From time to time I think of living in the woods, or on the road away from the clamor and noise of the city. I cherish the idea of living a simple life, unencumbered by the stresses of appointments, stores, and traffic.

I look forward to a time when our living could just be traveling down the road in an RV and looking for the next place to park and staying there for a while. Maybe a few other wandering folk like us could meet and share the time together, or better yet, there among the cottonwoods and streams, we’d find a place to paint or read.

We’d finish our coffee and carry our canvases to that special place nearby. The sun would have already come up, but the glistening light would spread its wings across the tree tops. The birds would sing their songs and welcome us. A scampering squirrel or two, would run in front of us, and quickly find their hideaway in the treetops above.

I long to shed my skin of many of my belongings; furniture and lamp stands have their place, as do pots and pans. But sometimes it’s best to leave them all behind, taking only what you need for the journey ahead.

The children of Israel carried their belongings with them as they left the captivity of Egypt. They crossed the sea with the arm of the LORD, and found a place in the wilderness. For many years they encamped beside the mountain of the LORD, and were given manna from above.

The city can’t ultimately feed us, with its programs and lights. Perhaps the wandering gypsies knew this when they left India over a thousand years ago.

We have a plan to ultimately strike the road before us, and in time, our hope is that it will happen. Then that segment of time what some call the golden years will come, but not in ultimate comfort or splendor, but just in freedom and simplicity.

I’d reminisce about the years before when we lived in the city. There were friendships and neighbors who were there beside us, but the daily grind of existence had taken its toll. There were always bills to pay and appointments to meet. The floors were always dusty, and the laundry was never finished. It was a season, a time set apart for the many who have etched out a living in this daily grind of existence.

We all long for a better life, or perhaps just a change. We look for freedom and wings to leave this sometimes monotonous life of ours at times.

To be sure, there is always joy and happiness to be found, no matter what our lives may entail. It’s not the place we live or the friends we keep, that fulfills us ultimately. We are nothing without the One above; for He alone can fill us and give us peace.

Thoreau lived in the woods a century and a half ago. He found solace amid the pond and trees. He found simplicity and peace but perhaps not the final truth. Our search for these things lies beyond the trees and hills. It is not to be found in the sounds of the Robin or the babbling brook.

“I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth,” Psalm 121:1-2.

We don’t worship nature, but it can provide the impetus, a spring board, to usher us into the presence of the LORD himself. We are not unlike those who transcend nature, but it is not a universal mind or force we find – we find the LORD himself, not the collective consciousness that some would seek.

The time will come when many will have left the cities. They will find pockets of people like unto themselves, who sought to find protection and nourishment from the devastation that is coming.

We all look to the walls of the New Jerusalem whose glittering stones and gates will welcome us one day. But until then we travel, we break bread with some, and find solace beside the waters that flow.

 

Selah,
~ Stephen Hanson

---

Stephen Hanson of In His Truth Ministries came to the LORD is a special way in 1975 and has prophesied regularly since. In these end-time birthing pangs we are reminded that judgment must first begin with the household of God. Will we be prepared and ready?

Back to Top