Deserts of Development: How We Grow in the Wilderness
Bearing Fruit: Cultivating the Garden of Our Hearts
Gardens are an important setting in Scripture. Adam and Eve are created in the Garden of Eden, born out of God’s great love for us (Genesis 2). Jesus prays and suffers in the Garden of Gethsemane before he is arrested and crucified (Matthew 26:36-46, Mark 14:32-42, Luke 22:39-46)—again, out of love for us.
This Lent, the Catholic Women in Business team is meditating on our interior garden, where we can invite God to help us bear fruit. As St. Augustine wrote, “The turn of phrase by which the man is said to work the land, which is already land, into also being landscaped and fertile, is the same as the one by which God is said to work the man, who was already a man, into also being godfearing and wise.”
As you continue along your Lenten journey, have you encountered Jesus in the proverbial desert yet? Has God’s will for you included a period of time in the desert? If you’re at a “desert” place in your life, you may find more puzzle than purpose. You might be overwhelmed and questioning God’s wisdom—or your own. Did you arrive at this place by God’s guidance or by misreading God’s guidance?
This article embraces the importance of prioritizing our relationship with God, believing his word despite our circumstances, and remembering that his promises bring spiritual development during our desert experiences.
What does time in the desert mean? It means facing desert struggles, desert hardships, and desert questions. The desert can be a place of problems and, at the same time, a place of purpose. In the life of a believer, a desert experience is also often a tool God uses to shape him or her for some specific calling. While the desert we are thrust into may be physical, psychological, or a combination of the two, desert experiences share common characteristics, yet they yield an array of different results for the people who travel through them.
There are several Biblical examples of God’s people enduring desert experiences. Moses, Joseph, Elijah, Paul, and even Jesus traveled through times in which God allowed them to experience the difficulties, temptations, and lessons of the desert. Reflecting on Jesus’ experience, more so during this Lenten season, is a practice to help us embrace our deserts of development during our own wilderness experiences.
Jesus’ Desert Experience
Jesus’ desert experience is a great example of what it means to travel through a wilderness prior to a life-changing event. While many may argue that Jesus required no extra preparation for the task he was assigned, Jesus offers a model that shows how believers grow and are prepared during a time of isolation and testing. From the outset of his ministry, Jesus’ experience also provides a perfect example of what it means to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit, even if it means going from a place of great community and recognition to one of solitude and temptation. This submission to the Lord’s will is a necessary characteristic of a vessel of God.
Jesus’ Physical and Spiritual Desert
It is important to note that Jesus’ desert was physical as well as spiritual. Although God does not often send believers into literal deserts in today’s world, he may withhold resources and fellowship from many, if not most, during seasons of testing. This deprivation provides fertile ground for growth and increased dependence on God.
Jesus’ Example of Humility
Jesus humbly understood and proved through these tests that while he had powers others did not have, he had to decide how he was going to use them. Jesus willingly followed God’s call into the wilderness and readily humbled himself in every temptation. In the same way, when we face deserts in our lives, the correct response is always to be led humbly through and willingly suffer tests without seeking a shortcut or loophole.
Lessons Learned From Our Desert Experiences
The lessons we learn in the desert are valuable to our growth and success. It is often in the wilderness where God reveals himself to be enough for us and the only permanent, stable, life-giving source of inspiration, direction, and wisdom. While the lessons learned in the desert are many, three common spiritual lessons that God uses to shape and develop us are separation, preparation, and revelation.
The Desert Is a Place of Separation
The uncertainties of the desert create a need for and dependence on God. He lets you without so that you can come to know him as your provider. He lets you be lonely so that you can come to know him as your friend. He lets you be weak so that you can know his strength.
In the desert, it’s important to have separation from the influences of the world, as well as the things and people that you have learned to depend on so that you will learn to depend on and trust in God.
The Desert Is a Place of Preparation
As Moses and the Israelites entered the promised land, God said to them, “I led you for forty years in the wilderness. Your clothes did not fall from you in tatters nor your sandals from your feet; it was not bread that you ate, nor wine or beer that you drank—so that you might know that I, the Lord, am your God” (Deuteronomy 29:4-5).
When God takes you into the wilderness, he withholds the things you have come to depend on other than him. He brings weakness into your life so that you will learn that your strength is in him. While you may see it as deprivation, God sees it as preparation.
The Desert Is a Place of Revelation
Part of the preparation for what God wants you to do will grow out of the revelation of himself that he gives you. For most of us, the only place we can be ready to receive that revelation is in some wilderness, where God separates us from what we have learned to lean on in order that he can show us that we need to lean on him alone.
Our time in the desert is never a wasted season. During times of pressure and adversity, God is refining us, and in his timing, he’ll make diamonds out of us: “See, I refined you, but not like silver; I tested you in the furnace of affliction” (Isaiah 48:10).
Shivonne Sant-Solomon is a wife and mother of two, blessed with the responsibility of raising them in this dynamic world! In all of her work, and in her most important roles as mother and wife, her relationship with God has been and continues to be central, as she is first and foremost a child of God. Over the past 19 years, Shivonne has had the opportunity to work in a variety of commercial roles within the energy industry, as well as assuming the role of a stay-at-home mother to her then-younger kids for three years—a transformational experience indeed, and one where the challenges and due respect are saluted and applauded. As Shivonne continues along her spiritual and professional growth and development paths, she seeks out opportunities to share her faith and contribute and support the achievement of the world’s energy transition goals in caring for God’s creation.