back to index2020-10-25 Worship in and through the wilderness
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If you guys have your Bibles with me, the bulk of today's message will be coming from 00:00:10.800 |
It's going to be up here for you, but I do find it helpful when I actually have the text 00:00:17.940 |
So Deuteronomy 8, verses 1 through 7, and I'm going to be reading out of the NASB. 00:00:27.200 |
All the commandments that I am commanding you today, you shall be careful to do, that 00:00:32.680 |
you may live and multiply and go in and possess the land which the Lord swore to give to your 00:00:40.020 |
You shall remember all the way with which the Lord your God has led you in the wilderness 00:00:44.980 |
these 40 years, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, 00:00:51.200 |
whether you would keep his commandments or not. 00:00:53.960 |
He humbled you and let you be hungry and fed you with manna which you did not know, 00:00:58.500 |
nor did your fathers know, that he might make you understand that man does not live by bread 00:01:03.480 |
alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord. 00:01:09.000 |
Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these 40 years. 00:01:14.200 |
Thus you are to know in your heart that the Lord your God was disciplining you just as 00:01:21.560 |
Therefore you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God to walk in his ways and 00:01:26.440 |
For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of 00:01:31.200 |
fountains and springs, flowing forth in valleys and hills." 00:01:37.760 |
Every nation has significant events or moments in their history, and many of the events are 00:01:43.760 |
either annually celebrated or they are so painful that they are rarely talked about 00:01:51.560 |
So no book on Chinese history will leave out the Cultural Revolution, the Opium Wars, the 00:01:57.240 |
Great Wall of China being built by the Ming Dynasty. 00:02:01.120 |
The books on the US will discuss at length the American Revolution, the Great Depression, 00:02:07.720 |
So every nation has significant moments in its history that its people remember proudly 00:02:17.980 |
So the same is true for the people of Israel in both the Old and the New Testaments. 00:02:24.600 |
The nation of Israel had many significant events that they were called to remember. 00:02:33.820 |
The Babylonian captivity is an especially painful one, and you have the entire book 00:02:38.960 |
of Lamentations emotionally devoted to that event. 00:02:44.320 |
One of the most significant ones, though, in Israel's history is the wilderness wanderings 00:02:52.020 |
So it's so significant that you have about 40 of the books of the Bible reference the 00:02:57.740 |
wilderness wandering, and Israel is often called to reflect on it. 00:03:05.920 |
They crossed the Red Sea in awe of God's power, and they were excited about Canaan, the land 00:03:13.760 |
And then came this wilderness, and the wilderness had been hard. 00:03:21.340 |
It had been a horrible experience for the Israelites, and of the 600,000-plus of the 00:03:26.780 |
people who had left Egypt, only two actually made it through the wilderness and into the 00:03:32.640 |
So everyone else was either, like, struck down, bitten by venomous serpents, or literally 00:03:42.020 |
And the wilderness wandering wasn't just hard, it was also seemingly endless. 00:03:47.680 |
The journey from Egypt to Canaan should have taken about 11 days, but it took them 40 years. 00:03:58.200 |
You guys are very familiar with COVID and pandemic, right? 00:04:02.900 |
You know, we've been in lockdown for 31 weeks now. 00:04:10.980 |
And 40 weeks would be a horribly long time under any kind of suffering or wilderness 00:04:17.360 |
wandering, but the Israelites were there for 40 years. 00:04:26.300 |
I was living in Korea, sporting a fresh bowl cut, eating choco pie, and toddling around 00:04:40.280 |
You guys, most of you have not been around that long. 00:04:46.640 |
So the wilderness was hard, and it was 40 years long. 00:04:51.120 |
So as I said, the wilderness wandering of the people of Israel was one of the most significant 00:04:55.280 |
and most painful chapters in their history, and they were constantly exhorted to reflect 00:05:03.020 |
And in the scriptures, you and I as new covenant people of God are also called to reflect on 00:05:08.760 |
And that's what we're going to be doing a little bit this morning. 00:05:11.320 |
And I just read for you in the beginning, the opening of Deuteronomy chapter 8. 00:05:15.620 |
The book of Deuteronomy is written toward the end of the wanderings with the land of 00:05:20.220 |
Canaan in view, and the people of God are finally about to enter into the promised land. 00:05:26.840 |
Deuteronomy is addressed to the second generation of the people of Israel, almost all of whom 00:05:35.220 |
And in chapter 8, we have Moses' own commentary and reflection on this 40-year journey. 00:05:41.440 |
So for you guys who are taking notes, we're going to be looking at four biblical truths 00:05:45.200 |
about the wilderness wandering, and we're going to be looking at four things Deuteronomy 00:05:52.360 |
And I'm going to give you three up front, three truths or points up front, and then 00:05:56.520 |
we're going to tackle the fourth one at the end in application. 00:06:00.120 |
One, the wilderness wandering was on purpose. 00:06:06.400 |
Number two, the wilderness wandering was for testing. 00:06:11.720 |
And the third point that we glean is that the wilderness wandering was for training. 00:06:18.760 |
It was on purpose for testing and for training. 00:06:23.120 |
So the first point, the wilderness wandering was on purpose. 00:06:27.200 |
Deuteronomy 8.1, I'm going to read that for you again. 00:06:29.720 |
All the commandments that I am commanding you today, you shall be careful to do, that 00:06:35.000 |
you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the Lord swore to give to your 00:06:44.120 |
So Moses begins by telling the people that God will soon deliver on his promise to give 00:06:52.220 |
He calls their attention to God's covenant with Abraham, and in Genesis 15, that's where 00:06:57.520 |
God makes this covenant with Abraham, swearing that Abraham will have many descendants and 00:07:05.440 |
In Genesis 15, Abraham is already physically living in the land of Canaan. 00:07:10.800 |
But the narrative tells us that Abraham believed God, trusted in this promise, and his faith 00:07:19.320 |
And then later in that chapter, God proceeds to tell him the things that will happen before 00:07:28.680 |
So Genesis 15, 13 to 16, God said to Abraham, "Know for certain that your descendants will 00:07:35.440 |
be strangers in a land that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed 00:07:41.400 |
But I will also judge the nation whom they will serve, and afterward they will come out 00:07:49.160 |
As for you, "You shall go to your fathers in peace. 00:07:54.680 |
And then in the fourth generation, they will return here, where the iniquity of the Amorite 00:08:02.280 |
So using the words, "Know for certain," God tells Abraham that with absolute certainty, 00:08:09.280 |
one, his descendants will be enslaved and oppressed 400 years. 00:08:14.200 |
Two, with absolute certainty, they're going to leave Egypt, having plundered them, having 00:08:21.440 |
And three, they will return to the very land that he is standing on once the iniquity of 00:08:30.480 |
The Amorites were living in the land of Canaan during the time of Israel's wanderings. 00:08:34.800 |
And just a little bit of an insight, Amos 2.10 reads, "It was I who brought you up from 00:08:40.600 |
the land of Egypt, and I led you in the wilderness 40 years, that you might take possession of 00:08:47.880 |
So the 400 years in Egypt, the exodus out of Egypt, the wilderness wandering, and the 00:08:53.840 |
return to the land of Canaan are all spelled out in advance for Abraham in the book of 00:09:03.600 |
We see that the Israelites were not in Egypt as slaves because of their sins. 00:09:09.600 |
There's no record of any particular sins at the end of the book of Genesis or at the 00:09:13.200 |
beginning of Exodus that give us reason to believe that the slavery period was judgment 00:09:21.500 |
We read in Exodus 1.8 that the new king of Egypt did not remember Joseph. 00:09:27.760 |
So that's the only reason given for the explanation, like that's the only explanation given for 00:09:39.920 |
The famine that initially forced the patriarchs out of Canaan into Egypt, on purpose. 00:09:48.680 |
And the journey through the wilderness was also on purpose. 00:09:51.880 |
And through all of this, God desired worship, and he wanted his people to know that he was 00:10:00.600 |
So in his confrontations with Pharaoh, what is Moses commanded to say to him? 00:10:07.080 |
Exodus 7.16, "You shall say to him, 'The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, sent me to you, saying, 00:10:16.800 |
let my people go, that they may serve me in the wilderness.'" 00:10:21.560 |
It wasn't let my people go so that they may serve me after they get into the land of Canaan. 00:10:26.360 |
It was that they may serve me in the wilderness. 00:10:30.680 |
So they were in the wilderness for the purpose of worship and service to God. 00:10:36.800 |
So the books of Exodus and Numbers make it seem like the reason for the wilderness is 00:10:43.400 |
But here in Deuteronomy, God says that he deliberately led them there. 00:10:50.560 |
Israel's sin caused them to wander in the wilderness. 00:10:55.960 |
God's good purpose caused them to wander in the wilderness. 00:11:06.720 |
It is a truth that cannot be explained without some degree of logical or emotional discomfort. 00:11:14.480 |
And there are at times very difficult circumstances and events in our lives that God has deliberately 00:11:23.040 |
Sometimes these circumstances and events are consequences of our sins. 00:11:27.600 |
Sometimes they are events divinely ordained for our good or for the good of his people. 00:11:36.800 |
But whichever the case, James 1, verse 2, many of you guys know this passage. 00:11:42.760 |
Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials. 00:11:53.280 |
So there are seasons of trial ordained by God that sometimes feel like 40 years. 00:12:00.760 |
If a trial just lasted a day or two, most of you guys would embrace them. 00:12:11.440 |
But sometimes a season of God-ordained trials seem to last an eternity. 00:12:17.880 |
And the longer these trials go, we are left to wonder if they are a result of our sins. 00:12:24.760 |
And when the trials do not go away somewhat quickly, or after we've prayed many prayers, 00:12:29.840 |
we might wonder, "Why is God not providing immediate relief?" 00:12:36.000 |
We wonder if it's because of our lack of faith. 00:12:40.080 |
Perhaps maybe I'm not praying enough, or I'm not praying the right prayers well enough. 00:12:48.040 |
And we wonder if God is indeed a God of love, if he is indeed good. 00:12:55.960 |
So no normal human being enjoys the tests of the wilderness. 00:13:03.560 |
But we'll see in Scripture the wilderness wandering of Israel was on purpose. 00:13:09.040 |
And the wilderness wanderings ordained for us in our lives are also always on purpose. 00:13:15.880 |
So regardless of the who, what, why, when, and where the wilderness that you may currently 00:13:21.960 |
be in now, one thing is for certain, God in his sovereignty and in his goodness has purposed 00:13:34.360 |
Second, the wilderness wandering was for testing. 00:13:38.920 |
Deuteronomy 8, 2-3, "You shall remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you 00:13:44.480 |
in the wilderness each forty years, that he might humble you, testing you to know what 00:13:49.680 |
was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. 00:13:54.160 |
He humbled you and let you be hungry and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor 00:14:02.520 |
That he might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives 00:14:07.280 |
by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord." 00:14:12.240 |
So we read here that God led them into the wilderness on purpose to test them and to 00:14:20.760 |
And ultimately the test was to see if they would trust him, if they would obey him. 00:14:25.600 |
The test was to see if they would have faith in the God who had led them out of slavery, 00:14:32.080 |
destroyed their enemies and all their strongholds, to see if they would trust him to lead them 00:14:40.200 |
But with each passing year, remember, forty years, not a short time, with each passing 00:14:44.200 |
year, each obstacle, every bout of thirst and hunger, the Israelites grumbled and complained. 00:14:52.940 |
On the surface they may have looked okay, but they're like sponges. 00:14:57.520 |
As soon as you squeeze them a little bit, the stuff that's on the inside comes out and 00:15:04.860 |
So the wilderness squeezes expose their faithlessness, the squeezes betray their rebellious spirit, 00:15:12.440 |
their cowardice, their selfishness, and what was exposed is that indeed their God is their 00:15:22.240 |
The Israelites were inclined to evil and self-destruction all the time. 00:15:27.080 |
They were a bunch of stiff-necked, ungrateful whiners. 00:15:33.440 |
They were weak, helpless and powerless, but they had the audacity to curse the God of 00:15:38.600 |
the universe and to blame him for this misery. 00:15:43.400 |
If only you hadn't cared about us and led us out into this desert, we would rather be 00:15:48.000 |
in Egypt and eat leeks and cucumbers and garlic, we would rather be slaves than to follow you, 00:15:57.200 |
So God had delivered them out of slavery and showed them miracles and wonders, but the 00:16:03.640 |
perpetual cry of their hearts was, "What have you done for me lately, Yahweh?" 00:16:10.920 |
Let me read this section of Deuteronomy 8-2 again for you, to know what was in your heart, 00:16:16.360 |
whether you would keep his commandments or not. 00:16:19.600 |
The wilderness wandering was for testing, is our second point, right? 00:16:31.400 |
Were the tests for God's benefit so that he could see what was in their hearts because 00:16:42.280 |
Did God need some kind of confirmation or evidence that they would in fact turn out 00:16:56.760 |
The tests were for Israel's benefit so that in their humbled and their helpless state, 00:17:02.600 |
they would seek God, that they would learn to trust and put their hope in God alone. 00:17:08.800 |
They need to learn this and to teach them that they were not saved because God knew 00:17:18.520 |
Praise the Lord that God, praise him that he did not save us because of our ability 00:17:28.080 |
We may be shocked when we see the sins come out of our hearts, hear the things that come 00:17:33.360 |
out of our mouths, but God is never taken by surprise by our depravity. 00:17:46.640 |
To make you understand, the man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything 00:17:56.480 |
Israel was created by God and for God to love God and to serve God, but rebellion and 00:18:02.920 |
rottenness was at the very core of their hearts. 00:18:06.520 |
Israel was created by God and for God to love God and to serve God, but in their core, they 00:18:16.160 |
Acts 17.28, Paul in front of the Areopagus, this is what he says, "That in God we live 00:18:23.240 |
Other translations say, "In Him we live and move and have our being." 00:18:31.660 |
But for you and me, oftentimes, in our rebellion and foolish arrogance, we often think that 00:18:46.160 |
Israel had always needed God because Israel too had inherited Adam's sin nature. 00:18:53.200 |
Israel would always default to faithlessness, forgetfulness, rebellion, and placing hope 00:18:59.440 |
in all the wrong things, walking by sight and not by faith. 00:19:03.960 |
And without God's intervention, Israel would destroy themselves, be ravaged by their neighboring 00:19:10.120 |
enemies, and seek always to worship created things rather than the Creator. 00:19:15.800 |
And that would never lead to them being fully satisfied. 00:19:21.440 |
So why did God deliberately allow Israel to feel hunger? 00:19:28.900 |
Because bad things always happened when they were full. 00:19:37.360 |
Yet I have been the Lord your God since the land of Egypt, and you are not to know any 00:19:42.200 |
God except me, for there is no Savior besides me. 00:19:46.360 |
I cared for you in the wilderness, in the land of drought. 00:19:51.320 |
As they had their pasture, they became satisfied. 00:19:54.960 |
And being satisfied, their heart became proud. 00:20:00.480 |
And Jeremiah calls it the fountain of living water. 00:20:09.360 |
But the problem is that oftentimes man believes that he can. 00:20:16.160 |
Man needs humbling, because in arrogance, man is destined and doomed to wrath. 00:20:23.280 |
The Israelites needed to understand that there is nothing good in and of themselves, that 00:20:29.520 |
there is no worth in and of themselves, and that the only reason they are a chosen people 00:20:34.440 |
of God, that they are a royal priesthood, is because of God's mercy alone. 00:20:40.200 |
So the wilderness wanderings, one, were on purpose, and two, they were for testing and 00:20:50.200 |
And likewise, there are wilderness wanderings ordained in our lives to show us that there 00:20:55.600 |
is nothing good in us outside of Christ, that we live and move and exist solely by the grace 00:21:04.320 |
And the wilderness seasons in our lives expose oftentimes our sins and painfully remind us 00:21:11.080 |
of our need for a Savior, lest we forget that we do not live by bread alone, but by everything 00:21:21.200 |
Brothers and sisters, you were created by God and for God to love God and to serve God. 00:21:29.320 |
And praise the Lord that the wilderness wanderings in our lives remind us of that purpose. 00:21:36.440 |
Praise God that the wilderness wanderings in our lives help to wean us off the things 00:21:39.960 |
of this world, teach us to worship the Creator rather than created things, because again, 00:21:53.280 |
Praise God that we often get dissatisfied during the wilderness because it makes us 00:22:02.400 |
So our call is to praise him in the wilderness and through the wilderness. 00:22:10.800 |
The wilderness was for our testing and our humbling. 00:22:14.800 |
And third, the wilderness wanderings were for the purpose of training. 00:22:22.520 |
Verse four and five reads, "Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot 00:22:30.960 |
Thus you are to know in your heart that the Lord your God was disciplining you just as 00:22:37.320 |
Now the word discipline, it feels negative, right? 00:22:41.800 |
Here God is training Israel to trust him and to obey him in faith. 00:22:51.040 |
God the Creator of the universe had handpicked and adopted and had vowed to be their Abba 00:22:57.120 |
Father so that they would be orphans no longer. 00:23:03.320 |
Hosea 13 and 14, the last two chapters of the short book, reflect on the wilderness 00:23:09.280 |
wanderings and Hosea's conclusion here is, "For in you only the orphan finds mercy." 00:23:19.240 |
The Lord their God in the wilderness was treating them as beloved sons. 00:23:25.200 |
Love motivated and saturated discipline is a tremendous blessing to a child. 00:23:32.480 |
Beloved children are trained up and disciplined. 00:23:44.160 |
They are left to fend for themselves, usually to their harm, but this would not be the case 00:23:54.520 |
So as a good father trains a son in all things, disciplines with loving correction, God would 00:24:06.440 |
He was their creator, yes, he was their king, but he would also love them as a father loves 00:24:13.960 |
Correction, building up, teaching, exhorting, and when necessary, the rod, they are all 00:24:23.960 |
So God the Father was more active and directly and physically tending to his people in the 00:24:29.240 |
wilderness than at any other time in Israel's history. 00:24:37.740 |
He let them understand hunger, but he did not cause them to starve. 00:24:42.520 |
He allowed them to feel thirst, but he gave them water whenever they needed it, not always 00:24:47.660 |
when they wanted it, but when they needed it. 00:24:50.480 |
He knew that in their immaturity, they would need visible evidence of his presence. 00:24:57.160 |
So he led them by a visible pillar of cloud and he led them by a visible pillar of fire. 00:25:05.160 |
And what's more, you look at Deuteronomy 8.4, 40 years their clothes did not wear out. 00:25:15.800 |
For 40 years, the clothes that they walked in, slept in, and labored in did not wear 00:25:23.400 |
I don't know what kind of material does not wear out with that much usage. 00:25:27.120 |
They likely wore the same things day after day and yet the material stayed intact, not 00:25:32.800 |
just for 40 days, not for 40 months, but for 40 years. 00:25:39.160 |
Do you think textiles were readily available in the wilderness? 00:25:44.080 |
Do you think material for crafting garments was readily available in the wilderness? 00:25:48.840 |
My guess is that the clothes that they were in at the end of the journey were the same 00:25:53.320 |
ones that their fathers had been in when they exited in haste from Egypt. 00:26:01.560 |
And Deuteronomy 8.4 also says that their feet did not swell. 00:26:07.080 |
They weren't necessarily genetically enhanced feet, but all that wandering did not cause 00:26:12.320 |
their feet to swell and it wasn't just their feet. 00:26:18.280 |
If you run on a smooth treadmill with the best Nike running shoes long enough, they 00:26:28.480 |
But for Israel, in the midst of all of that rocky, thorny path, God even protected their 00:26:36.560 |
sandals Deuteronomy 29.5 says that these crudely fashioned sandals, not hiking boots, sandals 00:26:50.320 |
Your clothes have not worn out on you and your sandal has not worn out on your feet. 00:26:58.820 |
He was divinely and miraculously preserving them even to supernaturally protecting their 00:27:04.760 |
clothes, supernaturally protecting their shoes and their feet, but they were too busy grumbling 00:27:14.360 |
What other God would discipline, love, and preserve in such a way? 00:27:19.880 |
Because remember, 40 years is a long time to put up with a bunch of people. 00:27:25.920 |
The wilderness wandering and even sometimes a very difficult application of Yahweh's rod 00:27:38.600 |
And he was and is and always will be both God of the universe and good, good father 00:27:51.560 |
So one, the wilderness wandering was on purpose. 00:27:54.480 |
Two, the wilderness wandering was for testing and the wilderness wandering was for blessed 00:28:02.080 |
And the purpose of all of this was to teach us children how to worship him and revere 00:28:08.040 |
him, to trust him and to obey him on purpose for testing and for training. 00:28:18.360 |
Are you in the middle of a wilderness wandering season currently? 00:28:42.040 |
No matter how hard you pray, there may not be immediate relief. 00:28:47.880 |
And things may get worse before they get any better. 00:28:52.960 |
And in the wilderness wandering that is your life, you may be squeezed again and again 00:28:57.480 |
and again and again and you're so sick of it. 00:29:01.360 |
But remember, wildernesses, they are on purpose. 00:29:11.680 |
They are for your training to grow you in your faith and to grow you in reflecting his 00:29:25.480 |
Most of you guys know this, but for those of you who are newer to our church, I'll 00:29:34.880 |
This Friday I'm going to be going in for surgery to have 10 inches of my colon and 00:29:45.120 |
I was diagnosed in December of last year with stage 3C colorectal cancer. 00:29:50.440 |
And there was a disgusting, if you want to see it I'll show you, okay? 00:29:52.840 |
There was a disgusting six, I actually texted that to the leaders and they're like, "You 00:30:00.840 |
It was a disgusting six centimeter long tumor in my colon. 00:30:05.900 |
And starting in January, I've done six months of chemotherapy with some very strong drugs 00:30:17.560 |
And the final step in my cancer treatment is this Friday. 00:30:21.760 |
And so, and for you guys who have been praying for me and my family, we do have some good 00:30:29.920 |
So there's a little divot in my colon where it used to be, but it's gone. 00:30:40.560 |
But I'll have the surgery to remove the area where the six centimeter tumor and the enlarged 00:30:44.400 |
lymph nodes were, mainly to prevent the cancer from coming back. 00:30:52.160 |
And a lot of that I'm assuming is you guys have loved on us and prayed for us and sent 00:31:04.520 |
But I don't praise God because I'm cancer free. 00:31:09.080 |
I praise him because he is worthy of my praise. 00:31:20.560 |
I praised him when I first got diagnosed, when I didn't know how my body would respond 00:31:36.520 |
I praised him when I first got diagnosed, when I didn't know how my body would respond 00:31:43.600 |
I've been praising him for the last 10 months of treatment. 00:31:47.280 |
I praised him on the days when the treatments were hard. 00:31:52.120 |
And I praised him on the days I felt so good, I forgot and you forgot that I had cancer. 00:32:00.240 |
And I would like to think that I will praise him in the event the cancer comes back. 00:32:06.640 |
Because if God purposely ordains it, it will come back. 00:32:11.240 |
And if it does, if he ordains, it will be for my good and for the good of this church, 00:32:23.840 |
So like I said, I got diagnosed in December of last year. 00:32:27.940 |
And there are two things that I still have not done. 00:32:31.860 |
Two things that I likely will not continue to do. 00:32:34.960 |
One, I have not once prayed for my healing from this cancer. 00:32:43.680 |
Though I know many of you guys have prayed for it the past 10 months. 00:32:51.800 |
And he is able to cure all of this at a word. 00:33:00.720 |
I don't need to pray for the God who loves me more than I love my children for healing. 00:33:07.960 |
I mean, it's biblically prescribed for you to pray for healing, but so don't get me 00:33:18.800 |
The second thing I haven't done is I have not once asked why. 00:33:27.360 |
I don't need to know the why of this disease. 00:33:35.980 |
The regenerate man trusts fully in the one who in his power and mercy has regenerated 00:33:44.540 |
I don't need my why questions answered because I trust that he is good. 00:33:50.820 |
The cancer was on purpose and it was for good. 00:33:54.760 |
It was used to humble me, to remind me of my mortality, which is always a good thing. 00:34:00.800 |
It humbled me and exposed areas of pride, selfish ambition, selfishness, and doubt. 00:34:07.220 |
It moved me to cherish my relationships and to cherish my time and my opportunities. 00:34:20.240 |
And through all of this, what were evidences of God's grace? 00:34:23.640 |
What were my miraculously preserved garment or sandals? 00:34:39.800 |
I worked and ministered through chemo, through radiation, in the midst of a strange pandemic. 00:34:47.120 |
God gave me favor with all my doctors, my radiologist, who I got randomly assigned to 00:34:53.600 |
just happened to be my high school friend's older sister, who actually was concerned, 00:34:59.840 |
prayed, and she's a Christian, and designed a treatment as if she were treating her own 00:35:06.440 |
A whole bunch of my nurses just happened to be Christians. 00:35:16.480 |
And praise the Lord for ordaining it for good and for my good. 00:35:21.600 |
Cancer was a very short, but a very real mini-wanderlust for me and my family. 00:35:30.320 |
The wilderness wandering for the people of Israel was on purpose. 00:35:38.840 |
And I told you in the beginning that there would be a fourth point. 00:35:42.520 |
And here is the fourth lesson we learned from Deuteronomy 8. 00:35:46.760 |
It's this, the wilderness was not and will never be home. 00:35:55.000 |
The wilderness was not and will never be home. 00:36:02.600 |
"Therefore, you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God, to walk in his ways, 00:36:08.560 |
For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of 00:36:14.280 |
fountains and springs, flowing forth in valleys and hills." 00:36:21.080 |
So "therefore" is an important word in an inductive Bible study. 00:36:24.880 |
So you always want to ask, what is this "therefore, therefore"? 00:36:28.760 |
It connects what has just been said to an expected and appropriate application. 00:36:34.000 |
So in reflecting on this wilderness wandering, Moses was saying, "Hey, God is sovereign. 00:36:46.520 |
Therefore, trust and obey, because sooner than later, you're going to go home. 00:36:55.960 |
You're going to go to the home that the Lord has promised your forefathers. 00:37:00.840 |
The Lord your God is bringing you into a good land." 00:37:08.560 |
The New Testament believer hears a similar promise from the Lord in John 14. 00:37:29.420 |
Verse 2, "In my Father's house are many dwelling places, and if it were not so, I would have 00:37:36.780 |
If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself, that 00:37:47.300 |
And there are two aspects of these verses in John 14 that not only encourage me, but 00:37:51.740 |
cause me to persevere whenever a wilderness happens upon my way. 00:37:57.780 |
One, Jesus Christ is going to return to take us home. 00:38:03.180 |
C.S. Lewis once said, "The Son of God became a man to enable men to be sons of God." 00:38:08.060 |
So he's coming to take us home, where there are many, many, many, many rooms. 00:38:14.880 |
And secondly, my Savior is familiar with both the physical and the spiritual wilderness. 00:38:26.360 |
So I can and will believe in God, and I can and I will also believe in Jesus Christ, my 00:38:32.760 |
Savior, and because of these things, my heart will not be troubled. 00:38:37.000 |
I want to turn your attention to Matthew 4, verse 1. 00:38:44.200 |
"Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil." 00:39:01.080 |
"Two, and after he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he then became hungry." 00:39:06.080 |
I always chuckle when I read this because it took forty days and forty nights to become 00:39:10.640 |
I would have been hungry after forty minutes, okay? 00:39:12.640 |
"And the tempter came and said to him, 'If you are the Son of God, command that these 00:39:32.040 |
"Although he was the Son of God, he learned obedience from what he himself suffered." 00:39:46.320 |
And then we see Jesus quoting Deuteronomy 8, verse 3, "to the devil. 00:39:50.920 |
But he answered and said, 'It is written, 'Man shall not live on bread alone, but on 00:39:55.640 |
every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.'" 00:40:12.120 |
And the wilderness was and never will be, was not and never will be, his home. 00:40:19.040 |
So in the little wildernesses in our lives, and with the macro wilderness, which is our 00:40:33.560 |
Well, the obvious answer, "To worship him in spirit and in truth," John 4, 24. 00:40:48.200 |
"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. 00:40:52.360 |
In all your ways, acknowledge/worship him, and he will make your path not easy, he'll 00:41:07.280 |
I want to close with one encouragement for those of you who feel like in the midst of 00:41:12.680 |
your wilderness, in the midst of every squeeze that you're failing. 00:41:17.520 |
I'm not going to have you raise your hand, but there are seasons where you feel like 00:41:21.040 |
every test you're failing and falling on your face. 00:41:25.600 |
I also want to encourage those of you who are feeling humbled because you're realizing 00:41:29.080 |
more and more, no matter how hard you try, you cannot be holier. 00:41:36.000 |
You are rotten to the core, and sometimes that's a very sobering and very saddening 00:41:46.280 |
The earthly consequences of your sins are already weighing you down, and you're feeling 00:41:50.160 |
the venom of the spiritual serpents in your life. 00:41:57.560 |
Numbers 21, we read the account of the Israelites grumbling yet again, and God sends this time 00:42:04.880 |
fiery serpents to bite them, and many of them repent. 00:42:10.520 |
God tells Moses to fashion a bronze serpent, place it on a staff, hoist it up, and those 00:42:17.840 |
who want to be healed and spared need only to look at the bronze serpent. 00:42:26.520 |
That was one of the many demonstrations of God's mercy in the wilderness. 00:42:32.000 |
Through it, through the serpent's visual representation of their curse, the Israelites learned an 00:42:46.400 |
For you guys who are feeling bedraggled, who are weary and heavy laden, who need hope, 00:42:54.080 |
who need some strength to persevere, here is the encouragement. 00:42:59.480 |
Isaiah 30.18 says, "The Lord longs to be gracious to you." 00:43:11.120 |
Lift up your eyes to the only one who can and who is more than willing to save. 00:43:19.160 |
John 3.16 reflects on this wilderness episode. 00:43:25.560 |
As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so the Son of Man must be lifted up, 00:43:33.100 |
so that whoever believes in him will have eternal life. 00:43:38.200 |
For God, kutos, in this way, for God in this way loved the world, so that he gave his only 00:43:45.240 |
begotten Son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 00:43:53.080 |
Believe in Jesus, the Messiah of God, and then in whatever wilderness the Lord ordained, 00:44:06.280 |
Trust and obey, for there's no other way to be what? 00:44:26.480 |
Praise God that he is more than willing to save, and praise God that he is leading us 00:44:33.760 |
through every and any wilderness that we face. 00:44:41.240 |
Not because we are good, not because we are able to obey, but because he is good. 00:44:59.360 |
They are for testing, they are for training, but he will not leave us there. 00:45:04.640 |
They will end, and we will be in glory at home with the Lord forever and ever and ever. 00:45:14.920 |
No matter what election results, no matter what political environments, no matter what 00:45:19.680 |
kind of persecution, oppression, and strife we experience, he is coming back, and he will