alone in the desert?

I shared with Pastor John George in India a couple of weeks ago that I feel like the children of Israel wandering in the desert. I wonder if we're ever going to get to the Promise Land? I read something last night that changed the way I look at the desert.

This comes from Sex God by Rob Bell

The marriage of God and people.

The union of the divine and the human.

What they learn is that the desert is a very, very hard place to live.

It's hard to find food

and hard to find water

and hard to defend against enemies

and hard not to grumble that maybe they were better off in their old life.

The writer wants us to see that God is with these people. In their grumbling and complaining and ingratitude, God is with them. The text says that says that a "cloud by day and a fire by night were with them all the time." The Hebrew word here for the presence of God is shekinah. The shekinah of God, hovering over his people in a cloud and in fire."

So the presence of God is with me. This may be my desert. And I may very well feel like I'm wandering around. And I may REALLY want to get to the Promised Land. But God is with me. I am not alone. He will not leave or forsake me. And I'm so glad. And suddenly, the desert doesn't seem so terrible after all.