There are times in every believer's walk with the Lord that the road ahead looks dry and desolate. Your mouth is parched, desperate for water, and your stomach is in knots, wondering when and if this season will ever end. Your mind taunts you, advising you to give up or back down and it is convincing you that you won't make it, you'll never be enough.
You're tempted to look behind you, back to Egypt, back to what was comfortable, back to the place where your food and water were guaranteed. You vow to never take the certainty of "things" - your provisions, your paycheck, your friends and family - again. You wrestle with turning back because Pharaoh never left you starved and desperate, dreaming about your next meal. Your schedule there was reliable. You always knew when you would labor, when you would eat, when you would sleep. Pharaoh actually looks like a kind and just ruler. You never knew true uncertainty there - with him.
But do you remember the groaning and complaining that escaped your very own lips back in Egypt? Do you remember how you cried out to your God again and again to deliver you from that place? How you pleaded with the Lord for your freedom? Do you recall how painful slavery was? How those chains and whips cut you and bore deep into your skin? Do you remember how He, your God, came through for you even if it was in the eleventh hour?
He delivered you. He took you out of Egypt. He answered your prayers.
And now here you are . . . stuck in the wilderness. The only thing you can see is desert sand stretched out for miles in every direction. The only thing you feel is the sun beating down on your neck. Every single thing ahead is uncertain. That is a hard place to be.
Believe it or not though, it is exactly where He wants you to be. If you can combat the voices in your head that say you won't make it, that you're not enough. . . . If you can find the strength to keep moving forward no matter how uncertain it looks. . . . If you can surrender your trust to Him again today . . . then you will realize that He is doing more than just delivering you out of Egypt. He is delivering Egypt out of you.
He loves you so much that sometimes He has to take you the long way around, so that you will see Him as your sole provider and hope. He is establishing Himself in your life, proving to you that He is enough. He has you in this place for only a season and every season must come to an end. One day you will look back on this wilderness and call it blessed because you saw just how much He did come through . . . for you, His beloved.
In your desert, rest assured that He has gone before you. He will provide a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. He will rain manna from heaven and spring forth water from a rock to satisfy your hunger and thirst in a dry and dusty place. He promises to meet your every need. It may not look the way you thought it would, but if you search for it, you will find His hand on you every step of the way.
Lean into this wilderness. Trust Him with the process, your desert, your future. He has delivered you. Now He wants you to experience what true freedom in Christ looks like.
Very soon, beloved, you will find yourself on the banks of the Jordan, about to cross over into the Promised Land. You will look back and see just how far you've really come. And, hopefully, you will realize just how far and wide and deep the Father's love for you is and how your Heavenly Father never left your side.
"The desert and the parched land will be glad;
the wilderness will rejoice and blossom.
Like the crocus, it will burst into bloom;
it will rejoice greatly and shout for joy.
The glory of Lebanon will be given to it,
the splendor of Carmel and Sharon;
they will see the glory of the Lord,
the splendor of our God.
Strengthen the feeble hands,
steady the knees that give way;
say to those with anxious hearts,
'Be strong, do not fear; your God will come,
He will come with vengeance;
with divine retribution, He will save you.'
Then will the eyes of the blind be opened
and the ears of the deaf unstopped.
Then will the lame leap like a deer,
and the mute tongue shout for joy.
Water will gush forth in the wilderness
and streams in the desert.
The burning sand will become a pool,
the thirsty ground bubbling springs.
In the haunts where jackals once lay,
grass and reeds and papyrus will grow.
And a highway will be there;
it will be called the Way of Holiness;
it will be for those who walk on the Way.
The unclean will not journey on it;
wicked fools will not go about on it.
No lion will be there, nor any ravenous beast;
they will not be found there.
But only the redeemed will walk there,
and those that the Lord has rescued will return.
They will enter Zion with singing;
everlasting joy will crown their heads.
Gladness and joy will overtake them,
and sorrow and sighing will flee away."
- Isaiah 35 -
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