Outside Reading #3

Themes of wilderness and the presence of God are especially evident throughout the psalms.
Some examples include:
Ps. 63:1-2 "You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, in a dry and parched land where there is no water. I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and glory."
Ps. 78:14-16 "He guided them with the cloud by day and with light from the fire all night. He split the rocks in the wilderness and gave them water as abundant as the seas; He brought streams out of a rocky crag and made water flow down like rivers.
Ps. 136:16 "to Him who led his people through the wilderness; His love endures forever."
Ps. 107:4-6 "some wandered in desert wastelands, finding no way to a city where they could settle. They were hungry and thirsty, and their lives ebbed away. Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress."
Woven into these examples, is the idea that wilderness puts us in a position where we are fully able to call out to the Lord and encounter His transforming presence. The wilderness allows us to enter into an I-You relationship with God where our ego is put aside and we call on Him.

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