What other “word” does God give to us in wilderness space? I think this is also one—when you think you’ll die in this wilderness, you need only be still. I am fighting for you with a power that is liberating, not abusive. When the Israelites go out into the wilderness and fight the Egyptians, they discover that God is fighting for them: “At the morning watch the LORD in the pillar of fire and cloud looked down upon the Egyptian army, and threw the Egyptian army into panic” (Exod.14:24). And the Egyptians said, “Let us flee from the Israelites, for the LORD is fighting for them against Egypt” (Exod.14:25). God fought for the Israelites’ freedom from slavery; all they had to do was wait and watch. God is not only fighting to free them from slavery, but he is fighting for a transference of loyalty—“Love the LORD with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might” (Deut.6:4). These are the words of Yahweh, before they are the words of Jesus. God is fighting for them so that he can put them under the lordship of his own liberating power. Rather than flailing under abuse, God wants them to flourish in freedom.
And so what we see God fighting for in the wilderness is nothing less than the heart of his people. Nothing less than all that they are. And I think that’s part of what we discover about God in the wilderness—that he is fighting FOR us—which is to say that he is fighting for US—he is fighting for access to all that we are. Fighting for access to our hearts, our hurts, our hopes. God is fighting for us. All we are to do is to be still and to let ourselves be held by God. And therein lies the challenge.
I think sometimes the most challenging enemy we face in the wilderness is ourselves. What is your default position before God? Is it to be still? Is it to trust? I’ll confess—being still—it’s not mine. Sometimes my default position before God in the wilderness is to fight the work that God is wanting to do in my life. “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt, that you took us out to die in this wilderness?” (Exod.14:11-12) Why have you exposed this wound, made me deal with this pain? Why have you taken me to this hard place, where I have to really look at this? Other times, my default position before God is run away from God completely—the voice of the taskmasters in Egypt still beckon; the safety of what I know still beckons. At other times, my default position before God is to freeze—to shut myself in, to shut myself off, not to engage God or the world around me, or those who are quietly speaking for God. There’s a temptation in the wilderness to exist in a kind of listlessness, a kind of closed-off ness, because everything is frightening. My default position is not to be held by God. I don’t imagine that I’m alone there. But I think that is what we are called to—to wait, and to be held.