Make peace with God

The Clay Hills area is on the route that the Mormon settlers took as they migrated from Escalante to Bluff, Utah, in 1879.
Go along Highway 276 from Halls Crossing about 15 miles to the east and you will encounter a mass of sliding clay; beautifully colored in greys, pinks, and reds depending on the time of day and the season. The road has a tendency to slide down slope every year we have good moisture.
A roadside monument put there by the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers in 1965 explains some of the history. It took the pioneers eight days to build a three-mile road to drop down about 1000’. But there is more to the story on this slippery slope of clay.
If you know where to look or spend some time hiking around you can find an inscription etched in stone by a pioneer that was perhaps tired, hungry, cold, and wondering if they would survive, “Make Peace with God.” Although the inscription is 143 years old, it still seems like pretty sound advice.
Sure, there is a paved road there now. Indeed, me and Charlie Brown (my dog) made pretty good time in my truck with heated seats and cruise control, so I wasn’t sure what all the fuss was about.
My too kind and loving wife is always talking about the harrowing Hole in the Rock trek. I drank my Pepsi, ate Almond M&Ms, and Charlie was content to watch out the window.
Honestly, it didn’t seem harrowing until I ran out of Pepsi.
But go back in time to October 1879 when Platte Lyman and Silas Smith were about to head out on a family vacation with 70 families and 83 wagons.
Okay, they got the idea of going southeast from Escalante, which at the time was the last settlement along their route, because the Church of Jesus of Christ of Latter-Day Saints issued a mission call to make a settlement in the Four Corners region.
I can only imagine how many times Platte had to say, “Listen if you don’t quit your complaining I am gonna turn this wagon train around and we are going straight home.”
Although, after getting through Hole in the Rock, I am not sure they could get back up it. The actual Hole in the Rock was perilous enough just getting down it the first time.
Coming down that narrow slot was more like a controlled fall than a comfortable “Steep Grades. Trucks use Lower Gears” descent.
Before our pioneer vacationers and long before this land was hunted and explored by the Native Americans, this tumultuous land was being formed into its present form.
Albert R. Lyman described it this way, “This country was once a heated bed of ferns, falling against and across each other to sink and decay in a tangled mass, as suggested by the coal beds with their fossil stems and leaves.
“At another time it must have been the silent bottom of a great green ocean, whose coral trees are imbedded in our solid sandstone, and whose oyster shells are still found in stratus and cakes or floating about as loose stones on the surface.
“The bones of its fishes and monsters long extinct, are still in evidence where the desert has grown hot and silent.”
Our pioneer vacationers didn’t exactly discover the San Juan County, but they did have to make a courageous expedition that would have been daunting or impossible to anyone that was not sure that their adventure had divine purpose and assistance.
The inscription near Clay Hill is similar to the one you will find on San Juan Hill which states “Thank Thee O God”.
Apparently, to write things on rocks is difficult, so one must choose their words carefully and be prudent and say exactly what one wants to say and nothing more.
Nothing like this newspaper column.
So I think we should at least honor the writer by taking time to contemplate the message that comes forth out of the past to give us some direction from a fellow traveler.
Sure, our journey may not be the Hole in the Rock trek, but there are many perils and pitfalls that we travel during our life and “Make Peace with God” still seems like helpful advice.
And I think San Juan Hill’s “Thank Thee O God” is probably a good reminder too.
I suppose having peace of mind and gratitude in our hearts could be a pretty good start to becoming a better version of ourselves.