Have you ever felt like God was not paying attention to you? You pray and pray, but all you hear is—silence! Or, you want to experience the abundant life of joy, but you feel like you are living in a spiritual desert.
The silence and the wilderness are both experiences we don’t want and places we don’t like. We sometimes think that God is not speaking or that God has abandoned us.
Yet, God’s people often find themselves there.
God’s People in the Wilderness
When the prophet Malachi finished his ministry to the people of Israel, no one knew that 400 years would pass before another prophet would speak. The people faithfully reestablished temple worship, the sacrifices, and keeping the Torah, but the kingdom of God did not come.
Instead, God’s people saw the kingdoms of the Persians, the Greeks, and the Romans take over. Their oppression seemed to get worse. By the time we open the pages of the New Testament, a half-Jew, Herod, ruled the land with fear. He was gifted and brilliant. He was a warrior. He generously agreed to beautify the temple in Jerusalem, yet he also built pagan temples in other cities. He was a friend of Rome, and he was a paranoid tyrant who killed family members to protect his reign.
“We don’t have to be afraid of the wilderness—the dry times of life. This is often the place where God meets us.”
But one day, a voice was heard … in the wilderness, “Prepare the way of the Lord!” How interesting that when God renewed his speaking and his work, he did not begin in Jerusalem among elite scholars. He began in the wilderness of Judea.
Why the wilderness? The wilderness was commonly viewed as a place to avoid. Many believed it to be the haunt of evil spirits. Yet, the wilderness, in the history of God’s people, was the place where God revealed himself. Think of God revealing his glory to Moses at Mt. Sinai and to his people in the wilderness after he rescued them from Egypt.
We don’t have to be afraid of the wilderness—the dry times of life. That is often the place where God meets us, away from the busyness and noise of life where he will give a special word of guidance and love. Don’t be afraid of the silence. God will speak.
What Will You Learn in the Wilderness?
As we faithfully wait, we will discover that God is with us, and he has a special word for us. What will we learn in the wilderness when God shows up?
That answer depends on a couple of things. It depends on our maturity level. It depends on our needs. God will make his presence known and his word unique to us and our unique needs. However, there are two things all God’s people must learn. They are vital lessons.
We must learn how great God is, and we must learn how weak we are. John the Baptist was the new prophetic voice of God in the wilderness. He had quite a resume! His parents were Levites. His father was a priest. His birth was announced by an angel. His birth was a supernatural answer to prayer. His mission was the greatest any man could have—to prepare the way for the Messiah. Yet, when John speaks of the Messiah and himself, he says, “There is one coming after me, and I am not even worthy to take the sandals off his feet!”
“As we faithfully wait, we will discover that God is with us, and he has a special word for us.”
Taking off someone’s sandals and washing their feet was a job reserved for slaves in the ancient world. Rabbis would teach their students to be servants. But they exempted them from having to wash the feet of their teachers. That was only for the lowest slaves. Yet John, the one whom Jesus would call the greatest of all men (Luke 7:28), said that he was not worthy to do even that. I don’t think it is because John had a low view of himself. He knew who he was. He knew the importance of his mission. John said these words because he knew how glorious the Messiah would be.
When we find ourselves in the wilderness and experience the presence of God once again, we can expect this—a humble evaluation of ourselves and an exalted picture of our glorious Lord and Savior.
Both are indispensable to live a life worthy of our Lord.
Read more in Luke 3:1-18 and Matthew 3:1-12.
Jonathan Williams pastored for 35 years. He is now the president and teacher/storyteller for WGS Ministries. His messages and stories are heard around the world, and he trains God’s people in oral communities to share the gospel through storytelling. He is the author of numerous books including Dead Men Rising, The Women Jesus Loved, and Changing the Stories of the World. You can reach him at jonathan@WGSministries.org.
Listen to Jonathan dramatically tell the story, A Word in the Wilderness at A Word in the Wilderness | SOTM (storiesofthemaster.com)
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