A transformative time in the wilderness
From the moment you enter the gate heralding you are entering Two Moose Ranch in Montana and start the five mile drive to the ranch house you enter a world apart. Along the drive you are likely to see any of the several big game animals of North America: moose, elk, antelope, deer, bighorn sheep, mountain lion, or bear. The blue rushing water of the Big Hole River kept fresh by the snow melt dances along part of the road. It is alive with a variety of fish, making it one of the top trout fishing streams of North America. Boatmen skillfully guide their clients through swells and shallows. Osprey, curlew, bald eagles, golden eagles, sandhill cranes, and even pelicans abound. It is a veritable menagerie without confinement.
Mount McCartney, the tallest free-standing mountain in North America towers over the ranch on which it stands. The rarefied air is pure and invigorating. The expanded horizons make it is easy to see why this is called Big Sky Country.
We have friends from Grand Rapids, Michigan, who own this rare retreat. For nearly 20 years since we met while I was chairman and he the vice chairman of the National Board of Trustees of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes we have rendezvoused there for a couple of weeks each summer. In this ethereal environment on the high desert it is meaningful to have a quiescent experience.
In the majesty of the mountains that surround the ranch you can’t help but feel fragile and sorely inadequate. The purity of each new day invites you to another uplifting adventure. The challenge of a new day might involve venturing up Timber Canyon to visit one of the abandoned gold mines on Mount McCartney or watching fishing guides skillfully maneuver their boats down the azure blue waters of the Big Hole River that flows just below the elevated table on which the ranch house sits.
Apart from the ranch house, at some distance, our friend has developed a large, lovely retreat center. Each summer over a period of 10 weeks, he invites in about 35 college students per week from different universities for a week of Christian leadership training. He does so at his own expense. From youth out of the ghettos where they are awakened each day by the sound of gunfire to those from prestigious gated communities, and everywhere in between, they form an amalgam for the week. It has been my good fortune to work with groups from schools in the states of Washington, Indiana and Michigan.
This is an ideal environment in which students can engage in introspection and evaluate expedient changes that are biblically based. For many it is a transformative time. Having been a part of this for years it has given time to know the lasting life-style changes in the lives of many who can came there needing a new life.
One of the best learning experiences for the students is the day we isolate each one somewhere on the high desert where they cannot see or be seen by anyone with only a bottle of water and their Bible. Their cellphones are stapled in a bag only to be opened in the event of an emergency. Most of them have never spent a day alone and find it self-revealing and inspiring in setting priorities for life.
Native Americans called any expansive valley a hole. A week in the Big Hole is a big deal.