Read alongside the book
Choose a reflection below and walk through Through the Wilderness one poem and one honest devotion at a time.
Get the BookYour eight-week path
Every poem in the book has its own place in this journey. Open one week at a time, or view the complete poem-by-poem path.
Explore by what you’re walking through
Choose a path from the guide at the end of the book to see its corresponding poem devotionals.
Week 1
Follow the book’s progression through each journey moment in this week’s theme.
Poem Devotional · Through the Wilderness
There are moments when you have missed the version of yourself who laughed more freely, trusted more easily, and did not examine every good moment for signs that it might disappear? Maybe life taught you to build walls so gradually that you forgot what your heart felt like before them.
Poem Devotional · Through the Wilderness
You might recognize what it is like to have looked back at an ordinary day and realized it became one of the memories you treasure most? At the time, nothing announced that it mattered. It was simply laughter, conversation, or someone you loved being close enough to reach.
Poem Devotional · Through the Wilderness
Somewhere in your story, you may have grieved something you never actually had—the marriage you pictured, the home you planned, or the future that felt so real you had already begun living inside it? Losing an imagined life can hurt just as deeply as losing something you once held.
Poem Devotional · Through the Wilderness
You might recognize what it is like to have discovered that God was protecting, preparing, or carrying you long before you knew to ask Him? Looking backward can reveal prayers, people, and moments of mercy that your younger self could not yet understand.
Poem Devotional · Through the Wilderness
Have you ever reached for the phone, remembered a familiar voice, or wished you could tell someone one more thing—only to feel the ache of their absence all over again? Grief can return inside the smallest moments because love still remembers.
Poem Devotional · Through the Wilderness
Somewhere in your story, you may have realized that someone taught you how to live without ever sitting you down for a lesson? Their habits, work ethic, faith, or steady presence became part of you simply because you stayed close enough to watch.
Poem Devotional · Through the Wilderness
Somewhere in your story, you may have wondered whether being chosen can carry even more meaning than being expected? Family is not formed by blood alone. Sometimes love becomes most visible in the person who had every opportunity to leave and decided to stay.
Poem Devotional · Through the Wilderness
When you picture home, do you remember the building—or the person who made you feel noticed inside it? Often it was a meal, a favorite treat, a laugh from another room, or a quiet act of care that made a place feel safe.
Through the Wilderness Journey
Somewhere in your story, you may have stood close enough to a group to be included but still felt like the extra person? Maybe you learned to leave first, stay quiet, or convince yourself that you preferred being alone before anyone else could reject you.
As a child, I sometimes stood close enough to be included yet still felt like the extra person. Eventually I stopped following, went inside, and learned that solitude could soothe the ache of feeling unwanted.
Enjoying your own company can be a gift, but independence sometimes begins as protection. God never treats us like the extra person. He does not merely tolerate our presence—He sees us, welcomes us, and calls us His own.
The independence you built may have helped you survive rejection, but it does not have to become permanent isolation. God can help you risk healthy connection slowly, while reminding you that belonging begins with being fully known and welcomed by Him.
You’re not alone in Scripture
Hagar felt cast out and alone, but God met her in the wilderness and revealed Himself as the God who sees her.
Read their story: Genesis 16:7–13You are the God who sees me. — Genesis 16:13
How has feeling left out shaped the way you approach relationships?
Until the next step
Whether you are reading along in the book or joining these reflections here, thank you for allowing me to walk beside you.