I’m currently reading a book titled Pilgrimage: My Journey To A Deeper Faith In The Land Where Jesus Walked, by Lynn Austin. I’m reading this because Mr Hot Stuff and I are going on a Holy Lands study tour this summer, and I want to be more educated about what we will experience while we are there. Hopefully this will help me also get more out of it also.
Although the author and I are from different branches of Christianity, her experiences are teaching me more about the historic lands of Israel than I’ve ever been aware of before, and it gives me a better understanding of the historical order of biblical events, and how the geography impacts the way the events unfold. Her book is written as she toured the Holy Lands, and she shares, not only about her spiritual insights, but also about her physical challenges, and she shows how the physical impacted her spiritual experiences and growth. Because of her writing, I have a better understanding of what our tour guide means when he tells us that we need to be physically prepared to endure this tour, so that we will not be distracted by exhaustion or injury.
I love the way Lynn personalizes the scriptures and demonstrates how they work in her daily life. I am strengthened in my faith in Jesus Christ because she is so willing to be open about the process of introspection that she went through as she toured the Holy Lands.
The thing that has caught me off guard is that when I started reading this book, it didn’t register to me that I would be reading about her experiences of visiting the holy sites of the Savior’s final week during the week before Easter Sunday. As I read her words and the words of the Bible, I am getting a bigger perspective on what that week may have meant to Jesus, and I have a deeper sense of gratitude for what He did for us, for what he did for me. What amazing power is found in the love of God!
“10 The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. 11 I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.”
John 10:10–11
https://www.lds.org/scriptures/nt/john/10?verse=10-11&lang=eng#p10
Weathering The Journey 
Wonderful! And you’ve touched on a subject I’ve been thinking of for a while now (a few years, actually). it’s this: there are Christians outside of the LDS faith who have also been inspired with truths that we who are LDS can benefit from.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Absolutely! In fact I find that sometimes I learn certain things better when they are not said with what I call the “Mormon lexicon.” Somehow hearing the same principles spoken with a different syntax helps open my eyes and ears to new observations. The book, “The Circle Maker,” by Mark Batterson changed the way I pray and perceive the answers to my prayers. I think that the more we are willing to listen and learn from people from all belief systems, the richer our own worship can become. Thank you for commenting!
LikeLike