Pilgrimage is an ancient ritual in many religious traditions. It is often a mark of religious devotion. The faithful adherent travels many arduous miles to reach a site of importance to their religion.
In Islam, the hajj to Mecca is one of the five pillars of the Muslim religion. Medieval Christians crossed Europe and Western Asia to reach the holy city of Jerusalem. In fact, crusades were initiated to retake this city and to protect the pilgrimage routes.
Protestant Christianity has generally not placed a large emphasis on physical pilgrimage, although the practice is still observed in Catholicism. Some Protestants travel to tour the Holy Land but this journey doesn’t fit into the mold of historic pilgrimage with that tradition’s emphasis on suffering and endurance to prove devotion.
The Protestant rejection of physical pilgrimage is well-founded.
Pilgrimage’s emphasis on a long journey to a holy site is out of place in a theology that doesn’t require works for justification and maintains that we are united to Christ now. Christ Himself defined New Covenant worship in John 4:21-23 when He said, “the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father…the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.”
As New Covenant Christians, we have no need to reach a special plot of ground to worship our Father in Heaven. We worship in the Spirit and in truth.
Additionally, we are not justified by our completion of a physical pilgrimage that proves to God our sincere devotion to Him. We are saved by the grace of God through faith (Eph. 2:8).
But this does not mean that pilgrimage has no place in the Christian’s life. In fact, it means that all of the Christian’s life is pilgrimage.
In this article we will examine the paradox, purpose, and promise of Christian pilgrimage.
The Paradox of Pilgrimage
There is a tension in the Christian faith between arrival and journey. As New Covenant Christians we are living in a unique period of redemptive history. We are living in the space between Christ’s first coming and His second. This age contains both promises that are fulfilled and hopes yet unfulfilled. It is the age of the “already, not yet”.
The Apostle John refers to this tension when he writes, “Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared” (1 John 3:2).
On this side of Christ’s second coming, we walk in faith, hope, and love. On the other side, there will only be love (1 Cor. 13:8-10).
And yet, we do not hope as the Old Testament saints did. For we have already seen the promises of the Gospel fulfilled. We are “already” saved and yet, in another sense, our salvation has “not yet” been completed or consummated as we experience it.
This is the tension of Christian pilgrimage. We are on a journey to our final home, while at the same time residing in that home (the love of the Father) already. Our hope is to see Jesus and yet the veil has already been torn.
This is difficult to square sometimes. We are creatures bound by time and so the completion of Christ’s work on Calvary seems unfinished to us at times. We still sin and struggle. We still suffer. We still feel, at times and for seasons, distant from God. And we yearn to experience the fullness of the promises of God and the fullness of our intimacy with Him. We do not know what to do with passages like Hebrews 10:14 which declare that Jesus has “perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.”
There is a tension. Some may call it a paradox. That is good. It is our job as Christ’s people to learn how to live in this tension while we still call this earthly body home. One day, the Scripture promises, we shall know fully and we shall be like Him (1 Cor. 13:12; 1 John 3:2).
Not only this, but Psalm 84:6 portrays another paradox of our Christian pilgrimage:
As they go through the Valley of Baca
Psalm 84:6
they make it a place of springs;
the early rain also covers it with pools.
The Valley of Baca is the valley of “weeping”. (Baca means weeping in Hebrew.) As the pilgrims, who are making their way to Zion (v. 5) pass through the valley of weeping, they make it a place flowing with springs. There is joy in the midst of sorrow and lamentation. The Spirit is the spring of living water that is poured out through Christ’s atonement (John 7:38-39, cf. Isa. 44:3). We are pilgrims who have the highways to Zion in our hearts (v. 5). We are on a spiritual pilgrimage. As we pass through the “valley” with all its shadows and death, we do not fear because the Spirit is in their hearts and God’s steadfast love follows us forever (Ps. 23:4, 6).
The Purpose of Pilgrimage
Psalm 84 also reveals what the purpose of our pilgrimage is. We are not traveling to a holy site on the physical earth. We are traveling to God’s presence in Heaven.
Blessed are those whose strength is in you,
Psalm 84:5
in whose heart are the highways to Zion.
The Psalmist also declares the beauty of God in His dwelling place and the joy of attending to Him in His presence (Ps. 84:1-4, 10). This is the purpose of our Christian pilgrimage: entering God’s presence. And of course, this is where the tension comes in that was mentioned above. We are, in one sense, already in God’s presence. Jesus Christ became the Tabernacle of God (John 1:14) and we ourselves have been made into the house of God (1 Pet. 2:5, 1 Cor. 3:16). So, in one sense, the Psalmist’s yearning is fulfilled in our own lives.
But in another, very real, sense, we are not yet in God’s Heavenly presence. And this is the destination of our Christian pilgrimage. We are all traveling the path of this earthly life, with the hope of meeting God face-to-face when we reach His Heavenly temple.
The Promise of Pilgrimage
And this brings us to the beautiful promise of pilgrimage that we find in Psalm 84:7.
They go from strength to strength;
Psalm 84:7
each one appears before God in Zion.
Each one of the pilgrims completes their journey and appears before the face of God in His Heavenly dwelling place. This is because all faithful pilgrims are united to their Lord Jesus Christ through faith and He is the one who has already ascended the hill of YHWH with clean hands and a pure heart, making the way open for all who follow Him (Ps. 24:3-4). Let us be clear: we only appear before God in Zion with joy and without trepidation and fear of judgment because of Jesus Christ who “entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption” (Heb. 9:12).
Furthermore, God protects those who come to Him in faith. Nothing can take them from His hand (Rom. 8:38-39, John 10:27-29). This means we are eternally secure in Christ. It is not about how hard we hold onto God. He holds His own children in His hands and nothing can tear us away.
Throughout Psalm 84, the Psalmist describes God as “YHWH of Hosts” (vv. 1, 3, 12), “YHWH, God of Hosts” (v. 8), and a shield (vv. 9, 11). These terms use military language to describe God. The Hebrew word sabah means “army” and it’s root is in the word for “waging war”. It’s translated as “hosts” in this psalm. The meaning is clear: God, the covenant king of vast armies is accompanying His people on their pilgrimage and ensuring that each of them appears before Him in Zion. Not one will be lost or left behind.
Christian Pilgrims
We can walk this life in faith that the “God of Hosts” is with us and He will bring us to His Heavenly tabernacle. He has written the highways to Zion on our hearts and has placed His Spirit in us as we journey to our final home. In the midst of this forward-looking hope, we can rest in His presence now because Jesus is Emmanuel (God with us).
In the midst of the suffering and uncertainty of this present life we may pass through the proverbial valley of Baca/weeping. But through the Spirit, we shall make it a place flowing with springs of living water.