The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - A Harley Pilgrimage

Episode Date: January 6, 2017

Jeff Cavins introduces his new podcast and recounts the story of his 2016 Harley Pilgrimage. As he shares the challenges, dangers, and joys of traveling thousands of miles on his motorcycle with a group of Catholic men, he connects his experience to our everyday pilgrimage of faith.

Hey, I'm Jeff Kavins. How do you simplify your life? How do you study the Bible? All the way from motorcycle trips to raising kids, we're going to talk about the faith and life in general. It's the Jeff Kaven Show. And welcome to The Jeff Kaven Show. I'm Jeff Kavins.

Thank you for joining me. You know, as I travel the country, I meet thousands and thousands of people. And one of the things that has really struck me in our conversations is how much we have in common. You know, the common denominators, the things we're interested in, like simplifying our life and reading the Bible and raising our children. And it goes on and on. And I got to tell you, I drive around during the day. I'm in the course of everyday living, I come up with ideas or I hear something that really, really fascinates me. And I write it down and think, I'm going to make sure I share that in one of my talks coming up because I get to speak all over the country.

But so often I miss those, I forget to dig him up. And I just wanted a forum in which to talk to you about faith and how our faith fits into everyday living, you know, how we can bridge this gap between our faith and what we're doing at work and what we're doing at home. and truth be known that I'm interested in so many things life is interesting as you know and it's not all just studying the Bible I'm sitting in my office right now and I can look around I can see all kinds of hundreds and thousands of you know theology books and books on the Bible but there's a number of other things too that I'm interested in to catch my attention and I would like to talk about those a little bit a little bit too so I really appreciate you joining me you know I this first episode of the Jeff Kaven show, I'm going to talk about something that is probably

what you never suspected I would talk about. You probably thought, well, he's going to talk about the Bible, or he's going to talk about how to read the New Testament or whatever. We'll get to that in the future. And we're going to talk about a lot of theology and a lot of Bible issues, all the way from how to mark your Bible to how to interpret the Bible, to taking a look at particular passages and see how they fit into our everyday life. Those are all going to be very, very important. But today I want to talk about something that I know everyone is interested to some degree or another, and that is pilgrimage. And it's taking pilgrimage. It's a journey in life.

But my idea of pilgrimage is just a little bit different, a little bit different today, because I want to talk about motorcycles and pilgrimage. Now, before you think, well, I'm not into motorcycles, let me share with you that what we're going to do is we're going to go through a trip that I went on this August, this last August, with a number of of men from Canada and the United States, where we went on a 4,000-mile motorcycle ride from Minneapolis all the way up to Banff in Alberta and down through Montana, Glacier Park, and back through Wyoming, or back through Montana, and then South Dakota, and back to the Twin Cities. And it was what I learned along the way and the obstacles that we faced that really gave me the idea to share this opening show with you about a trip. about a trip you know some people like to fly some people like to take trains bus a lot of people like

to ride their car drive their car across the country and i've always had this fascination with the idea of just going out on the open road on an adventure maybe that's why i came up with the great adventure because i've always been fascinated with this idea of an of an adventure you know and my fascination with uh with motorcycles actually began not just a few years ago in fact Somebody asked me. I've got a Harley-Davidson-Roglite Ultra. It's a beautiful touring bike, and someone asked me a while ago, oh, did you have a midlife crisis?

No, I think I had a real interest quite some time ago. In fact, I was seven years old when I first got really interested in motorcycles, and I remember it very, very well. My mother was raised in Iowa, and so every year we would go down to Iowa as a family to visit grandma and grandpa and the cousins and uncles and aunts and everybody else. And I remember very, very vividly at seven years old, standing in front of my grandmother's house and my uncle Jim, who was about 10 years older than me, rode up on a triumph Bonneville motorcycle. I had never seen a motorcycle up close.

I had never known anybody who had a motorcycle, and suddenly my uncle drives up. You know, actually rides up is what we say in motorcycle language, not driving, but he rides up and parks the bike. and I was hooked. I looked at that bike and I looked at him and I, you know, I sat there, I wanted to touch it and he wouldn't let me because it was too hot and we talked for a while. And then he ended up leaving and I watched him go down the road. And I went over to my mother and I said, that's what I want. I want one of those. I want to go on a motorcycle ride. So growing up, I never quite got that out of my system. Have you ever had anything like that where, you know, you see something and think, oh, I'd like to do that. It could be any hobby.

It could be anything. And you start to think about it. It's kind of a fast. fascinating topic, isn't it? Why do we get interested in the things we are interested in? You know, what caught our attention? Why are you so into macromay? Why are you so into bowling? Why do you like sculpture? How come you like gardening so much? And your neighbor doesn't care at all about gardening. That kind of stuff fascinates me. Well, anyway, I was fascinated at that young age with the motorcycle. And all the time that I was growing up, I kept saying to my mom and dad, And when I turned 16, I'm going to buy a motorcycle. And you know what?

I did. All those years, I kept looking at motorcycles and went to go on a big trip on a motorcycle. And when I was 15 years old, I tried to get a job. And they told me I was too young. And I went to the city council and looked up some of the rules about people under 16 working. And I found out there was a loophole. So I went back to this business and told them that I could work certain hours. And they hired me.

And I saved my money. And at 16 years old, I bought a young. Omaha. And I rode that everywhere, absolutely everywhere. And that was the beginning of riding bikes for many years. And now I have something like 125,000 miles on motorcycles. So I've been fascinated with this all of my life. Well, one of the things I wanted to do was someday take a long, long trip on a motorcycle and kind of venture out. About a year ago, I was talking to my good friend Tom in the Twin Cities, and he rides too, and we were talking about taking this big trip. And then I got into a discussion with Sean Lynn from the God Squad up in Calgary, Alberta,

and found out that he also had a motorcycle. And we got to talking, we said, why don't we get a bunch of men together and make a big pilgrimage out of motorcycles where we go into cities and we combine motorcycle riding with teaching the Word of God in parishes and barbecues and all that. Well, one thing led to another, and we ended up gathering together close to 15 men that joined us at one time or another

on this trip this last August. And I want to walk you through it a little bit because I think it has spiritual implications when it comes to life in general. You know, Pope John Paul II said that life is a pilgrimage, and it's a pilgrimage to a specific destination. And that destination that he pointed out

was our father's house in heaven. And that's really the goal for all of us. It's called the beatific vision. It's to be with God face to face forever and ever. And the life that we now live here in the flesh, here on earth, we live by faith, and we have that goal of being with God in mind. And in order for us to reach that goal, to be with God, there's a certain amount of preparation that is needed. There are certain people that we meet along the way. There are confrontations. There are obstacles. There are opportunities. There's there's good times. There's difficult times. There's times where you just feel like, wow, I could just tackle the world, like getting up at 8 in the morning and having a cup of coffee and getting on your bike.

And there's other times at 10 o'clock at night where you're tired and you're worn out and you feel like I just can't go on anymore. So life is a journey. And that's kind of what we really, you know, got to know on this trip is that this pilgrimage that we took is like life. Now, before I tell you a little bit about this, this trip that began last August 9th, I want you to know, I'm going to put some pictures up on the web here on the show notes, so that there'll be a connection. So you can see some of the pictures and what I'm talking about. But I'd like to take you through that trip briefly. Well, when we first started to talk about this 4,000 mile trip in eight days, we had to look at the preparation, and we had to literally count the cost.

I mean, what is this going to cost us in terms of time and money, fuel? Do we know where we're going? Do we have plans for hotels? Are we going to stay in homes? What are we going to do to eat? All of that. What happens if we have a breakdown in our bikes? So we had to do some real preparation.

And it kind of reminds me of what Jesus said in Luke chapter 14, verses 28 and 29. He said, for which of you, desiring to build a tower does not sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it. Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him. So the first part of our trip, this pilgrimage, which is true in life, in general, is that there's this time of preparation, counting the cost. Do we really have what it takes to go on a long, long trip like this in terms of finances and recent? and all of that. So we started to get everything together. We started to look at maps and we all

gathered on Google Maps and looked at the route that we would end up taking. Had to figure out the money. Oil changes, emergency numbers, contact information. And certainly as someone coming from the States going into Canada, I had to have a passport. So all of that, all of that was part of the planning. And you know, if you don't plan well, you're probably going to get caught along the way. And I think that's true in life in general, don't you? That if you just kind of go about life willy-nilly and say you're going to fly by the seat of your pants, you're probably going to get caught in situations where you wish you had planned a little bit. I know that's true in ministry. And I know that's true. I know that's true

in launching ministries around the country, is that you've got to count the cost. Well, the beginning of something new began at my house. Two people joined me at my house, my good friend Tom. And then we had a wonderful friend Dwight from Iowa who joined us. And they met early in the morning at my house in the driveway. And I think we left at something like six o'clock in the morning. And as they came to my house, we all came inside and had a cup of coffee and started to say our goodbyes to my wife and family. And we got outside. And I said, let's just gather around the bikes here and let's pray. So we all came together and we prayed. And we offered this trip up for the Lord and ask the Lord to lead us and to guide us, to protect us, and to provide along the way. And we

prayed that the Lord would be glorified in everything that we would do along the trip. Kind of reminds me of the time in Israel's history when they went through quite a difficult chastisement from the Lord. And Isaiah talks about this in the first 40 chapters, but then in four, In Chapter 43, Isaiah starts to mention something new about to begin, something fresh, like a new springtime in their life. That's kind of the way we felt on that morning, to be honest with you. It's like, hey, there's something new and exciting happening here. Isaiah 43, 18, and 19 says, remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing.

Now it springs forth. Do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. Let me pause just for a moment and just talk to you about what might be happening in your life right now. Do you have anything in your life right now that you would consider kind of, this is new, this is exciting? The Lord is doing something in our lives. I think that that's an important element in our walk with the Lord is to always look for what he's doing, what's happening, and how can I be a part of it? And you might be a part of about leading that, you know,

or being a real supportive role of some new ministry at your church or some initiative that's going to bring glory to God. And the beginnings of these things are always exciting. You know, I started, I was the founder of Life on the Rock on EWTN back in 1995. And wow, was that an exciting time to build a show for Mother Angelica and to design the set and the format. of the show and come up with a list of guests, it was an exciting time. I've got to be honest with you. And then later with relevant radio, morning air, I started a morning show, and that too was

very, very exciting, as well as the great adventure. Many of the things that I've been involved in have just been kind of like a new springtime. Well, this trip was like that on that morning. We were beginning with something new and something exciting. Well, we took off from our house, and in the first few miles, you know, your mind kind of spins a little bit as to where where we're going and how long this trip is going to be. You're talking to each other on Bluetooth. We had a wireless Bluetooth in our helmet, so we could talk along the way,

which gave us an opportunity to fellowship, to pray the rosary. Just a great, great, great time. It's kind of neat to think of all these guys getting together and praying the rosary down the highway for their families and for their parishes and for their priests. Well, our first stop, our first major stop, was in Valley City, North Dakota.

We left the Twin Cities and we headed north, West, and our first major stop was Valley City, North Dakota, and this city, I've got to be honest with you, has a real sweet spot in my heart, you know, as far as my own history, because it was in Valley City, North Dakota, at St. Catherine's Church that I ended up leaving the Catholic Church. That's right. Back when I was younger, I had a powerful conversion experience at 18. And after that, I went to Bible College in Dallas, Texas, back and went through radio and television school. And my first real independent job as an announcer on radio was in North Dakota.

And I just had such a passion for the Lord that I was in this rock station, KovC, Valley City. And at night, from 7 to Midnight, I would play Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers and, you know, all kinds of Dillon, whoever. You know, we'd play all kinds of music. And then I would invite high school kids to come into the studio, which the management, I'm sure, would not have approved. of, but we would turn down the music and I would play Christian music.

That was in Valley City, North Dakota. That is the city that I became so frustrated, really, to be honest with you, with my family and everyone's response to my newfound love for Jesus. And I was upset, emotionally troubled about when I would go to the Catholic Church and I would not see people reading the Bible or fellowshiping or opening up their homes. and some of this, to be honest with you, is just my own hurt, you know, from family and friends. But anyway, that's where I left the church, and that's where I ended up yelling at a bishop publicly, Bishop Driscoll from Fargo, and told him that I've had it.

I'm leaving the Catholic Church. And as I walked out that night, he started clapping, because I said this in an open forum at St. Catharines. And the next day is when I met with him privately. And I didn't know that was going to happen, but he stayed outside of Valley City, where I would go every morning to pray with nuns and go to Mass. And he told me at that point, he said, I'm going to tell you three things. Number one, the journey you're on is of God. Isn't that interesting, the journey?

And here I am on a motorcycle journey. And it was back then in the 1980 that he said, the journey you are on is of God. And number two, I'm going to call you little Newman, which I didn't know what that meant at all. And I thought it meant Al Newman from Mad Magazine, but it wasn't. He said, Cardinal Newman. He said, you remind me of Cardinal Newman with your

love for scripture. And then number three, he said to me, and he pointed right at me. He said, mark my words, one day you're going to return. And when you do, you're going to teach your people. And I looked at him, and I said, I don't think so. I don't think so. And I got up and I shook his hand and I left. That's how I left. And that church was St. Catharines. And so we stopped in North Dakota, at Valley City at St. Catharines, and all of us went into the church. And I showed them the exact pew that I sat in when I stood out in the aisle and gave that that speech and made kind of a fool of myself, to be honest with you. And as I was done, I walked out of the church back in August, and there I saw something that just sort of stopped me cold in my tracks. As I left this small

country church in Valley City, North Dakota, my attention was drawn to a kiosk from Lighthouse Media. and I looked at that kiosk, and there were a couple of my CDs about my return to the Catholic Church and the beauty of the Catholic Church. And I got to be honest with you, I got a little choked up as I went down memory lane there and looked at those CDs and thought, who would ever have thought when I walked out in 1980 in that church so mad and so angry that when I returned in 2016 in August that I would see my CDs there, which CDs were not even invented when I left the Catholic Church, but it had a powerful impact on me.

Well, we left Valley City, North Dakota. We left there, and we started to venture towards Canada, and we ended up getting to the border right around something like 9 o'clock at night. It was a long first day, about 600 miles on the bike. And we were going to meet in Estevan, Canada, right across the border, we were going to meet Sean Lynn, who rides a victory. And we ended up going across the border, and we met Sean and had dinner that night. And we ended up staying everyone at a hotel.

And then the next morning we left, and we started to make our way westward across Canada through Saskatchewan. Now, if you've been to Saskatchewan, you know that there's not any mountains in Saskatchewan. It's relatively flat. But our trip, while relatively flat, was blessed by the meeting of so many great, wonderful people. The first place that we really stopped and kind of settled was in Bruno. Now, Bruno might not mean a whole lot to you. If you're from Canada, you probably know where Bruno, Saskatchewan is, but in the States, most people don't know where Bruno is, and you would have to drive long and search for it, because it's a very small town of a couple hundred people in the middle of what

felt like, at least, nowhere. But there was a gem there. There was two gems there. One was Gerald and Denise Montpetit. Who are they? They're the founders of Cat Chat. Cat Chat is a children's ministry that has had a profound impact on young people in the Catholic Church in North America, and I dare say around the world. And the Mont Petit's were there in their home in Bruno. And they have their world headquarters in this little town with, there must not be more

than 300 people in the town. There's a railroad track that goes through it, but it's about it. and we had a wonderful time with them, and then they treated us to a fantastic dinner. I learned something about hospitality on the pilgrimage, and that is that in this journey of life, you meet certain people that are really beautiful people, and they're giving people, and they really exercise hospitality. I'll bet you can think right now of someone in your life, in the last 15, 20 years, who stands out in your thinking as someone who has such a gift of hospitality.

You know, when you're on a pilgrimage, like a 4,000-mile motorcycle trip on a Harley, hospitality is really welcomed. Because at the end of the day, to sit down at a table and to smell the food and a home and the laughing of children, it is in the warmth of a family, it's just wonderful. It was really wonderful. And they prepared an amazing meal for us. Also in Bruno is another gem, and it is St. Torres Institute. St. Therese Institute is kind of a mini Stubanville, Franciscan University, in Bruno, Saskatchewan.

I didn't even know it when we drove up, but they had a summer conference series for young people. And they asked me if I would speak, and I said, I'll be glad to. And so it must have been close to 100 teenagers were spending quite a few weeks there in training. And the people who run it are even graduates of Franciscan University. Well, I spoke to those kids, and it was so refreshing to see young people in the middle of Saskatchewan who had gathered from all over North America to come to to be formed in the faith. Well, we ended up leaving Saskatchewan headed further west, and we were on the border of Alberta, and we ran into a city called Lloyd Minster.

And once again, we were met with great hospitality, and we had lunch at the parents of Janelle and Jason Reinhart. Now, maybe you know Janelle. Janelle is the one that wrote the major song for Pope John Paul II for World Youth Day in Toronto. And a lovely couple, beautiful couple, and they're involved in ministry. That's their whole life. And we were so looking forward to meeting them. And we had quite a meal of ribs and some other things. And there was about 10 people that joined us there.

Just great fellowship along the way. And then after that, we headed on to Edmonton, Alberta, and another long ride. and we got to Edmonton, and this is where things began to change a little bit, which was kind of interesting. One of the things that we wanted to do along this pilgrimage was not just ride and talk to each other via Bluetooth, but we wanted to stop in major cities, and we wanted to teach. So as we went from city to city, starting in Edmonton, we picked up more riders. We ended up with a total of about 15 altogether, but we got to Edmonton, and it was the first trip where we had our barbecue truck go before us. That's right. It's not mine, but Sean Lynn

from Calgary, Alberta, he's the leader of the God Squad ministry. Maybe you've seen them on EWTN. It's a bunch of cops in Calgary that just have an incredibly fruitful men's ministry. Well, they bought a big barbecue truck a few years ago, and they make a ministry out of barbecuing for men. So when you know it, in Edmonton, the truck was there when we arrived at the church, and they set up the barbecue, and a couple hundred people came out to the church to have barbecue with us. And we had a great, it's bikes, it's Bibles, it's barbecue. And we had a great barbecue. And after that, everybody went into the church, and I spoke. And I spoke to both men and women at that point came into the church. And it was such a great, great opportunity. But I'm going to

look to see if I have a picture of this. But when all the guys gathered at that church in Edmonton, there was probably 20 bikes, 20 different motorcycles lined up and people came out and they were kind of blown away when all these bikes rode into town. We weren't the Hell's Angels, more like Heaven's Angels riding in. And it was quite a sight. It was a lot of fun. So in Edmonton, we had our first barbecue and talk that I gave to the men. And that was just so much fun. You know, I think about Hebrews chapter 12 along this part of the pilgrimage where we started off in Minneapolis. And as you move along, you've got to keep your eyes on Jesus into pilgrimage. You know, you don't just go your own way. You really got to keep your eyes on Jesus. And these evenings with the men where

I was speaking helped us do that. Hebrews 122 says, looking to Jesus, the pioneer and the perfector of our faith. Not only did he start our faith, not only did we begin the journey with Jesus, but he perfects it. We keep our eyes on him. Well, we ended up leaving Edmonton and went down to Banff, and as many of you know, Banff is one of the three most visited sites for visitors on, you know, vacations and so forth, in North America. It's in the Rockies in Canada. And is it gorgeous? I mean, just Google it.

BAMF. It is so nice. And we had another barbecue in, in, right outside of BAMF at another church. And, you know, what was really interesting, this is kind of a lesson. What I'm about to share with you is a real lesson in pilgrimage. When you're riding a motorcycle through the Rocky Mountains in Canada, and you go from Edmonton down to Banff, and then you're starting to actually ride in the mountains, there is a real temptation. Now, that temptation is looking at the beautiful mountains. Now, I've

been there in a car. In a car, you only see so much through the, you know, through the dashboard, the front window. And you can only see so much from the side. But when you're on a motorcycle, It's almost as if you're like a bird. You're there. You see everything. There's nothing blocking anything. And the temptation is to look up to the left, look up to the right, and to see the beauty all around you. That is a temptation. And if you look long enough, you can go right off the road into a mountain or off a cliff and have serious ramifications. In fact, a number of the people who do get into accidents is exactly what they do. They start. start staring at the beautiful mountains, which are beautiful, and we should look at them, but they become so fixated on that which is beautiful, that they lose their lives. Now, that fits in so well in our faith, doesn't it? We see that in the Garden of Eden in Genesis chapter 3 in verse 6 that prior to that God told Adam, you can eat freely of any tree in the garden, but the tree of the knowledge of good

and evil, you can't eat of it, for in the day that you eat of it, you will die. well Eve in chapter 3 in verse 6 noticed three things about the fruit she said it's tasty looks beautiful and makes one wise what's not to like about that what's not to want to stare at there but we see with Adam and Eve they chose the creation rather than the creator and it ended up in death and that's what happens in life doesn't it sure we're going to talk about a lot of hobbies and we're going to talk about a lot of things that interest us in life but if you get so fixated on anything, including motorcycles. It could be a ruin, and it could be anything.

As I mentioned earlier, we become fascinated with everything. There's nothing out there that someone isn't, you know, radical about, or really over the top about. So that's something you have to watch out for. And that once again reminds me of that scripture in Hebrews 12, to looking to Jesus, not just the beauty around you, but looking to Jesus, the pioneer and the perfector of our faith. let me just pause for a moment and ask you right now in your life,

is there something that you're so fixated on right now, like this pilgrimage and looking at the mountains that you're running the risk of going off the road? If so, put your eyes on Jesus. We're going to take a break when I come back. I'm going to take you into what was probably one of the two scariest moments on the trip, where we were riding bikes next to cliffs about three. thousand feet down. It's a special road called Going to the Sun, and I'll talk to you about that. We'll be right back.

It's hard to live out your Catholic faith on your own. In fact, the Bible reveals that we need a community of people to help us on our journey of faith. If you're interested in finding that community by joining or starting a small group study, visit ascensionpress.com and sign up for a free ascension account. With your account, you'll get all the tools you need to start walking with others towards Christ. Welcome back to the Jeff Kaven show. Glad you could join us. If you just joined right now, we're talking about a motorcycle pilgrimage that I and about 15 guys took this last August from Minneapolis up to Alberta and Canada down through Montana back home. Four thousand miles in eight days. Not bad. And were we sore? Not really. But boy, we encountered a lot of great things

along the way. It kind of fits into life. You know, it's a kind of a pilgrimage like this is like a life squished, you know? It's miniature. It's miniature. Well, I left off before the break talking about how we were really tempted to look at the mountains going through the great Rockies in Canada. If we look too long, it could have cost us our life because we'd go off the road. we ended up leaving Edmonton going down to Bamp having a meeting with a bunch of men at a church there and I spoke. We had barbecue. And then we eventually, after a couple days left Bamp

and headed back towards the United States and we were going to go into Montana to Glacier Park. Now, I'm assuming you probably know about Glacier Park and maybe you went to Glacier Park as a kid had a vacation there. You know, it's a beautiful, beautiful park. It's kind of like Yellowstone, you know. You see the wildlife.

And in fact, in riding these motorcycles, up in Canada and the United States, we several times. There were grizzly bears just off to the side of the road. And that made you think a little bit, you know. What if a great big grizzly bear kind of came out in the road and wanted to have a discussion, you know? And so you had to kind of prepare for that as well.

Well, we ended up going back into the United States into Glacier Park, and there was one part of the trip. I got to be honest with you about, I was nervous. I was nervous. Maybe you've been there. It's going to the sun road. Now, I knew we were going to do this before the trip, and I was a little nervous. One, I don't really do well with heights, and I knew that there were going to be parts of this road that my motorcycle was going to be about four feet away from a three or four thousand mile, you know, three or four thousand feet, you know, drop off.

So I was thinking about it in the days approaching. You know, fear is a funny thing. Fear has a way of working on you where, number one, it can paralyze you for sure. But number two, fear about something in the future has a way of ruining today, where you can't even focus on today because you know that next week you've got this portion of the journey to go through. Now, the rest of the guys didn't seem to be bothered by it. And I would bring it up occasionally. And they're like, oh, yeah, I'm looking forward to that. And I'm thinking, oh, okay.

And while we were in BAMPth, we were at Sean Lynn's father's house, the God Squad president there. And we told him where we were going. And he kind of gave us this look. He's like an 80-year-old man, he's had a lot of experience. And he gave us the look like, you sure, you want to do that? And I'm thinking, oh, don't say that. Isn't it funny how things that other people can say, or they say that it feeds our fear, or feeds our fear? What do you fear in life right now?

what are the things that kind of get you going as far as your blood pressure and your your heartbeat well this this was on my mind so the day came we're getting ready to ascend this amazing mountain and going to the sun now let me give you just a little idea here and I'm going to read something I found on the internet the road is one of the most this is from the internet I read this before I went probably shouldn't have The road is one of the most difficult roads in North America to snowplow in the spring. Up to 80 feet of snow can lie on top of what's called Logan Pass. And more just east of the pass, where the deepest snow field has long been referred to as the big drift.

Now, the road takes about 10 weeks to plow in the spring, even with the equipment that can move 4,000 tons of snow an hour. So the snowplow crew can clear as little as 500 feet of road in a day. Now, there's two lanes going to the Sun Road, and it's quite narrow and winding with hairpin turns, especially west of Logan Pass. Consequently, vehicle lengths over the highest portions of the roadway are limited to no longer than 21 feet, and no wider than 8 feet between Avalanche Creek and Rising Sun picnic areas. Well, we started to make our ascent, and we got to Logan Pass, and it started to snow and rain. And I thought, no, no, don't do this. So we had to pull over at this little stop, and we had to put our rain gear on.

And then we made the rest of the trip. And all along the way, I'll be honest with you, I kept saying, Lord, I'm going to keep my mind on you. I'm going to keep my mind on you. Thank you, Lord. You make my feet, or in this case, wheels like Heinz's feet in high places, as the psalm says. And we got through it. And I was glad that I faced it. You know, once I faced it and I just kept my mind on the Lord and made sure that I was being wise at riding the bike and not taking any risks there, I was fine.

And that's true in life, too, isn't it? You know, you go on a pilgrimage with Christ, and there are times where it seems so scary. But if you keep your eyes on the Lord and you prepare well and you are responsible and you don't act foolish, you're going to be okay. God's going to take care of you. And I kind of learned that lesson. And when I was done, I thought, well, I could go. I could do that again. There's no problem there.

So we got down into Glacier Park. And then we had one more, one of, I guess, three times on the trip where we had real difficulty. For me, going to the sun was one. But then we got down and we were going by, I think it's called McDonnell Lake, if I'm not mistaken. McDonnell Lake, we got down from the going to the sun road. And all of a sudden, it started to rain. Now, we couldn't get off the road here because there was no, no area on the side of the road.

So you had to keep, you had to keep going. And then all of a sudden, the rain got harder and harder. We were talking to each other on Bluetooth saying, this is really a downpour that we're going through. And then all of a sudden, I felt my hands were hurting on the bike. And I couldn't figure out why. And then I looked down into my lap, and there I had, order size hail piled up in my lap. We were being pelted by hail. This so reminded me of redemptive suffering in this pilgrimage of life. There are times where we were riding in the

mountains and the beauty. We were on the plains and we could see forever. Great fellowship and wonderful hospitality. This part of the trip, we just had to endure. And I had to focus on the Lord, because we couldn't stop or we'd get hit by cars behind us. So for about 10 minutes, we're just driving through this horrendous hail. And we had to simply offer this up to get through it. And we did. It reminds me of what Paul said to the Colossians in chapter 1 in verse 24. What did he say?

He said, I rejoice in my suffering for your sake, and I fill up in my body, that which is lacking in the sufferings of Christ. Well, what could possibly be lacking in the sufferings of Christ? What's lacking, St. Augustine said, is the sufferings of the mystical body of Christ, and that's you, that's me. And so on this trip, it was unavoidable. It happened. There was the hail, quarter-size, and it hurt, but we got through it. And whatever you're going through right now, my friend, in your life, whatever hail is pelting you right now,

keep your eyes on Jesus. Offer up your suffering in union with Christ. suffering. Not only will you get through this, but you can do something with the pain. You can do something with the suffering. Your suffering has redemptive value. Wow. That was a little lesson for us along the ways. And then we took off there. We stayed in a beautiful home in Montana, and they were so wonderful and gave us filet mignon. We were all tired, and we got to this house, and we all parked our bikes in the driveway, and then they treated us to a lovely meal. It was so. good. And then we left there and started heading home, really, from Montana. We were going to head

east to go back to the Twin Cities. Some people went back to Canada. Some would go to Iowa. But we encountered one more really difficult thing that I want to share with you. It was the most dangerous part of the trip. We did not anticipate it. We did not plan for it. We never thought this would happen at all. We ended up going through Montana. We stopped. We stopped. in Billings at a gas station. A guy, an older guy, came over to us, and he said, hey, you guys going to Sturgis? He said, no, we're going to go through there, but that rally is over with. But we're going to be going back through Minneapolis.

And he said, let me give you a piece of advice. Don't take the highway through the Indian reservations. We said, why? That seems to be a shortcut. He said, it looks like a shortcut, but you are going to go through some of the most dangerous area for a motorcyclist. I said, how? I mean, what's so dangerous about it? And he said, he said that there are thousands of deer, thousands of deer that come up by the road as the sun goes down. And if you take that, that road, you're going to get stuck in it. Stick to the

highway. Stick to the highway. Stick to the main road. So he said, thanks. You know, we appreciate the advice. So we took off from the gas station. It went about, it was probably about 30 miles before we had to make this decision to go on the highway or the back the back road. We had made the decision to go on the smart road. We made the decision to follow wisdom, you know, in this situation, and really felt that the guy was there as kind of a messenger from the Lord to give us some advice. Stick to the road, you know, the main road, the highway, where the gas stations are and everything. Well, we made a mistake. And we do that in life, don't we sometimes. We either don't listen to advice or we don't listen close enough.

we made the wrong turn. We made the wrong turn, and we were on the shortcut. And we didn't realize it until we were close to 100 miles into the trip, into that leg of the trip. And right when Tom said in my headpiece, he said, Jeff, he said, I think we took the wrong road. I sank. It's like, oh, no, tell me this is not true.

Now it was a beautiful country, but we had about an hour until the sun was going to go down, and we knew what we'd be facing. As we got closer, the sun did go down. And then all of a sudden, we're going about 70 mile an hour, and we're looking for deer. And all of a sudden, I see three deer up to the right. And I said, in the Bluetooth to Tom, I said, Tom, deer to the right, deer to the right. He goes, thanks.

And then about a minute later, he says, Jeff, a buck to the left, a buck to the left. I think, oh, no. Now, these deer are right on the edge of the road. And we're going 70 mile an hour. And I thought, we were foolish enough to take the shortcut because we didn't listen to the instructions. Now we've got to be wise enough to slow down. And it got to the point where I kid you not, every, every quarter mile, half mile deer to the left and the right. And we slowed down and I realized this is going to take forever to get up to Spearfish South Dakota, which is our next destination.

Oh, man, you talk about scary. Their deer were so close to us. We pulled over on the side of the road and we put our leather jackets back on. And I'll tell you why, in case we got hit. In case something happened, we had leather on. At least if we fell, it wouldn't be as bad as just having a shirt on. And it was really hot. So we got off to the side of the road and we prayed.

We said, let's just pray. And all of a sudden, three huge semis went by us all in a row. And we came up with this idea. If we can draft those semis, if we can get behind them, they're going 70 mile an hour, no deer is going to hop out right behind a semi. They'll hop out in front of a semi. but we won't have to worry about them hopping out in front of us. We'd have to worry about retreads hitting us, yes,

but at least we won't have to worry about the deer and we'll get to our destination at maybe 11 o'clock at night. So we got on our bikes and we sped up as fast as we could to those trucks and we drafted them. That is to say we went right behind them and there was a safe zone there. Someone led the way. Somebody, these trucks, led the way and gave us a sense of safety. now I got to thinking about that

and I got to think about our own spiritual lives and the pilgrimage that we're on and those points of danger where we feel alone and vulnerable like we did on the road that evening in Montana going into South Dakota like we even hit part of Wyoming

and you know we're feeling very very vulnerable and you might feel like that in life at times and that's when we call on the communion of saints we call on our older brothers and sisters who have gone before us and we we draft we go in their path we live the way they lived we walk as they walk and certainly the greatest of all jesus christ and we ended up that night getting to spearfish but i'll tell you what i thought about when we were drafting those trucks i thought about my family i thought about my grandchildren i thought about my my children i thought about all of the things that were important in my life and was this really

worth risking all of that. And that's why we ended up drafting those trucks and not doing this alone. We needed help. We needed help because pride goes before a fall. And to think that we could simply tough it out may have proved to be fatal. You've got to have wisdom. You've got to have wisdom. And if I had that all to do over again, you know what I would have done differently? I would have listened to the old man at the gas station in Billings. And I probably would have written it down and a map and followed it meticulously. My friend, when Jesus is leading you on the pilgrimage of life, when he's leading you on the pilgrimage of life,

you need to follow the manual, the Bible. You need to follow direction, the teachings in the catechism, in the church, because therefore you're good. And when we think we can launch out and do things on our own, we have a leader of as a fool, and that's ourselves. Let us never go forward thinking we can do this all ourselves that we don't need Jesus. Well, we ended up leaving spearfish,

the Black Hills area, Sturgis area the next morning for our final leg, which was going to be another 600 miles, a long, long day. And as we got ready to come into the Twin Cities, wouldn't you know it, the biggest rainstorm of them all. We're only 20 miles away from home. I'm only 20 miles away from my garage. I'm only 20 miles away from home cooking. I'm only 20 miles away from my wife and family. And amazing storm sets in. And we were so wet and tired already from storms along the way.

We just said, let's go. Let's just go through it. And as we made our mind to do that, we saw the most remarkable picture of nature of the entire trip. A complete rainbow. A complete, perfect. rainbow that was crossing the road on the highway we were on. And we laughed with each other and we were talking to one another and said, look at this. It's almost like God is welcoming us. We're going to

ride right through this rainbow. And we did. And it's the first time in my life where I had the sense that we were literally riding underneath a rainbow to where you could look back and see it. It was really, it was really, really incredible. So we made our way home and I'll never forget going up into the driveway. And Tom went his way and I went my way. And, and, uh, and, uh, we ended up getting home, safe, and sound, and what a pilgrimage. And my friend, isn't that the goal to get home? That's what Pope John Paul II said, St. John Paul II. He said that life is a pilgrimage to our father's house.

It's a pilgrimage to home. And all that you do along the way, the prep, the people, the obstacles, the joys, and the difficulties and the suffering, it's all part of it. It's all part of it. But you will get home and you will get back to your father's house. And that's what this life is all about. So in conclusion, I want to encourage you to do planning well for life. Count the cost in everything that you are facing. And as you go through the pilgrimage of life, be mindful of the wonderful people that God has put in your path and be thankful and be one of those people because other people are on a pilgrimage and they may run into you, and they may be doing a radio show at some point, talking about you and how kind

and warm and inviting you were, how loving you were. And then when you face the difficulties, keep your eyes on Jesus, remember that all suffering, if it's in Christ, if it's joined to Christ, has redemptive power. Well, I'm so glad that you could join me today. You know, in future shows, we're going to be talking about a lot of different things, all the way from Motor cycles to how to deal with anger. Raising daughters, how do you deal with suffering? What about being a supernatural grandparent? I'm going to talk about some of my favorite books. I'd like to know some of yours, too. Maybe we'll talk about how do you deal with being offended? And one of my favorite topics is simplifying your life. What are some practical things we can do to simplify our life? Mark your Bible.

What's adoption like? And maybe we'll talk about Bible study helps. We've got so many things that we want to talk about in the in the coming shows. Hey, I would really appreciate it if you would do something for me and that is give me a little bit of feedback. If you're listening to this on iTunes, simply rate the show, make some comments. I appreciate you rating it and letting me know what you think of the show. You can get a hold of me on Twitter at Jeff Kavens, Facebook. Pretty obvious. You can just do a search there. My website is www.jephcavins.com. And that's where I post a lot of things like our trips and pilgrimages and stuff. Most of my work is published by Ascension Press.

You can go to ascensionpress.com, and you can find out all about the great adventure and many of the things that were mentioned earlier on the show. So God bless you. Thank you for joining me on the inaugural show, and we'll talk to you very soon. God bless.