Hearing God Session 4
Purpose in Pain - Hearing in the Wilderness
Isaiah 35:1-9
It's only natural, considering the geography of the Middle East, that many of the Old Testament Scriptures, especially when dealing with the Prophets, refer to the desert.
In Hosea, God (speaking of Israel) says, “I am going to allure her and bring her into the desert, and I will speak tenderly to her.” Hosea 2:14
Ezekiel goes back to the days of Egypt, remembering when God “brought them into the wilderness” Ezekiel 20:10
I believe you can make a very strong biblical case that the desert is significant, because we see God repeatedly drawing his people into desolate, barren, difficult places.
In fact, in the days immediately preceding His earthly ministry, even Jesus went into the wilderness. You might remember He was there for forty days, alone with His Father and He added, not only to His ability to hear God, but as part of that process, His own discomfort and dislocation by fasting.
This idea of hearing God in barren places, the desert, the wilderness, through sorrow, sickness and pain is a recurring theme throughout all of Scripture.
The American church isn't very fond of the idea that God shows up and shows out when we are most troubled, least outwardly blessed, financially challenged, sick or infirmed, but it's a theme that you cannot escape if you're trying to discern and be informed by the whole counsel of Scripture.
In fact, we very often make the same mistake the disciples made when they came across a man who was born blind. The story is recounted in John chapter 9.
1 As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. 2 His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” 3 “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.
But large, and growing parts of the American church, and, to our shame it's a bad theology being exported by us around the world – believe, like the disciples apparently did, that this blind man, or his parents, . . somebody - must be doing something wrong.
After all, we're never supposed to suffer hardship, sickness, pain or, God forbid, lack. The ones who are the closest to God are believing Him for fleets of automobiles, at least a couple of jets, a summer home, tailor-made suits and all kinds of material, physical and natural things.
A strong metaphor for what God wants to accomplish in the desert is featured in the 35th chapter of Isaiah. The prophet is describing a time when “the desert and the parched land will be glad; the wilderness will rejoice and blossom. Like the crocus it will burst into bloom; it will rejoice greatly and shout for joy.” Isaiah 35:1-2
I want to suggest to you this morning, that when you're in the desert, if your desert isn't blooming you may be wasting the purpose for which God brought you there.
See man, it's in the desert, when it really hits the fan and the rubber meets the road. In the desert your theories about God get tested and you get put to the test. You find out you can trust the one who brought you out of slavery.
But you also find out, that even though your critical needs are met – you've got manna in the morning, you've got quail, you have water running in a dry land – from a rock – but you're still in the desert. Yes, your critical needs are met, but you are very hot – burning up, you're tired, uncomfortable, sore, in pain, hurting – and it's difficult to ever feel physically refreshed and rested in the scorching heat, dry, broken ground and barren land of the desert.
But that's why it's one of God's favorite places to take us to. We find Him much more readily and much more seriously when we learn to stop depending on ourselves – our intellect, experience, acumen and wherewithal.
In the wonderful book of Hosea God says, “It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, taking them by the arms; but they did not realize it was I Who healed them.” Hosea 11:3
Now this Ephraim isn't talking about the second son of Joseph and Asenath, but rather the Tribe of his descendents that walked with Moses and Joshua through the wilderness.
Do you see what Hosea 11:3 is saying? It's a metaphor. It's a beautiful picture of a loving God using the wilderness to take us by the hand – teaching us how to walk – and healing us in the ways that are most important.
I spent a lot of my childhood, two summers and many more weeks of my adult life in the Sangre de Cristo mountains of New Mexico. The elevation (average of about 7500 feet) makes it much more bearable, but that is some dry, barren land and only certain types of plants and vegetation do well there.
One of my jobs was to take children on nature hikes up to peaks and scenic destinations in an area about 20 miles southeast of Santa Fe. I always carried a pocket knife because there was plenty of prickly pear cactus – which we would cut into to demonstrate the survival skill of finding usable moisture where it seemed there was none to be found. If the cactus was alive, at all, it was full of water that could be extracted.
But when I think of the prickly pear cactus I think of this blossom (show picture). It's found in many different colors – as beautiful as any flowering blossom you will find anywhere else on God's green earth.
Now listen: They go through a lot to get these blossoms. They don't have an easy time of it, like a Texas bluebonnet or a wild sunflower. And the blossoms don't last very long either. It may get all of the attention, but the blossom is not nearly the best part of this plant.
What some people would call the ugly part, with spiny thorns and thick, off-kilter protrusions and all that. Those are called the pads. In fact they are the stems of the prickly pear cactus. As I've already said, they hold water. You've probably also had cactus jelly made from those pads.
But it's hard to imagine or fathom, and we probably still haven't discovered all of the wonderful attributes and blessings found in this desert-growing cactus.
It is high in amino acids (building blocks of proteins and highly bioactive, generally), prickly pear cactus is obviously high in fiber, B vitamins, magnesium, and iron. Of course it also has water, carbohydrates, protein, fat, minerals, vitamin C and beta carotene.
It's been used for healing purposes and as food for centuries. It treats diabetes, stomach problems, cuts and bruises, sunburn, windburn, constipation, and cold symptoms.
But listen, if you take it out of the desert and give it, what common sense would tell you it needs, plenty of water, nitrogenous soil, all of that – what happens? It dies.
I don't like the desert. I don't enjoy being sick, in pain, mistreated. . . I avoid, as best I can, all forms of personal suffering – don't you?
But when I look back at my life, I see that in the desert is where God teaches me how to trust Him. It's there that He intervenes to “strengthen the feeble hands, and steady the knees that give way.” (Isaiah 35:3) It is in the desert that He comes down to meet His children and “say to those with fearful hearts, be strong, do not fear.” Isaiah 35:4.
We've been told so often, and we want it to be true, that abundant life is about living in lush, rolling hills, like the Austrian Alps with Maria Von Trapp singing, “the hills are alive with the sound of music.” It's easy to think of the desert as an ugly, dead place.
But that's not the take of Scripture. Not at all. In Scripture the desert is where the redeemed walk, a place where a highway is found – a Way of holiness. Isaiah 35:8-9
But now, that's all well and good to a point. But what about those people who seem to have to stay in the desert long after any meaningful lesson would make it necessary? What about people in lifelong chronic pain and suffering various afflictions not for a season or even a while, but for decades on end?
I mean, even if I can concede the case for learning in the desert, why do so many people have to live there?
And that, my friend, may be something we need a Rhema word from God about. For some reason God didn't see fit to give us a systematic theology on suffering and wilderness living in Scripture. He gave us plenty of examples, so we'd know that he uses it, but the Bible is short on explanations, and especially ones that completely satisfy.
For that, though, we are not left without resources. After all, this is a series about hearing God. Many people have thoughtfully prayed about, what theologians call, “the problem of evil and suffering.” The best Christian philosophers have wrestled with it for hundreds of years.
And while we may never know, this side of Heaven, all of the reasons that suffering is a part of our lives, we can enumerate several of the ones that are agreed upon by many of the best minds who have sought God on this vital subject.
Because we know the character of God, we know that He doesn't rejoice in our suffering, but He's also not surprised by it. It doesn't catch Him off-guard.
John 16:33 33"I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world."
1. God's much more concerned with our ultimate fulfillment than our immediate or short term happiness.
The Westminster shorter catechism opens by answering life's most important question.
Q: What is the chief end of man?
A: The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
You can't be blamed, very much, for being confused about that, especially if most of your theology comes from the television. But God can be trusted, that He has set up a world where the greatest number of free thinking moral agents have the most opportunity to find Him, receive Him and enjoy eternity with Him.
And you might ask, well why can't Christians escape the pain and suffering, be healed of all disease and enjoy Him more now?
Many times they are, but if Christians become immune to all suffering, including some Christians that suffer very terribly and harshly, the actual motive for embracing Christ becomes mixed with selfish advancement and personal aggrandizement.
And the very question, “why me?” would have never occurred to eh Apostle Paul, or so many others of the early Christians who considered it honorable and joyous to suffer with and for Him.
2. God is just as concerned with all of His other children as He is with me.
The argument from skeptical atheists is that such a mindset causes us to be no more than pawns on God's chess board – and my answer is, everyone is, but at least I know it, and what an honor.
So again, He has set up a world where the greatest number of free thinking moral agents have the most opportunity to find Him, receive Him and enjoy eternity with Him.
The objection raised by some people is that God cannot be all loving and all powerful yet still have a world that includes suffering. If He was all loving then no one would suffer, unless, of course, He could not stop the suffering – which would mean He's not all powerful.
But that objection doesn't understand what we mean when we assert that God is “all powerful,” or “omnipotent.” It means simply this, not that God can do absolutely everything, but that He can do anything that's logically possible.
It may not be possible to create a world, and prepare an environment, where people remain free – free to choose God and freedom to reject Him as well – that's substantially different from the one we are living in. For God to redeem the maximum potential number of people may take just this mix and balance of good and evil. Since we cannot possibly know, from our limited perspective we should trust the One who's vision is perfect and clear.
Our perspective is way to narrow to understand all of the ramifications and potential outcomes when faced with desert moments that we cannot see redemptive moments in.
Illustration: Donna Stansberry was sharing, yesterday, with Kathleen (my wife) about a time when she had a horrible motorcycle wreck which left her flat on her back for quite a while. One of the ways her mom pitched in to help was by taking Donna's kids (i.e. her grandchildren) to church for her. She didn't go to church herself, but she knew it was good for the kids and that Donna wanted them there. And the wilderness of the aftermath of Donna's motorcycle wreck she would not trade for anything in this world because during that time, of taking her grandkids to church, Donna's mother fell under the convicting power of God and gave her life to Jesus.
And in a time like that we can see the purpose in our pain – there's at least a one to one correlation in that case. And what really demonstrates our maturity is when we trust that there is similar purpose in our pain even when it's not nearly so obvious.
1. God's much more concerned with our ultimate fulfillment than our immediate or short term happiness.
2. God is just as concerned with all of His other children as He is with me.
And there's, at least, a third reason this world is often so painful.
3. This is a fallen world.
God warned Adam and Eve, in the garden of Eden, of the harvest they would sow and the consequences that would follow if they chose sin and rebellion and they did.
This world is cursed and must be, because God always keeps His word. And in the same way, just as we live in a fallen world because God warned and then delivered on His warning – we will someday live in a pain free world – because He's promised no sorrow, no tears, no sickness and no pain in a new Heaven He's preparing for those of us who know Him.
So why do we continue to pray for healing here, and why do we see healing here if this world is fallen and if God's primary plan is to subsume this kingdom into the eternal kingdom of Heaven where everything will be right and every person will be whole?
It's really simple: We ask Him because we're hurting and we're in a relationship with Him. He has the power to do anything and we know from history and experience that He will often choose to heal us and rescue us from disease and pain. But if He doesn't, there's one thing He will always do: He will walk with us THROUGH our pain – He is with us in the valley as well as on the mountain top. In fact, His voice is often loudest in the valley.
And here's the ultimate illustration of that truth:
Compared to Heaven, all of earth, even the best of it, is like living in the wilderness. But God left Heaven and humbled Himself to become a man so that He would experience that wilderness with us, become sin for us and build Heaven in us.
But what a tragedy to experience the pain without the comfort, so that all that you have is the pain without the purpose.
