To Meet the Church Where It’s At

Colorado Trail Ministry, Part 1

Post Race Travels, Part 2

“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together”. – African Proverb (quoted by Drew Davidson; posted on the wall at Globe International’s headquarters )

It’s been a terrific adventure ministering to the outdoor community in Colorado! The next three blogs over the next month will be sharing all about this trip! The trip was a little over 2 weeks long, and this post focuses on the first 5 days on trail. Thank you again for your support and prayers. Furthermore, if you feel led to donate to help offset expenses related to this trip, feel free to venmo at @brett_explorer or PayPal at @navigatorBH. Also, I will be in the Boone area after August 15. Feel free to reach out, and I look forward to sharing more about what took place on the World Race and during this trip!

The plane took off from Florida (https://bretthaas.theworldrace.org/post/for-the-love-of-mountains-and-family) and touched down at Denver on a sunny July day. My friend that I met while in Alaska last summer, Paul, picked me up from the airport and took me to the house where we all gathered together to hike. Excitement filled the air. The trip leader, Unger, shook down our backpacks and thinned out what we did not need to backpack on the woods. It actually was quite comical, as we nitpicked through every item, trying to cut out weight where we could. The heaviest items in my pack were food and water. Fun times! A diverse group assembled, including a man planning to move to the Middle East, Unger (who does thru hiking ministry), two women who are part of the YWAM Yosemite crew, and a missionary counselor from Salem.

The next day, we all woke up to a tasty breakfast before starting on the trail. For some of the group, the destination was Durango, CO, a ~470 mile thru hike on the Colorado Trail. I planned to get off at Day 14 in order to fly to my World Race squad’s reunion in FL. We reached the Waterton Canyon parking area and started our grand adventure. During the first and second nights, three of us hung out with a group of hikers from Minnesota. It was a terrific time of sharing our beliefs and engaging them with the Gospel. However, the electrical storms were crazy out here! The second night literally had a fireball of lightning engulf the area. I was camped in the forested valley, where it was safe. However, a different part of our group camped on an exposed ridge 11 miles behind us, where lightning struck all around them. Thankfully everyone was ok.

Day 3 presented a bit of a challenge. The Minnesota group that I was hiking with wanted to get around 20 miles in today. They left early in the morning. However, my group wanted to wait for everyone to catch up (which made sense). Halfway through the day, we all regrouped, and we hiked 5 miles to a campsite further up the mountain. But by the end of the day, I could tell that we were facing pace and logistical issues. We are together as a church on the trail- seeking to make Christ’s name known. And we are called to walk this faith journey with Christ together- as a community.

I pondered this a lot since the World Race. The Race, similar to this trip, was done together in community. But with community comes brokenness, complexity, uncomfortability, and hard realities. Some of my previous blogs (https://bretthaas.theworldrace.org/post/when-the-world-race-gets-messy AND https://bretthaas.theworldrace.org/post/walking-through-the-wilderness) recount this. How do I walk with the church and open myself up to them- even as the hard side of community shows on the mission field? Many people, I heard, leave the field (or even their faith in God) as a result of difficult group/ church dynamics on the field. It’s a tough issue that has to be addressed.

On Day 4, I faced a hard decision- either to speed ahead to stay on schedule and catch the Minnesota group or to stay with my group, which was many miles behind them at this point. After talking this over with some of the group the night before, I decided to push forward. At first, it was smooth sailing. I was able to book it and make it through the open valley before storms began to hit. It’s interesting how we talk about spiritual storms and encountering God in them. But today, I faced a physical storm along with a spiritual one. Lightning, hail, and rain flashed around me as I trudged on. Near the end of my day, I was exhausted and cried out to the Lord. I began to miss the body of Christ but also began to weep. Some of the group/ organizational dynamics on the World Race caused some hardship, and the current situation on the Colorado Trail brought flashbacks of this. But God was there on trail, forcing me to confront this: “Will I love and walk with the church as a Christian towards the Great Commission- even if it means showing grace towards brokenness and sacrificing some of what I would hope to do?”. As I continued to surrender my path to the Lord, the thunderstorm ended and the sky opened back up.

I reached my campsite exhausted that night. But after setting my gear out to dry out the next day, I decided to wait for my group to catch up. Thankfully, one of them caught up to me around 10 am, and we began to hike. The views were gorgeous along this stretch to Kenosha Pass. In the afternoon, we made it to the Pass, where his girlfriend gave us amazing Gatorade and apples. She took us into Jefferson, CO, to resupply before going back out on trail. Unger and another friend from the group showed up, and we eventually hiked to the same camp a few miles down trail this evening. Day 5 was not a big mileage day, but was nice to camp together. The lesson that the Lord taught these first few days was hard but important- especially as I join Antioch Church in Boone, NC after all of this ends. That evening, a couple who is in the same career field as me (Geography / GIS) invited me to a campfire. We talked for hours as the sun began to set. As the flames kept us warm, I reflected on the healing the Lord accomplished while preparing for the adventures ahead..

“So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.” Ephesians 2: 19-22 ESV

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