I've been doing a photo challenge for Lent, and the word for today is wilderness. As I thought about what picture to take, I ended up with a whole bunch of thoughts about the word and its use in Scripture and the way we talk about our spiritual lives. My journal entry for the day is a hot mess of all of those thoughts, and I thought perhaps blogging about it would help me make more sense of it. As I've written and rewritten sentences and paragraphs several times over, I'm not sure about it making more sense. But let's give it a go anyway.
When we talk about being "in the wilderness" in our spiritual lives, I think we're often thinking about that last definition: "a position of disfavor." There are times we feel lost, wandering aimlessly, out of favor with the world or even with God. We call it the wilderness. If we are self aware enough, we know that there are lessons to be learned and growth that needs to happen. But, let's be honest, our prayer in those times is to be led to the other side of the wilderness, to reach a land that is safe, fruitful, and familiar. Being in the wilderness is something we look to be delivered from, not to dwell in.
In the sermons/teachings about wilderness that I can recall, most have made use of the story in the New Testament about Jesus' time in the wilderness, as told in Matthew 4. After Jesus was baptized by John, Jesus goes into the wilderness, where He fasted and was tempted. We seek to relate to this story about Jesus when we're feeling "in the wilderness" ourselves. We look for comfort it in, whether it's in holding onto the idea that our Lord knows what we're feeling, or trusting that our time in the wilderness will come to an end, as His did. And that's good and fine, I think. But in my own self-reflection, I'm feeling that this isn't the best wilderness story to which we can relate.
In the Old Testament, we read that the Israelites were made to wander in the wilderness for 40 years before entering the promised land. In fact, while the English name for the book of Numbers comes from the censuses that are recorded within the story, the Hebrew name for the book is translated "In the Wilderness," because it documents the peoples wanderings. To make a long story short, after being freed from Egypt and seeing many miraculous signs from God, the people still doubted and sinned against God. And so, the people were punished to wander in the desert until an entire generation had passed away before they could go to the place which God had prepared for them.
There are things about my wrestling with this word and these scriptures today that are complicated, and some things that are very simple. The truth of the matter is, I would like to believe my time in the wilderness is akin to the New Testament story, when, in fact, it is much more like the Old Testament one.
Let me back up. See, the difficulty I've always had with Jesus' story is the part about the Spirit. "Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil," Matthew says. Jesus goes from hearing the Father speak over Him and the Spirit descending on Him, to being utterly alone in a desolate place, physically weakened and encountering the enemy. The Spirit actually led Him into that place of struggle. My problem has always been in hating that Jesus had done nothing wrong, and still had to wander in that way. It is probably [read: most definitely] ridiculous to dwell on that when, you know, that is true of His entire time on this planet. But it still always gives me pause.
On the other hand, the Israelites made their own bed. They complained and argued and did, like, exactly the opposite of what God told them to do. They were freed from their bondage, delivered from their enemy, literally fed from the heavens, and still they broke every promise they made. And so, they wandered. And, you know, that makes more sense to me.
What's convicting me? I am the Israelites. Much of my wanderings are consequences of my actions, my sin. I have no doubt that the Spirit leads me, that there is testing, growth and refinement in the midst of struggle. But I am not blameless. I cannot pretend that the wilderness is something I've been unfairly led into. As much as I'd prefer to shirk responsibility, the truth is that every time I choose my anger, pride, or selfish desires over the love, humility and compassion that Christ asks of me, I create the uninhabitable place through which I must then walk.
This could end quite depressingly, but it won't. Because in 40 years of wandering in the desert, but the Israelites were never alone. On the contrary, God continued to struggle with them, providing for them, fighting for them, and eventually bringing them to the place God had promised them.
Because despite how fantastically I make mistakes, Jesus is quite fantastic at forgiving them.
