Episode Transcript
PRAYER OF CONSECRATION
Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.
Jesus, I belong to you.
I lift up my heart to you.
I set my mind on you.
I fix my eyes on you.
I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice.
Jesus, we belong to you.
Praying in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.
Exodus 15:22
Then Moses led Israel from the Red Sea and they went into the Desert of Shur. For three days they traveled in the desert without finding water.
CONSIDER THIS
And just like that, the Israelites descend from the Red Sea win into the waterless wilderness. Say it isn’t so!
Let’s be honest. We want a trouble-free life. We want our lives to be easier, not harder. We want to struggle less, not more. We expect that after a lifetime of cruel slavery and a cataclysmic deliverance like the Red Sea, we might be in for a nice, extended vacation at the beach. Instead of getting the beach, the Israelites got the desert.
For three days they traveled in the desert without finding water.
But what if God’s purpose is not to make our lives easier but to make our souls stronger?
This is the meaning of the wilderness.
We want to get out of the wilderness and into the promised land, but what if the wilderness is God’s plan—not forever, but for a season? What if, in fact, the longer we resist the wilderness, the longer it will last? What if the sooner we submit to the Spirit’s wilderness work in our lives, the sooner we enter into the destiny of God’s promise for our lives?
And this kind of thinking, my friends, is our problem. As I wrote the last paragraph, I wanted it to be true, but the Spirit chided me. I have chosen to leave it in order to demonstrate just how seductive this kind of thinking can be. We think the wilderness is the exception, a short break from an otherwise prospering life. What if the wilderness is actually the rule? What if the will of God in the wilderness is to teach us the true meaning of prosperity—that it does not rise and fall with the tides of the stock market or our health or any other set of myriad circumstances constantly befalling us? The real prosperity gospel is the Father blessing us through Jesus with us and the Holy Spirit filling us—all the time, no matter what, come what may. It is through the fire that Jesus forges your soul with all his goodness and glory.
The apostle Paul shows us the outcome of a wilderness-tested soul:
I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through him who gives me strength. (Phil. 4:11–13)
Let’s ask the question again. What if the sooner we submit to the Spirit’s wilderness work in our lives, the sooner we enter into the destiny of God’s promise for our lives? See the flaw in this thinking? It’s like I’m saying: the sooner we get the lesson of the wilderness, the sooner we get out of it. Here’s the real question: What if the destiny of God’s promise for our lives is different than we thought? Though the prosperity gospel intends well, it misses the point. In the kingdom of God, prosperity is not tied to our temporal circumstances.
Here’s the lesson: God’s promises and prosperity transcend our circumstances—need or plenty, hungry or full. The secret is Christ in me. This is why the wilderness is the proving ground of the Holy Spirit, who takes our circumstances and translates them into the deep formation of Jesus Christ in us. And this is the meaning of the wilderness—the strengthening of our souls in the midst of struggle through the power of the Holy Spirit. I’m going to say what we all know in our bones but don’t want to be true: The wilderness is the rule of life, not the exception. The sooner we can accept this truth is not the sooner we can escape the wilderness, but the sooner we can embrace our destiny of true prosperity in Jesus in the wilderness.
The old hymn says it best, “When peace like a river attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows roll; whatever my lot thou has taught me to say, ‘It is well, it is well with my soul.’”
THE PRAYER FOR DELIVERANCE
Lord Jesus, you are my Deliverer.
Indeed, the horse and the rider you have thrown into the sea.
And yet I sense a deeper Exodus rising up in me. I receive your deliverance from the way my soul is tossed to and fro by my circumstances. If my life is smooth sailing, my soul is good, but if I run into stormy seas, my soul plunges into the depths. Deliver me from this thinness of soul and into the depths of the wellness of the presence of Jesus in me through the Holy Spirit—come what may—no matter what. Anyone can be happy when things are going well. Only Jesus can rejoice when conditions are collapsing. I desire the prosperity of Jesus in my deepest soul, who brings the land of promise smack dab in the middle of the wilderness. Yes, Lord, that! Please! I know this will require some unlearning in me and some new training. I am here for it.
It will be for my good, for others’ gain, and for your glory.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be. World without end, amen! Amen!
