June 6, 2026
There are moments in the wilderness that stay with you long after you’ve left the mountain. Moments that are difficult to explain because they feel less like an experience and more like an encounter.
Last summer, I was solo hiking Wilson Peak after doing the El Diente-Mt Wilson traverse the day before. I started at 2:00am hiking higher and higher into the darkness of the Colorado mountains. It was around 4:00 in the morning when I reached the saddle and layed on my pack and looked up.
And above me was a sky unlike anything I had ever seen.
A meteor shower was unfolding overhead. Every few minutes another streak of light would tear across the heavens. The Milky Way stretched from horizon to horizon, brighter than I knew it could be.
Laying there, miles from the nearest city, person, and far above treeline, I felt incredibly small.
But for the first time in a long time, small didn’t feel insignificant.
It felt right.
In our daily lives, it’s easy to become consumed with our own plans, problems, ambitions, and distractions. We live surrounded by noise. Notifications, schedules, deadlines, responsibilities. Every day pulls our attention in a hundred different directions.
Yet on that mountainside, there was none of that.
Just silence.
Just creation.
Just the realization that I was laying underneath the work of a Creator whose power and majesty far exceed anything I could comprehend.
Psalm 19:1 says:
“The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.”
I had read that verse countless times before, but laying under that sky, it felt more true then anything this Earth has to offer.
The heavens truly were declaring His glory.
Every star, every mountain ridge, every meteor streaking across the darkness pointed toward something greater than itself. Creation was doing what it was designed to do: directing attention back to its Creator.
I don’t remember praying any elaborate prayers that morning.
In fact, I remember mostly being quiet.
Sometimes the most appropriate response to God’s greatness is simply awe.
Sometimes worship looks less like speaking and more like listening.
As the horizon slowly began to glow and the first light of dawn touched the surrounding peaks, I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude. Gratitude for the mountains. Gratitude for the opportunity to explore them. Gratitude for a God who not only created such beauty but invites us into a relationship with Him.
The wilderness has always been a place where God meets us, His people.
Moses encountered God on a mountain.
Elijah heard His voice in the wilderness.
Jesus often withdrew to lonely places to pray.
Perhaps that is why so many of us feel drawn to wild places. Not because God is absent elsewhere, but because the wilderness removes many of the distractions that keep us from focusing on him.
The mountains cannot save us.
The stars cannot satisfy us.
But both can remind us of the One who can.
That morning above 13,000 feet, under a sky full of stars, I was reminded of a simple truth:
Creation is magnificent because it reflects the glory of an even greater Creator.
And sometimes all it takes to see it is stepping away from the noise and into the wilderness.
Born and raised in Colorado Springs CO. I began my relationship with Jesus very young but didn’t begin to fully know him and seek his presence until I was mid teens. Since then I have grown so much in my faith through the outdoors and adventure and want to make the same experiences I have had possible for others.
