“You shall remember all the way which the LORD your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years, that He might humble you, testing you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not…
For the LORD your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing forth in valleys and hills; a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey; a land where you will eat food without scarcity, in which you will not lack anything; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper. When you have eaten and are satisfied, you shall bless the LORD your God for the good land which He has given you. Beware that you do not forget the LORD your God by not keeping His commandments and His ordinances and His statutes which I am commanding you today” (Deut 8:2, 7-11).
This passage strategically juxtaposes two very stark contrasts: a barren desert over against a very good land. “REMEMBER how God provided for you the barren the WILDERNESS” (v. 2), “lest you FORGET him in a GOOD LAND filled with overflowing abundance” (v. 11). In my own experience, times of feast are far more detrimental to my spiritual life than periods of famine, and success is far more dangerous than failure. It is, after all, much harder to forget God when we’re thirsty in the wilderness than it is to remember him with cups overflowing in the Promised Land. Success in life can all too easily puff up our hearts (vv. 14, 17), whereas challenges to meet our mortgage payment, bad reports from doctors, and wayward children constantly drive us to our knees.
God is A Good Father
He must discipline us and humble us so that we will truly hunger for “every word that proceeds from God’s mouth”
As much as we despise the deserts of life, God must bring us into them because he loves us like a father loves his child (v. 5). And if there is something we have learned about parenting in the 21st century it is this: There is nothing quite as harmful to a child’s well-being than a parent who gives him everything he wants and removes from his life everything he doesn’t want. Because God is a good Father, he must discipline us and humble us so that we will truly hunger for “every word that proceeds from God’s mouth” (Deut 8:3). The desert isn’t God’s place to punish us. It’s the place he leads us through to show us how much we’re truly blessed!
“He led you through the great and terrible wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water; He brought water for you out of the rock of flint. In the wilderness He fed you manna which your fathers did not know, that He might humble you and that He might test you, to do good for you in the end” (Deut 8:15-16).
