Lessons from the Wild
Comedian Sheng Wang released a comedy special on Netflix titled Purple. I watched it recently and stumbled into a section that felt pointed (to me)—his bit on backpacking. There is something both humorous and almost embarrassing about the white middle class impulse to go backpacking. It was easy to walk away and wonder to myself: Why do it, really?
Some of you may know I spent the last week backpacking with two of my kids in the Appalachian Mountains. I’m drawn to the mountains, to the wild. I’m certain this is partly because I grew up there, in the mountains and wilds of Alaska. But I’m drawn there for other reasons too.
I am convinced that we humans are simple creatures at heart; we need far less than we think we do. There is something liberating about paring down our life to what we can carry, and realizing it is enough. The wild can teach us about simplicity, which is freedom.
The wild is a place of attention. On our hike, we met an older gentleman who was 600 miles into the Appalachian Trail. While talking over dinner, we asked him about his experience. He said the wild was a place that cultivated attention. Once or twice a day, he said, something would capture him: the hieroglyphic patterns of bark beetles on the trunk of a dead tree, a flower, a view from the top of a mountain. The wild can teach us to pay more careful attention.
The wild is also difficult. Our most recent foray began with a 10 mile day, starting at the James river and climbing 2,500 feet onto the spine of the mountains. It was 90 degrees when we started, our packs were 32 pounds, and we didn’t bring nearly enough water. I wondered if my quads were going to seize up, wondered if we were going to make it to the next water source. It was hard. But the hard is a chance to learn endurance. And if the Scriptures are right, the fruit of endurance is hope (suffering → endurance → character → hope...see Romans 5).
Finally, the wild is a place of encounter. This has always been true. Think of Moses out in the hinterlands, meeting God in a burning bush. Think Elijah on the mountain, after the wind, after the earthquake, after the fire, meeting God in the sound of silence. Think of John the Baptist. Think of Jesus.
Martin Shaw wrote a piece in December of 2024 titled And Where The Desert? It is his reflection on the place of the desert within Christian spirituality. His piece reflects on the life of St. Anthony, considered the father of the desert fathers and mothers. In it he says this:
“Anthony had left secular life with nothing, he’d given some money to his younger sister and the rest to the poor. He was all in. With Christianity now above ground and legal, the early monastics could be seen as a push towards an alternative Christian culture. Something that remained lean, essential and awake.”
I think we need to enter the desert, the wild, in some real way and meet the God who encounters us there. Maybe the Spirit is calling to us to follow Anthony’s hunger towards a fatih that is lean, essential and awake.
So, as Shaw says, “...for most of us, I would counsel actual, literal encounters with forests, meadows, big untrammelled spaces. It’s no bad thing if it takes a day or two to get there. God gave us senses: a nose, eyes, mouth, hearts. Take that alertness with you, see where they can lead. I’m wary of the desert becoming a metaphor too swiftly.”
And.
The exterior wild is the beginning of a journey into the wildness of the interior. In the end, desert consciousness is a way of beholding the world, seeing through the eyes of Christ, falling into the mind of God. Our world needs more such saints.
I am prepared to choose that way, if it leads to a faith that is lean, essential and awake. Maybe we can travel together.