I
have often wondered why the LORD took the Israelites wandering forty years
through the wilderness of Sinai after delivering them from slavery in
Egypt. If I were God I would have turned
north and headed up by the Mediterranean Sea and taken the King’s Highway. The trip would have lasted only a couple of
months and there would have been plenty of food and water. But hey, God is God. He is who he is and he does what he
does. But God is not arbitrary. He had a reason for taking them into the
wilderness – to teach them faith by providing for them in the most extreme of
circumstances.
So,
God took the Israelites through the wilderness to teach them faith. This is a hard one I think for us to
grasp. You see, we are not accustomed to
saying that God brings hard times upon us, that God causes or lets suffering
happen to us so that we can come to know him better and grow in faith. We find it very difficult to say that God brings
suffering to his people, his daughters and sons, that they might come closer to
him. We like to say that bad things
happen because this is a messed up world or because we brought them upon
ourselves and that God will somehow work things out because he loves us. Rarely, if ever will anyone say, “The LORD
has brought me out into the wilderness.
The LORD is doing this to me.”
But, you know, if we
are going to be truly biblical about things; if we are disciples of Jesus born
from above in him by the free gift of the Holy Spirit so that we are God’s
children with him; if we are such, we are going to spend some time in the
wilderness and it’s going to happen because God is going to take us there. He will indeed lead us into the wilderness,
into the valley of the shadow of death where our souls are ripped to pieces
rather than take us where he makes us to lie down in green pastures beside the
still waters so that our souls are restored.
He will lead us to painful places where we are forced to ask, “Is the
Lord among us or not?” In a world so
utterly broken and corrupted by sin, the LORD must bring us to places where in
the depths of despair, of grief, of poverty of spirit, of loneliness, of
boredom where our only resort is to turn to the LORD and ask, “Are you here?”
In the wilderness we
float. We wander. We wait.
We cannot help but ask “how am I going to survive out here?” By
nature we, like the Israelites, will complain.
We will want to turn back to the way life was before instead of moving
forward. We will doubt the LORD’s motive
of love. We will take matters into our
own hands and serve and worship things that we believe will make us feel
better. We will try to bargain with the
LORD. We will say “Lord, get me out of
the wilderness and I’ll do my best to be a better person and come to church
more.” But, God’s got bigger plans for
us than just wanting to get us to behave a little better or come to church more
often. The grace behind the wilderness
is that it is not punishment. It is the
only healing way for us to move forward in Christ Jesus and the new life he has
for us.
To endure the
wilderness we must keep asking the questions “Who are you Lord and why have you
brought me here?” This entails that we
must keep coming before the LORD in prayer.
We don’t come asking for what I
perceive I need for things to be
better. You see, the LORD brings us into
the wilderness to strip us down and show us who we really are. So it is important while we are in the
wilderness to pay attention to what we are feeling for chances are we have felt
these painful feelings before and buried them but now the LORD is bringing them
forth from the tomb to heal us.
There are things we
can do in the wilderness to aid in our growth in Christ. We should feel free to
rant at the LORD. We are taught not to
complain to the Lord. But, God’s a big
boy. He can handle it. Rant, for sooner or later God very cleverly turns
our rants back on us and reveals to us the truth about ourselves.
Once I was in a
wilderness and I got on a rant with God.
I was complaining that I always seemed to be the one to make painful
sacrifices so that other people can be happy.
He turned that one around on me one day when he told me, “That’s exactly
what I do for you.” I shut up about that
and realized it’s part of what love is.
When you’re in the
wilderness read the Bible listening for something to stick out to you and then
spend the day or days pondering it. Keep
a journal of those things so that you can see the patterns that arise in what
you hear so you can discern what is actually from the LORD and what are the
things you want to hear.
The wilderness is also
a good place to draw together with our brothers and sisters in Christ to
worship, to share, to pray and to study.
For it is by the love of our brothers and sisters that we are built up
in Christ and equipped and nourished in Christ.
The thing to note about the wilderness wanderings of the Israelites was
that they all went through it together.
There were no Lone Ranger sufferers. This is the single most significant strength
of the small congregation. If one of us
suffers we all feel it. This fellowship
and support is what the church is all about.
The fellowship in the LORD is something I really appreciate about this church. Many churches have lost their Christian fellowship amidst a culture that is consumeristic. People visit churches asking what programs a church has that can meet what they think they or their family’s religious needs are, religious rather than actual faith needs. Then, if the programs aren’t there, they go elsewhere. Fortunately, we don’t have the resources here to meet every perceived need that comes through the door. What we do have is a home to offer those who come here asking who is the LORD and why has he brought me to the place that am at in life. Well, the LORD is the mystery of the loving communion of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He dwells here richly and he calls people here to meet him. The people who come to this church searching for this or that program will not stay. But those who come looking for the Lord, will find him and be well fed and stay for the Lord is among us. Amen.
The fellowship in the LORD is something I really appreciate about this church. Many churches have lost their Christian fellowship amidst a culture that is consumeristic. People visit churches asking what programs a church has that can meet what they think they or their family’s religious needs are, religious rather than actual faith needs. Then, if the programs aren’t there, they go elsewhere. Fortunately, we don’t have the resources here to meet every perceived need that comes through the door. What we do have is a home to offer those who come here asking who is the LORD and why has he brought me to the place that am at in life. Well, the LORD is the mystery of the loving communion of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He dwells here richly and he calls people here to meet him. The people who come to this church searching for this or that program will not stay. But those who come looking for the Lord, will find him and be well fed and stay for the Lord is among us. Amen.
