Walking Through Wilderness Seasons: 3-Day Reading Plan by Levi Lusko and Brooke LigertwoodExemplo

Honey From The Rock

In Psalm 81, over and over again, the people of Israel are tested in the wilderness. They are invited to meet with God and fail. The wilderness proved to be too much for Israel, but not for Jesus. Not only did He do what the Israelites couldn’t, but He did what we couldn’t.

There’s a beautiful connection between Psalm 81 and Exodus 17:5-6. In Exodus, Moses is told to strike the rock and water will come out of it. Tim Keller explains in a powerful sermon that this staff represents the judicial wrath of God. When the staff struck the rock, it was a picture of the wrath of God striking Jesus so that ‘water’–sweetness, provision, sustenance– would be released.

Sweetness is made available through the wilderness. When we trust God in our wilderness seasons, a special nearness is found that can only be experienced when walking through great pain and suffering.

If you haven't experienced this yet in your own story, you see it all throughout the Bible. Job, Noah, David, Isaiah, Elijah, Elisha, Jeremiah, the disciples, Paul, John–you get the picture.

How often, as Christians, do we pray to have courage like David, or faith like Esther, but forget that it was through great suffering that they were poised to be used by God?

In your darkest hours, when you feel like it's rock after rock after rock, God is saying, "I have honey! I have growth for you. I have strength for you. I have sweetness for you."

‘Honey in the Rock’ is not a catchy phrase or fun idea. But, it's a realistic picture of the depth of joy and fullness we can find in the most barren seasons of our lives. All of this is possible because of Jesus, who passed the test in the wilderness.

When you come face to face with suffering, you can either wonder where God is, wonder what went wrong, wonder why you are experiencing this setback–or you can choose to see it as a setup for what God wants to do in your story.

The reality is, God always comes to prepared places. The preparation often doesn't look like what we want. Oftentimes, suffering and chaos and excavating and foundation laying prepare our lives to bear the weight of all that God wants to do.