Formed By The Desert

I've just finished reading a book called 'Formed By The Desert' by Joyce Huggett. A heart-to-heart encounter with God. It's an often forgotten fact that God frequently leads His loved ones into the desert, but when we read the Bible we find this is a recurrent theme running through the Scripture, and that some of the finest stalwarts of the faith were shaped by the desert.

Joyce Huggett draws upon the stories of these spiritual giants - Abraham and Sarah, Moses and Miriam, Elijah, the psalmist, Hosea and his wife, John the Baptist and Jesus Himself - to explore how God works mightily through them and how their experiences can be an inspiration for our lives. Our wilderness need not be a physical desert - few of us have spent time in the deserts of Africa or the Middle East - but we may nevertheless experience its solitude, silence and struggle.

As we wait, listen and surrender, we find that it is also a place of formation and transition - a place of revelation and new beginnings, of miracles and grace. Far from a place of abandonment (admittedly, it doesn't half feel like this sometimes!), it's a place of spiritual growth and encounter with God as He draws us closer to Himself, strengthens and empowers us, wooing us away from the props and luxuries that camouflage our thirst and need for Him. The book beautifully unravels and illustrates the richness that lies in the desert experience and helps us to discover that the desert does indeed hide a well.

We can be sure that, if we are serious about following Christ, we, too, will be led into the desert. James Houston puts the situation well: There is not one kind of desert experience, but as many as there are differing personalities and personal stories, yours and mine. For the 'perfectionist' there is the desert of imperfection, where we have to face up to our own weaknesses and let God alone give us the humility to face and work through them. For the 'giver' there is the desert of inadequacy, where we face the flight from our own sinfulness. We are too in need of help from others and, above all, from our God.

The 'doer' is lured into the desert of uselessness where we seem to get nowhere and where we face up to the need to become a powerless 'child' of God. The 'idealist' who has assumed romantically that life will be interpreted and identity given merely by artistic creativity is placed in the desert of ordinariness. The 'observer' or 'scholar' is placed in the desert of solitude until the inner loneliness that substituted 'ideas' for relationships has been confronted...

The 'rigid' or 'loyal' maintainer of the status quo, afraid of change, is placed in a desert of flux that appears as disorienting as sand flying in the desert winds. The 'fun-lover' who fears suffering and pain will wander in the desert of desolation, where for a time life is dominated by pain. Similarly, the 'controller' ends up in the desert of weakness, and is made vulnerable to the treat of the chaotic in a wholly new way. The 'pleaser' or 'peace-maker' needs freedom in the desert storms where survival requires confrontation with reality, and refuge lies only with God - learning to speak the truth becomes a terrible risk that has to be taken.

In the light of this challenging claim, the stories that sojourns in the wilderness challenged me to ask, "Which of the deserts mentioned have I encountered? How did God use this particular desert experience to transform or remould me?"

© 2012