SURVIVING YOUR WIDERNESS

INTRO - THE PATHWAY OF ADVERSITY  "If you're going through hell, keep going!" So said Winston Churchill during one of the worst crises in world history. And these words of wisdom still apply to anyone passing through a trial today. Adversity does not have to become our destination. It can be a pathway to something greater. Maybe you are passing through a difficult season in your life. Perhaps you feel spiritually dry and alone. You might feel as though your prayers are not being heard and you wonder if God even knows where you are. You are not alone. Millions of believers have passed through these troubled waters and experienced the same emotions. King David sang about the "deep sunless valley of the shadow of death." John of the Cross wrote of the "dark night of the soul." Even Jesus went through times of suffering when He had to offer "prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death" (Heb. 5:7). People often refer to such seasons as, The Wilderness. The wilderness is a hard place. But it's as crucial for our lives as it is painful. While a desert season feels terribly wrong, and loneliness and despair may seem to reign, God is with you and He desires to use the wilderness for your eternal good. To reap its benefits, however, you must understand its nature and purpose. That's the reason I wrote the Surviving Your Wilderness book and have created this special, email series. It looks to the Bible as a spiritual "Survival Guide" for the desert – the supreme source of wisdom both for enduring the wilderness, as well as navigating safely through it to God's promised destination. But first things first. If you have not been born again into the family of God, then the wisdom that follows cannot apply to you. Before a person receives the mercy of God through faith in Jesus Christ, he or she is lost in a perpetual wilderness that stretches beyond this world and into the next. And there's no way out – except one: repent and believe the Gospel. Entering God's Kingdom by making Jesus your Lord and Savior makes you a child of the most loving, powerful, and wonderful Father. He knows how to guide and take care of you as you traverse life's journey, even when it leads you into a wilderness. His wisdom for the wilderness is what I want to explore in this timely, email study. To do that I will adopt six tips survival experts give for those stranded in the wilderness. As you will see, the secrets for surviving a physical wilderness bear striking parallel to those for surviving a spiritual one. Survival Tip #1 - DON'T PANIC Survival Tip #2 - Assess Your Situation Survival Tip #3 - Find Shelter Survival Tip #4 - Build a Fire Survival Tip #5 - Drink Water Survival Tip #6 - Find Nourishment BE ON THE LOOKOUT FOR SURVIVAL TIP #1 IN JUST TWO WEEKS! This Bible Study has been taken from the introduction of Daniel Kolendas’s new booklet “Surviving Your Wilderness” and is for those who want to discover God’s way for conquering their wilderness times