Guest post by Pastor Steve Wiens 

The wilderness is one of the main characters in the Hebrew Scriptures. Abraham, Jacob,
Moses, and of course the entire Hebrew population all spend time there. The Hebrew
word for “wilderness” is midbar. The word midbar derives from the same root as dabar,
which means “to speak.”

Whose voice will you hear in the wilderness?

I met Marcos in Long Beach, California, at a training session for denominational pastors.
Marcos was introduced to us as someone who had the gift of prophetic prayer and
would be available for anyone who wanted to meet with him. If you didn’t grow up in
the church or in that kind of church, let me explain that “the gift of prophetic prayer”
means Marcos is sometimes able to hear from God while praying with people and
knows things about them that he couldn’t know in any other way. So Marcos could
some- times hear from God for people and then bring God’s message to them.

We called him “the prophet.”

I believe in that kind of thing, as mysterious as it sounds. I noticed that quite a few
pastors were meeting with him. I saw them huddled together, praying. I saw some of
them crying, then hugging him. But I was afraid to meet with the prophet.
As the training went on, more than a few pastors asked me if I had met with the
prophet. I kept feeling very resistant to meeting with him, though I wasn’t really sure
why. He seemed gentle, even quiet.

On the final morning, I sat by the pool with my journal, wrestling with whether I should
meet with Marcos. I felt as though I should, but I just didn’t want to. I finally realized
that I didn’t want to meet with the prophet because I was convinced that he would have
a word from God for me, and that word was absolutely going to be that I was arrogant.

I didn’t want to hear that from God. I felt fragile and vulnerable. I didn’t want to be
confronted.

And then my friend Ricky Jakubowski found me by the pool.
“You have to meet with him,” he said. “It was so crazy. I don’t really believe in those
kinds of things. I mostly met with him to prove that he was a fake. But it was crazy.
What he said was right on the money.”

So I finally met with the prophet. He asked me my name and why I wanted to meet with
him. I honestly don’t remember what I said. We closed our eyes and prayed. It was
silent for a couple of minutes, and then he spoke.
“I’m getting this picture of Joseph and the coat his father gave him,” he said.

Hot shame washed over me. I knew it.

Joseph was the arrogant brother who kept badgering his older brothers about the self-
aggrandizing dreams he was having and about how they meant that one day he would
rule over his brothers—which is an extremely rude thing to say to your older brothers,
even if it’s true.

Here it comes, I thought. God is going to talk to me about my arrogance.
The prophet opened his eyes and looked at me. “Why do you think his father gave him
that coat?” he asked.

I remained silent.

“He gave it to him to honor him. I think God wants you to know that he is going to honor you.”

I’m not really a person who cries very much. I have nothing against crying. Sometimes I
even try to cry. But I just end up making those odd whimpering sounds, as though the
cry is caught somewhere in my throat and doesn’t want to come out.

But when Marcos said that God wanted to honor me, I lost it. I wept and wept as he
prayed over me, whispering words of compassion and healing and love.
For someone who has been raised by Approval and Admiration, hearing that God
honored me was a gentle breeze, a racham (compassion) that nourished me and caused
something brand new to grow in me.

As I process my own brokenness, this word of honor causes me to re-member (to put
back together that which had been scattered) the painful memories of my childhood
with healing and compassion instead of self-condemnation.
I’m not sure what the name Jesus conjures up for you.

• Maybe it’s the code word to get into an exclusive club filled with people with whom
  you’d rather not spend five minutes.
• Maybe it reminds you of scary sermons and creepy crucifixes from your childhood.
• Maybe you hear it and you’re encouraged—because Jesus loves you, this you
  know—but not too encouraged because Jesus loves everybody: He has to; it’s his job.
• Maybe you’re lost in the wilderness and you don’t know what you believe anymore.

What will you find when you wind up in the wilderness? What voices will try to silence
you? And what voices will nourish you?

You will end up in the wilderness more than once in your life. And when you do, I hope
you find comfort in knowing that the wilderness is the place where God speaks.

The wilderness is a womb in which mercy can grow, if you let it. And when it grows, you
can offer it to those who are overcome with shame and regret.

When you finally leave the wilderness, you will not be the same person who entered it,
as long as you let it do what it needs to do: starve the false self and nourish the true self.
There are things that need to change in me; they just won’t be changed by feeling bad
about myself or trying really hard to fix them. That isn’t how wholeness works.
The journey of wholeness is not a self-improvement project.

It’s a journey of loss, trust, and transformation.
And then, eventually, hope.

Steve Wiens is the author of Whole: Restoring What is Broken in Me, You, and the Entire
World. He’s also the Senior Pastor of Genesis Covenant Church in St. Louis Park,
Minnesota. You can connect with Steve and find out more about his podcast and his
other writings at http://www.stevewiens.com