There's always a reason for the wilderness

Burdens?  This and that?

Sometimes the walls in your life, the glue that binds you together, the thing that keeps you sane, that makes you continue to chose right over wrong seems to loose its grip and the adhesive wears away.

I know the Holy Spirit is steadfast within us, but sometimes as believers we can ignore that very adhesiveness that binds the being within us.  We ignore Him and go our own way.

When I get like this I find myself asking, "Is it worth it?"

I mean really and truly is all of what I am doing, not doing and giving up really worth it?  Sometimes you just wonder these things you know?

Most of us, the one's who have dedicated our lives to walking in the way that pleases God, make decisions for our life based on how we feel God's leading. However, we learn very quickly that just because we are obedient to what God has told us doesn't mean that our obedience in that area will SEEMINGLY to us— turn out perfect or pleasant.  Sometimes it seems that doing the right thing for the right reasons seems DISASTROUS.  PAINFUL AND PAINFULLY HARD.

When we are obedient to God and those right decisions that we've chosen turn out to make us feel bad, are they the right decisions? We know the answer to that is, "Yes."  Though, if you are anything like me, I bet your flesh can make several arguments to the contrary.  Nonetheless, the answer to that is yes.

When I look at the Bible characters from days gone by and see the mistakes many of them made, I understand that they didn't know or have the facts as I know and have many of the facts today.  Even though I have many more facts and I know how a lot of their situations turned out, I still, at times, have a desire to go my own way and travel down some of the destructive roads of my biblical siblings.

"There's always a reason for the wilderness."  I say to myself.

1.  The wilderness gets me out of the way.
2.  The wilderness helps me become more like Christ.

Hardships ...
Difficulties ...
This and that ...

They refine us.  They make us wise.  It is there . . . in the dark flickering on the wick that the image shows up and I see it plainly.  It is me. It is me becoming more like Him.  What do I see in this image, with eyes lifted up and a face full of flowing tears, I see how I become more like Him.  In that glow of orange crescent I see a few of His characteristics in me.

For one I see how my wilderness has brought me low. I'm on bending knees, my head is bowed, hands clasped, and the image of the garden resonates in my minds-eye. "Ah, this is what hardships do. This is where a sorrowful heart can bring you.  In sync . . . in sync with Him.

And the understanding takes hold and I hear in my heart, feel it to the marrow and understand the cry of His will.  Him wanting the cup to be removed, asking that it be passed from Him. "No.  Lord.  No.!" My lips mouth these words, but nothing comes out.  "I don't want your cup, but I know that I need your cup.  I need it if I am ever to become the woman I long to be.  If I want to be your woman."

I'm torn.  My heart is grieved. The mind is willing, but the flesh is so weak and life seems hard and unfair.

The reason for Christ's wilderness was to give you and me life.  In Him going through the wilderness, He taught us how to go through and I get that my reason for my wilderness is to be more like Christ. It is only during my crawl in the wilderness that I see His character more.  So I tell myself  "Hold on girl."  "Wait."  "Be still."  "Do what the wise ones do."

"Bend the knees, bow the head, clasp the hands, read His book and call out to Him. Be obedient"  This is the only way my true help will come.

I know this, but I will forget it each and every time.  This . . . this wilderness is my refining, the giving up of my will for His, my life for His, my ways for His.

And then it comes back to my remembrance, what I read in His book right there in Exodus.  He took the children of Israel through the wilderness because He loved them and He didn't want them to be frightened when they saw war.

I may not know the full story behind my trials, my sagas in life . . . just as some of the other biblical characters didn't know theirs, but there are a few things I do know:

God is love

God loves me and because He loves me and has a purpose for me He's refining me.  Part of that refining is to get my junk out so that more of who He is can be put in ... this takes a dying to self.  Just as Jesus cried in the garden because even He didn't want to give it all up.  I, too, cry for that very reason, but like Jesus, I know that there is a reason for God's children being in the wilderness.  There is always a reason Saint.

xo, Angela

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