God Will Provide

A Reflection on the First Reading for March 31st, 2019:
​Fourth Sunday of Lent

Joshua 5.9a, 10-12

The Lord said to Joshua, “Today I have rolled away from you the disgrace of Egypt.”

While the children of Israel were camped in Gilgal they kept the Passover in the evening on the fourteenth day of the month in the plains of Jericho.

On the day after the Passover, on that very day, they ate the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain. The manna ceased on the day they ate the produce of the land, and the children of Israel no longer had manna; they ate the crops of the land of Canaan that year.

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“God will provide; He always does.” These words still echo in my mind from January of 2010, when, as a nurse in the Canadian Armed Forces, I was deployed to Haiti following the 7.0 magnitude earthquake that crumbled the already shaky foundations of the country. I was profoundly impacted by the poverty I witnessed there. As a healthcare provider, I saw firsthand the physical and emotional suffering the people endured, not only from injuries and losses caused by the earthquake, but also from their ongoing survival on the bare minimum of everything.

In this reading, Joshua has taken up the torch from Moses and is leading the Israelites into the Promised Land. Up until now, God has provided them with manna, every day, as much as they needed—no more, no less—for all this time. And now, He has delivered on His promise of the land of Canaan, flowing with milk and honey.

One aspect of God’s provision is indeed in terms of material things; money, food, shelter, clothing, and belongings. I am often guilty of taking these things for granted in my world of relative plenty, and reflecting on my experience in Haiti helps me to put it all in shocking perspective. Despite this, I sometimes struggle, quite profoundly, with trust in God’s provision for the spiritual aspects of my life. I admit this, my spiritual poverty, as I reflect on memories of my time in Haiti.

Like the people of Haiti, the people of Israel suffered, and though we in Canada are by comparison wealthy, we suffer also, in many ways. The people of Israel were afraid, so they complained, they rebelled, and they doubted. Yet God provided for them—He gave them manna; He provided their leader, Joshua, their land, Canaan, and all that came with it—all He required of them was to have faith. How easily we forget.

"... He provided... all He required of them was to have faith."

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While I was in Haiti, a couple of my nursing colleagues and I went along with our chaplain to deliver some supplies to a local orphanage. The place was chaotic with energetic children who were so excited to see us and the pictures of actual snow that were on my camera. The dear woman who ran the orphanage expressed gratitude that they had sustained little significant injury or damage in the quake, but shook her head as she lamented the gaggle of teenage boys in her charge who, as she said it, were “eating her out of house and home”, and she had nowhere to send them. They were ready to go into the world, but there was no school for them, no work, no family other than each other. And she said, lifting her eyes and with a slight smile, “… but God will provide. He always does.”

Lindsay Elford

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