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You'll never walk alone
Monday 21st July 2025
A few years ago, Journeying leader Paul Heppleston did some really wild walking alone in Greenland; “I went there asking God to be with me in this strange and possibly dangerous landscape, praying that I would always be totally open to whatever he wanted to show me of his wonder.”
Paul writes… There are three occasions that remain firmly in my memory from my time in West Greenland.
The shapes
The first occasion God spoke was when I was on a long coastal walk, making my way along a recognised trail which ran from the very remote village where I was staying, southwards to the nearest town. I went at my own pace, alone. It was a strange area to me and I didn’t know of any possible, unexpected dangers ahead. The trail was up and down and at one point I looked southward to the next valley from my hilltop position and saw an arrangement of plants and rocks a quarter of a mile away in the valley below that formed a shape. There were no other recognisable shapes around, for the landscape was rough hill and coast with glacial rocks and ice all around. Why was it there? What did it represent?
The nice thing about this kind of wandering is that you can stop. So I stopped and looked and couldn’t believe what I saw; it was, so clearly, a cross - about 30 metres long. This was the first occasion in West Greenland when God was speaking to me very clearly. It was a natural rock formation, but God was giving me ‘new-view’ eyes to see the cross shape and to know therefore that I was ‘on the right track’ and accompanied - God saying again “I’m here, all the time; do not fear”.
The dots
That sensitised me to God’s voice for the rest of my time in Oqaatsut. So the second occasion was when I was walking on that same trail two days later; it was marked with large orange dots painted on rocks beside the trail, useful especially if the path was very indistinct, like a sheep track in Britain. The dots are painted on both sides of the rock so that you can see them from whichever direction you were walking. I wandered off track before lunch to visit a small bay I could see which had lots of ice floes pushed in from the Davis Strait. I wanted to actually touch the ice, to feel that I was, yes, truly in the Arctic.
After lunch I gazed out to the west dreaming that I could see Baffin Land in Arctic Canada. I couldn’t (too far!) so I started back towards the trail; but I couldn’t find it. I didn’t know what direction to move at all.
So I stopped and looked and thought and prayed and weighed up options and moved on 50 metres, but always looking back towards my Ice-Bay to get my bearings. And eventually what did I see? An orange dot. Once again God was saying “I’m still here; I’m not going to leave you. Just keep seeing me, get your eyes trained in my way, on my wavelength”.
So I now know that when things seem difficult and I feel lost in some way all I need to do is put on my God-seeing glasses, switch my mind to God’s wavelength and look out for him. He’ll be there, visible or audible through the words of a friend or even a stranger. And also in orange dots showing me the way to live, the way to Him.
The shadows
For a third time God ‘spoke to me’ in the same area. About an hour out from my dwelling place I reached a 100m cliff up which I had to climb to get to the plateau at the top - the starting point for the next section of my Big Walk. It wasn’t rock climbing stuff, just scrambling with hands and knees and feet up past big and little boulders and amongst vegetation of the beginnings of an Arctic autumn. I was facing this cliff, looking at it from 75 metres away and seeing that it was in the shadow of the sun. The day was yet early and the sun hadn’t yet spilled over the top of the cliff. So there was a deep shadow which would only be dispelled when the eastern sun broached the top edge and began to shine onto this west-facing rock face. But here was the oddity - waiting for that light to appear would in fact mean that I was dazzled; a great feeling but not when you are climbing a cliff or driving up a hill with the sun shining down the road. So the result was that I was only able to scale this rocky cliff face because it was in the shade. The way ahead was more clearly evident when I was in shadow.
God’s Presence is with us, particularly in the shadows of life. It’s all a matter of being aware, being aware of God in the very ordinary, in the unexpected.
Conclusion
It’s so simple really - summarised in these four statements:
God in all things.
God in all places.
God in all happenings.
God in all people.
All you need to do is tweak your mindset and your eyes a bit and God will do the rest.