We love changing seasons. It doesn’t seem to matter which one it is, we are always ready to leave the last and look forward to the next with anticipation. All you must do is walk into a store in the middle of October and recognize how “out of season” we live. Christmas décor up before Halloween, Easter décor up as soon as New Year’s passes and July 4th shirts are on the rack before it warms up enough to wear them.
It seems we tend to live that way, grow tired in our present season and hope the next is better. Paul writes in Galatians 6:9 “Do not grow weary in well doing for at the proper time you will reap a harvest”. Isn’t that what we want? A harvest for our labors yet not “at the proper time”, we want it now. Jeremiah 8:7 says “Even the stork knows the time of migration as do the turtledove, the swallow and the crane. They all return at the proper time each year. But not My people; They do not know the Lord’s commands”. If we do not know the Presence and Word of God, we do not recognize where we are in this hour that we live. Ecclesiastes 3:1 “For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven”. Do we know the season? Or are we like Israel wandering in the wilderness far longer than we needed to because we only want the promise, but do not steward the present time we are given.
Israel knew they were going to the place of abundance that God had promised them. It was an 11-day journey to get there yet for them, it took 40 years. Exodus 11:17-19 tells us that this extended stay in the wilderness was for their good. God knew beforehand that He was leading out a group of shepherds, farmers, blacksmiths and extremely experienced brick masons. But to take the promise land, they needed to be a people of unwavering faith, they needed to be warriors. Throughout their journey they would learn to do what they needed to possess the promise for until they did, it was only a dream.
In this season of delay whether it is the salvation, healing or deliverance of a loved one, or the current compromised situation in the church or the growing wickedness we see in the world around us, how do we walk out of this wilderness? How do we become the faithful warriors we need to be to “take the promise” in the name of the Lord? How do we take back our churches and nations that the Lord is truly glorified in them? It is quite the simple solution, yet many find it difficult to follow. That simplicity is drawing near to Jesus, follow the cloud by day and the fire by night. Move when He says move, do what He says do, say what He says say, think how He says think for it is only there we build our faith to the point we can take back what we have allowed Satan access to. A people who stays close to the cloud and the fire will make it all the way. But before we can do that, we must wake up, get up pray up and stand up! We must become alert to the voice of the Lord and the moving of the Holy Spirit in our present time.
If we do not, we would be like a turtledove that misses the time of migration, and we shall die right where we are as many of the faithless Israelites did. This begins in one place, the place of repentance, the place of recognizing our own wanderings away from the cross, away from the cloud and the fire and draw near. In all of God’s perfect will, He allows His permissive will to govern us, that is we get to choose what we are to do. We can follow Him, obey Him NOW and shorten the time or not. How we walk in this season determines the when and how of the next. When will we become a people who will actually “humble ourselves and pray and seek His face” so that He can send healing to the land? To be prayerful is to be humble, diligent and dependent on Yahweh for everything we need. Little by little we are being stripped of our dependence on lesser things and the wilderness teaches us this lesson richly. Recognize, repent, return, rest and restore. This is the way of the wilderness; this is the way to the promise. Maybe this is the season we are in, do not waste it! Do not grow weary and you will arrive at the proper time! #MyGodisYahweh