Wilderness

Here are some thoughts I have recently heard about the wilderness. I am really trying to "digest" it. Maybe you have some thoughts?

Defining the Wilderness
A. The wilderness is a real place in God. It is not so much about the physical location of the wilderness, though many of God's messengers spent significant seasons of time in an actual, physical wilderness.
1.The wilderness is a place on the journey for every believer who desire wholeheartedness. The wilderness call is the designated path that God calls all believers to and through in order to bring them to totall dependency and abandonment in Him.
2. The wilderness is not a place you visit once in your journey with God, but rather, part of the prescribed, continual process of maturity that you will revisit many times in life.

B. The wilderness speaks of the essential testings and trials that God uses in order to bring us into conformity with His Son. Just as Christ Jesus was tested in the wilderness at the hands of the enemy, our pathway to 100-fold obedience will take us through the wilderness of trials, tests, and temptations.

C. Every momentary, light affliction is part of the wilderness journey. It's everything that is working on our behalf that we might receive an imperishable crown, the eternal weight or abundance of glory. (2 Cor 4:17)

D. All of the unique tensions of life, in which we experience the ironies of living as citizens of the kingdom of God yet as strangers and aliens in the world, are part of the wilderness journey.
1. It is experiencing the exceeding joy in the presence of the Lord all the while touching the barrenness of not truly knowing God.
2. Living in the tensions of seemingly contradictory realities can cause you to feel as if you live in a perpetual state of emotional and spiritual tenderness or rawness.

E. The veil of the flesh is a wilderness.
1. In this life, as we peer into that which is eternal we experience the drama of touching that which is unseen while not perfectly perceiving it. We, powerfully at times and subtly at other times, access that which is divine, that which is transcendent, yet because we are captive within flesh, we touch it only for a moment and only in part.
2. The tension of experiencing that which is real, yet only in part, is part of the lifelong wilderness journey. The veil of our flesh keeps us from being able to fully access the realm of the spirit, that which is forever and unfading.
3. Once we come to understand that we were made for eternity (Eccl 3:11) and that we are only pilgrims and sojourners in this life (Heb 11:13, 1 Pet 2:11), we wrestle with the tension and ache of living life through the veil. This wrestle is the wilderness.

Col 3:2-4 Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. 3 For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.

God help us to get an eternal perspective. Let our eyes be fixed solely on You. May my gaze be locked with Yours and Yours alone. May I embrace this walk of wilderness with delight knowing that this life is only a shadow.

Fix Your Eyes- Twila Paris
When I look into Your eyes I see the love that died for me
When I look into Your eyes I see the hope that I will be a faithful bride
Following close behind.
Following ever blinded to the things that should not move me

Saying to my soul fix your eyes on Jesus
Saying to my soul fix your eyes on Jesus

Fix your eyes upon the prize
The highest calling you will find
Following close behind
Following ever blinded to the things that should not move me