The wilderness is that place, situation, set of circumstances in your life where there is nothing familiar or comfortable, where there are none of your usual creature comforts around you. The wilderness is inhospitable, just as the name says, both figuratively and literally. If we learn nothing else from the Bible, let it be etched into our minds, that the walk of faith of each and every born-again child of GOD is bound to take you through a wilderness where all you will have is GOD and nothing else, where you will be strengthened in Spirit through faith, where GOD will deal with the flesh so that the Holy Spirit that dwells within you can reign, where your flesh will learn to serve the Spirit, where the flesh will learn to be in obedience to the Spirit utterly and completely. ‘Is there no other way for GOD to teach us these very important spiritual lessons on Kingdom principles? Is the wilderness necessary?”, you ask. We look into Israel’s trek out of Egypt in Exodus 14:10-12, 15, 19-20, and Exodus 13:17 for some answers.
A whole 40 years after having fled from Egypt and living in exile, GOD appears to Moses through a burning bush and instructs him to go back to the place and the people that he had run from. Remember Moses had fled from Egypt to escape prosecution for having killed an Egyptian, And that is precisely where GOD sends him. GOD uses Moses to deliver the Israelites out of Egypt but not before GOD works miracles, signs, and wonders through the hand of Moses accompanied by his brother Aaron, and not before GOD sends plagues to decimate the land and the people of Egypt. Pharaoh eventually relents and lets Israel go. Not only that, after 430 years of slavery and bondage, Israel leaves Egypt as a very wealthy nation because GOD willed it so. GOD can give us anything that we want, anywhere, anytime and anyhow He chooses. GOD is not bound by time or the laws of natural progression in the natural realm. GOD did not need time to enrich Israel after 430 years of bondage and slavery, He made them a very wealthy people overnight! All GOD needs is our cooperation with His will for Him to prosper us.
Now after letting Israel go, Pharaoh changes his mind and gives chase after Israel with the intention to recapture and return them to Egypt. Pharaoh caught up with Israel as they reached the shores of the Red Sea. Israel had nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. At this moment, in a state of panic, fright, and terror, Israel cry out, complaining and criticizing Moses for taking them out of Egypt [Exodus 14:10-12]. But GOD, in His omnipotent brilliance, had already provisioned for Israel’s protection through the angel that was first leading their way; The angel moved to the back to shield them from harm by hiding them from the Egyptians with a pillar of cloud and fire [Exodus 14:19-20]; And GOD parted the waters of the Red Sea to let Israel walk on dry ground to escape Pharaoh and his army. Exodus 14:19 says that ‘the angel of GOD had been leading (traveling in front of) the people of Israel’. This means GOD was always with them; He did not just appear to part the Red Sea; He was always with them, He had never left them.
When we get caught between a rock and a hard place, it is crucial that we keep our gaze fixed on GOD, the One who permitted the situation. We must maintain a calm mind in times of trouble. Long before GOD appeared to Moses through the burning bush, the LORD had set things in motion that would move Israel from one profound moment to another, from one outstanding miracle to another. And at the time when GOD parted the Red Sea because Israel was trapped between Pharaoh and his army and the Red Sea, Israel HAD BEEN living from miracle to miracle leading up to that moment! My difficult situation does not mean that GOD has forsaken me or that GOD is no longer with me for it is written ‘hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; perplexed but not in despair; persecuted but not forsaken; struck down but not destroyed’ [2 Corinthians 4:8-9 NKJV]! Every situation that GOD permits, He already knows how to resolve. GOD does not allow us to go through anything where He has not already made a way out for us, And GOD will allow His beloved children to ‘walk through the valley of the shadow of death’ [Psalm 23:4], to go through the wilderness, because it is the season for it. GOD allows the wilderness because the wilderness is a servant of GOD and He uses it to do His work in us.
GOD chose the harsher terrain of the wilderness that Israel took to Canaan. There are easier quicker ways for GOD to get us what we want. GOD is never bound by the laws of physics, time, or science in the natural realm. The Creator could deliver Israel into Canaan in a split second if He willed it so, by just saying a Word. Exodus 13:17 NLT says ‘GOD did not lead them along the main road’. Why would GOD do that? Why would GOD make it take 40 years when it could have taken Israel 11 days to Canaan? To add to the answer written in Scripture, GOD led Israel through the wilderness because of what GOD wanted to accomplish in Israel. GOD knew that – (i) mediocrity and slave mentality cannot inherit the land, blessings, and promises; (ii) some people, some things, and some habits must die in the wilderness; and (iii) in the wilderness GOD reveals Himself to us for us to know Him. GOD leads us where and how He wants; He can give you what you want anytime, anywhere, anyhow, but He wants a relationship with you before He gives you what you want because He knows that once you get what you want, you will care nothing about seeking, pursuing, building a relationship with Him.
GOD was always with Israel, constantly dwelling in them and journeying with them. We too have GOD constantly with us, dwelling in us and journeying with us through the proverbial valley of the shadow of death and the wilderness. It is by reason of the Holy Spirit that lives within us as born-again believers that we are never alone without GOD. Our walk of faith as believers is a journey. Faith is never a destination but it is a journey. We set ourselves up for great disappointment when we adopt the arrival mentality as believers, when in fact our faith is never a point and/or place of arrival. In our walk of faith, GOD takes us from place to place, from situation to situation, from moment to moment, from milestone to milestone. Some Do’s and Don’ts for that walk through ‘the valley of the shadow of death’ or the wilderness: (i) DO NOT get settled or set up permanent residence in the valley; (ii) DO NOT make any permanent decisions when you are in the valley; and (iii) DO remember that GOD has never left you not even for one moment. The wilderness is a place and a time of transition that GOD has determined for us and He has not left us alone in that transition.
Be encouraged that GOD has sworn by HIMSELF that HE would never leave nor forsake us. Lean into your faith and believe that we are never without GOD in our wilderness, difficult situation, or valley of the shadow of death, even though it may not feel like it. Worry not about how you feel because faith is not a feeling. We will not always feel the presence of GOD with us all the time, but I know by faith that GOD dwells in me, He is with me, He surrounds me, and He has me covered. GOD did not set us free, deliver us from the world, only to leave us. We are constantly and consistently under GOD’s eye, surveillance, providence, provision, and grace. GOD is our pillar of cloud by day and our pillar of fire by night. When the first signs of difficulty appear, in whatever season that we are in, we must not change the language of our speech and prayers, we must not utter doom and gloom. Despite having witnessed the strong and mighty hand of GOD in Egypt – all the miracles, signs, wonders, and plagues – Israel turns on Moses at the first signs of difficulty [Exodus 14:10-14]; Oh how quickly they forgot, all the glorious goodness that the LORD did for them to deliver them out of slavery.
Let us not make the mistake of assuming that everyone is looking for freedom, that everyone is looking for a better life. Man can become comfortable in his bondage, slavery, pain, misery, limitation, stagnation, and abusive toxic relationship; And man could prefer not to be disturbed from his status quo. That one day when man has discomfort and difficulty under the leadership of a man of GOD (who is led by GOD and is in fact the mouthpiece of GOD here on earth), they soon forget all the good that the man of GOD led them through and they turn on him. In the wilderness, Israel wanted to go back to slavery. This is because the impacts of slavery, bondage, and oppression lingered for a long time in Israel – even when they were out of Egypt their minds were still in captivity, and they still longed to go back to that which was killing, destroying and harming them, and they even told Moses as much. Although Israel was delivered by the strong and mighty hand of GOD out of Egypt, GOD still had to deal with the Egypt in them.
Like Israel, there are people who cannot be delivered from what is harming them, they will not leave it. Like Israel, there are some of us who even though GOD has set us out of the world and delivered us according to Colossians 1:13, the world is sadly still very much in us because we still very much enjoy the worldly things that we were delivered from, we still love the places that GOD has delivered us from, And it is difficult to completely shake off the world and the ways of the world because we have developed a dependency on them and our souls are enslaved by these worldly masters. There comes a time when GOD changes your status from being a slave to the world and its sins to being freed through salvation, when GOD moves you from being in the world to being one of His in the Kingdom; And when GOD changes your status He is going to disturb you, He is going to shake you, He is going to sift you and He is going to shift you. May we realize when GOD is changing our status, when He transitions us from our old selves into our new selves, as He moves us from one phase of our lives into the next.
As uncomfortable as transition is, do not make the mistake of settling into that state when your status is still changing; Instead seek to hear what GOD says in that phase of transition. The changes that happen in that transition phase will bring discomfort (unease, a shaking, a shifting, a sifting), as they are supposed to, and it is all very deliberate with GOD. Changes bring a new status quo, a new reality. The one thing that is certain in life is change – any one particular phase of your life will always be followed by another phase, and on and on it goes. GOD will settle you but as far as your journey of faith is concerned, the change is and will be consistently constant; And when the changes shake and sift you, DO NOT start a pity party and stop moving. In Exodus 14:15 Israel cried out to Moses and Moses cried out to GOD because they were cornered, GOD simply said ‘Stop crying and get a move on’. This scenario clearly proves that if you do not move, you run the risk of falling into the very peril that you are crying out to GOD to save you from. We must resist the urge to curl up in the fetal position in self-pity. You may not understand, but do not stop, follow the change, and keep moving forward with the change because GOD is at hand, He has never left.
Like Israel, GOD is leading us moment by moment. You do not know what is going to happen tomorrow, where you are going to be tomorrow, or what you are going to do tomorrow. This is what living by faith is and means. I cannot help but marvel at the absolute awesomeness of the grace of GOD in how He assigned His angel to Israel! Now this angel understood his assignment, he stayed on post, never moved from his assigned duty, and when he did move, he went behind Israel where he was better positioned to protect and shield Israel. The angel moved with them and kept on moving with them and for them. The angel and the grace of GOD moved in the direction of the will of GOD as Israel kept moving forward. Believers, the grace of GOD will only sustain you, keep you, and protect you in line with the direction where the will of GOD is taking you. If we insist on doing things outside of the will of GOD, we cannot then blame GOD when things do not work out, when that was not His will in the first place. We must always move in line with the will of GOD for us, and the grace of GOD will move for us and with us, even in the wilderness. Without the wilderness, we may not relish, cherish, or appreciate the promise fulfilled, the freedom, the abundance, the overflow, and the blessing that is Canaan.
The wilderness is a place and a time of transition that GOD has determined for us and He has not left us alone in that transition. Without the wilderness, we may not relish, cherish or appreciate the promise fulfilled, the freedom, the abundance, the overflow, and the blessing that is Canaan.
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