In Exodus we see the people of God triumphantly brought from the desert by a benevolent God.  They were protected by a pillar of fire and guided by a cloud, the red sea parted and the Egyptian captors swallowed.  Though they were stuck out in the desert God didn’t let them starve, but gave them the very bread of heaven.  Water flowed freely from the bare rocks and God was with them.

And the response of the people of God was praise…for about 20 minutes. 

As a kid this made me furious.  ‘What’s wrong with the Jews! If I had seen the stuff they had seen, and was literally living by the grace of God day to day, I would be laughing and skipping all day long!’  ‘They made an IDOL!! WHAT IS WRONG WITH THEM!!!’ etc.

But us kids living somewhere in the New Testament know that what was physical in the Old Testament is probably now spiritual.  Circumcise our hearts not our skin, eat pure spiritual food, and let our stomachs deal with the impure physical.  Physical deserts found as spiritual deserts in us.

Last year at Momentum (Soul Survivor for 20 somethings) there was a speaker called Todd from Canada who stood up to do his pre-planned talk and found himself asked by God to abandon his notes and talk about his experience in the desert.  At the end Mike Pilavachi asked whether there was anyone who felt that they were in the desert.  A huge amount of this enormous tent stood up.  And I was one of them.

Recently talking with a friend we decided the worst thing about the desert was the boredom.  ‘What did you see today?’ ‘Sand’, ‘yeah’.  I know God is with me.  I see God working through me.  I eat the manna; I drink miracle water, and am so frustrated with the boring horizon. ‘Some promised land!  I see neither milk nor honey, fulfilled promise nor prosperity, I tell you, Egypt is looking pretty sweet right about now’.

The sand just itches at you, a constant scratching, a tiny irritating reminder that at some stage in the past you weren’t surrounded by a desolate sea of scrubland where nothing can grow.

My problem is that at this stage I forget that the manna comes from God, and the miracle water, and feel as though I have been abandoned entirely.  God’s hidden face leaves a silence which I long to fill with… anything.  What makes me feel like I AM prosperous?  What makes me feel like I AM a man?  If I was the kind of guy who was into bling I would melt it down and form it into anything to fill that void; even some kind of farm yard animal.  The thorn in the flesh begs me to find solace anywhere but in the distant arms of the Lord.  It scratches and tells me that he is gone.  It scratches and tells me I’m lost, and lonely; and it’s my fault.  So I believe it, and collapse into the lying arms of the thorn.

It feels like no one understands, but sometimes I hear a radio signal, and just for a few moments I hear someone else out here, lost and alone.

If you are out there my brother, my sister, there is hope.  All things work for good for those who are in Christ Jesus, he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and swift to bless, and he is near right now.  So besotted and passionate about you that he counts each hair as it grows, nurtures every cell of skin, we aren’t lost, we are just growing.

My friend was given the picture of a tree with no leaves in the desert.  It doesn’t look like it’s growing at all.  But it is, you are, but it is your roots growing deep, deep down to reach the deep water of life.  Have faith.  It’s down there.