A quick break from my series on the 11 countries to update you on what’s been going on in my heart.
It just occurred to me that desert has two meanings. And I don’t know much about words, but it can’t just be coincidence that they are both words associated with struggling, loneliness and waste.
I have been struggling, feeling like I’m wasting my time. I’ve been feeling lost and wandering. I’ve felt forsaken and disappointed, like God hasn’t been holding up His end. And these emotions are really real.
The truth is that sometimes God leads us into the desert, but He will never desert us.
When I’m in the spiritual desert there are two possible scenarios:
1. I just give up, cross my arms, and stare at God like “really? you’re doing this to ME?”
The result of this is indefinite frustration and often sin that tears me up later.
2. I come to the water every day that I wake up in the desert and I beg on my hands and knees in humbleness that He would refresh me and fill me.
“That is why we never give up. Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed every day. For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we seen now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.”
2 Corinth 4:16-18
God lets me choose. And because I’m a self-centered fool, sometimes I choose #1. And I am forgiven over and over and over because Jesus lived out His life choosing #2. And I get His record.
So I’m wrecked and I’m driven back to Jesus because what kind of love is that? I just want to be near that kind of love.
I will continue to plant seeds in the desert even when it seems like a waste because I am motivated by that love.
“Are we commending ourselves to you again? No, we are giving you a reason to be proud of us, so you can answer those who brag about having a spectacular ministry rather than having a sincere heart. If it seems we are crazy, it is to bring glory to God. And if we are in our right minds, it is for your benefit.
Either way, Christ’s love controls us.
Since we believe that Christ died for all, we also believe that we have all died to our old life. He died for everyone so that those who receive his new life will no longer live for themselves. Instead, they will live for Christ, who died and was raised for them.”
2 Corinth 5:12-15
