Moving with the Cloud?

Moving with the Cloud? The LORD used this cloud to tell the Israelites when to move their camp and where to set it up again. As long as the cloud covered the tent, the Israelites did not break camp. But when the cloud moved, they followed it, and wherever it stopped, they camped and stayed there, whether it was only one night, a few days, a month, or even a year. As long as the cloud remained over the tent, the Israelites stayed where they were. But when the cloud moved, so did the Israelites. They obeyed the LORD's commands and went wherever he directed Moses. (Numbers 9:18 – 23 CEV) I thought of what to share with you this week and resolved to share from my current experience. I have been at a place lately where I so much want God to speak clearly to me on a number of issues. I wish I could tell you that His voice has been unmistakably clear and that I now have clarity on these issues – I don’t. Well, not yet. I have been itching to take some major steps and get into action in one or two areas, yet even after praying a long time, a heaviness still remains and I feel even more compelled to keep praying. As time has gone on, I realised my attention has been so focussed on the immediate issues; I almost missed the voice of God speaking to me all the time. For several days the scripture above has been on my heart and when I finally read it, I realised that to continually experience God’s resident presence (“Shekinah” in Rabbinic Hebrew), I have to move with His cloud. I have to move at the command and prompts of His Spirit who indwells me. I have to be obedient and move in sync with Him – even when that means staying action or a certain activity as long as His “cloud” tarries. I can assure you this is not easy for me and it is a real test of obedience. Being the kind of person I am, I would rather be involved in some activity that convinces me I am being “productive”. We do not have a physical “cloud”; we have the Holy Spirit who guides us. It is not our place to linger at the spot where He has been or try to guess where He may go next and attempt to run ahead of Him. What is important is for us to know where His cloud is and to follow it, whether it is a rest stop, slow run or quick action. And He may not always give us any reasons for what He does. The experience of the Israelites in the wilderness is not as far-fetched as you might think. You only need to recall that we are sojourners and pilgrims in this world, on a journey to our destination. And to successfully navigate our way through sometimes strange and difficult paths, we need a guide – and who better for a guide that He who owns the universe. On one of my recent trips, I was invited to a prayer camp located in a remote area. I followed the directions called out to me on my mobile phone (I was not the one driving, though) up to a point where the path got very confusing. However, I needed no further phone-in directions from that point because a member of the church that runs the camp came out to join me in the car and showed us the way. And the point here being that to get to my destination, I needed to rely entirely on my guide – I (and my driver) had to follow his directions, turning as many times as he ordered. In fact, at one point he asked us to stop, while he got down, went ahead of us to take down a gate barrier to let the car drive through. Roy Gane writes, “God’s leadership calls for readiness to move at any time, and also patience to stay put until He directs otherwise. For an individual who wants to set his or her own agenda, this arrangement can be intensely irritating and unsettling. But it is fine for someone who wants to be with God more than anything else. The Lord does not merely give His people a detailed map of their “journey” that shows when they reach “rest stops”, “filling stations”, and their final destination. He Himself is their map. Even when His will doesn’t make sense from your human perspective, your obedience will reveal that His will was right.” I don’t know about you and where you are at the moment. I do hope that this helps you somehow. As for me, I will wait for as long as what I consider to be God’s check, the heaviness in my spirit, remains.