“Do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah,
As in the day of Massah in the wilderness,
When your fathers tested Me,
They tried Me, though they had seen My work”
Psalm 95: 8-9

I have read many times about the years spent wandering in the desolation of the wilderness when God watched over His people with such compassion and tenderness.

Their shoes didn’t wear out even though they walked in them for forty years plus–you know they didn’t get new ones just before starting the trip. Their clothing didn’t get threadbare, and I’m sure they didn’t pack for a forty-year trip. He gave them water to drink, but they fussed about the delay. He sent manna in the wilderness and they got tired of it. He led them every step of the way with a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night and nothing tells us that they saw anything unusual about these amazing, supernatural phenomena in the heavens!

He was patient with their grumbling and manifested His presence to them in incredible ways. And when I read about everything He did and their response, I’m tempted to think, “What a bunch of losers! Were they really that hardheaded and that blind? Tell me, please, to whom did they attribute these wonders?”

But then I stop and think about Anabel.

Lord, I, too, have seen Your work–miraculous work, beautiful, tender, restoring work–awesome, organized, inexplicable work that could come only through You! And I ask, have I been hardheaded and blind? I have so much more proven research to look at than they did. These people did not know You as their loving Father. They had not been redeemed as I have been redeemed. Your act of reconciliation is greater than all Your acts of creation but they didn’t know anything at all about that amazing gift of love! I have experienced it! I have been redeemed and reconciled to God! I know Him! His Word tells me all about Him!

Oh dear Lord, You dont have to prove Yourself to me. You don’t have to do one more single act to convince me of Your magnificent power and Your marvelous love. Yes, I’ve been to Meribah, I’ve had my own personal times in the wilderness at Massah, but I don’t want to mutter and grumble the way they did so many years ago at their Meribah. You have been tender and compassionate with me, as You were with them. I understand, and I just want to tell You over and over again how much I thank You for all You have done for me and how deeply I love You.

Come, let us worship and bow down, Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.
For He is our God, And we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand
(Ps. 95: 6-7a).