Now the Angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur. Genesis 16:7 NKJV

I am convinced God has a special fondness for wildernesses. Throughout Scripture, He sent—sometimes drove—people there. But He also met them there. 

Time spent in the wilderness isn’t always pleasant, but it’s always purposeful.

In the verse above, Hagar, a slave woman, was fleeing from a harsh mistress when the Angel of the Lord found her. Having nowhere else to go, she had run into the wilderness. Was she afraid? Exhausted? Depressed? Confused?

Was she angry because life had treated her unfairly by making her a not just a slave, but now a despised slave?

Whatever her emotions were, they had driven her into the wilderness.

We usually think of a wilderness as a densely forested, uncultivated area, but the wildernesses in the land of the Bible are more akin to the dry, arid lands of the desert. 

LOST

I’ve never been lost and alone in a desert, but I have had a brief—albeit unpleasant—wilderness experience in a forest. What started as a fun day hike, turned into a few unpleasant hours (you can listen to a full account of our “comedy of errors” here). The result was that I ended up alone on the trail, barely able to walk, with darkness setting in. 

Even though I knew if needed, I could find the stream and follow it to trailhead and that even a night on the side of the mountain was unlikely to prove fatal at this time of year, it was not an experience I’d like to repeat.

That is true of all our wilderness experiences, though. No one ever wants to find themselves in a place they are unprepared or unequipped to deal with. A place where they feel lost and alone, without comfort, security, or knowledge of the clear path out.

SENT

And yet that is exactly where God sometimes sends us.

Now it came to pass, as Aaron spoke to the whole congregation of the children of Israel, that they looked toward the wilderness, and behold, the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud. Exodus 16:10 NKJV

Sometimes we need reminding of times like this, when the children of Israel looked to the wilderness and saw the glory of the Lord before them.

When we find ourselves in a wilderness—spiritually, emotionally, physically—we can know that God is there with us.

LIVING WATER

Hagar found a spring of water when she went into the wilderness, and it was there the Angel of Lord appeared to her. We have been given an even greater spring of water. Ours is the Living Water.

In John 4:10 – 26, we read the account of the woman Jesus met at the well. Given what we know about her from the words of Jesus, she was experiencing a wilderness in her life. She’d had five husbands and was now living with a man who wasn’t her husband. She was ostracized from the society of others. Found no security in the present and no comfort in the future. She came to the well at a time when no one else was around.

She was alone in the wilderness.

The Angel of the Lord had met Hagar by a spring in the wilderness. Now Jesus met the Samaritan woman in her place of need—by the well in her wilderness.

THE WAY TO FREEDOM

Sometimes God has to lead us out of our slavery and into freedom by taking us through a wilderness.

So God led the people around by way of the wilderness of the Red Sea. And the children of Israel went up in orderly ranks out of the land of Egypt. Exodus 13:18

But like so many others who have gone before us, we can be confident that He is there with us.

For the Lord your God has blessed you in all the work of your hand. He knows your trudging through this great wilderness. These forty years the Lord your God has been with you; you have lacked nothing.” ’ Deuteronomy 4:7

Are you facing a wilderness in your life?

When we find ourselves in our next wilderness like Hagar and the woman at the well, may we wait in patience and hope the spring of His Living Water, knowing He will surely meet us there.