READ: MARK
1:1-8
Many who
are preparing for ministry today attend bible colleges and seminaries. This is
good, but the place where the patriarchs of old were trained was not in the
four walls of a school. It was in the un-walled Bible colleges of the deserts.
Their instructor was the Holy Spirit. The subjects were ‘shepherding’,
‘humility’, ‘dependence on God’, etc… These were taught practically.
The Bible College David attended was not in the palace but in a cave. Moses had his training at the backside of a desert rearing cattle (Exodus 3:1). According to 1 Kings 17:1-3, God had to send Elijah to the brook Cherith so as to teach him more spiritual lessons. In Revelation 1:9, we are told that John the beloved who had been very close to the Teacher of teachers for three and a half years was banished in a forsaken island called Patmos for his post graduate studies in the University of Suffering. That island was in the middle of nowhere. His only companions were wild beasts. This was after the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus.
Before John the Baptist began his ministry, he spent several years in this same school of the desert (Luke 1:80). In the process, he died to self. What he ate was locust and wild honey. By the time he came back from the wilderness to the civilized world, he found it difficult to eat regular food. Even his clothes were different. He could not wear the same clothes others wore. This lifestyle enables him fulfil his ministry as the voice in the wilderness sent to prepare the way for Jesus.
Are you presently going through the wilderness experience? Are you in a cave or desert now? Thank God for it. It is in the cave that you will be able to hear God clearly (1 Kings 19:12). This is why you need to make out time to retreat to a quiet place to fellowship with God. When God was going to call me into full-time ministry, I was in a bush emptying my bowel. As you pass through the school of suffering, let the school also pass through you. That is, let us see the positive effects of God’s pruning and fire. Let us see humility, brokenness, submission to God. Let us see the fire in you.
The Bible College David attended was not in the palace but in a cave. Moses had his training at the backside of a desert rearing cattle (Exodus 3:1). According to 1 Kings 17:1-3, God had to send Elijah to the brook Cherith so as to teach him more spiritual lessons. In Revelation 1:9, we are told that John the beloved who had been very close to the Teacher of teachers for three and a half years was banished in a forsaken island called Patmos for his post graduate studies in the University of Suffering. That island was in the middle of nowhere. His only companions were wild beasts. This was after the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus.
Before John the Baptist began his ministry, he spent several years in this same school of the desert (Luke 1:80). In the process, he died to self. What he ate was locust and wild honey. By the time he came back from the wilderness to the civilized world, he found it difficult to eat regular food. Even his clothes were different. He could not wear the same clothes others wore. This lifestyle enables him fulfil his ministry as the voice in the wilderness sent to prepare the way for Jesus.
Are you presently going through the wilderness experience? Are you in a cave or desert now? Thank God for it. It is in the cave that you will be able to hear God clearly (1 Kings 19:12). This is why you need to make out time to retreat to a quiet place to fellowship with God. When God was going to call me into full-time ministry, I was in a bush emptying my bowel. As you pass through the school of suffering, let the school also pass through you. That is, let us see the positive effects of God’s pruning and fire. Let us see humility, brokenness, submission to God. Let us see the fire in you.
MEMORIZE:
LUKE 1:80 –And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, and was in the
deserts till the day of his showing to Israel.
