Deuteronomy 1:19

That great and terrible wilderness.

Memorable experiences

There are some things that are never to be forgotten in life. There are troubles whose shadow is as long as life’s whole day. The troubles are past, but the shadow is still there; the victory is won, but the battle seems still to be booming in our ear. We are miles and miles away from the desert--yea, half a continent and more--but who can ever forget “all that great and terrible wilderness”? Yet life would be poor without it. The memory of that wilderness chastens our joy, touches our prayer into a more solemn and tender music, and makes us more valiant, because more hopeful, in reference to all the future. There cannot be two such wildernesses in the whole universe. We are the better for the wildernesses of life, and we cannot escape them. Oh, that great and terrible wilderness! It comes after us now like a ghost; it darkens upon our vision in the dream-time; we repeat the journey in the night season, and feel all the sleet and cold, all the dreariness and helplessness of the old experience. How many a joy we have forgotten; but we cannot play with “that great and terrible wilderness.” The very pronouncement of the words makes us cold. It was “great”; it was “terrible”; it was a “wilderness.” But, rightly trodden, its barren sand made us men; taken in the right spirit, we thought we saw in it the beginning of the garden of God. Every man does not pass through exactly the same wilderness; it is not needful that he should do so in order to confirm this doctrine--namely, that in all lives there are great dreary spaces that we approach with fear and traverse almost with despair. What are the thoughts that such a review should excite? Can we look back upon that way, through all the great and terrible wilderness, without remembering the Divine help which we received? God was God in the wilderness; God looked at us through the darkness, and there was no blaze of anger in His eye. Who can forget the touch that came upon our burning brow in the night time? Who can forget the ever-branching tree just by the side of the bitter pool? Who can forget the clump of palm trees where no palm trees were expected? Who can cease to remember the voice of leadership--the strong, authoritative man who came amongst us like a revelation from God, and spoke broad words in broad tones, and was a tower of strength to us in the time of our weakness, and wonder, and fear--the sympathetic pastor, the mighty preacher, the kind friend, the one who understood us wholly through and through? Then, is there no Divine purpose, the recollection of which may sustain us in traversing wildernesses and lonely deserts? Who made the world? Is the world a fatherless thing, a self-rounded thing that may split up at any moment, or is there method in it? Is there a God above it? Is there a throne anywhere? And the King, is He but a name or an echo? I see purpose in my life; I see it now--Thou hast done all things well. I did not think so at the time; I should have made the wilderness a mile shorter, but it was on the last mile that I saw the brightest angel. I would have come to honour and renown sooner; but I see now that the very movements were ticked off, and that a moment earlier would have been a mistake. “I would have come,” says another Christian man, “to a sense of competency, and comfort, and household security ten years ago; but in my soul I see that ten years ago I could not have borne what I now carry gracefully.” Thou hast done all things well. I would not have had seven graves in the cemetery, nor two, nor one; but I see now that I am the richer for the seven; I would not now have it otherwise. They are my best estate; I have property in them; I grow my choicest flowers there; there I meet with the angels that understand me. There is a method in all this; I accept it; I will bow down before it; I will kiss the rod that lacerated me to the bone; it was in my Father’s hand. Then is there to be no human gratitude springing out of all this? Is ours to be a false life--an unsympathetic existence? As we have received help of God, let us give help to others. (J. Parker, D. D.)

The utility of sandy deserts

If we do not at once see the use of a thing which is unbeautiful, we are apt to disdain it altogether. Utility or beauty we demand as a characteristic of everything. But let it be constantly remembered that our limited vision and knowledge often prevent our discerning the uses which exist in things. Do not be deceived by the mere appearance. The sandy deserts which one might have been inclined to consider as mere encumbrances on the earth are of high importance in creating winds. They send off vast streams of hot air into the higher regions of the atmosphere, and hence the cooler air off the coasts is sucked away in an opposite direction. The deserts, indeed, may be regarded as vast suction pumps placed at certain stations on the earth, to create useful winds and help the transport of moisture to lands that are in want of it. But for the Thibetan deserts there would have been no southwest monsoon; and without the monsoon the fertile plains of Hindostan would have been a waste of sand. (Scientific Illustrations.)