For at least twenty years, I have enjoyed walking labyrinths. Labyrinths are maze-like structures that have been used as spiritual tools for centuries. For the past seven years, I’ve been walking labyrinths throughout the northeastern United States, and blogging about them. To learn more about labyrinths, check out this page at the Labyrinth Society. To find labyrinths near you, try the Worldwide Labyrinth Locator.

I was on my way to see an old friend from my high school days, one of the most important people in my life in those days. In high school, I found my closest friends not in school but at Lutheran synod youth events I attended, weekends and retreats with youth from other churches around northeastern Pennsylvania. And Michelle was the very first friend I made at my very first event. It was an accident that we met, but she very quickly took me under her wing, like she was my “designated extrovert” for the weekend. Or perhaps I was her designated introvert. Hard to say. But either way, it was through Michelle that I was actually social that weekend when I was just shy of fourteen. And it was through her that I ended up meeting most of the other friends I made over the next four years.

Michelle and I had kept touch over the years, on and off. Letters for a while, then emails, then Facebook messages. But I hadn’t spent a significant amount of time with her for many years. So I was driving to see her, and I decided that I’d try to visit and walk two labyrinths along the way, two I hadn’t walked before.

My journey took me through areas I’d lived in the past, and roads I’d driven before. I was filled with nostalgia – times I’d driven on these roads, times I’d gotten lost, times I’d done things I wished I hadn’t. I felt like I could see my own footprints all over the townships and boroughs I drove through.

I started thinking about why I lived in these places – why did I attend that particular seminary? Why did I take that job after graduation? And I thought also about my morning devotion that day, in which I read about how Abraham had left his whole life behind, and moved to a distant land, because of his faith in God. I wondered about how many times I’ve moved in my life, but also about how I’ve never left eastern Pennsylvania, despite several opportunities to do so. Had I been ignoring God’s call to get out and go somewhere new? Somewhere distant?

Had I failed in my faith by staying so close to home? And was it a failure of faith that I have always been so nostalgic? As I drove, I heard a podcaster mention that “self-reflection is really good, but self-obsession is really bad” or something like that. I wondered which one I was engaged in.

So, you know, a normal day’s thinking for me.

Anyway, I reached the first labyrinth, at Trinity Episcopal Church in Blue Bell. It was an 11-circuit Chartres-style, with small stones for a path and brick walls. And it was lightly covered in snow.

Just like the labyrinth I’d tried to walk a few days ago! Now, I found it very funny not to be able to walk that one the other day, but I really wanted to walk today! And luckily, I could. The snow lay in such a way that I could barely see the path, and I decided to walk it. My question was:

How am I following in faith right now?

The first words I wrote in my journal after walking it was: That was amazing! And indeed, it was. The snow here enabled me to do something I’ve never done before while walking a labyrinth: I could plainly see where I’d walked before. My footprints stood out clearly. As I circled around, I could see the labyrinth slowly filling in, with my own experience.

And I realized that this was the exact same experience I’d been having on the road today. As I drove on roads I had known before, in the vicinity of places I knew so well, on the way to see an old dear friend, I was looking back on my own footprints. But just as in the labyrinth, in real life I was not just retracing my steps. I was walking in new paths adjacent to paths I’d walked before. I’m not stuck repeating my own past, caught in a loop of nostalgia and self-obsession; rather, my life’s journey just takes me to similar places and along similar routes. And it’s okay to look around as I go. That’s just who I am, it’s how I’m made. And maybe it’s the journey I’m called to be on.

I think God’s journey for me was never to uproot and go far away like Abraham. It was always to explore, labyrinth-style, who I am and revisit places I’ve been in new ways. And yes, I’m faithfully following that journey.

One interesting thing was this. When I was in the center, I looked around and saw that there was one section of the labyrinth that I hadn’t walked on. Somehow I’d skipped that part, but I still made it to the center. On the walk out, I discovered my error and walked it then.

So all around, this labyrinth reminded me that I am following God, not perfectly, but faithfully. And I am, bit by bit, heading toward the center. I’m not sure what the center is in my life — God, perhaps? Something else? It’s covered in snow right now, so I can’t make it out. So I’ll just keep walking the best I can.