Have you ever been through a “wilderness” season — trials beating you like a relentless desert wind, and mountains looming so high, you thought you’d never make it out?
Are you in that wilderness now?
I’ve been there. As if living thousands of miles from family in a country where Christians are persecuted isn’t “wilderness” enough, a few years ago, we went through six long years where many loved ones died, and my closest friends attacked me, cutting me out of their lives. Other tragedies howled against us, as well — too many to write in one blog. Suffice it to say, it was hard.
But Jesus….
He awakened me in the wee hours of every morning, and calmed my racing heart. He healed my wounds, set me free from what made my grief all the more painful, and set straight what the enemy had knocked askew.
You, God, are my God,
earnestly I seek You;
I thirst for You,
my whole being longs for You,
in a dry and parched land
where there is no water.I have seen You in the sanctuary (of my wilderness)
and beheld Your power and Your glory.
Because Your love is better than life,
my lips will glorify You.From Psalm 63:1-3 niv
“Persecution bleeds anointing,” one of my friends once said. And it did.
Each book the Lord has called me to write together with Him in our quiet times has flowed from that anointing. The lost have come to Christ. Hearts have been healed and set free. Strongholds have fallen. Marriages have mended. Teens have caught on fire for Christ, and their parents, too. The wilderness was worth it.
But even more worth it is walking hand in hand with Jesus, feeling enveloped by the Lord’s presence constantly, like living every moment in the mist of His breath.
He found (me) in a desert land, in the howling wasteland of a wilderness;
He (encircled and shielded me). He took care of (me). He protected (me) as the apple of His eye.From Deuteronomy 32:10 amp
As beautiful as that sounds, when I sought the Lord at the beginning of 2019 for His word over this past year, “wilderness,” was not the answer I wanted to hear.
I’ve always thought of Jesus’ 40 days of fasting in Luke 4 as agonizing, lonely, hungry, thirsty, dangerous, surrounded by wild animals, with no roof over His head, and nowhere comfortable to sleep; not to mention that sinister visit from Satan. Reminds me a bit of my own howling wasteland.
But in a dream the Lord gave me, I saw Jesus smiling at me, hand outstretched, welcoming me into His wilderness. He pulled me up onto the edge of a high cliff with a spectacular view of the rising sun, as it poured out its brilliant colors upon the desert. The Father’s thick presence enveloped me, and took my breath away. I looked at Jesus standing next to me, holding my hand, the fire of the sun lighting up the joy in His eyes. “Now, this is the wilderness!”
I realized for the first time how glorious, how radiant, how powerful and even joyful those 40 days of alone-time with His Daddy must have been.
When I awoke from the dream, I stepped into a 40-day fast to start out the year. (I’ve actually been on a fast from certain foods for about three years now, praying for the unreached millions in this dark corner of the world where God has called us to serve Him. But this was a greater fast on top of the first — complete during the day, and then joining up with the first fast at night.) Was I hungry? Yes. And yet, completely satisfied, for my Father was with me.
And then … our family traveled constantly for many months, far from home, laying our heads down in a new place every few nights. Many of those beds were on the floor or otherwise uncomfortable. And we did see a lot of wilderness. In fact, one week, we stayed in the middle of a jungle on the top of a cliff at the end of nowhere, with a murderer on the loose in that very jungle. We had no phone service, no electricity, no locks on the doors of the house, and no neighbors to yell to if we got in trouble. But we had the Lord, and He surrounded us and spoke to us, and filled our days with more of Him. We slept in peace, knowing His angels guarded us. If that murderer had walked through those open doors, he would have found a hot meal, and an earful of the Gospel!
Now, at the end of the year and beginning 2020, the darkness has darkened all the more in the corner of the world where we live. Most of our friends and other Christians have fled or are in hiding because of increased threats and persecution. We don’t know what this year will bring, but we know the One Who holds our hand, and He is Good.
Whether or not the coming days are hard for you, I pray you’ll find peace and rest, carried by the One Who lovingly allows the trials so we will draw closer to Him. May your wilderness bleed anointing.
Here is my prayer for you:
Lord, open up our eyes to see as You see, to not be distracted by other things in our view that move us away from You. Please, God, get up in our face. Invade our space. Make sure we SEE what You’re doing, such that we can’t miss it. Grab our face in Your hands and hold our gaze, Lord. We need You. Now more than ever. Open up our ears to hear Your voice over all other voices. Captivate us with the songs You’re singing over us, so that we catch the tune and sing along. Let us hear Your heart for the nations, and join in those prayers to see Your Kingdom come. Move us at the sound of Your voice. Don’t let us become stagnant or complacent. But speak so clearly, so powerfully to our hearts, Lord, that we tremble with holy fear, and fall on our faces before You, completely surrendered, and overwhelmed with such awe, that all we want to do is obey You. Open up our hearts to bond with Yours, Lord. As we look at the people around us, distract us from our judgments and criticisms with Your LOVE and GRACE and TENDERNESS. Break our hearts for what breaks Yours, Lord, and open us up to truly love those around us. To stop making every situation about me. And to finally become about truly loving You and loving others. Matthew 22:37-40. Draw us into Your arms of love, Lord, so we can love others, not in the way we think we should, but with Your powerful, life-transforming Spirit flowing through us like a River to touch, renew, knock down the old, and cleanse with the new. Flow through us, before us, around us, and behind us everywhere we go this year, so that everyone who knows us gets “wet” with Your Living Water, and thirsts for more of You, until they all dive into that River themselves. Make us light in others’ darkness, shelter from their storm, and confident in our own Light and Shelter in You. In Your name. Amen.
I encourage you to take time to look over what God did last year, find the miracles and the things He has taught you, and seek Him for what He has in store for you in 2020.
In fact, seeking the Lord together as a family, and walking out in obedience as one, is a powerful way to train your kids up in listening to the Lord and following His lead. Proverbs 3:5-6, John 5:19.
This is one of my favorite methods for doing that:
- Gather everyone together, and begin the time with prayer, asking the Lord to speak to your hearts and show you anything He desires.
- Invite everyone present to personally ask Jesus what He wants to say (In this case, ask Him for a verse or word or picture or whatever He’d like to show you about this coming year.)
- Leave time to listen for His answer. You can play soft worship music in the background, if you like, or just be silent. They can dig in the Word, write in their journals, draw or color what He shows them, or anything they feel led to do.
- Then invite everyone to share what came to mind.
If the Lord leads, put those drawings, words, or verses somewhere where you can look at them often throughout the year and talk together about how you see God doing those things, as the months progress.
For a free guide to knowing God’s voice, visit MoreThanAConquerorBooks.com.
Kingdom Culture Parenting 