Migrating South
In 1994 our family went on a mission trip to Idaho. We took the opportunity to see many of God’s amazing creations and to visit sites important in American history by taking the long way home. It was our first opportunity to see the Pacific Ocean.
I love the story of how salmon migrate to the sea and then work and struggle to migrate back to the place of their birth. Think of all the things God has put together to make that happen year after year, century after century. A highlight of that trip was a stop we made to watch salmon jump upstream as they headed to their home streams.
Today our ship is to stop at Icy Strait Point, a new tourist destination operated almost exclusively by native Alaskans from the nearby Tlingit village of Hoonah. We plan to visit the salmon canning factory museum there, hike in the local rainforests, and walk around Hoonah, the world’s largest Tlingit village.
The prophet Jeremiah records many admonitions God gave to His disobedient children. In chapter 8, God laments:
Even the stork in the sky
Knows her seasons;
And the turtledove and the swift and the thrush
Observe the time of their migration;
But My people do not know
The ordinance of the Lord.
Jeremiah 8:7
God directs the stork, the turtledove, the swift, the thrush, and the salmon. He has given us the responsibility to make sure our children know the ordinance of the Lord.