into the desert

Sometimes when we feel the most stuck, God is doing the most work in our lives.

The book of Hosea is an unbelievably deep metaphor for how God responds to his people and moves with them, redeeming them and growing them to be like him. So when it’s time for Gomer – the character that represents God’s people – to be brought back to God, we watch how he works.

It’s not a long monologue answering every question she has.

It’s not the answer to every pray she’s prayed.

It’s not every door opening up in her life so she could move forward without struggle.

God’s plan was completely backwards.

I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her. And there I will give her her vineyards and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope.

- Hosea 2:14-15

So to move deeply in Gomer’s life, God takes her to the wilderness – where most people assume God does nothing. The one place that stands as a universal symbol in Scripture for being apart from God. Being lost. Hopeless.

God’s plan was to take her somewhere she would have nothing but him.

God’s plan was to give her places full of life and hope.

God’s plan was to turn her place of pain into an opportunity of hope.

So maybe the times we think we’re stuck in our faith, God is really doing the most. Moving the most. The closest to us.

Maybe the times we want to give up because we feel stuck are really opportunities to rely on something outside of ourselves and learn that through him we can live a life beyond what we ever imagined.

Maybe the only thing stuck in our lives is our insistence that we can do it on our own.