I have never physically been in a desert or wilderness.
I flew over one once in Africa.
I have read about them.
But I have been in the wilderness. I know the wilderness. And I suspect many of you do too.
Let’s talk about the wilderness…
In the Bible, the wilderness is an arid, dangerous, isolated place. But it is where God’s people are sent to be refined, challenged and taught to depend completely on God. The wilderness is this unlikely place that no one really wants to go – but it’s where people truly meet God.
Likewise, today, although not a Middle Eastern desert, you and I have known wildernesses. Sometimes it’s a failing marriage or a divorce or a loss of a loved one. Sometimes it’s a diagnosis. Sometimes it’s a faith crisis or loss of faith. Sometimes it’s treatment for a disease or an addiction. Sometimes it’s a job change or loss. Sometimes it’s just being a tween or teen. Sometimes it’s after graduating high school or college. Sometimes it’s when you are caring of an aging or troubled parent or child.
I can’t show it to you on a map. But you know when you are there. It’s a season of life when you wonder if you will be intact at the end of it all. Everything seems out of control. What used to work doesn’t anymore. It seems like the end of certainty and confidence. Our sense of direction is all messed up – what was once up is now down. What was once east is now west. You really understand disorientation in the wilderness. And God feels so far away.
The wilderness is the place where you think it’s all going to end…but it’s actually the beginning…
Because in the wilderness, while we are stripped of much of ourselves, it’s what’s left that matters most. Like a refiner’s fire, all that’s left is the gold. All the dross and impurities are burned away. This is the purpose of God allowing us to enter into a wilderness. After it, we will be different but closer to what He is shaping us to be. In the wilderness we learn things that we would never learn in any other way. In the wilderness we find strength that we never knew we had; clarified purpose; a trust in God we never thought possible. In the end, we get much closer to seeing who God really is and who we are in God’s eyes – and we are given a choice…
Listen, I know the wilderness is hard. No one wants to be there. Maybe you are there now. I want to share with you what I have learned from my own wilderness over the last two years to encourage you. I want to show you and assure you that there is an other side to this. And I want to tell you the most important thing about the wilderness…
What I learned because of the wilderness…
Now I know what it is to keep going on when everything inside you wants to quit – this is faithfulness.
Now I know what Paul meant when he said I no longer live, Christ lives in me. The wilderness strips away your ego, pride and sense of self from a “success” point of view. You really learn in the wilderness that it’s not about “me.” I am a vessel and channel.
Now I know what it is to be at war with Satan and to face him head on. He is relentless and his goal is destruction. If you are trying to follow God with any kind of passion and faithfulness – he will be there opposing you – via doubt, fear, temptation, playing on your weaknesses, discouragement and he will use willing people too. Though scarred, I know now that he is beatable.
Now I know that sometimes victory isn’t overcoming – sometimes it’s remaining standing and enduring.
Now I know that when people try to tear me down and try to tell me I am a failure and I shouldn’t even be in ministry – I know to ignore it. When you stand for something, when you are leading, people are going to oppose you, but don’t believe their lies. We can do very little about their ignorance and blindness, but the worst thing you can do is to entertain foolishness, fears and agendas. Now I know to trust what God says about me more than anything else.
Now I know fully and with certainty who I am in Christ. I suspected it, I had hints of it. But this is it, “It is a matter of sharing and bearing the pain and puzzlement of the world so that the crucified love of God in Christ may be brought to bear healingly upon the world at exactly that point (N.T. Wright).”
Now I know that I’ve spent twenty years trying to accomplish things and being very driven. Now I understand God wants me to be Christopher and through that He will accomplish what He needs to accomplish. I’ve never had to fight to be myself. I was always just Christopher. Most things had always come naturally to me. But when this was relentlessly tested, for the first time I had to choose. There is an unprecedented choice in the wilderness. Sometimes it’s a choice between living and dying; sometimes it’s choice between being faithful and not; between quitting and enduring; between moving toward God or away; between depending on yourself or depending on God. I had to choose, consciously, to be who God was calling me to be or not. I could have turned away from it. But I didn’t. There’s a choice in the wilderness.
Now I know that God had us the whole time. Even when it seemed the worst, God never let go – and never will!
Now I understand beauty in a new way – there is such beauty in brokenness. Too often we are hiding it. It’s much more beautiful than some manufactured façade.
Now I know the difference (vast) between His strength and my strength.
Now I know what it is to be fearless, to be at peace, and to know that they can’t take away what matters most – they can’t take away the gold within us that is of God.
Finally, the most important thing to know about the wilderness is…that it is not permanent. It will end –
And, now I know that on the other side of a wilderness, on the other side of all the challenge, loss and pain and struggle and discouragement – is a promise and its fulfillment – a promised place, a promised state – a new life! I can testify to you today that God has kept His promises and we have been blessed beyond what we could have imagined.
I want you to be encouraged today by my testimony. The wilderness will end and it will end with goodness and blessings. There will be a day when you look back and will be able to say that it was worth it and that the blessings outweigh the pain. Take heart and never give up. Let this be a time of depending on God, finding joy in His strength – remember – draw near to God and He will draw near to you (James 4:8)! I promise you that God knows what He is doing and it is for our good.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost. As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen. Amen.
Rev. Christopher B. Wolf
Isaiah 42:7
Christopher B. Wolf is the author of Giving Faith a Second Chance: Restarts, Mulligans and Do-Overs (2007) and the forthcoming, With You: Every Step of the Way (2011).
“It is a matter of sharing and bearing the pain and puzzlement of the world so that the crucified love of God in Christ may be brought to bear healingly upon the world at exactly that point.” N.T. Wright
Living Water 