Tree NP after staying the limit allowed—two weeks. We’ve only done that in a handful of national parks in 22 months of the Isaiah 6:3 Tour, which is a measure of how much we loved it. While there we had one of the best birding days we’ve ever had at Big Morongo Canyon Preserve adjacent to the park, and right over a fault line that joins the San Andreas fault a few miles away. We saw thirty-some different species and 7 new ones on our third and final day hiking there. It sure helps when you have a savvy guide with sharp eyes and ears.

Then we headed north a hundred miles through the desert on a lonesome, see-forever two-lane road to the Mojave Desert National Preserve and The Hole in the Wall Campground. “Holes in the walls” would be more accurate. It’s called that because the mesa and canyon walls around the campground are perforated with holes that began as gas bubbles in lava that then got exposed by erosion. This morning we hiked through nearby Banshee Canyon, so named because when the wind blows through it the airflow over all those holes in the walls makes a howl like a banshee. It was not a hike for the faint of heart or the claustrophobic. In places the canyon walls were less than shoulder-width apart. In other places iron rings were hung from the walls to climb up through the most difficult passages. I’m proud to report this codger and his bride are still capable of such challenges.

The Mojave is high desert (our campsite is 4288 msl) so the nights are in the 40’s and the days in the 60’s or low 70’s—perfect, in my view. The night sky is dazzling in its detail and the Milky Way is mind-boggling. The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork (Psalm 19:1). Only the dim glow of Las Vegas lights above the northern horizon, 65 miles away as the night hawk flies, reminds us that there are other humans in the universe in the middle of the night. What a blissful place to spend the springtime after a Colorado winter!

The Bright Morning Star over Joshua Tree

I am…the bright morning star (Rev. 22:16).

I’m usually up long before any sign of dawn. It’s my favorite time of day, spent engrossed in God’s Word with a well-rested mind. But one day this week sloth overcame me and I took another turn on the pillow. It was a warm night parked up against some very large boulders in Joshua Tree NP, so we had slept with the bedroom window open and the night shade only half closed to allow the most delightful zephyr to waft across our sleeping bodies. When my eyes finally opened, the first thing I saw was the black eastern horizon, a rocky ridgeline covered with silhouettes of boulders, yucca and Joshua trees below a deep fluorescent blue sky. And in that sky, just above the peak of the ridgeline, was a single sparkling star, “the bright morning star.” To use a Biblical metaphor, it was the face of Jesus, and if there is a greater blessing with which to start the day I do not know it. Revelation 22: 16, the last chapter of God’s revelation to humankind, says, “I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you about these things for the churches, I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star.”

When we began our RV travels we named them the Isaiah 6:3 Tour because at every point of the compass in every place on this planet we’ve been we have seen God’s creative glory manifested. And every few days the glorious scenery changes. We’re blessed beyond our worthiness.

This is our second shot at Joshua Tree NP, the tree named by the Mormons, who thought it looked like Joshua with his arms upraised. Eight days ago it was 32 degrees at dawn in a different campground in this high desert, a bit below our comfort level. This morning, after a balmy respite eating fresh-picked strawberries, oranges, tangerines and grapefruit west of the Salton Sea, we returned to Joshua Tree and 64 degree nights and desert dandelions blanketing thousands of acres of desert. From a mountaintop overlook–Key’s View (5,185 feet MSL, a few miles west of our campsite–we reveled in a magnificent God’s eye view of the Salton Sea and Imperial Valley all the way to Palm Springs at the base of snow-topped San Jacinta Mountain. In the middle of the valley 5,000+ feet below was a gorge–the San Andreas fault–a vivid reminder that the God who created all this breath-taking beauty can destroy it, too.

The Book of Revelation ominously prophecies of such, but three times in the final verses of its final chapter Jesus declares, I am coming soon, and the bright morning star is his reminder. Just as this morning light of prophecy foretells the bright light of a new day, with attendant new mercies for God’s elect, it also “assures them of the light of the perfect day approaching” (Matthew Henry). And right after Jesus calls himself the bright morning star he issues the most amazing invitation: The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” That is, God the Holy Spirit and the whole church, in heaven and earth, say Come and share our happiness (Henry). All of that from a single star in the predawn sky that engenders the first thought in my mind on waking–my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is coming soon. Amazing grace.

As I lay there and watched and wondered and counted my blessings, the Master Artist turned off the morning star and an invisible hand painted the silhouette of a Joshua Tree against pink clouds and powder blue sky that exploded into orange  brilliance. Makes my day, my life, my eternal joy.

Striking Gold in California

Well, this and the warmth are what we came to SoCal for. We were too early at Joshua Tree NP–it was 32 degrees at night and only the Canterbury Bells, beautiful blue blossoms, and rare, were blooming here and there. So we eased on south to lower elevations and camped under two orange trees in the Imperial Valley, which provided shade, delicious fruit snacks, OJ, and the intoxicating aroma of orange blossoms, I don’t know any other fruit tree that has blossoms at the same time as its ripening fruit. Orange blossoms are my favorite aroma, just above new mown alfalfa hay and blooming lilacs.

Friday we struck gold in Anza Borrego State Park, California’s largest, just west of the Salton Sea and stretching within two miles of the Mexican border, where the wildflower blooms are peaking. They say it isn’t the best year ever, but it sure looked good to us. The following pictures were taken along Hellhole Canyon Trail. I think that refers to the 120 degree summer temps in this canyon. It was a delightful 50 degree less than that when we were there.

The desert is a desolate place most of the year, but when springtime comes the Master Artist creates a divine work of art, a visual smorgasbord of His glory that sends the spirits soaring. Over the last two centuries miners have dotted the desert with holes dug in solid rock, back-breaking work to accumulate a ton of rocks to be crushed and processed with chemicals, all for the fleeting enjoyment of perhaps an ounce of gold. We got to enjoy a whole desert full of gold, and every other color and variation, just for showing up. What a spectacularly vivid reminder that we, as children of the God of Creation, are heirs to an eternal joy that no one can take away.

These are a small sample of the desert flowers we saw, some no bigger than half a shirt button.

Desert Dandelion and Fremont Pincushion

Blooming Teddy Bear Cholla.  Looks cuddly, but if you pet it you’ll be picking spines out of your hands the rest of the day.

Chuparosa, a hummingbird favorite.  They get their beaks all the way to the bottom of these red 1-1.25 inch tubular flowers. (Can’t identify the white and blue flowers, but their sure add a divine artistic touch to this canvas.

Blooming Beaver Tail Cactus

Brittlebush, the predominant gold of this desert

Ocotillo, another hummingbird favorite.  This plant spends 90+% of its life looking like an ugly dead plant with nasty thorns, until the spring rains when it greens up and blooms for a few weeks.

A Glorious Reintroduction to the Isaiah 6:3 Tour

The land around the entrance to the park looks no different than the last 70 miles, the endless rolling grassland, still winter brown, of northern Arizona. About 15 miles in, however, fallen tree trunks litter the plain–petrified tree trunks, imported from God only knows where. Nearly all are broken into 3 to 8-foot sections, the breaks as clean as if made with a Divine chainsaw, or perhaps as if the trees petrified while upright and then fell over and shattered in segments. Actually the trees are thought to have washed in during a great flood…. Who knew?

Not a tree stands in the Petrified Forest National Park, one of the great and glorious mysteries of God’s creation. The park literature recites the standard “scientific- theory-presented-as-fact” that a few hundred million years ago the giant trees were growing near the equator, then moved north when the continents on this planet split apart, then washed to their current location in a flood, then got buried in silt, soaked in silica-laden ground water and petrified, then became exposed after eons of wind and erosion brought them to the surface. The hydraulic force of a flood powerful enough to move such a massive amount of enormous tree trunks can only be explained by the Genesis story.

The beauty of these petrified tree trunks is just beyond description. Likewise the colored layers of sediment exposed by erosion, both in the Park and the adjacent Painted Desert. All are a glorious reintroduction to the Isaiah 6:3 Tour: …the whole earth is full of His glory.

God was most gracious to give us a summer weather window to escape the Colorado winter after our final 7-month stint of caregiving, an exhausting, high stress, sleep-stealing ministry that we intend to spend the foreseeable future recuperating from. Already, in three days back on The Tour, my blood pressure is down 35 points.

Another timely aspect of God’s providence is the spring wildflower season in the California desert–Anzo Borrego SP, Joshua Tree NP, Mojave National Preserve, and Death Valley NP. We’re checking the desert wildflower reports online several times a day as we press westward at about 3 times our normal pace (90 miles per day for the first 21 months of the Isaiah Tour), trying to beat the unseasonal weather window slamming shut and not wanting to miss a day of the grandeur of the spring colors in the California desert.

It is so good to be back in the magnificent theater of God’s creation. Cruising down I-40, large sections of which are paved in black velvet, at a sedate 55 mph, everyone passes us without causing the slightest ripple in my pool of competitive juices. The Navajo Nation radio station plays oldies but goodies country music and only the tunes are understandable, which suits me fine. And we passed up a chance to get photographed with the famous girl in the flat bed Ford in Winslow, AZ. The girl who rides shotgun in my Ford is woman enough for me, has been for over 44 years now with no end in sight. I just don’t know how life could be any better this side of the river. Thank you, LORD.