O God, when You went out before Your people, when You marched through the wilderness, the earth quaked, the heavens poured down rain, before God, the One of Sinai, before God, the God of Israel. Rain in abundance, O God, You shed abroad. You restored Your inheritance as it languished. Your flock found a dwelling in it. In Your goodness, O God, you provided for the needy. (Verses 7-10)
Don't you think it's interesting that God went the children of Israel through the wilderness and into their promised land, God's inheritance according to His covenant with them? I do. God with me in the triumphs. That I get. Thundering before me with mighty angels carving the way for me to a victorious life. That I understand. But trudging with me through my wanderings. Putting up with my complaints. Providing though I whine it is not enough. That is beyond the hearts of the pale idols others serve. My Lord lives in the dusty, dry and barren places with me until I get to water in abundance.
Moses had to argue with the Lord for Him to make the choice to trek the forty long years with his stubborn people. At first He wasn't about to: "Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey. But I won't go up among you lest I consume you on the way, for you are a stubborn and stiff-necked people." Further, God told the people: "If for a single moment I should go up with you, I would consume you." Ouch! That scared the mass of people so much they mourned and stripped off their jewelry. Unadorned they humbled themselves before God. Though He promised mighty angels to go before them and protect them, Moses wasn't about to start out with these people God made him lead out of Egypt without the power of God to guide them. Moses was smart enough to know God Almighty made Pharaoh let the people go. Not Moses.
A friend of God. One who has intimate conversations with Him. Moses dares ask to see God's glory. Personally. Not with frogs, locusts or bloody rivers. God shows Moses His goodness as He passes by when Moses hides in the cleft of a rock. It is that goodness that causes God to change His mind about putting up with His children in their wilderness. And, oh, it wasn't pretty.
Eventually, His people entered their promised country where God rained down abundance. Even as His kids languished in the wilderness thinking they would eat manna forever, God called it time. But He never left them. God went through it all with them. His Presence guiding them every day into, through and out of the sandy hot desert. Because He has a personality and character, God took their ups and downs (some major downs, here) and marched through with them to the end.
In a wilderness? Thinking you are alone? Our God is familiar with the solitary places where our faith is tested and our souls are dried up. Just as He was with the Hebrew youths in the fiery furnace, walking around in their hell, Jesus is with us mingling His glory with our ignominy. Nothing can separate us from His love, remember? Not nakedness, tribulation, distress, persecution, or famine or danger or the sword. Not one thing! The One Who was willing to come to earth to walk His own solitary way to the cross will never leave us or forsake us. Even if we step into a hell of our own making. As David said, "If I make my bed in Sheol, You are there!" (Psalm 139)
What is Jesus after on this journey He willingly takes with us? Restoration. Plumping up the languishing heart in giving, by His goodness, what we need in order to have abundant life. I am near speechless as I think about the kind of love that sweats out my salvation with me. The kind of benevolence that sees the life I will live on the other side of the desolation I might be in and weathers with me driving sandstorms and parching sun in order to bring me to the oasis He knew was there all along.
Don't you think it's interesting that God went the children of Israel through the wilderness and into their promised land, God's inheritance according to His covenant with them? I do. God with me in the triumphs. That I get. Thundering before me with mighty angels carving the way for me to a victorious life. That I understand. But trudging with me through my wanderings. Putting up with my complaints. Providing though I whine it is not enough. That is beyond the hearts of the pale idols others serve. My Lord lives in the dusty, dry and barren places with me until I get to water in abundance.
Moses had to argue with the Lord for Him to make the choice to trek the forty long years with his stubborn people. At first He wasn't about to: "Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey. But I won't go up among you lest I consume you on the way, for you are a stubborn and stiff-necked people." Further, God told the people: "If for a single moment I should go up with you, I would consume you." Ouch! That scared the mass of people so much they mourned and stripped off their jewelry. Unadorned they humbled themselves before God. Though He promised mighty angels to go before them and protect them, Moses wasn't about to start out with these people God made him lead out of Egypt without the power of God to guide them. Moses was smart enough to know God Almighty made Pharaoh let the people go. Not Moses.
A friend of God. One who has intimate conversations with Him. Moses dares ask to see God's glory. Personally. Not with frogs, locusts or bloody rivers. God shows Moses His goodness as He passes by when Moses hides in the cleft of a rock. It is that goodness that causes God to change His mind about putting up with His children in their wilderness. And, oh, it wasn't pretty.
Eventually, His people entered their promised country where God rained down abundance. Even as His kids languished in the wilderness thinking they would eat manna forever, God called it time. But He never left them. God went through it all with them. His Presence guiding them every day into, through and out of the sandy hot desert. Because He has a personality and character, God took their ups and downs (some major downs, here) and marched through with them to the end.
In a wilderness? Thinking you are alone? Our God is familiar with the solitary places where our faith is tested and our souls are dried up. Just as He was with the Hebrew youths in the fiery furnace, walking around in their hell, Jesus is with us mingling His glory with our ignominy. Nothing can separate us from His love, remember? Not nakedness, tribulation, distress, persecution, or famine or danger or the sword. Not one thing! The One Who was willing to come to earth to walk His own solitary way to the cross will never leave us or forsake us. Even if we step into a hell of our own making. As David said, "If I make my bed in Sheol, You are there!" (Psalm 139)
What is Jesus after on this journey He willingly takes with us? Restoration. Plumping up the languishing heart in giving, by His goodness, what we need in order to have abundant life. I am near speechless as I think about the kind of love that sweats out my salvation with me. The kind of benevolence that sees the life I will live on the other side of the desolation I might be in and weathers with me driving sandstorms and parching sun in order to bring me to the oasis He knew was there all along.
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