numbers 14

so i was asking god what he wanted me to study from his word today and (being the blonde that i am) he was like, "sarah ... you're kind of on this whole desert thing, obviously you should go back to the israelites and their time in the desert!!! duh!!" ok, so he didn't really convey that to me in that fun and obvious way but it really felt that obvious. and i don't know about you, reader, but reading numbers & deuteronomy do not get me excited and super pumped. for that, i read psalms, the gospels, or the pauline epistles. but that wasn't where god was leading me today. so, i opened up to deuteronomy and started reading the first chapter. and god blew my mind. i swear, i have never written so much down after reading a passage of scripture than i did today. i've read this passage before but never have i read it in this mindset and with this hunger for understanding and for it to just satisfy my yearning heart.

so for those of you who haven't read the first chapter of deuteronomy in awhile, let me fill you in! basically, the israelites have been out of egypt and safe from captivity for a little over 2 years now. they were previously at mt. sinai where god laid out what he wanted from them in the form of the 10 commandments and they responded by building a golden calf because they got bored waiting for their leader, moses, to get his butt off the mountain. the israelites lack patience in a bad way and it gets them into trouble A LOT (kinda like me, too). god had previously promised his people that he would lead them to the land that he promised abraham years ago and that they would possess it. so, god, being the faithful god that he is does indeed lead them RIGHT to it! the israelites send ten scouts into the land to check it out and find out that the land is amazing and beautiful and "flowing with milk and honey"! and then there's the problem .. giants live in the land. and what do you think the people on focused and heard when the scouts delivered this report? the giants!! they completely miss everything else and focus only on the problem. they forgot the big picture - the fact that god had fulfilled everything he had promised them. he had indeed led them to their promised land! and yet they completely lost sight of that and started freaking out and complaining and wining. this was where god took my hand and told me to look at him and said, "sarah, this is what you have been doing. you are missing the BIG and AMAZING part of your life i have brought you too. i have never let you go astray or gotten you lost yet, right? so why are you doubting and freaking out on me now? i'm still with you and if you ask me, i will of course fight this battle for you. i am with you, you tend to forgot that a lot."

and he was absolutely right. because i do ... i look at the big scary obstacles that stand in my way, things that satan places before me and i freak. i'm like peter and let the waves and the impossible fact that i am actually walking on water start to crowd my mind and stop staring at my lord and look down at my own two feet and i fall ... fast. that is what happens when we let the bondage from our past crowd into our future. i don't know about you but i have a lot of ugly, nasty bondage and sin from my past that my god has forgiven me for ... that he has DIED for me for. it doesn't matter to him at all. but yet what do i do? i grab onto and cling to it as if that's the only thing that is keeping me from drowning. how ridiculous is that? and how often do we as humans do that??? see, i think that we need to study the old testament a lot more than we do now. we are just like the israelites and if we could just realize and see how ridiculous they were then maybe we would see just how ridiculous we are when it comes to our walk with jesus christ and we would see just how much we complain and forget to see the obvious truth that is just staring us right in the face.

i just want to challenge you all to read through numbers 11-14 to get the context if you've forgotten it and then to read the first chapter of deuteronomy. ask god to open your mind and your heart to see it in a new light and i swear, you will be blown away by it. until we stop yearning for egypt (whatever keeps us bondage) and start yearning for more and more of god, we will continue to wander in the wilderness lost and confused. i pray that that will NOT be our generation, that we will not follow in the paths of those who have gone before us. i pray that we, and that i would never revisit "egypt" again but would eagerly be awaiting our "promised land".