Some lessons are easier to recognize when the trail grows quiet.
We arrived at the Mount of the Holy Cross trailhead late Thursday morning with one immediate goal: reach East Cross Creek early enough to claim a campsite.
Only ten designated campsites are available along this section of the East Cross Creek Trail, and they are first come, first served. We assumed they would fill quickly as the day continued, so we shouldered our packs and started hiking up a steady ascent.
Our destination was campsite number three, a little more than three miles from the trailhead. The first part of the hike climbs more than 1,300 feet in approximately 1.7 miles to Halfmoon Pass. It is the kind of beginning that makes you immediately aware of everything you decided to carry.
The trail rises through spruce and fir before approaching timberline. With every switchback, the landscape opens a little more. Then, upon cresting Halfmoon Pass, the trail reveals what has been waiting on the other side.
Mount of the Holy Cross rises powerfully across the valley.
For a moment, the effort of the climb disappears beneath the view. The mountain seems both close and impossibly large. Below the pass, the trail descends toward East Cross Creek and the designated campsites. We still had elevation to lose and miles to walk, but standing at the pass and seeing the rugged mountain for the first time made the journey feel worth taking.
Purple flowers and an exhausted hiker
About two miles into the hike, Lynlee noticed some beautiful purple wildflowers beside the trail. Mountains filled the background, so naturally she stopped to take a photograph.
As she was framing the picture, a young man came toward us from the direction of the mountain. He appeared to be in his twenties, and he looked completely exhausted.
He stopped to rest near the flowers. Lynlee jokingly asked him to move outside her camera shot, and that small exchange opened the door to a more meaningful conversation.
His name was Braden.
We learned that Mount of the Holy Cross was his first fourteener. He had started hiking at two o’clock that morning. It was now around 12:30 in the afternoon, which meant he had already been on the trail for more than ten hours.
Braden told us that he was running on “E.”
He had spent about an hour and a half on the summit, hoping the rest would restore some of his energy. It had not helped as much as he expected. He was worn out and still had approximately two miles remaining, although most of those miles were thankfully downhill.
We congratulated him on reaching the summit and completing his first fourteener. We offered him food and tried to encourage him for the remaining distance.
Then his exhaustion gave way to an enormous smile.
What he carried up the mountain
Without prompting, Braden told us that the hike was especially meaningful because he had recently been saved and baptized. He wanted Mount of the Holy Cross to be his first fourteener because of its name and what it represented to him.
Then he told us that he had carried his Bible all the way to the summit.
He had packed it through the darkness, carried it over Halfmoon Pass, descended into the valley, climbed the mountain, and brought it with him to more than 14,000 feet. At the summit, he opened it and spent time with the Lord.
The rest had not restored his tired legs, but sharing with us what had happened in his life with the Lord, why he had come on this hike and what had happened in his heart on the summit felt like a renewing of the soul. We were all smiles and joy.
When Lynlee and I told him that we were followers of Christ too, the encounter became even more meaningful for all of us. For a few minutes, three believers who had never met stood together on a mountain trail encouraging one another, bothers and sisters in God's family.
Braden was exhausted, but his excitement about Jesus was impossible to miss.
He had to tell us.
He had to climb that particular mountain. He had to carry his Bible. He had to spend time with the Lord at the summit. And when he met two strangers along the trail, he had to share what Jesus had done in his life. He opened his mouth and proclaimed the gospel and the Holy Spirit was working.
The enthusiasm of a new beginning
Looking back, I do not remember Braden primarily as the exhausted hiker we first saw coming down the trail. I remember his smile when he began talking about Jesus.
There was something wonderfully uncomplicated about his enthusiasm. His relationship with Christ was new, and the reality of what had happened to him still felt astonishing to him. He was not embarrassed by it. He had not learned to speak about his faith cautiously or disguise his excitement just in case it would not be welcomed by a stranger. He was bold. He was sincere. Jesus had changed his life, and he wanted people to know.
Psalm 66:16 captures that spirit:
“Come and listen, all who fear God, and I will tell what he has done for me.”
Braden did not need a platform, a prepared testimony, or a perfect opportunity. He simply recognized two people standing beside a trail and told us what the Lord had done for him. His body was depleted, but his heart was full.Lynlee's final words after I told Braden, "We will see you again," were, "Keep walking in the faith." Braden said, "I will. You keep walking too."
Braden had almost nothing left physically, yet he still possessed enough spiritual enthusiasm to encourage Lynlee and me. We had stopped to photograph wildflowers, but the moment we carried away was a picture of something else: the unmistakable joy of a person who knew he had been rescued by Jesus. A beautiful sense of forever family. Mutual encouragement, new faith and seasoned faith.
What I carried away
Lynlee and I continued toward campsite number three. The trail descended from the pass toward East Cross Creek, with Mount of the Holy Cross rising above the valley.
We kept thinking about Braden, even talking about the encounter. I found myself praying for more young people to meet Jesus as he had—not merely to become familiar with Christianity, but to be genuinely transformed by Christ. I want them to experience a faith so real that they have to tell someone, a gratitude so deep that it changes where they go and what they carry.
I also found myself examining my own heart. I want to liberally express my gratitude for His grace over so many years of my life. I want to speak readily and without caution about what Jesus has done in my life this last week and the last several decades. I want to be as eager to tell my story now as I was when the wonder of salvation first became clear almost fifty years ago. Encountering Braden reminded me that we need each other, those younger in the faith and those older in the faith. We both have stories we are telling about meeting each other on Mount of the Holy Cross, stories about Jesus and the life He alone gives.
He reminded me that the gospel is still astonishing.
We began that day hoping to find an available campsite. The Lord gave us something more—a brief encounter on the trail that renewed our confidence in the transforming power of Jesus. Jesus is working in the next generation and Lynlee and I want to be a a part of what God is doing.
Some trail lessons are discovered through miles of quiet reflection. Others come walking toward you, exhausted and smiling, unable to keep the good news to themselves.
