WilderVoice

Sometimes the Church is on God’s side. The place to be is on the inside, reaching out to the unchurched, drawing them in.

Other times … for whole eras … the Church is offside with God. Better, then, to take your place outside. There, among the demon-possessed, the lepers, the tax collectors and prostitutes. There, with the poor [in spirit] — the least of these — Jesus’ brothers and sisters.

There, in the wilderness.

The wilderness is a place with profound theological overtones for God’s people. It was a place of punishment — forty years of wandering as a direct consequence of Israel’s disobedience.

But the wilderness was also Israel’s birthplace. It was the place where YHWH delivered the Law to Moses. With Egypt behind them and the promised land before them, Israel was shaped by its wilderness experiences into the very people of God.

Thus, many generations later, it was in the wilderness that John’s voice cried out, calling Israel to repentance. And it was into the wilderness that the Holy Spirit drove our Lord, who sojourned there as Israel’s representative. Jesus’ forty days of fasting represented a new beginning, a new birth, a re-formation for the people of God — in the wilderness.

Many more generations have passed since those heady days. The Church has plainly lost its way.

in the Wilderness / a Voice / crying