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Journey and God’s song in the house of pilgrimage

Lynne Baab • Thursday August 21 2025

Journey and God’s song in the house of pilgrimage

When we moved to New Zealand in 2017 for me to take a job as a lecturer at the University of Otago, a friend gave me a card with her beautiful calligraphy of Psalm 119:54: “Your decrees are the theme of my song wherever I lodge” (NIV). I kept that card and used it as a bookmark for many years in New Zealand. I wanted to sing God’s song in that amazing and distant place where God had called me.

Three weeks ago, when I did a search for the word “pilgrimage” in the Bible, I found that same verse in a different translation: “Your statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage” (NKJV). The phrase, “house of my pilgrimage,” jumped out at me.On one level, the phrase acknowledges that on our trips and pilgrimages, God gives us the stability of places to lay our heads at night. On another level, the contrast within that phrase says something about our lives. “House” implies something stable and fixed, while “pilgrimage” indicates movement, travel, and change. “House of our pilgrimage” captures the unsettling reality that everyday lives have components of both stability and movement. God’s truth enables us to sing in both the stable and mobile aspects of our lives.

Viewing our lives as a journey can help us accept that change and movement are unavoidable. Actually going on a pilgrimage can help us grow in experiencing God’s presence on journeys.

I talked with four people who recently walked parts of the Camino de Santiago in Spain or Portugal. All of them found the experience profoundly moving. All of them talked about the immediacy of God’s provision for them.

One woman was longing for coffee, walked around a bend on the path, and saw a café. She perceived the café as God’s gift. For another, a tree with a bench appeared right when she was hoping for shade. She, too, saw this as God’s provision. One of my friends went into a café in pouring rain. He was worried about how to get to his next lodging place because the rain was making the path slippery and dangerous. A random conversation with people in the café resulted in a ride. He was awed by God’s care for him through that conversation. For one person, God provided bandages from another pilgrim. God used one of my friends to provide pills to balance another pilgrim’s electrolytes.

One woman described her awareness of God’s provision in giving her a variety of interesting and stimulating walking companions.

Another experienced the entire pilgrimage as God’s provision of silence in a life full of words and noise. She went on to talk about how her experiences of God’s provision encouraged her to trust God for more. “On my walk, I started to notice that God is actually around me all the time. I not only noticed my needs for prayer, but also the answers and the provision. As I noticed more of this presence, I found myself asking bolder things with more confidence that God will actually provide. I felt an embodied rest that my needs will be met.”

Adele Ahlberg Calhoun echoes these themes in describing her daughter’s pilgrimage:

“Each morning on the Camino my daughter offered herself to God and relied on God to provide a place to stay at the end of the day. Some days she walked alone. Some days she fell into step with others. The silence, the changing landscape, the unpredictable weather, the need to trust, all made space for noticing, listening, and reflection on how she had chosen to live her life back home. In the walking, God did something in her that she couldn’t do on her own.”[1]

My friend who got the ride on the rainy night has walked the Camino de Santiago three times, as well as pilgrimage paths in England and Japan. (See last week’s post for more about various pilgrimage routes.) He reflects, “You’re more vulnerable on a pilgrimage. Those experiences touch you when God comes through.” He said he feels sad that he simply doesn’t feel the need to trust God in the same way in his daily life. He loves the feeling of dependence he experiences on a pilgrimage.

Questions for reflection:

When and where have you experienced an intense feeling of dependence on God? Has the power of that experience influenced your daily life?

Think back on two or three moments when you noticed a direct provision from God. Thank God for those moments. Ask the Holy Spirit to show you how you have brought or could bring that awareness of God’s provision into your daily life.

What helps you sing God’s song in the stable and mobile moments of your life?

God who provides, open our eyes to see your provision in our daily journey of life and faith. Guide us into situations where we can grow in trusting you to provide for us. God who enables us to sing, open our hearts to praise you in all situations of our lives.

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Next week: Journey and wandering. Illustration by Dave Baab: Riddarholmen Church, Stockholm. For some people, visiting historic churches feels like a pilgrimage.

[1] Adele Ahlberg Calhoun, Spiritual Disciplines Handbook (InterVarsity Press, 2015), 69-70.



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