No Different

Last year, my husband and I went on what we affectionately call, The Trip from Hell. That's probably irreverent, and probably not how we should label it, but I'm open to suggestions. We had booked a cruise over a year before. COVID restrictions being what they were at the time of finalization, Hubby and I decided to forego the cruise and do a quiet cabin in the woods instead. Well, we both got sick about a week before, and...it...lingered... We decided nothing was going to stop us, and we set off for our cute little rented cabin. And we drove. And we drove. And we drove. Until, hours later, we were hopelessly lost. Little did we know, the local rental agencies --and there are many-- exchange and rearrange cabin names rather frequently. Google Maps was not our friend. Our cabin was about twenty minutes from the group of cabins we were endlessly circling. It was late and we were tired, hungry, and very frustrated. When we finally found what we dreamed would be our love nest for the next five days, the accommodations were meh and there was no place to eat for miles. The weather had gotten sloppy, wet, and cold, and within twenty-four hours we were completely encased in ice with no food in the fridge and no way to get safely down the mountain. No postcard could possibly capture the excitement we felt. Did we grumble? Did we complain? You betcha!

This morning I was reading in Exodus 16:1-3. Israel is one month out from Egypt. They have seen terrible plagues befall Egypt by "the finger of God." They have seen an entire sea dried up in its midst that they might cross. They have witnessed water made pure by wood and rested in an oasis of springs and palm trees. But, in Exodus 16:2, they are grumbling again. Really?! we exclaim. How quickly they forget! we chastise. But I caution you (as I do myself), how many times have you grumbled in the last thirty days? Or perhaps, there was that moment you were brought to in which you grumbled enough for the entire thirty days. Let us not judge too harshly. How quickly we forget!

Israel was a people that had been raised to worship and to observe, but they had been enslaved in Egypt for generations. Nothing much had changed about their lives from the time a Pharaoh rose up who did not know Joseph, who was threatened by the people of God and appointed taskmasters over them-- nothing much had changed until their redemption. Their lives in Egypt were not at all like their lives here in this wilderness. This was a completely different type of existence, a different type of "test."

And this is where the Holy Spirit began to speak to my heart. All of life is a journey, with ups and downs, bumps and blessings; but they don't always look familiar to us. We long for stability, and when things get dull, we crave a change. We are rarely truly content, as Paul advises in Philippians 4:1-13. But not only are we sinfully fickle, we find ourselves completely undone when led into a trial or test that "appears" new. Folks, there is nothing new under the sun. Whether it's a trial of our hearts or a test of our patience, whether our finances fall short or the problems with our health are multiplying, whether our children have rejected us or our parents have moved in with us-- whatever is our present situation it requires the same course of action as every other situation that has come before: go to God.

When the dinner bell rang, God provided quail, and at breakfast time, manna for the people of Israel to eat. He had heard them. And when it came time for Scott and I to get off that mountain, God heard my prayers-- lots of them! So let us bear in mind that, though the specifics may be different, though the feelings may be different, though the length of time may be different, our God is not different. All any situation requires is that we look to Him.