Most of us have struggled to break a habit or a hang up and at some point have met with success. Some say it was by willpower or having the right strategy or the right discovery, but is it not grace that breaks through and delivers us?
Israel’s wilderness journey can help us understand our hang ups, habits and character defects. Israel experienced withdrawal symptoms in their longings for the old days of how it used to be.
They made continual resolutions to obey God’s commandments only to fall away. Their attention was kidnapped and lost in the idol worship from the enemies around them or their own issues. Yet, through it all God guided, protected and suffered over them and continually invited and empowered them to choose to trust and love Him.
As Gerald May said, “The desert is where the battle with addiction or attachment takes place. But it is much more than a journey; it is the discovery of the depths of weakness, the power of grace, and the price of both. Moreover, which takes place in the desert is not simply difficult travel and adventure is learning; it is repentance and conversion and the transformation of motivations.”
Just as no one is exempt from bad habits and addictions no one can completely avoid encounters with the desert. We may choose these encounters willingly and struggle with a particularly distressing issue. Perhaps we try to quit smoking or drinking too much or… that is damaging our relationships. We stop biting our nails because of embarrassment or we try to lose weight to look good. These are utilitarian motivations are based more upon our health and acceptance.
Substances and other character defects can bring people to the desert by eroding their lives enough until they feel the need to change. Addictions of lifestyle and even mood can force us into the desert or we will enter a desert of grief when someone or something to which we have been attached to is taken away from us. Like the desert our emotional journey is certain to involve very practical struggles with addictions and attachments and we will find ourselves on common ground.
“The joy of freedom and love must be bought with pain. We might wish that God created things differently so that an easier life could be possible, but a careful look at our own history will prove that is an empty wish.” Gerald May
Our deserts can enrich our lives immeasurably. There can be an oasis in the desert.
Each wilderness experience holds seeds of real change which can only be found in our dependence upon God. Even though your desert can be a difficult battlefield it is also a place to develop your trust in God. Will you trust Him?
There is no habit, hang up or condition that God’s grace and love cannot penetrate. The fulfillment you long for will come from nothing other than God’s very self. Nothing less than God will satisfy the yearning that He has planted within you.
