Today’s Lenten reflection was recorded by Lisa Thomas, an ordinand training through the Licensed Ministry Training programme. You can find a transcript of the video below:
So hello and welcome to my allotment. We’re up here this morning – we’re going to plant some potatoes and I’m pleased that the allotment’s looking really nice and tidy and it’s really looking ready to be productive after the long winter of sleep.
And I think of this little space here as my Eden, but I have to accept that, like the original Eden, there’s a snake in it, because I reckon that it probably only takes a couple of weeks of neglect for the wilderness to take over, with lots of weeds and all the young crops at risk.
And I’ve been reflecting that this sense of wilderness always being there, always potentially being among us, seems to echo our experience in life and faith. In our lives, wilderness might not just be a one off that we conquer and get over and done with.
And I think there’s potential to find ourselves in the wilderness that is always there, whether it’s feelings of sorrow, whether it’s feelings of isolation, being overwhelmed by challenges, maybe feeling that God’s not listening to us and that he’s not there for us.
So how can we live with this ever present sense of the wilderness? If it was the allotment, what I do is I get a spade and I dig myself out of the wilderness, hoping that everything is going to be all right – despite my neglect, I hope that the crops will grow.
And there’s an old song that says “I’m stuck like a dope on a thing called hope”, and I’m wondering if hope can help us to live with the possibility of that wilderness.
Hope’s mentioned 180 times in the Bible and in many cases it’s linked to directly to trusting in God, trusting in God’s purposes for the world and for us as well. Paul in Romans 15:13 says, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Now, this might seem a bit of a tall order when we’re in the wilderness or we fear the wilderness is about to take us over.
And I want to encourage all of us this Lent period to trust in God, no matter how desolate the wilderness might seem or how many times we find ourselves in it.
Trust that God can bring us out of the wilderness. With a deeper sense of faith and a deeper feeling of joy.
