Streams in The Desert and a Table In The Wilderness

“The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom like a rose. …For in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert.” (Isa. 35:1,6)

When we look at today’s church world, we become aware that the main emphasis is on personal salvation and the love of God. Now, I know that these things are truly important and necessary in our walk with our Lord, but many, if not most, fail to see the need for national repentance and salvation, because it is only then that we can fully experience the full and complete measure of the awesome God that we claim to love and serve. The Bible is replete with instances where God showed forth His mercy to His people when they seemed to have reached the end of the road. One of the first examples of this mercy toward His people we find already during the Exodus from slavery in Egypt. First, there is the parting of the waters of the Red Sea, next we find the sweetening of the bitter waters at Marah, then when the Israelites started to run out of food, God provided bread from Heaven called manna, a table in the wilderness. Next, we find the Israelites grumbling because of lack of water, again God stepped in and provided water out of the rock, yes, streams in the desert. Throughout the history and the annals of the early Hebrew Israel nation we find that whenever they got themselves into a pinch, due to their own lack of faith and disobedience, God would always be there to provide and rescue them from their calamities. When, some thousand years after the Exodus, the Israelites started their migrations to the God foreordained appointed places in the West, we can be sure that although unbeknownst to them God provided and led them all the way according to His plan. There is not a thing that the Israelites, then and now, can do without God’s providence. It took the Israelites anywhere from five hundred to a thousand years to reach their allotted places in North West Europe and the Isles of the sea, but by God’s guidance they, tribe by tribe, under different names than what they started with, settled down in their new lands to build a new life and a new society suited to their own special needs. God had provided the way and the means but it would yet take many, many years before these people would pay homage to the one true God, who had brought them to their new home. God has never forgotten His children, but His children have often forgotten their God. Throughout their migration years God had instilled in some of the people a wanderlust that sooner or later would make itself known and thus, after a time when things were quite well and settled in their own lands, the lust to colonize awoke and these resettled Israelites reached out for new horizons.

The Dutch, “the tribe of Zebulon”, took possession of the Indonesian Spice Islands and settled a colony in the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa, Britain (Ephraim) reached out to North America and Australia to start colonies. Again, God was with His people. And while among the native savages, provided protection and a table in the Wilderness in these untamed lands. It was not always easy for the first settlers, but God’s hand was always over them, they thrived and established wealthy countries through hardship and perseverance, trial and error, but, as long as they walked with God. There is a saying that an elephant never forgets, by the same token it could be said that an Israelite never remembers. No sooner are they in tune with their Maker and covered in blessings, they go a whoring after other gods and idols. It is just as Paul states in 2Tim. 3, men shall be, and are certainly now, lovers of their own selves. Verses 2 through 5 surely depict the sad state that now prevails in our once great Christian nations. Under these conditions what is the faithful remnant to do? Paul again give the answer, telling Timothy in chapter 4 “Preach the word diligent in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke, exort with all long-suffering and doctrine. For the time will come, [and is now], when they will not endure sound doctrine but, after their own lust, shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.” (2Tim. 4:2-4).

So, no matter the conditions, we have to persevere in spreading the good news of the Gospel of Salvation in our Lord Jesus Christ. In the past, we had some great revivals, back in the late eighteen hundreds and early nineteen hundreds, when people by the thousands drew nigh again unto the God of their fathers, but alas, these times are past, but if it is in God’s Providence and Will, the same can happen again. The need for returning to God is way past due, the time and need for repentance is now! All we need do is apply the protocol as set forth in 2Chron. 7:14, and God will gladly heal our lands. When this happens, and happen it will, then God will take this morass, this jungle, this wilderness that we have created and turn it into a virtual paradise flowing with rivers of living waters and the Lord will again provide for us a table in the wilderness overflowing with the blessing of Almighty God. May that day come soon is my prayer for all of us. AMEN!