Day 40 – Issue 14

Be Still Know

Exodus 16:3 NLT

‘If only the Lord had killed us back in Egypt,’ they moaned. ‘There we sat around pots filled with meat and ate all the bread we wanted. But now you have brought us into this wilderness to starve us all to death.’

I can remember as the reality of Katey’s deterioration began to weigh heavily upon me, my social behaviour deteriorated as if in some form of macabre synchronisation. While Katey became ever sweeter to know, I sadly became the opposite.

From my vantage point seven years after her death, I attempt to make sense of that meltdown. I can recall making the family meal and prayer time we held as an extended household a time of misery. Somehow I had to thrust my internal anger, confusion, hurt and misery centre stage. I’m sure my behaviour provoked one couple to up sticks and leave our community; a once close and very dear friendship that sadly subsequently has dwindled to nothing. I deeply regret that.

Pain and fear provoke strange reactions within us. Here, Israel, three days into apparent freedom, complain against Moses, even expressing a desire to die rather than face their uncertain future. Between exodus and promise there lies the wilderness. Here I am to discover the reality of God’s love, such that I can trust God and God’s promises going forward. Here I unravel and confront the very worst of myself. Both are essential lessons if we are ever to make sense of either promise or destiny. It is God’s very own school of hard knocks and follows no predetermined pattern, and lasts for as long as it lasts. I emerged eventually deeply scarred from my wilderness journey, yet with a greater appreciation of my own limitations and God’s abundant grace.

QUESTION: Are you in a season of wilderness or do you see God’s promises coming true?

PRAYER: Gracious God, teach me the secret of being content whether in times of plenty or in times of trouble.