Spirit of the Heartland

Have you ever been in the wilderness, in the desert? What was it like? Take a minute to make a picture Dry, rocky ground? Empty echoing silence? Dark and frightening and cold, or bright and blistering hot? A place of hunger and thirst and loneliness? Were there tempters and beasts and angels?

This wilderness is a picture of Lent. Our forty days in the wilderness in preparation for Easter. Although the church has traditionally used the forty days as a period of preparation for baptism, Jesus' forty days come IMMEDIATELY AFTER his baptism.

Just when Jesus hears the words that might indicate that he is comfortably situated, as God's beloved Son, Jesus is driven BY THE SPIRIT into that most uncomfortable place -- the desert.

The desert is a dangerous place, where one is unprotected and vulnerable. The desert is a place of solitude, where we leave behind the clutter and busyness, the walls we build between ourselves and God. The desert is an empty place of silence, where we might hear the still, small voice of God. The desert is a place of nothingness and of everything. An early Christian desert father, speaks of his monastic cell as this kind of desert, and advises young monks simply: "Go to your cell and your cell will teach you everything."

Sometimes we don't even need to take the initiative to ‘go to our cell.' Sometimes, the desert finds us: At times of great loss or trauma --the loss of a loved one or a job or our health -- we may be cast into the desert of emptiness, where all the extra "stuff" of our lives is stripped away. Then we face our own beasts and demons and wait, often in despair for the angels. The covenant promise for us is that God is there, even in the despair of the desert. The rainbow reminds us that "never again will we be cut off" from God.

Other times, especially in the middle of the comfortable times in our lives, the Spirit may call us into the desert. Lent is that kind of time -- a time for reflection and self-examination, a time to find our own desert, and look at our temptations and search for our angels. But how do we find our desert in the busyness of our lives? Not alternating hectic busyness and retreat -- that just postpones and compounds the busyness But making space for God in our lives, or recognizing God's presence in the busyness.

The desert is a place of a new vision of attentiveness to God's presence. Like the rainbow, it makes us aware that God is with us -- we are not "cut off" from God's presence.

Jesus was not alone in the desert -- we are told that Satan, beasts & angels were there, and the angels waited on him.

Carlo Carretto a hermit, writes about "The Desert in the City" and reminds us that deserts can be found anywhere because "the desert does not mean the absence of [people], it means the presence of God."

The desert is the place where we are made most aware of God's presence in our lives. Be aware of the temptations that lead us away from God. Be aware of the wonder of God's creation -- the beasts. Be aware of the angels -- God's messengers to us -- in our everyday lives.

"Be aware." or rather, " Beware!" Because the desert is dangerous territory.

Our desert may be an unexpected painful trauma or it may be an intentional retreat for reflection. Neither is easy, but it is in those hard, empty, dry, often painful places that God waits for us.

It is in the desert that our hearts broken and opened to God's presence in our lives. It is in the desert that we know ourselves to be God's beloved children.

Put yourself back in your earlier picture of the desert. If you look closely enough at the picture you might see the rainbow.