Sometimes The Wilderness Is The Parted Sea

​I was filling out a financial application yesterday to support one of my kids' dreams. And as the numbers I was crunching refused to crunch, I found myself thinking—this is not where I’m supposed to be. I should be in a place where I can help him more than I am right now.

That tension—between where we think we should be and where God has us—is often our greatest struggle with Him. It’s the battle between our expectations and His plan. The wrestling between this isn’t where I’m supposed to be and this is exactly where God needs me to be.

Isaiah 43:19 says:
"See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland."

This was a message to the Israelites, a people who had a habit of looking backward—back to the parted Red Sea, back to the miraculous rescues of the past—assuming God would always rescue in the same way.

But God doesn’t just repeat old miracles. He does new things.

Sometimes, He doesn’t part the sea. Sometimes, He leads us through the wilderness. And if we aren’t paying attention, we might miss Him—not because He isn’t there, but because He isn’t showing up the way we expected.

"Do you not perceive it?" Isaiah asks.

It’s easy to stand in the middle of a troubled marriage, a troubled culture, troubled finances, or troubled health and believe we’ve hit an impassable place. But what if we haven’t hit a dead end—what if we’re standing at the beginning of a path?

Because what we perceive as trouble is often God’s way through.

When we don’t see that, we often press harder against the struggle. We follow a path of our own broken spirit and wilted strength instead of leaning into faith—faith in a God whose plan is never broken.

Never wilted.

A God whose plan sometimes skips the parted sea routine in favor of walking us through a wilderness.

Why?

My guess is there are times when God wants to reach the masses in an instant. Moments that call on a God to part a sea. And then there are moments when God wants to reach the masses by changing some parts of me. Moments that require some trouble in my life more than a clear path through a raging sea.

I think many of us might be at some moment in our life that feel impassable. Maybe consider this isn't something impassable but simply something new. Something new God is doing in you to create a passage for the people around you.

Maybe, like me, you sometimes find yourself standing in the middle of a wilderness waiting for a parted sea.

Don’t wait too long, I encourage you, because you just might miss the truth--

The wilderness is the parted sea.