Forty years of wilderness wandering plagued the Israelites because they listened to the report of ten spies instead of God’s promise to give them the promised land. They had experienced God’s miraculous works for their deliverance, yet still, rather than believing God’s promise and facing their enemies with faith, they were caught up in human deception and discouragement.
The giants occupying their land were huge and the enemies were strong, the challenge too dangerous, the risk too great. They refused to move out and take possession for fear of their lives.
They wept and wailed through their night with bitterness! They complained and grumbled about their plight! Why did we leave Egypt? We’ll die in this forlorn land! Shouldn’t we just go back? Wouldn’t it be better? Be safer? Wouldn’t it just be easier back in captivity? Those unfaithful, unbelieving, grumbling Israelites twenty years and older never made it into the land of promise because God saw to it that their unbelief would not be honoured.
Oh, the wilderness wanderings we face when we focus on deception instead of truth. When we focus on the giants instead of the promises; when we rebel instead of trust!
You know it don’t you? The wilderness of rebellion, unbelief, deception and despair? Does your old slavery and bondage to sin just seem more comfortable, easier, and safer than trusting God for deliverance? We need to move on out and take what God has promised through trust, while He still gives opportunity. Courage is found when we take God at His word and trust him even though the giants are many and the tasks impossible.
I wonder who we hear? The reports of people or the Lord’s promises to us.?
1 Corinthians 10:11
“For whatever was written in earlier times was written for our instruction, that through perseverance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.”
#soulnotestoself #soulnote
Thing is, the fear is huge and the questions unending without any concrete answers. Sadly, man has lost control of all he thought brought happiness to his world. Of all, he thought he held tightly within his reach, within his power. Today, we realize we really have so little! You and I and we and us, today, here we sit, all of us, now no longer watching other countries suffer but feeling the nitty-gritty of our own countries in chaos and failure. Our economy writhes in pain as travel becomes somewhat restricted, and sports events carry on without spectators in the bleachers. Masks are a way of life and mandates and protocols are put in order for shoppers. Malls close and restaurants tighten their doors and here we are sitting smack dab in the middle of the fear and pain of it all. Now we sit on the edge of global collapse under the defeat of a pandemic that can’t be stopped and a clever beast that can’t be controlled. Is it God’s wrath, maybe?
Beautiful one, this desperate scenario, we see today, as hard as it is, is nothing compared to what a lost eternity will hold! A lost eternity will be a place of hope gone forever with no way to escape. There, no mask will protect and no protocol will keep one safe. It will be a free-for-all for the enemy to have his way, and he won’t care one whit about you. It won’t be pretty and it won’t be fun. Hope will sink with the final sunset of a lost eternity where the sun will rise no more. Ponder it as you sit wringing your hands over today’s problems and realize that today is the day of salvation. Today He calls but tomorrow may be too late to heed the call. Today is the day of salvation and coming to the Lord to find shelter under His wing of salvation, protection and unconditional love. Yeah, He’s got this hard place and in His mercy, He always makes a way through. 
Hope and Healing In Hard Places 