September-October 1997
PERSPECTIVEA Walk in the WildWhy did Jesus go to the by Michael Warren | 
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Day-to-day life in Judea offered enough ruggedness and challenge that no one had to seek it out by signing up for a course in wilderness survival. Jesus and his followers did their share of hiking and camping, to be sure, but I doubt the usual motive was recreation.
We're also told that Jesus often left the crowds behind to seek his Father in the wild places. Sometimes the temple, or a quiet corner of a garden, simply didn't suffice. Sometimes being alone with God required a journey into the desert.
We know God is no more present in the great outdoors than inside the air-conditioned comfort of the local supermarket. So going to the wilderness to pray has nothing to do with where God is, but has much to do with our state of mind.
Although I love the outdoors, I still feel safer and more secure indoors, in the world I have created for myself, surrounded by four walls and my favorite appliances. But this world isn't large enough.
There is a perspective -- a glimpse of who God is and who I am -- that I see more clearly from a mountain crag, a lonely seashore or the sunbaked floor of some endless desert. In such places, prayer takes on a new quality.
I admit this is a sort of visual crutch, which only hints at how "big" God is and what it is to be a finite creature in an infinite universe. Perhaps there are many ways to gain the same perspective.
When the Hubble Telescope sent back its famous pictures of the "birthpangs" of the universe, one person wrote this anonymous letter to a British paper (quoted by John R.W. Stott):
"It is difficult to know what the appropriate reaction to such mind-expanding discoveries should be, except togive thanks to God or Big Bang or both, for cunningly contriving to allow this infinitesimal part of the universe called Earth to be bestowed with something called Air."
Such a perspective is numbed by the workaday world, at least it is for me. I spend much of my day at a computer, listening to the constant hum of its fan. When I go for a walk outside, it's impossible to escape the low-level buzz of traffic. Light pollution has brought an end to starry nights.
All of this has reduced the world to a comfortable size. There is nothing in this world that need be startling or unsettling.
Eternal thoughts get crowded out of my mind. My days are consumed by making a living, then there's the trip across town to pick up fertilizer and shelf brackets at Home Depot, then a quick drive over to Wal-Mart to buy I forget what, then to Staples for an ink-jet cartridge, finally ending up at the counter of Blockbuster to see if a new release has been returned.
If I want to meet God in a solitary place, it won't happen by accident. In this environment, it must be a deliberate act.
As Christians, we place a higher value on the special revelation we find in Scripture, and rightly so. Natural theology -- what we can learn of God through study of nature -- does not yet bring us to the gospel of salvation.
But nature should teach us something of fundamental importance: that we are finite creatures, utterly dependent on our Creator. It should teach us awe and humility.
The psalmist tells us that the heavens declare the glory of God. In revealing himself to Job, God spent the greater part of his lesson showing the glory of his creation.
For this reason, then, we might seek out a starry night far away from the city lights as an opportunity to praise our Creator. We might even venture out for a weekend in some desert wilderness, away from all distractions. Who knows who we might encounter in such a place?