“For the Lord Your God is Bringing You Into a Good Country… Where You Will Lack Nothing” (Dt 8: 7, 9)

Yesterday, during a meeting with a group from my parish, we were given this reading from Deuteronomy to meditate on:

The clothing did not fall from you in tatters, nor did your feet swell these forty years.

So you must realize that the LORD, your God, disciplines you even as a man disciplines his son.

“Therefore, keep the commandments of the LORD, your God, by walking in his ways and fearing him.

For the LORD, your God, is bringing you into a good country, a land with streams of water, with springs and fountains welling up in the hills and valleys,

a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, of olive trees and of honey,

a land where you can eat bread without stint and where you will lack nothing, a land whose stones contain iron and in whose hills you can mine copper.

But when you have eaten your fill, you must bless the LORD, your God, for the good country he has given you.

Be careful not to forget the LORD, your God, by neglecting his commandments and decrees and statutes which I enjoin on you today:

lest, when you have eaten your fill, and have built fine houses and lived in them,

and have increased your herds and flocks, your silver and gold, and all your property,

you then become haughty of heart and unmindful of the LORD, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery;

who guided you through the vast and terrible desert with its saraph serpents and scorpions, its parched and waterless ground; who brought forth water for you from the flinty rock

and fed you in the desert with manna, a food unknown to your fathers, that he might afflict you and test you, but also make you prosperous in the end.

otherwise, you might say to yourselves, ‘It is my own power and the strength of my own hand that has obtained for me this wealth.’

Remember then, it is the LORD, your God, who gives you the power to acquire wealth, by fulfilling, as he has now done, the covenant which he swore to your fathers. (Dt 8:2-18)”

Wow! This reading was really powerful for me yesterday, and I’m still kind of in awe that God would have this word for me yesterday, at a time when I really needed to hear it. It really speaks to where I’m at in my life, and where I’m at with my ongoing struggle with masturbation, lust, and homosexuality.  First, it really explains why I’m continuing to really struggle with my temptations to do unchaste things. Let’s take it line by line.

“Remember how for forty years now the Lord, your God, has directed all your journeying in the desert, so as to test you by affliction and find out whether or not it was your intention to keep his commandments (Dt. 8:2)


So I see in this verse that in spite of how I feel, God is always with me. Even when the temptation to masturbate or have a homosexual encounter is very strong, He is with me in this desert that I find myself in. And why am I still in the desert? Well, this reading answers that question too. God is giving me all kinds of “afflictions” (i.e., temptations) to find out whether it is my intention to keep his commandments. And what have I shown him through these tests? It certainly hasn’t been that intend to keep his commandments. It’s that I only love God for the consolations he gives me. When the trials come, I say the hell with God and I fall into sin.

The next part really resonated with me too. “He therefore let you be afflicted with hunger, and then fed you with manna, a food unknown to you and your fathers, in order to show you that not by bread alone does man live, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of the LORD (Dt 8:3)” In my case, the “hunger” that God has allowed me to experience is my loneliness. As I’ve described in other posts, I have been feeling a pretty strong longing lately for a romantic relationship with another man. This is a type of hunger. But even though God allows me to experience this longing, this loneliness, he provides me with manna, which his grace, in order to show me that the things of the world cannot satisfy me, only he can. This is a lesson that’s been really tough for me to learn. I desperately want to believe that God is enough for me, and that I don’t need the pleasure that comes from masturbation or a homosexual encounter. These things bring pleasure, sure, but pleasure is not happiness. That’s something that is lost on our society I think. I think that a lot of people believe that pleasure is the same as happiness. It’s a lie I’ve believed too, and it’s one that I continue to believe on some level. But I know from experience that masturbation or homosexuality are both let downs. Sure, they bring pleasure, but as soon as the act is completed, there is a let down. There is a feeling of emptiness that is incomprehensible. Pretty soon it becomes a viscous cycle of masturbating or having a homosexual encounter, feeling empty afterward, swearing it off (for a time), and then engaging in those types of behaviors again to fill an even deeper void. I continue to do these things, even though I know that they can’t satisfy me, because I also don’t believe yet that God is enough for me. I know intellectually that He is, or should be, but I don’t believe it with my heart. It’s a big obstacle for me, and one that I need to continue to pray about.

The next section is really beautiful, because it speaks of God’s love. “So you must realize that the Lord, your God, disciplines you as a man loves his son (Dt 2:5).” This is another characteristic of God’s that is very hard for me to grasp. Intellectually, I know that He is allowing me to undergo these very difficult temptations because he is trying to mold me into a man made in His image. And He does this because He loves me, more than I can possibly imagine. I think that it’s difficult for me to grasp this because of the problems I’ve had with my earthly father. I grew up thinking that he didn’t love me, which I believe is one of the reasons why I developed homosexual attractions. When he disciplined me, I didn’t feel like he was doing it out of love. Having gone through that type of experience, it’s difficult for me to believe that I have a heavenly Father who loves me and is disciplining me out of love. Again, something I need to pray about. 

“For the LORD, your God, is bringing you into a good country, a land with streams of water, with springs and fountains welling up in the hills and valleys, a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, of olive trees and of honey, a land where you can eat bread without stint and where you will lack nothing, a land whose stones contain iron and in whose hills you can mine copper (Dt 8:7-9).” This part of the reading gives me a lot of hope. What it says to me is that even though God is allowing me to undergo the temptation to masturbate and have homosexual encounters, He is slowly but surely bringing me to Paradise. The best part of this is the realization that I don’t have to be dead to enjoy this! God gives us a foretaste of heaven here on earth when we live holy lives and strive to obey his commandments. Of course, it’s not as good as heaven is, but the point is is that the Christian life is not all striving and hardship and no joy. There is a great deal of joy in striving for holiness. Even though life can be difficult for me now in dealing with these temptations, it is still much better than it was when I was living the homosexual lifestyle. This is what I try to remember when I’m tempted to go back to that life of promiscuity.
  
“Be careful not to forget the LORD, your God, by neglecting his commandments and decrees and statutes which I enjoin on you today: lest, when you have eaten your fill, and have built fine houses and lived in them, and have increased your herds and flocks, your silver and gold, and all your property, you then become haughty of heart and unmindful of the LORD, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery; who guided you through the vast and terrible desert with its saraph serpents and scorpions, its parched and waterless ground; who brought forth water for you from the flinty rock and fed you in the desert with manna, a food unknown to your fathers, that he might afflict you and test you, but also make you prosperous in the end. Otherwise, you might say to yourselves, ‘It is my own power and the strength of my own hand that has obtained for me this wealth.’ Remember then, it is the LORD, your God, who gives you the power to acquire wealth, by fulfilling, as he has now done, the covenant which he swore to your fathers (Dt 8: 10-18). This section of the reading speaks to another tendency I have: the tendency to kind of drift away from God when things are going well. I experienced this recently, when I was able to stay away from masturbation for about two months. I was really happy about this, and I thanked God often during this time for helping me to be chaste. But what I noticed during those two months was that my prayer wasn’t as fervent as it was when I struggle. Looking back on it now, my prayer wasn’t really from the heart because I didn’t really feel a whole lot of urgency. I was starting to forget about God and how much I needed Him. So what happened? God humbled me by allowing me to fall into masturbation, to help me remember that I cannot be chaste without His help.

I’m really grateful that I had the opportunity yesterday to meditate on this reading. It also really made me thankful for the group that I am in in my parish. Even though I complain about it a lot, it is giving me some food for thought every once in awhile. I’m definitely going to have a lot of good, substantive things to bring to prayer over the next several weeks.