Day 3 – March 7, 2025

Spiritual wilderness is what I’ve experienced. And at the time I was experiencing it, I would not have called it wilderness, nor would I have said that there was refuge/a society to serve as a foil to that wilderness. I would have said there is no spirituality at all, and that all that we experience in the flesh is all that there is. For about five years, I was a pretty staunch atheist. I grew up going to church and all that, but by my second year of college, I became fed up with where the Lord had me. I thought if He’s so great, why has he allowed such disappointment in my life? If he was real, he would always answer my prayers and allow my plans to come to fruition! I said I’m done with you God, I’ll follow my own moral compass and live for me, not for You! If there even is a You!

So this kind of worked for awhile, I mean I was living like hell and having a good time like a lot of college kids do. I had all sorts of ways to make myself feel better about my self-disappointment and surrounded myself with media and folks that were just confirmation bias for my own mindset. Ultimately though, I was no better off in any way than before.

After college graduation, a couple of years went by and I still felt inwardly direction-less, empty, and isolated. A couple of folks at FUMC reached out to me about helping with the youth group to just be an adult male figure there, wouldn’t really have to do much. I said sure, thinking I’ll go for a week or two, I should have something like that on my résumé. However, when I got there I found myself enjoying the simultaneous sense of community and chaos from the kids playing games and other activities. I bonded with a few of the adult leaders there and continued to go back to FUMC on Sunday evenings. I slowly became more involved with United Youth…fast forward eight years and I live for Christ to the best of my ability. I’ve had some other experiences that have brought me even closer to God, but my return to FUMC was the first step out of the spiritual wilderness. 

When you start listening to God speaking to you, you become aware of the spiritual wilderness that you’re in (or possibly you look back at the wilderness that you were in). Whether that’s rebelling against Him by convincing yourself that he’s not there, or by ignoring Him, or purposely going against what He’s called you to do, there is only one way out of it. In that wilderness, Satan will lure you with an oasis that may temporarily quench your thirst, and then you go back to being even more thirsty, starved, tired and confused than when you started.

Some time later, I looked back on that and realized that I had angels attending me in the form of the FUMC members and the youth group who were the hands and feet of Christ that had brought me back to Him.

A man’s heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps – Proverbs 16:9

-Spencer Pendley

Prayer: Holy Creator, thank you for the gifts of loving friends who become the hands and feet of Christ in our lives.  Thank you for those who invite us to be a part of something bigger than ourselves and for the nudge to accept, even if we don’t understand why. Help us to trust that you are guiding our way straight to you – if we just take daily steps in your direction. Amen.