Man in the Orange Hat

 

"Man in the Orange Hat" will be the title of this blog which will be a series of reflections on my journey along the Pennine Way.

I grew up in Bolton, and whilst Bolton is not directly ON the Pennine Way, it is overshadowed by the West Pennines - and the "West Pennine Way" snakes around places I was very familiar with as a boy - Jumbles Reservoir, Winter Hill, Rivington Pike, and Darwen Tower.  I have wanted to walk the Pennine Way for a very long time.  Thanks to the URC and our decennial three month Sabbatical, I now have the time and space to do it.

As well as simply wanting to do it - I am also taking it as a time and space to explore the set of Psalms known as the "Psalms of Ascent" - the psalms sung by the people of Israel as they journeyed to Jerusalem for festivals.  The most famous of these is Psalm 121 which begins:

I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills.  From whence cometh my salvation? 

 Actually, that's NOT quite what the King James Version says.  The KJV has a full stop rather than a question mark.  I've taken a iberty!  The shift toward punctuating verse 1 as a question rather than a statement emerged in modern English Bible scholarship, especially in the 20th century. Scholars studying the Hebrew syntax noticed that the second part of the verse in Hebrew could also be read as a question (Hebrew: מֵאַיִן יָבֹא עֶזְרִי, me’ayin yavo ezri? — literally: “from where will my help come?”). This reading aligns with the psalm's poetic structure of lament and reassurance.

It’s a small thing, really—a question mark where once there was a full stop. And yet it opens a window.  Once, the hills seemed to stand themselves as sentinels of help—a place of strength, a promise of protection. People saw the hills as places of refuge from enemies, a vantage point from which to see danger coming, even a home for sacred shrines or altars. But now the question mark gently reminds us: it’s not the hills themselves that save us.

The hills lift our gaze. They remind us of the One who formed them, whose hands carved them. It is their creator who is our help, our salvation. Our trust is not in the hills but in the Maker of the hills—the One who watches over us, who neither slumbers nor sleeps.

So let the question mark remain, a gentle nudge to lift our eyes higher still. Beyond the hills. Beyond our own strength. To the One who made heaven and earth, who is ever our help and our salvation.

Lord of the hills and the valleys,
As I set out tomorrow to walk the Pennine Way,
Lift my eyes beyond the ridges and the clouds,
To the One who made them.
Remind me that it is not the hills themselves that sustain me,
But Your steady hand, Your constant presence.
Guide my steps, keep me safe, and fill my heart with the wonder of Your creation.
Be my help and my salvation, every step of the way.
Amen.