Living in the Wilderness

This holy week having celebrated 14-15 Nisan we had also lots of time to think about those people who were liberated but refused to see the light and kept complaining about futilities, not wanting to see the greater things.

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By not wanting to see further than the length of our nose, we also often are in the dessert, feeling more the loneliness and the cold instead of feeling the heath and seeing the sun shine.
Having had these special days to think about the love of the Most High Elohim Hashem Jehovah, we should make a commitment to remember Him more this year and to try to come closer to Him, Whom we should trust with all our heart.

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To remember or to question:

1. do we know where we came from
2. do we know where we are going
3. do you think of the wilderness as a good place.
4. wilderness is not only a place of uncertainty (not knowing where you are going), it is also the place where people encounter God.
5. Hagar the maid servant of Sarah; Moses who fled into the wilderness after he killed the Egyptian; the Israelites when they entered the wilderness after crossing the Red Sea; they ran into the wilderness not knowing where they were going but met God and God spoke.
6. descendants too numerous to count
7. trust God for your daily bread
8. God’s peace passes all understanding and keeps heart and mind in Christ Jesus
9. Gods = cool drink of water in wilderness
10. God’s grace = manna from heaven – it nourishes soul
11. God’s grace gives peace
12. God will meet you there! God will speak!
13. Listen! Hear Him say – “my Grace is sufficient”.

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Preceding post: Getting out of the dark corners of this world

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Additional reading:

1. What loneliness is more lonely than distrust?
2. A Holy week in remembrance of the Blood of life
3. Passover and Liberation Theology

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Related articles

• Jesus in the Wilderness (maranathayoga.com)
  Lent is the time of year before Easter when we remember the 40 days Jesus spent in the desert before he began his ministry. Jesus had just been baptized by John the Baptist. In Luke 4:1 it says, “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness.” So, newly baptized, Jesus is full of the Holy Spirit. He is led BY the Holy Spirit into the Wilderness. Most scholars feel the place called “wilderness” means what is now named the Mount of Temptation. It is in the Judean desert, in the southern part of Israel, close to the Dead Sea.During the preparation for His ministry, Jesus spent 40 days and 40 nights in the desert. He fasted and prayed.
• The Wilderness of Sin (joshuamcelhaney.wordpress.com)
  As I read of Israel’s journey out of Egypt, I see an all too familiar scene unfold in Exodus 16. Israel has only been out of Egypt for 2 months when the Bible says that Israel found themselves in a wilderness of Sin. I am of the opinion, that once God brings you out of Egypt, you will find a wilderness of sin along your journey towards Canaan. Oh I’d love to tell you that Canaan comes immediately after Egypt, but truth be told there is a journey that must be traveled!
• Moses Got Screwed Out Of Passover (yidwithlid.blogspot.com)
  The “instructions manual”  for the Seder is called the Haggadah, a book that contains the narrative of the Israelite Exodus from Egypt, special blessings and rituals, commentaries from the  Sages, and special Passover songs. Seder customs include drinking four cups of wine, eating matza, partaking of symbolic foods placed on the Passover Seder Plate (bitter herbs, hard boiled eggs, etc), and reclining while we eat to act as free people. In my house that is supplemented with song parodies, stupid parlor tricks (like changing water into blood) and family discussion about the meaning of the freedoms given to us by God.
• Maundy Thursday & the Last Seder (christiannoob.wordpress.com)
  I’m not the only one who’s thought about this possible relationship. I found several articles on this same topic.
  1. Was Jesus’ Last Supper a Seder? by Jonathan Klawans (10/18/2012)
     http://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/people-cultures-in-the-bible/jesus-historical-jesus/was-jesus-last-supper-a-seder/
  2. Was the Last Supper a Passover Seder? (no author name, 01/01/2001)
     http://www.bible.org/question/was-last-supper-passover-seder
  3. Was Jesus’ Last Supper a Passover Seder? by Michael J. Cook (Spring 2013)
     http://www.reformjudaismmag.org/Articles/index.cfm?id=3175

  I’m surprised I haven’t really thought about it before.

• Sustenance for the Wilderness Journey (inkindle.wordpress.com)
  I feel like I’ve been walking in the wilderness lately, and God has sent me bread from Heaven.  The encouraging, sustaining words from some of my praying friends are strengthening me in the journey.
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  The truth is, “old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.” In my life it is more like they are becoming new. Praying for (him) to walk in newness of life as he draws closer to the Comforter in his pain.
• Led into the Wilderness (wherefaithmeetsreallife.wordpress.com)
  The Judaean Wilderness is describable….but it’s also a lot like taking pictures of amazing sunsets or epic snowfalls. Never does them justice. True perspective and definition get lost in the translation both verbally and on film. At some point, the person(s) trying to do the explaining of all that grandeur will finally come to the same conclusion….for the full effect, you just had to be there yourself.
• The History and Origins of Easter (personalcreations.com)
  Easter, which celebrates the resurrection from the dead of Jesus Christ, is a holiday actually based on an ancient Pagan ritual. Unlike most holidays, Easter does not fall on the same set date each year. Instead, Christians in the West celebrate Easter on the first Sunday after the full moon of the vernal equinox on March 21. Therefore, Easter is celebrated each year between March 22 and April 25. The exact origins of Easter are unknown, but some sources believe that the word “Easter” is taken from the Teutonic goddess of fertility and spring – Eostre. Easter has also been traced to the Latin words Hebdomada Alba – meaning white week – referencing Easter week in which white clothing is worn by people who get baptized.The Pagan ritual of the Spring Equinox is a celebration of renewed life and the change that comes with spring. This solar festival is celebrated when the length of the day and the length of the night are equal, which occurs twice a year at the spring and fall Equinox. Throughout history, this turn in the seasons has been celebrated by various cultures that had held festivals in honor of their gods and goddesses at these times of the year. Today, Pagans continue to celebrate spring and attribute the change of the seasons to the powers of their god and goddess – also portrayed as The Green Man and Mother Earth.
• Wilderness Wanderer (istellorton.wordpress.com)
  We have a tendency to describe our emotional or spiritual state in terms of the seasons.  But a long conversation with a friend, over several cups of coffee, made me think differently.  Maybe, just maybe what we describe as a winter season is actually a wilderness experience.Physically the wilderness is a place where the climate is arid, a place of barrenness, deep distress and loneliness.  The wilderness is a hostile, potentially deadly environment and has a reputation for supporting very little life.  Spiritually the wilderness, according to Henri Nouwen is “the place of the great struggle and the great encounter”.  The wilderness was, and still is the setting for divine acts of grace, revelation, nurture, preparation and intense encounters with God.  It is a place of wonder, silence and spiritual renewal.
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  Remember that the wilderness is not your final destination, but while you are doing some wilderness wandering may you know that The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame and you will be like a watered garden and like a stream that never runs dry (Isaiah 58:11).
• Parshat Beshalach: Let Them Eat Manna (acquiescere9.wordpress.com)
  In the desert the people suffer thirst and hunger, and repeatedly complain to Moses and Aaron. G‑d miraculously sweetens the bitter waters of Marah, and later has Moses bring forth water from a rock by striking it with his staff. He causes manna to rain down from the heavens before dawn each morning, and quails to appear in the Israelite camp each evening.
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  The main event of the “Giving of the Torah” at Sinai is recounted in next week’s parshah of Yisro (and also in the ensuing parshah of Mishpatim, as well as partially in Va-Eschanan, the second parshah of Deuteronomy). However, the lessons learned by the Children of Israel in All their wanderings in the Wilderness are integral parts of this same Torah, as in this week’s parshah of Beshalach, which begins to relate their encounter with the harsh reality of the Wilderness after the exuberance of the Exodus.
• Women of the Word: Hagar (virtuousgirls.wordpress.com)
  In Genesis 16 and Genesis 21:8-21, we come across the story of Hagar. Hagar was the slave girl of Sarai (later Sarah), who was the wife of Abram (later Abraham). God had promised Abraham and Sarah that they would have a child and He would make of them a great nation. But they were very, very old and not quite sure they could bear a baby. Abraham and Sarah believed God but their faith sometimes wavered and doubt often clouded their hope.

A Terebinth

While part of a Rabbinical studies group last year, the Rabbi was talking about the Israelites and their relationship to the wilderness. And how the wilderness has greater meaning – like most things in the Jewish culture, than just being a place where they wondered for 40 years. For the Israelites, the wilderness is this place that symbolizes that time when you know where you’ve come from but you don’t know where you’re going. And it is in that place where you encounter God. It’s that place where God comes to you and reveals Himself to you in new ways. 

Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been thinking a lot about the wilderness and the journey that Terry and I are on with our kids. We are definitely in the wilderness right now. We know where we came from – we just don’t know where we are going –…

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