I THOUGHT IT WAS SPRING!

Now, I realize I live in the Mid-West, but when the calendar states it is spring and there is a snow storm two days later, it is hard not to wonder what happened. Winter is long enough.  We NEED it to be spring!

I was thinking about this concept in our spiritual lives as well. We wait for and expect one thing when something else is given. How does that make us feel? Do we question what our motives were, or if God’s call to us was real? Do we allow our feet to falter and wonder where God could be? When we are holding out for spring and winter is what we get it can sometimes make us wonder what is going on. 

I was looking back in Exodus 17 and I had this written in my margin of my Bible-“How do I feel about following God and still having the ‘bottom fall out?” This is in the context of Moses and the Israelites in the desert after the Red Sea and the waters at Marah and the manna and quail. In chapter 17 Moses and the Israelites are in the Desert of Sin and need water again. They are complaining and feel hopeless. They were arguing with Moses (can you imagine all those people coming up against Moses?) and blaming him for all that had gone “wrong”. They were about to stone him! So here I ask the question, are we willing to continue on when there is no water and trust God? Are we willing to walk the path He has laid out before us even when winter comes and it was supposed to be spring? Will we seek His face in the midst of seeming failure and wait on His next steps? Or will we be like the Israelites and say, “Is the Lord among us or not?” 

Imagine a similar scenario today. What would we be saying on the side-lines? As the world watched what comments would be made of not only Moses but of his God? THEN in the very next section, Moses leads the people on after God did end up providing water and they defeat the Amalekites because Moses lifted up his hands to the God of heaven. The God he was still following and worshipping. Wow. Moses could have turned back to Egypt at that point, but he followed His God. What does the “bottom falling out” look like for you? If we know we are following God and walking with Him, let us remember that in the big picture, God is working where we cannot see. Let us be as Moses. Willing to walk triumphantly out of Egypt, be almost stoned to death in the desert and still courageously walk forward with God no matter who is willing to believe with us. 

How does Moses continue on? How does he know God is there? Because God was speaking to him. He knew God’s voice. He chose to trust. Do we know God’s voice? There are many voices out there…we need to make sure we are hearing God’s and when we do, we need to 100% follow it. No turning back, no turning back…even when the "bottom falls out".