pain

The Way Forward: Part I

The Way Forward: Part I

Part of what the wilderness does is teach us to wait. The pillar of cloud and fire will remain where it is as long as God wants it to. But, the pillar does move. We will stay in wilderness forever unless we find ways to be brave, to pick up our stakes, and to follow the cloud, trusting that God’s presence dwells inside it. We are to trust that God knows when we’ve been in our particular wilderness long enough—to ask him to help us be brave to walk forward when the cloud begins to move, because eventually it will move. It will move because God moves in our lives. There is a way forward.

The Hard Place

The Hard Place

God comes to the Israelites in the midst of their pain and tells them that he wants to bring them to a better place. Those of us who know the story, however, know that they have to go through a hard place—wilderness—to get to the better place. Wilderness is a kind of “space between”—a space between enslavement and freedom. Wilderness is the place where we lead ourselves, where life lead us, or where God leads us—to deal with our pain.

Bushes That Burn in Wilderness

Bushes That Burn in Wilderness

It’s a story we know well, of course—Moses and that burning bush. The funny thing about it is that it was a day like any other. Moses was somewhere in the middle of the ordinary—getting married, having a child, tending his father-in-law’s sheep—moving in and out of the same old places. On an ordinary day, there it was, a once-in-a-lifetime moment. The moment is significant, to be sure, but not because of the theatrics. The moment is significant because of what the bush signifies—the coming of God.