What do you do when God moves you into some place different? Into a “season of life” that you don’t like? Into something that feels hard? Feels dry? Where you feel like maybe you would starve or die of thirst (spiritually or other wise)? What do you do? How do you react? That’s a question that has been rolling around in my head for a while. And recently God sent me on a few long journeys for the answer to smack me in the face.

Imagine standing on a rock in the wilderness. You are standing watching a group of people who have recently become nomadic. They had just been saved from unbelievable slavery in incredible ways by their great God. And now here they are traveling in a direction they were promised good by that same God. Sure they are in the wilderness, but God not only saved them, but provided water, meat, and bread. You would think standing on this rock you would hear cheers and praises. But you don’t. Instead you hear grumbling and complaining. They are standing there and shouting about how the slavery was better than this journey. How they would rather die there than live here. Of course if you are anything like me you get angry at them and start yelling “Don’t you see. Don’t you see. How great God is to you?”…. So you yell at them, you stamp your feet, you get passive-aggressive, sarcastic, or snarky. Whatever your method of choice, you go all out to beat it into their brains. “Stupid Israelites eat your food.” As the words come out of your mouth an elderly man dressed in his dessert garb and battered sandles comes out of the crowd. He’s pointing at you and shouting back. He comes and gets in your face. “Boo… Boo..” He says. You respond in shoc “why do you do this?”
He continues in his attempt to copy the dream sequence of Princess Bride… “Because you had love in your hands and you let it go… God is working in your life and you ignore Him. You act like a victim. You act like you want to go back to your own version of slavery because you don’t see what’s around you. How are you any better than us…” This was the dream I had in Arkansas. God convicts me often using His word mixed with pictures in my head. This one stuck and it hurt.

When you are in a wilderness how do you respond?

Living Differently means I stack memorial stones before my world gets barried in confusion or stanky/moldy in control. Remembering what the Lord has done and recognizing where He is working is more important than living conditions. Look forward to what He promised and grow.

The Israelites were told in Exodus 14 “The Lord will fight for you; you must be quiet” then He parted the Red Sea and freedom struck. They were moving toward what was promised. God gave them water, meat, and bread to make it through every day, yet they were still complaining through chapter 16. They needed to remember that the same God fights for them still. Even when they had the bread and meat, they didn’t trust God to continue to provide. They started trying to store up the food, so that they could control the outcome. What they ended up with is moldy bread and rottening birds.

The last several years have been a “wilderness” of sorts. God called us and we moved, but we haven’t made it to the other side of the Jordan yet. I won’t focus on the details of what has caused thirst, starvation, dryness and hunger; its not worth the pages here. But I will tell you the old man in the dessert’s spit on my face woke me up. I wouldn’t say that I went around like Eeryore parading gloom, but God knows my levels of complaining. I could only see the bad, the difficult, the confusion. I didn’t see the good.I would even take the good and attempt to control it because I didn’t trust God to continue to provide. The mold spoils what is good. Rotten birds stink. We are still in the “Wilderness” God hasn’t moved us. But now I can see God is using us to impact ministries and specific people. God has given us opportunity to heal, to stand stronger, to grow and change. We aren’t the same people we were. His word literally feeds our thirsty souls. He’s provided in every challenge. He blessed us unexpectedly with beauty. And He continues to be faithful to His character and His children. This was not easy to realize at all; God’s word and His work through others in us truly changes our hearts.

In Arkansas we went to a place called Devils Den and stayed a couple days. In our hike through Devils Den we stumbled upon something else that struck me. Right in the middle of a river there was rocks.. Not just normal river rocks… But stacks and stacks of stones put there by people. Hundreds and hundreds of stones. I know that what I saw is not what everyone sees upon witnessing this. Years ago I fell in love with stories in scripture about people stacking memorial stones to remind them of what God has done in them and through them. In the middle of Devils Den my heart was praising God for the hundreds of things I could picture on those stones… No more sitting in the wilderness complaining… Time to stack some more stones… Thank You God for freedom, for growth, for Your strong character, for fighting for me.

Living Differently means I stack memorial stones before my world gets barried in confusion or stanky/moldy in control. Remembering what the Lord has done and recognizing where He is working is more important than living conditions. Look forward to what He promised and grow.