The Pilgrimage — Delacy A. Andrews Jr.

Imagine for a moment that you are living in a different time, a different place. You are a Jew during the period of the Old Testament, and you live far away from the Promised Land. Your neighbors worship idols and hold you in contempt. You long to live justly and to walk in peace, but those who surround you speak lies and make war. Is there any refuge for one who believes in Jehovah, yet lives in a foreign land? Josiah was such a man, a shepherd in the land of Kedar. Tragedy has struck his family, causing him to cry out with the psalmist, "Woe is me, that I sojourn in Meshech, that I dwell in the tents of Kedar! My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace. I am for peace: but when I speak, they are for war." (Psalm 120:5-7). Is there respite for the singer of that psalm? Yes, that rest is found at the end of a pilgrimage-a journey that leads him to the House of God. Come with the shepherd as we make the pilgrimage together.