Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Provision in the Desert

In this life temptation will come. It is inevitable. It is the very nature of the world. But not every season in life and not every temptation is the same. There are unique temptations that come in the difficult and desert seasons in life. We struggle with things we are not able to overcome and over issues we feel are noble but don’t seem to bring anything but pain. We feel as if God has abandoned us or may even actively be against us. These are real seasons in life with God, and can be some of the most difficult, but God has some things to say about the temptations of the desert.

Though the language is stark, it is nonetheless true – God led his people in the wilderness and even tested his people through the trials they faced there. Moses says, “And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness , that he might humble you, testing you” (vs. 2). In the desert God’s people faced some very real and difficult things, beginning with hunger and thirst. Adding to the natural difficulties is the fact that God did the leading into the desert with a few things in mind for them including humility, obedience and testing.

The inclusion of humility here is powerfully instructive. They were the children of generations of slaves and had spent their entire lives wandering in a barren wilderness. Do they really need humility? Hasn’t life been difficult enough on them? It turns out, however, that God’s most-used descriptor for them is not “humble,” but some form of “stubborn” or “stiff-necked.” Neither the ignominy of slavery nor the difficulty of the desert made them humble. Humility is not a function of our physical or material position in life, but of the position of our heart with God. The most destitute can be proud; the wealthiest among us can be humble.

In addition to humility, they needed to learn where their source of all sustenance came from. Moses says that God did these things, “that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord” (vs. 3). They wandered in a desert where there was no bread, so God provided bread from heaven. They had no meat, so God sent quail. There were no water supplies easily at hand, so God cracked open a rock and water flowed. There were no major cities along the way where they could buy new clothes for the ones that were wearing out in the wilderness wanderings, so God kept their shoes and clothes from growing thread-bare. These needs were met, not by what we might recognize as normal or natural means, but by the voice of God commanding that their needs be met.

Possibly the deepest fear we face when we wander through a desert is that we simply will not be taken care of, that our needs won’t be met. We are accustomed to working to pay the bills and applying our own skills and talents to our lives so things go as smoothly as they can. But when we are met with the barrenness of a land with no food or water, our abilities run out quickly. And often this is the only place where we learn – really learn – that the voice of God is our only source of provision.

And then we know that the abundant provision of the Promised Land is the voice of God working to provide for his people. “For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land” (vs. 7).

To drive the point home, when he was hungry after forty days of fasting in the wilderness, Jesus Christ rebuked Satan’s temptation to turn stones into bread by quoting from Deuteronomy 8. Jesus refused the bread of temptation in favor of the food that can only come from the voice of God himself.

Monday, August 22, 2011

Hope

Romans 8:23-25

Hope is a powerful desire deep within every human being. All of us hope for the better, the good, the resolution of tension and difficulty. All of us anticipate and work for the betterment of our own conditions and those of the ones we love. Hope is such an important part of the human make-up that its loss is devastating and often fatal. When a human gives up hope, or has enough of their hopes dashed, all meaning and purpose to life can slip away.

In Romans chapter 8 Paul speaks of the Christian’s hope of the glory of God and the kind of hope we have in a broken world. If the glory of God is far greater than the suffering and pain in this world (vs. 18), then what does it mean to hold onto the hope of this glory in a decaying and difficult world?

First of all, it is undeniably true that we groan under the weight of this world. “And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.” (vs. 23) And though we groan, we do not suffer meaninglessly; we have the foretaste of the glory of God living and breathing in us. We have the firstfruits now of the feast of God’s glory to come because the children of God have been given the Spirit of God. We know there will be complete forgiveness because the Spirit is at work forgiving now. We know there will be a complete transformation of the human soul because the Spirit is at work transforming now. We know there will be a complete healing of body and soul because the Spirit is at work healing body and soul now. We know the feast is coming because we are eating the appetizers.

And into this hope, Paul says, you were saved. (vs. 24) We were given a firm and true hope when we became children of God.

False hope is a dangerous and manipulative tool. Because every human being is built to hope, there are people and ideologies that will play on that hope and destroy lives, draining them of every effort and energy in order to get their way. These people and ideologies promise the world and simply do not have the power or intelligence to make good on their promise. In false hope, human lives are utterly ruined.

But the hope of God is founded on the truth and power of the gospel of Jesus Christ. When you were saved you exchanged all the snake-oil of this world for the truth of the hope we have in Jesus Christ. His kingdom will come and his will will be done on earth just as it is in heaven, and followers of Jesus Christ partake in that kingdom here and now. Just as false hope ruins lives, the true hope of Jesus Christ restores them. It gives meaning and redemption even in suffering and pain. It provides the taste of the glory of God in a world that causes so much groaning.

It is true that we “wait for it with patience,” (vs. 25) but we can wait in truth and security because we know the power and the glory of God. God has not orphaned us here in this world – He has sent his Spirit to be a Counselor, Teacher and Guide, and even the firstfruits of the glory of the kingdom of God.

Lose every hope you have in the people and structures of this world. Do not lose your hope in the truth and the power of the kingdom of God. For you were given this hope when you became a child of God.