Wilderness.Blog.II

There is a pretty hilarious video on youtube that is simply called “Jesus Video” and what it is is this collection of clips from an old timey video of Jesus and the gospel and is dubbed over with funny voices and dialogue. People say that the video is sacrilegious because of how people mock the story but I beg to differ. But that isn't my point. In one of the scenes, Jesus is sitting in the desert on a rock and a few of the disciples come up to him and announce they have been looking for him and how he isn't their friend. Jesus responds that he is their friend but he just doesn't have time for them. Now, this isn't true of course but I think it does shed some light on something that Jesus was all about. Reading through the story of Jesus, it seems to me that at the beginning of so many stories it talks of how Jesus went out on a hill or to the countryside or the other side of the lake. Then there are the instances when he goes to the wilderness for 40 days to be tempted and when he leaves the disciples to go pray in Gethsemane. Jesus constantly was getting away or attempting to get away, usually to a remote of isolated place.

I find myself needing the same medicine. Getting away from everything is such a peaceful and refreshing experience yet at the same time if can be a dangerous and uneasy time. The wilderness to me is any escape from the comfortable to that which is not guaranteed or easy so that you can either cleanse your mind, body and soul in a way that benefits you. God uses the wilderness in special ways for it is his stage, his playground that He has created. Why should we not use it for the same? He has given us this to enjoy and take in and to celebrate and to be afraid all at the same time. It like the Narnia quote: No, it isn’t safe but it is good. C.S. Lewis has a quote that I definitely can compare to: Nature never taught me that there exists a God of glory and infinite majesty. I had to learn that in other ways. But nature gave the word glory a meaning for me. Getting away from everything that we have come to know and for the most part things that we are able to so easily take for granted is a key to releasing the noise so you can open your life to God. That is how I feel it works, again not just a nature wilderness but a wilderness of any kind...simply an isolated, removed place where change can occur. God is constantly calling for us to change and, in my opinion, he uses the wilderness to allow us to release and connect, as Jesus did so many times. He has given us so much space...maybe so we never have an excuse to not get away, but to take on his wilderness in hopes of radical change.