Why God Sends Us Into the Wilderness

The path to a mature relationship passes through the desert.

I was in my early twenties when I faced my first major crisis of faith. I had started attending Bible College in California and working with a inner-city missions organization, and it was wonderful. I loved everything about my new life: my classes, the kids I was working with, the friends I was making, and the San Francisco Bay Area. To top it off, I felt like my relationship with God was strong and getting even better. I could see him doing miracles around me all the time, I could sense his closeness to me, and I was excited to tell others about him. It just was a great time to be alive.

Then it all came to a screeching halt. Basically, I ran out of money. I simply didn’t have the funds to register for a new semester of classes and had to return to Canada. I was shocked and confused.

I had gone into the situation knowing that funds would be tight, but I had been sure that the money for school would come from somewhere. After all, I had seen God provide for me in supernatural ways for the past six months. He had worked out my living situation and provided food and a job for me. Not to mention that he had been doing so many wonderful things in my spiritual life and had been using me to reach others. Why would God pull the rug out from under me now? I had no idea.

The next few months were tough. I worked and read and pined for California. It seemed like my life was at a standstill. Slowly, however, the disillusionment gave way to a renewed and deeper trust in God. I began to realize that God still had things under control and that he was busy molding and shaping me. I started to see areas in my life in which I needed to grow and I took steps to address them. When I went back to California the following year, it was with a better attitude and a more mature faith. My time in exile had been very good for me.

We will discuss the specific lesson I learned later in this post, but first let’s review the fact that sending people out into the wilderness, literally and figuratively, is very consistent with God’s pattern in history.

The Israelites Test God; Jesus Doesn’t

In the previous post we saw that God asks us to sacrifice in order to show us whom or what we are loving and move us toward loving God. In other words, the demand for sacrifice has the effect of testing and humbling us. Well, rather than always ask us to give up stuff, sometimes God just takes it away. He tests and humbles us by throwing us into a situation in which we experience loss. Sometime he sends us to the desert.

This is what he did to the Israelites when they escaped from slavery in Egypt. He took them from the plagues and the miraculous Red Sea crossing directly into the Desert of Shur, where within a few days they were complaining about a lack of water. (Exo. 15:22-24). Why didn’t he find a nicer route or send a few nicely equipped air conditioned coaches? Because he wanted to test and humble them: “Remember how the LORD your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands” (Deut. 8:2).

Unfortunately, many of the Israelites did not respond well to desert conditions. I wish it wasn’t the case, but I can definitely relate to these Israelites. Imagine it: they had just seen God defeat the armies and gods of Egypt and set them free. They must have been on an incredible emotional high after the Red Sea. And then: desert. Hot, dry, dusty wilderness. It had to be a shock. I can imagine them thinking, “Why would the God who has done such mighty things for us allow us to experience this misery? I know he has the power to change this, so why doesn’t he?”

Part of the problem here, it seems, is that the people had started to have too high a view of themselves. They had developed the notion that, as the people God had called to himself and brought out of Egypt, they must have some special value that warranted this effort. They had become proud and needed to be humbled. The reason I interpret this passage in this manner is the way Jesus referenced this episode when he was sent to the wilderness.

Like the Israelites, immediately after being baptized, Jesus went out in the desert to be tested.  Jesus was tempted three times by Satan. In the second episode,

The devil took [Jesus] to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written: ‘He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’”

Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”(Matt. 4:5-7)

Satan tried to get Jesus to demand a miracle from God. Jesus rightly refused and supported his decision by quoting Deuteronomy 6:16: “Do not test the LORD your God as you did at Massah.” This is a reference to the incident we are discussing: the one in which the Israelites grumbled about their lack of water. When they confronted Moses, he replied, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you put the LORD to the test?” (Exo. 17:2). That episode concludes with Moses inquiring of the Lord, who told him to strike a rock with his staff to bring water out. “So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel. And he called the place Massah and Meribah because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the LORD saying, ‘Is the LORD among us or not?’” (Exo. 17:6-7).

The Wrong Focus

The key to understanding this story (and why Jesus refers to it) is the question, “Is the LORD among us or not?” I think that perhaps the word “us” should be in italics. The focus of the sentence is the Israelites, not God. That is the problem.

The Israelites were thirsty and appealed to God (through Moses) to do a miracle for them. But notice the nature of this appeal. In asking if the LORD was among them, they were not questioning the existence of God or even whether or not he had the power to provide water. They were not asking, “Can God do this?” They were asking, “Are we special people or not? Are we God’s chosen family or not? Is he among us in a unique way or not?” It was a rhetorical question meant to force God’s hand. What they were saying in statement form is “We are special people. We deserve to have you do what we want. Where is our water!?”

The Israelites knew God existed and that he had power to provide water – they had just seen the plagues and the parting of the Red Sea and the miraculous provision of manna. When they complained about water, they were not questioning his power; they were telling God that they deserved to have him use that power on their behalf.

The way they reacted to being thirsty showed that the Israelites still had a lot to learn about God’s motives and their own place in his plan. They let their pride rise up even in the midst of being plucked out of slavery through no power of their own. They thought that somehow they were worthy to be saved and have their thirst quenched as well.

While I was in Canada wishing to be back in California, I realized that I had started to think this way as well. While ostensibly I was focused on doing the Lord’s work and knowing him better, in reality I was focused on taking classes that I enjoyed and doing work that I found meaningful and living in a place that I found exhilarating. It was all about me. When God took me out of that situation I couldn’t figure out why he wouldn’t provide the money for me to keep going to school. Hadn’t I exhibited great faith in moving? Wouldn’t it be better for me to keep studying the Bible and working with kids so I could lead more to him? Wasn’t I special? My questions revealed that my focus was on myself rather than God. I was acting as if God needed me to be on his team; as if I was deserving of his work. He doesn’t and I’m not. I was proud and needed to be humbled. God revealed that by sending me to the wilderness.

Jesus is not like me. He is not proud. This too was revealed in the desert. Satan tried to get Jesus to focus on himself (“If you are the Son of God…”) and test God in the same way as the Israelites and I did, but he would not. In the same way that the Israelites said “We are special. Quench our thirst!” and I said “I am special. Pay for my school!” Satan wanted Jesus to say to the Father “I am special. Catch me when I fall!” Jesus would not do that because he was focused on the Father’s glory, not his own. This is what the Israelites should have been concentrating on as well, as should have I. Rather than always thinking about what God has taken away from us and should do for us, we should be thinking of how God is going to be glorified in and through us. To test God is to try to get him to do something for our glory rather than his.

God’s Reason for Everything

One of the main lessons of the wilderness is that we are dependent creatures. The desert is a place where humans cannot survive without help. In the wilderness the Israelites needed God to feed and clothe them and fight their battles. So do we. As a corollary to this truth is the fact that God takes care of us for his own glory, not for ours. If we ever start to treat God as if we are deserving of his care or that he is bound to take care of us for our own sake, we’ve missed the point of God’s plan.

Unfortunately, that sentiment is quite common today. We speak of God as if he’d be lost without us. I read a children’s devotional recently that insinuated that God created us because he was lonely. That simply isn’t the case. God did not need to create the universe or us. He was not lonely or incomplete. He was and is completely satisfied and content; indeed he delights and has always delighted in simply being God. Creation resulted from a bubbling over of this delight. God’s joy overflowed like a fountain in creation and everything that resulted is intended to glorify him. “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands” (Psalm 19:1). Why do they do this? Because that is what they were created to do. God’s glory is revealed through his creation. Paul explains in Romans “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities – his eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made” (Romans 1:20). God’s intention in creating the universe was to show his greatness.

Man is the most explicit demonstration of that greatness. The creation account in Genesis reaches its high point with Adam and Eve because they are made in the very image of God (Gen. 1:26) and therefore glorify him the most. “Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth – everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made” (Isa. 43:6b-7).

The Glory of God in Redemption

God’s “passion for his glory”^¹ motivated the original creation and can also clearly be seen in the redemption of that creation. The Exodus is a prime example of that. Scripture is clear that God released the Israelites from bondage and remained faithful to them through the wilderness because of his passion for his glory. For example, God explained to Moses that he would take the Israelites to the Red Sea rather that a shorter route so that he could bring glory to himself through one more tremendous miracle: “I will gain glory for myself through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD” (Exodus 14:4).

In future years the Israelites would look back at the Exodus and recall what had happened and why. Isaiah wrote that “his people remembered the days of old” and asked,

Where is he…who sent his glorious arm of power to be at Moses’ right hand, who divided the waters before them, to gain for himself everlasting renown, who led them through the depths? Like a horse in open country, they did not stumble; like cattle that go down to the plain, they were given rest by the Spirit of the Lord. This is how you guided your people to make for yourself a glorious name. (Isaiah 63:12-14)

When David was called to build a temple for God, he responded with appropriate understanding of God’s motivation, describing Israel as the “the one nation on earth that God went out to redeem as a people for himself, and to make a name for himself, and to perform great and awesome wonders by driving out nations and their gods from before your people, whom you redeemed from Egypt?” (2 Sam. 7:23).

Later, when Israel rebelled against God, he explained clearly why he was still intent on redeeming them. It was not because they deserved it:

And wherever they went among the nations they profaned my holy name, for it was said of them, “These are the LORD’s people, and yet they had to leave his land.” I had concern for my holy name, which the house of Israel profaned among the nations where they had gone.

Therefore say to the house of Israel, “This is what the Sovereign LORD says: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am going to do these things, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations where you have gone. I will show the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, the name you have profaned among them. Then the nations will know that I am the LORD, declares the Sovereign LORD, when I show myself holy through you before their eyes.

“For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. … I want you to know that I am not doing this for your sake, declares the Sovereign LORD. Be ashamed and disgraced for your conduct, O house of Israel!” (Ezekiel 36:20-24, 32)

God sums up the motivation for his faithfulness and mercy nicely in Isaiah 48: “For my own name’s sake I delay my wrath; for the sake of my praise I hold it back from you, so as not to cut you off. See, I have refined you, though not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction. For my own sake, for my own sake, I do this. How can I let myself be defamed? I will not yield my glory to another” (Isaiah 48:9-11).

Just as God’s passion for his glory is what motivated him to redeem and stay faithful to the Israelites, it also motivates him to redeem and remain faithful to us. God saves us because he is glorified in saving us, just as Paul explained to the Ephesians: “In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory” (Eph. 1:13).

Our Value and God’s Glory

Does God think we are valuable? Of course. But we shouldn’t interpret that through the prism of our culture’s cult of self-esteem. God did not wander though Wal-Mart one day, happen to see me down the aisle, and suddenly realize he had found the most ravishing and valuable creature in the universe. He made me. I have value according to the worth he gave me at creation. This happens to be very, very high, since humans are made in his image (Gen. 1:27), but my value is especially high because I can glorify him more than, say, sheep and birds (Matt. 6:26, 10:31, 12:12).

According to John Piper,

The love of God for sinners is not his making much of them, but his graciously freeing and empowering them to enjoy making much of him.

As [Jonathan] Edwards says, “God is their good.” Therefore, if God would do us good, he must direct us to his worth, not ours….Today, people typically feel loved if you make much of them and help them feel valued. The bottom line in their happiness is that they are made much of.

Edwards observes, with stunning modern relevance, “True saints have their minds, in the first place, inexpressibly pleased and delighted with ... the things of God. But the dependence of the affections of hypocrites is in a contrary order: they first rejoice ... that they are made so much of by God; and then on that ground, he seems in a sort, lovely to them.”²³

As Piper points out, the fact that God’s love for us is not primarily about our value should keep us from loving immaturely. By that I mean that we should not love God only because he values us or even because he does nice things for us. We should love him because of who he is.

My wife and I have four children. Our major challenge as parents (as all parents can testify) is to try to make our children understand that they are not the center of the universe and that their parents do not exist to grant their every desire. To not attempt this would be to spoil our children and hinder our relationship with them.

For example, if I were to ask my youngest (as a toddler) to describe why she likes her daddy, I am quite sure her answer would center on all the things that I do for her. “My daddy plays with me, feeds me, reads books to me, changes me and gets me dressed,” etc. Hopefully this will change over time, and as she gets older my daughter will be able to answer somewhat more objectively; “My daddy plays with me and reads to me and he tells people about Jesus and makes cool movies and writes neat books,” etc.

We need the same maturation process in our relationship with God. We need to develop a love for him that is based on more than the fact that “He thinks I am special.” We don’t want to treat God like one of those early grade school romances. You don’t know a certain person exists until one day you find out that they like you. All of a sudden your opinion of them goes way up. As we all should know by now, that is no way to pursue a relationship. If you don’t like someone for who they are, rather than what they think of you, you’re in trouble.

Is God too Focused on Himself?

When presented with this argument, some people have told me that I make it sound like God is overcome by pride and just needs to get over himself. Is this the case? Of course not. The reason this cannot be so is that God could never put undo focus on himself. On the other hand, we can certainly put undo focus on ourselves. God is worthy of all the focus and praise he can get; we are not.

The reason pride is wrong for us is that we are not deserving to receive glory. Pride used to be referred to as “vain-glory,” and I think that term does an excellent job of describing the problem. Pride is glory that is given in vain. It is glory that should not be given because the object of the glory is not glorious. We should not focus on and praise ourselves because we are not worthy to be focused on and praised. However, God is. He is worthy of all glory and honor and therefore can never be guilty of vain-glory.

God is the only independent one. Everything else and everyone else is dependent on him. It is fine for God to consider himself the center of all because he is the center of all. As I argued in the previous post, it is fine for God to accept worship (worship means to have worth ascribed) because he is worthy. God is above all. He is the most valuable entity that exists. It is not alright for me to accept that same worship because I am not. For me to ascribe worth to something that is not worthy is foolishness. This is why God is so adamant that he will not give his glory to another. To do so is to reverse the order of the universe, and not even God can do that. When God works for his own glory, when he asks for worship and forbids the worship of anything else, he is simply keeping the universe in proper order.

According to Romans 1, The root sin of humanity, ultimately, is rejecting this order:

The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened….They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen. (Romans 1:18-21; 25)

Put another way, those that put their own glory over God’s don’t make it to the Promised Land. Let’s remember that when our journey there leads us into the wilderness.

1. I owe the phrases “God’s delight in being God” and “God’s passion for his glory,” as well as much of this argument, to John Piper, God’s Passion for His Glory (Wheaton: Crossway, 1998).

2. Jonathan Edwards, The Religious Affections, John Smith, ed., The Works of Jonathan Edwards, vol. 2 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1959), 249-50)

3. Piper, 34-35.