I saw a picture of a ship sailing out of a gilded cage and towards the Promised Land. As it sailed, the waters got turbulent. It kept going however and was soon in a severe storm. In all probability it looked like the ship would sink if it stayed the course and yet I knew that the right thing to do was to stay the course.

But then I saw the ship turning to go back towards the gilded cage. I was filled with a deep grief.

I wondered why it would do that and what had convinced the people to change course and begin to go back and then I saw a sticker label over the gilded cage that read—“PromisedLand.”

Every time the Israelites experienced the choppy waters of their wilderness experiences on their way to the real Promised Land, it looked to them like they had made a mistake leaving Egypt. At one point they even called Egypt the land of milk andhoney!

Numbers 16: 13a, “Isn’t it enough that you have brought us up out of a land flowing with milkand honey to kill us in the desert?”

 Compared to their desert experiences, Egypt looked like the better life and way. They were upset that they had listened to Moses. Their experiences convinced them that they hadbeen right when they had doubted him.

Exodus 14:10-12, “As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians, marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the LORD. They said to Moses, ‘Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, “Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians”? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!’”

Exodus 16:3, “The Israelites said to them, ‘If only we had died by the LORD’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.’”

Numbers 14: 3-4, “‘³Why is the LORD bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be taken as plunder. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt?’ 4 And they said to each other, ‘We should choose a leader and go back to Egypt.’”

When the Israelites began the journey to go for God and His way they weren’t looking for the spiritual prosperity of learning to lean upon God and trust Him for everything—they weren’t looking to die to their flesh and it’s understanding and it’s ways to live a life of trust and surrender. They weren’t looking for the Ten Commandments and to live a life that was holy and pleasing to God. No, they were looking for God to give them the promise of a land flowing with milk and honey and if not, then they preferred the life back in Egypt where hard though it was, at least they had a way of giving themselves what they wanted and needed and had some form of control. The wilderness experience with all this unstable, spiritual clouds and fire stuff, what use was that? When the army was coming to get them, they had nothing to defend themselves with; when there was no food or water, Moses just expected them to trust God and what? go hungry? And then he came up with all these rules they needed to follow that really spoiled their fun and was totally unlike the calf god that they had made who was fine with all their revelry … did Moses really know what He was doing? As a Prince of Egypt at least he could have done something to make a difference in their lives, but as this powerless poor Shepherd full of promises and rules for holy living, surely it couldn’t be! Who was this absolutely impractical God who offered them no security and a restricted lifestyle anyway?

God’s Practicality

When Jesus came to reveal the Father, do you see how such thoughts might have crossed the people’s minds too? He promised them the Kingdom, but the road was filled with impracticalthings.

Matthew 16:24, “Then Jesus said to his disciples, ‘If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.’”

Mark 10:21, “Jesus looked at him and loved him. ‘One thing you lack,’ he said. ‘Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come,follow me.’”

Luke 17:6, “He replied, ‘If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, “Be uprooted and planted in the sea,” and it will obey you.’”

Matthew 6:31-34, “So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”

This particular teaching doesn’t just sound impractical, it sounds totally irresponsible.

It was fine when Jesus did miracles and delivered them of evil spirits but when He began to tell them that He actually came to give them the bread of life and not the natural bread, when He made the law even more difficult to follow, saying things like if they hated somebody that was equal to murder, or when they lusted somebody, it was equal to adultery, and then other impossible to do things like love your enemies, forgive 70 times 7…as Jesus got more and more spiritual on them and seemed to be losing all sign of practicality and sanity … “Eat His flesh and drink His blood?!!” It began to get increasingly difficult for them to believe that He was indeed the Messiah… Where was this Kingdom that would free them from the governmental and religious oppression?…and then finally when He did everything possible to get Himself into trouble with the authorities, He did nothing to defend Himself or his followers; He just died. How can that be God? It madeno sense. So they left Him.

How many of us still leave Jesus to go our own way every time He gets too spiritual and impractical on us? How many head back to Egypt? How many are even now back in Egypt doing things man’s way and yet calling it the Promised Land?

I understand practicality, I used to be the most practical person I knew, and that’s saying something because I know a lot of practical people. As I am going through my own experience of journeying to the promised land from my own experience of the gilded cage, however, I have learned an amazing truth about practicality. Our practicality has to flow out of our spirituality to be in line with God’s will.

Discipleship—The Training of God’s Leaders

The thing is, our God isn’t impractical at all, it’s just that His practicality is very different from ours. In the desert God took care of every practical need the people had, didn’t He?  Even though they constantly felt insecure, possibly because each time He did it in the most unconventional way. I can see how Moses on His own would never have thought to strike a rock with his staff to get water, how absurd is that? I can picture Moses without God’s guidance going back to his old princely wisdom. I can see him trying to figure out where he should dig a well, and how to motivate an already exhausted people to get this job done.

We now can see why God trained Moses in the wilderness before he asked him to lead his people—It wasn’t his skills and wisdom as a ‘bad Prince turned good Prince’ that enabled Moses to lead the people to the Promised Land, it was His experience of God in the wilderness that equipped Him. That total trust and friendship with God that Moses had, that Joshua and Caleb received, is what each of them needed to lead God’s people. Whether rich man or poor man, whether it was the learned Pharisee Saul or the uneducated fisherman Peter or the doctor Luke, or the tax collector Matthew, the training of God’s true leaders is not about their worldly skills and gifts, or even their lack of them, it is the lifestyle of surrender and complete reliance upon the Holy Spirit—to lean not upon their own understanding and ways, but upon His practicality and ways that enables them to be true leaders. These are God’s chosen. The ones who seek God’s grace to be crucified in Christ, who no longer live but it is Christ who lives in them. That is our journey of salvation and the true narrow road. It’s a blessed life that is meant to be for all of us, every saint, but not all are willing to go through the training God requires. Not all want to take the narrow road.

In our walk with God, when we do not seek His grace to die to our own wisdom and ways to believe and live out His word, in effect, we’re trying to balance what works in man’s world with what works in God’s world and it simply won’t balance. We try to balance our old man’s ways with our new man’s ways, and it is in effect trying to balance flesh and spirit, but as the Bible says what fellowship does light have with darkness? All we end up doing is spiritualizing our flesh’s ways. We deceive ourselves, because  in truth when flesh and spirit meet, flesh will either die so Spirit can live, or flesh will reject Spirit and the Spirit will be quenched. The two cannot be yoked together. We cannot go to both Egypt and Canaan. We cannotserve two masters.

The road to the bread of life is a narrow one and while it is the Father’s heart that all take this road, the Bible says that in the last days the love of many will grow cold. It grieves me to see many ships turning back to Egypt. I can see a very drawing and attractive ‘form of godliness’ that will cause the world to turn towards it. It will be just as it was in the days of Noah with many living for the bread that perishes, and only a remnant dying to the flesh to unite with the Father.

Matthew 13:22 “The one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful.”      

Cheryl Johnson , This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it