On the 36th day of Christmas my true love gave to me a promise that he’d always be with me—Numbers 14:14.

For a couple of years I had a real problem with Christianity: When I was wrestling with my faith, I hated the lack of clarity leaders had when I asked them to explain to me who Jesus is and the pat answers that followed, like “you just have to have faith.” I praise God that He saw my doubt and he sent people to help me out, and now the more I read Scriptures, the more assured I become in this faith that I once rejected.

I don’t want you to forget, dear brothers and sisters, what happened to our ancestors in the wilderness long ago. God guided all of them by sending a cloud that moved along ahead of them, and he brought them all safely through the waters of the sea on dry ground. As followers of Moses, they were all baptized in the cloud and the sea. And all of them ate the same miraculous food, and all of them drank the same miraculous water. For they all drank from the miraculous rock that traveled with them, and that rock was Christ (1 Corinthians 10:1-4 NLT).

This is Paul in the New Testament talking about Jesus in the Old Testament leading the children of Israel from their Egyptian bondage into their promised land, and this blew me away. In these four verses Paul tells believers in Jesus that their God was the same God leading, protecting and providing for their ancestors in the wilderness. Jesus was symbolized by the cloud, by the manna and the water that sprang from the rock. He was that rock, and everything that they needed came from the rock. Everything they needed came from Jesus.

Yet after all this, God was not pleased with most of them, and he destroyed them in the wilderness. These events happened as a warning to us, so that we would not crave evil things as they did. . .

We, like they, get our needs and wants mixed up. We want shoes to match every purse we own, carry out food instead of what’s in the freezer or lust after a rock star-like man instead of the finance husband we have. Jesus knew what the Israelites needed, but they sought what they wanted and ended up in the wilderness for 40 years. Jesus knows what we need, yet we, too, end up in wildernesses of our own. What type of wilderness have you been in, or are you now in a wilderness from following your own ways, dissatisfied with the shelter, food, drink—the life—Jesus gave you? Yeah, it happens to the best of us, that’s why Paul says the consequences that happened to the Israelites are a warning for us so we won’t crave the evil things they did. But even when we do, Paul says:

But remember that the temptations that come into your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will keep the temptation from becoming so strong that you can’t stand up against it. When you are tempted, he will show you a way out so that you will not give in to it (v 10 NLT).

Yes, God is faithful, always there to guide us, protect us, provide for us, and even to help us escape evil things. Commit yourself to believing His word and you will see and be able to do great things.

Copyright 2010 by Rhonda J. Smith