Little Pine State Park, Waterville, Pennsylvania
Naphatali is a doe set free that bears beautiful fawns. ~ Genesis 49:21 ‘Naphtali the eloquent’ (son #6) Know what I pictured when I read this? The hippie movement! I know. Terrible, right? In Deuteronomy 33:23, Moses says that this tribe is “abounding with the favor of the LORD”. One bit of information I uncovered was that the original Naphatali area eventually ended up being part of Galilee, including Nazareth. I looked at maps, and I’m not sure about the Nazareth part, but it definitely contained Capernaum, where Jesus chose live during His ministry. Surely that fulfills Moses’ prophecy 1,600 years earlier! This tribe was blessed abundantly, however, they still failed to chase the Canaanites out of their portion of the Promised Land, and as a result, they assimilated with the pagans; a condition Paul is still warning about in II Corinthians 6, when he tells believers not to be ‘yoked together’ with unbelievers, because if you have the Holy Spirit living within You, You are the temple of the Living God. This by no means says that we shouldn’t associate with unbelievers, elsewise how would the lost know Him? Being yoked means tied together, so that your movements match – like oxen, working together in a way that makes them move as one, and unfortunately, it’s usually the unbeliever that turns the believer. Just look at our world today. The world twists God’s Truth around by claiming that Christians are unloving and hateful, and that anything we deny as the world’s truth is wrong. We cannot be yoked to the ideas that all these things we’re seeing now – anything from homosexuality and changing our identity, to erasing our nation’s history – are perfectly fine (or not, as the case may be) and if we don’t agree, then we’re in danger of being persecuted in a most hateful way. Is this why Naphtali assimilated? Have you allowed yourself to become yoked to the ideas of the world? Paul admonishes us in Romans 1:32, that we sin even if we approve of others’ sin. Do you, as a believer, agree with the world’s view of things?
By the way, the boundaries for each tribe were set up when, “Joshua then cast lots for them in Shiloh, in the presence of the LORD, and there he distributed the land to the Israelites according to their tribal divisions.” ~ Joshua 18:10
It was supposed to rain again this afternoon, so we left early this morning, in search of some mountainous adventure on the State Park’s Panther Run Trail.
It was a nice walk in the Park – at first. There were a few hills and some narrow sections, as we hiked through the lovely wooded mountainside. Little did we know that it was preparing us for one of the most difficult sections of trial we’ve ever encountered. Or maybe it’s just because we’re older and not in shape for mountains?
We’ve done miles and miles and miles of walking the asphalt jungles along our nation’s eastern shores this summer, but mountain climbing hasn’t been on our agenda for quite some time.
I’m here to tell you that the steep part of our ascent was so steep, my nose was almost touching the ground in front of me! How’d I do it? Not by remembering ‘The Little Engine That Could’. This time, I told myself over and over, “I’m training for Alaska!”. There’s no better motivation than that!
What does that mean? Well, it all started with Blaine’s paternal grandmother, Pearl. She had this brilliant idea to take her three children and their spouses on an Alaskan cruise. Nice, huh? Well, then I had one of my many moments of opening my mouth and voicing a tongue-in-cheek opinion that my in-laws should do the same for us. Lo and behold, they did! For their 50th wedding anniversary in 2005. So, now the ‘burden’ has been passed on to us, and we’ve promised to take our sons and spouses on that cruise for our 50th, which is coming up in six years. We can’t wait! But there will be trails to hike as well as cruise food to eat. I think we’ve got the food training down pat, but it seems the mountain climbing will need a bit more work. 😊
If you look, you can see the trail continuing up the mountain in front of him.
When all was said and done, and we made it to the plateau, we determined that we wouldn’t be able to go back the way we’d come, so we continued on until the end of the out-and-back seven mile trail, and then walked the road for a mile or so to where we’d left the Jeep.
Not only is it old and worn, but it was covered with wire mesh!
Very difficult to read!
How he managed to avoid being crushed by Blaine’s boot is anyone’s guess.
I’m extremely happy to report that things didn’t ache during the climb – up or down the mountain! Five years ago, Blaine’s knees would’ve been screaming during the descent, and my thighs would’ve practically refused to continue going up. I’m actually not certain we could’ve managed this trail. We’re sooo very grateful to be in better shape than when we began these little adventures!
And, lest I forget, Blaine also got a good workout for his arms today too, as there were many webs across the trail. He spent about as much time swinging his walking stick around, as he did leaning on it. All to protect his sweetheart from having to deal with them. 😊
After we got home, we discovered, tiny little sparrows were thrilled at their discovery!
As we were sitting around early evening, Blaine excitedly announced we had a bear! We both jumped up, and stepped outside and there it was! Wandering right through the campground not 20 yards (distance??) from our site! Sooooo exciting!! We weren’t dancing, but we were grinning from ear to ear!
He was actually much closer when first spotted, but it took a few seconds to grab Blaine’s phone.
Tomorrow, we bike. It’s supposed to be a very scenic “mostly flat” trail. Hopefully it’s not like the last ride Blaine talked me into. 😊