I packed a tent for this Race. It is actually a pretty nice tent: two person, three season tent with quality materials and not too bulky either. I bought it online in a nice teal color because i figured it was better that the “dandelion yellow” tent they had in the store. I really did not want to wake up in the African sun baking in a dandelion yellow oven. Teal would be better, certainly. I bought this tent expecting for it to be my home for a solid nine months, thinking perhaps if I’m REALLY lucky, I will get to spend a month or two with an actually roof over my head. In my mind’s eye the tent would come away from this nine month trip bearing the scars of a caribbean jungle, African desert and East-Asian rainforest. Truthfully, I have only unrolled my teal oasis twice so far in my journey; once just a couple weeks ago in Swaziland during and unexpected border-hop (don’t tell the South African government) and the second yesterday when we used it as a tomb for a skit we performed at church. The rest of my trip I’ve had a bed and roof over my head. What kind of joke is it, then, when God tells me that I am in the midst of His WILDERNESS?
I wasn’t sure what God’s idea of wilderness was because I grew up camping and that is the wilderness I know and love and where I live now is not like that at all. God has spoiled my team, the past two months in particular, when it comes to creature comforts. So what does God’s wilderness look like and more importantly, why is He calling me there?
The most famous instance of Biblical wilderness is the story of Moses leading the Israelites through the wilderness for forty years after coming out of Egypt. That would be a good place to start if I were to look for God’s purpose for wilderness. Here was a group of people that had grown out of a blessed family, that God had promised to be with, that have no true identity for themselves other than that of slaves to the Egyptians. They know nothing of the land they came out of and they had mostly forgotten the old fables of the God that their ancestors served. Now they are out of Egypt and eager to get into the land that they knew was promised to their ancestors, now they know it as their rightful inheritance. But not quite yet. Forty years they spent in the wilderness, making mistakes, challenging their leadership, shedding their lives as slaves and forming their identity as the people of God. Once they had that identity they were ready to step into the calling God had for them.
Let’s fast forward just a bit to a man named John the Baptist. John was cousin to Jesus and the prophet tasked with preparing the way for Jesus to start his ministry. John was described as a man in the wilderness.
I use to think that when God called people to the wilderness it was as a punishment. I use to think it symbolized a great distance from God. Wilderness called to mind the 40 years punishment and an encounter with Satan. So when I felt called to the wilderness I was scared and confused. I didn’t know why God wanted to punish me. But he asked me to look deeper into what it means.
When Jesus was lead into the wilderness it was immediately after God had publicly confirmed his sonship and told the world how pleased with Jesus God is. The wilderness journey was his opportunity to accept and claim his identity.
I’ve been told and I believe in the love that God has for me. I’ve been told and I believe in the identity of a son of God that is mine to claim. If God is calling me into this wilderness, I believe that it is to test that identity and take ownership of it. To stand in the face of temptation and silence the lies of the enemy with the truth of the Father. I don’t need a tent to step boldly into this wilderness and abide in it. I don’t expect easy, the past 6 months has instilled in me the confidence that God has not called me to follow him on an easy path. I do expect that when this wilderness is over, be it while I live or when the trumpet sounds, all who see me will look at me and see Jesus in me whether they like it or not.
“The wilderness proves what you truly believe about God.” -Jonathan David Helser
