Freedom in the Wilderness
Musings from the Garden
By Peggy Wyar
I recently heard a man on the radio say this:
“Why am I complaining about being in a wilderness
when God has already taken me out of bondage?”
Most of us are familiar with the story of Moses and the exodus of the children of Israel from the land of Egypt. In Exodus 9:1 the Lord told Moses to go to Pharaoh and tell him that the God of the Hebrews says, “Let my people go, that they may serve me.”
The Lord God wanted to free the Israelites from the forced slavery of Egypt. He wanted to show them how freeing it would be to serve Him, a loving Creator and Father. He wanted them to learn to worship Him up close and personal.
Through an amazing chain of events, God freed them from Egypt and He took them into the wilderness. For forty years He provided them food and water. He kept His fire bright at night to warm them and He was in the cloud during the day to shade them. When He moved, they followed. Their clothing never wore out and their feet did not swell.
Deuteronomy 8:2-3 “Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands. He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.”
As we embrace whatever wilderness God is leading us through, we may begin to see what’s in our hearts. We are being set apart to learn to live on the “bread of heaven” rather than the scraps this present world offers us.
Hosea 2:14-20 “Therefore I am now going to allure her;
I will lead her into the wilderness and speak tenderly to her
There I will give her back her vineyards,
and will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope.
There she will respond as in the days of her youth,
as in the day she came up out of Egypt.
“In that day,” declares the Lord, “you will call me ‘my husband’;
you will no longer call me ‘my master.’
I will remove the names of the Baals from her lips;
no longer will their names be invoked.
In that day I will make a covenant for them
with the beasts of the field, the birds in the sky
and the creatures that move along the ground.
Bow and sword and battle I will abolish from the land,
so that all may lie down in safety.
I will betroth you to me forever;
I will betroth you in righteousness and justice,
in love and compassion. I will betroth you in faithfulness,
and you will acknowledge the Lord.”
In this scripture, Hosea seems to be telling us that the Lord God allures (persuades) us into the wilderness. Sometimes He loves on us so much He wants us all to Himself, with no distractions. And there, when we are with Him only, He speaks tenderly to us. He promises us provision. He changes our valley of trouble into a doorway of hope. We’re free to call Him our husband, no longer looking at Him as a taskmaster. He reaffirms His original covenant of love that was established with Abraham long before the law ever came into existence. This covenant is based on His righteousness, justice, love and compassion, and He is faithful to keep it. If we are willing, we learn that every word that comes from His mouth becomes life in us.
When the Lord God takes us into the wilderness, may we trust He has good reasons. As we move about in that wilderness, may we hear the Word He has for us. May we experience the depths of His provision for us. May we learn to be satisfied in Him only, and may we worship Him freely, praising Jesus as the One who has already taken us out of bondage.