The Spiritual Desert…
Posted by Anne Elizabeth on July 31, 2017
Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil… Ps 23:4
Republished: 7/31/17
The Lord has told me I have more that He wants me to write, but I need to cut off all distractions. So I’m looking for that retreat He wants me to take and in the mean time, finding myself entering into a prepatory stage by entering into the Spiritual Desert. Wanna know more? Read on, dear friend, read on…
Updated: 8/16/11 Today I found in my e-mail a wonderful surprise, AND I discovered I can add it directly to this page! It’s a wonderful confirmation of all this post says: We must do all things in LOVE as we hope to obtain holiness and peace. The good with the not so good, the triumphs AND the trials. God IS with us, He will NEVER abandon us. Embrace His LIFE, His DEATH, and receive HIS RESURRECTION! You can also go HERE to Recalibrate your Heart…
In my last two writings I’ve made reference to my recent journey into the Spiritual Desert. In this post, I hope to address what the Spiritual Desert is, it’s purpose, and it’s effect thus far on me in the hopes of helping others who might also be experiencing their own desert wanderings. In doing so, I also want to refer periodically to this month’s Monthly Message from the Lay Apostleship as it applies brilliantly to my recent desert excursion.
Purification by desert is nothing new to the Christian Life. Abraham (Gen 12) went through it, Moses (Exodus 2:15 ) went through it, as did many prophets, and of course Jesus Christ, Himself (Mt 4; Lk 4; Mk 1: 12-13). And though the afore mentioned desert journeys were merely prefigurations of Christ’s own desert time, they all had the same theme: PURIFICATION and PREPARATION for greater things to come. Just think about that…
Father Abraham
Abram, in his wanderings, came to Trust in God so much that God made a holy covenant with him and ALL his descendants right to this very day. But He was only able to do so by PREPARING Abram to become Abraham, the father of a Great Nation.
Moses
Similarly, Moses had to experience a separation from the world in which he grew up – among the courts of Pharaoh. In taking Moses out of Egypt God prepared him to return years later to carry out God’s plan of bringing the Hebrew nation back into the land God had promised to Abraham and his descendants.
Prophet Isaiah
And in all the wanderings of the prophets and their successors, God prepared them to speak to a stiff necked people, and call them back to Himself; but first He had to purify them by separating them from their brethren.
40 Days in the Desert
God did nothing less for Himself. Retreating to the desert, the second Person in the Holy Trinity, Jesus Christ, sought after the communion He has with His Father so to give witness AND example to those who would follow after Him. They, too, would come to understand they have a Father in Heaven that they can have communion with because of the Son; which is why He taught us to say, “Our Father who art in Heaven…” And that’s what this journey is all about: COMMUNION with the FATHER through the SON by guidance from the HOLY SPIRIT and a PURIFICATION and PREPARATION for the greater things to come!
MY DAYS IN THE SPIRITUAL DESERT
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. ~1 Cor 13: 1-3
Did you know that piety and pious actions can get in the way of holiness?
HUH? WHAT?…!
Let me explain…prayer, chaplets, novenas…all these are WELL and GOOD in themselves and have GREAT efficacious graces attached to them…BUT if the person determined to do these does them WITHOUT LOVE and with only a sense of obligation, they have become, “A noisy gong or a clanging symbol.” Their outward appearance seems very spirit-filled, but their hearts are truly empty because they have NOT LOVE with which to fill them up.
Around my heart, O Lord, Your fingers entwine…
In the Spiritual Desert, one is brought to that point where LOVE is the only thing that will sustain them. Prayers, novenas, chaplets become meaningless and difficult to pray so the soul CRIES OUT for the only ONE who can give them life by His LOVE.
But God shows His love for us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. ~Romans 5:8
Thus the total relying on Christ becomes the WATER and FOOD during this desert journey, and the times of quiet and solitude are crucial. It is here where cunning old Satan plans out his attacks by giving the soul not food and water but DISTRACTIONS…!
rumors…earthquakes…plagues…nation against nation…
The world is constantly changing, now more so than ever before, but the concern of the servant of Christ is NOT for this changing world BUT for our CHANGING SELVES as we desire more and more to grow in holiness…
Do not be distracted by events around you. Do not be drawn into thinking that many events or big events mean that you can take your eyes off of the process of becoming holier. ~Monthly Message, August 1, 2011.
Daily activities then become the focus. By this I mean everything I would do during my day I did with LOVE and a clear CONSCIOUS INTENTION of doing, which oddly enough, brought me back in line with the work God is doing in me. Why? Because I was DOING HIS WILL without reservation, I was not allowing outside distractions of money, unemployment, anarchy, etc, etc…to get in the way of pursuing the holiness God has called me to…
I speak gravely when I say to you that you must concentrate seriously on becoming holier because your holiness and your commitment to holiness is a crucial part of My plan to bring comfort to others. Allow Me to see to the world. ~Ibid…
So even though I am aware – very much aware – of the events unfolding daily as I have chosen NOT to bury my head in the sand, and yet at the same time, I have NOT allowed these things to OVERTAKE me and become my soul-focus… Yes, pun intended…
For Christ told us these things would happen…
And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not alarmed; for this must take place…For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places; all this is but the beginning of the birth-pangs.
Then they will deliver you up to tribulation, and put you to death…for My name’s sake… many will fall away, and betray one another, and hate one another…false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because wickedness is multiplied, most men’s love will grow cold. ~Mt 24: 6, 7-8, 9, 10, 11-12
So these things are unavoidable – some sins will not be remitted – and ALL mankind must reap the punishment due for our actions. But for the individual PERSON seeking out HOLINESS, their endeavor is to focus on the LOVE of CHRIST as found in themselves from birth and SEALED by their BAPTISM having been created in the image and likeness of God (cf Gen 1:26), through their daily activities to which God has called them to.
FATHER OF LIES TRIES AGAIN…
Because we are created in God’s image and likeness, it is only NATURAL that we should desire a more complete union with our Creator in Whom we share so much; and yet, satan is ever cunning and watching for those “chinks in the armor” of human LOVE for the divine so he tries yet another tactic – personal failure… This is where my greatest weakness lies, PATIENCE, or rather the lack of patience with myself and patience with God. Which is why, when this month’s message came to me, I was deeply humbled as all that God had tried to achieve in me came to mind as well as where I had prevented His change because of my impatience.
Perhaps you identify My teachings as good but you feel frustrated because you see that you fall short on some days. This is when you must be truly patient and trust that I AM bringing you along as quickly as is needed.
Remember that you may see very little progress on some days, but your decision to remain with Me in the process of becoming holier creates a disposition for heaven that keeps the light where it should be, that is, on the need to examine yourself for failure…
Yes, patience is necessary, both with oneself and with others. I, Jesus, am patient with you. And so you must be patient with yourself. And then you must be patient with others. ~Monthly Message, August, 2011.
TALK ABOUT A KICK IN THE HEAD!
Knowing that I must rely entirely on LOVE because the task of praying became exactly that, a task. No LOVE was behind my decision to pray for I did it out of a sense of obligation. Satan used this- quite brilliantly I might add – in an attempted to make me seem UNFAITHFUL to God or a HYPOCRITE in the living of the Christian Life. Here’s a little of what ol’ red-boots had to say to me: You’re not praying in the traditional manner, you’ve set aside all your lofty deeds, you can’t do anything righteous or for the good of mankind…God does not love you.
As someone recently said to me, “If satan spends that much energy attacking you, then you’re on the right path doing EXACTLY what God would want you to do.” Which is true, satan doesn’t attack those who are NOT following God’s Will for if he did he would essentially attack himself! What would the point of that be?
If you see daily to the condition of your soul and if you love others then you will have fulfilled My plan for you. ~Ibid
Being able to accept my failures and allowing God to work through them requires TRUST that God KNOWS what He’s doing. He doesn’t choose people arbitrarily, nor does He choose those who are necessarily perfect and well disciplined. Nope, often times He chooses the weak, the down trodden, those who seem (at least to themselves), to fail over and over again…
Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not now how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with sighs to deep for words.
And He who searches the hearts of men knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the Will of God.
We know that in everything God works for good with those who LOVE Him, who are called according to His purpose. ~Romans 8:26-28
So I can join St Paul and rejoice in this present suffering…
I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. ~Romans 8:18
More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope… ~Romans 5: 3-4
For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. ~Romans 8:24
…and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s LOVE has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. ~Romans 5:5, emphasis added
The Kingdom of God is at hand! Repent and believe in the Gospel!
And that, my friends, is the WHOLE POINT of the Desert Journey. To prepare the servants of Christ the Returning King for the Glory that is to come that IS HIS, purifying His people for the service He has called us to in preparation for His return that follows on the evangelization of the world…
And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world, as a testimony to all nations; and then the end will come. ~Mt 24:14
Which is in God’s time, not ours, but as His servants are prepared so too will His church be, which will then bring her into that Spiritual Desert as well. For all of us are called to “Pick up our cross and follow Him”, and as I, and many others who adhere to the teachings of the Church Christ established on the Cross, have shouted from the roof-tops…
Before Christ’s second coming the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers. The persecution that accompanies her pilgrimage on earth will unveil the “mystery of iniquity” in the form of a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth. The supreme religious deception is that of the Antichrist, a pseudo messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh. ~CCC§675
Be ready… be prepared… allow Him to take you through your Spiritual Desert so that you may be the instrument of LOVE that God requires to complete His plan for His children’s salvation, the peace which only God can give, and the reign of His Son in the hearts of all men!
God Bless you ENORMOUSLY during your journey! My prayers are certainly with each and every one of you. 🙂
The below presentation is a BEAUTIFUL confirmation of what this post says. Please take a moment to watch and take to heart it’s continued message of doing all things in the LOVE of Christ FOR the LOVE of Christ.
The Power of the Cross from Mark Mallett on Vimeo.
Recommended Reading:
Living in the Two Hearts 
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