A reed swayed by the wind? (Luke 7:24 NIV) John the Baptist as a child grew and became strong in spirit; and he lived in the desert until he appeared publicly in Israel. (Luke 1:80 NIV) Solitude with God in the desert was his school. He gained the lessons and experiences needed to verify his beliefs, listened to God’s voice, and became forthright to resist an unbelieving world and shun popularity for the cause of the kingdom. No, you didn’t go out to see a flimsy reed tossed and turned with every wind but a prophet who would prepare the way for the Lord who was coming to baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire. What do you need to do to firm up your reed and prepare the way?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A reed swayed by the wind? (Luke 7:24 NIV) John the Baptist as a child grew and became strong in spirit; and he lived in the desert until he appeared publicly in Israel. (Luke 1:80 NIV) Solitude with God in the desert was his school. He gained the lessons and experiences needed to verify his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lessons-of-the-desert"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2615,"url":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?p=2615","url_meta":{"origin":9,"position":0},"title":"What did you go out in the desert to See?","author":"hollysmith","date":"October 27, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"What did you go out in the desert to see-a reed swayed by the wind? (Luke 7:24 NIV) John the Baptist as a child grew and became strong in spirit; and he lived in the desert until he appeared publicly in Israel. (Luke 1:80) Solitude with God in the desert\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Featured"","block_context":{"text":"Featured","link":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?cat=18"},"img":{"alt_text":"61428_10201932424216005_209254127_n","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hollywsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/61428_10201932424216005_209254127_n.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2706,"url":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?p=2706","url_meta":{"origin":9,"position":1},"title":"What Did You Go Out in the Desert to See?","author":"hollysmith","date":"July 1, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"What did you go out in the desert to see? A reed swayed by the wind? (Luke 7:24 NIV) As a child John the Baptist grew and became strong in spirit; and he lived in the desert until he appeared publicly in Israel. (Luke 1:80 NIV) Solitude with God in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Featured"","block_context":{"text":"Featured","link":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?cat=18"},"img":{"alt_text":"90333952_10158968883295559_6147890894155546624_o","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hollywsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/90333952_10158968883295559_6147890894155546624_o-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1865,"url":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?p=1865","url_meta":{"origin":9,"position":2},"title":"What did you go out in the desert to see?","author":"hollysmith","date":"November 8, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"A reed swayed by the wind? (Luke 7:24 NIV) John the Baptist as a child grew and became strong in spirit; and he lived in the desert until he appeared publicly in Israel.\u00a0(Luke 1:80) Solitude with God in the desert was his school. He gained the lessons and experiences needed\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Featured"","block_context":{"text":"Featured","link":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?cat=18"},"img":{"alt_text":"th-1","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hollywsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/th-1.jpeg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":155,"url":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?p=155","url_meta":{"origin":9,"position":3},"title":"Discipline or Pruning?","author":"admin","date":"January 23, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"John 15:1-2 \u201cI am the true vine and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit He prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.\u201d (NIV) Every branch. This means all Christians will have\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Lessons of the Desert"","block_context":{"text":"Lessons of the Desert","link":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hollywsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/grapes-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2015,"url":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?p=2015","url_meta":{"origin":9,"position":4},"title":"Word in Due Season","author":"hollysmith","date":"August 16, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God\u2019s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ. If indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory. I consider that our present sufferings\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Featured"","block_context":{"text":"Featured","link":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?cat=18"},"img":{"alt_text":"12080971_10206667323193578_105335597_n","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hollywsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/12080971_10206667323193578_105335597_n-300x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1422,"url":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?p=1422","url_meta":{"origin":9,"position":5},"title":"God’s School-The Desert","author":"hollysmith","date":"September 4, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 Jesus rebuked Peter in Matthew 16:23,\u201c...you do not have in mind the things of God but the things of men.\u201d Which do you have in mind? Are you prepared, equipped, toughened for the season ahead? I had a problem. I was impatient to reach my destiny but the more\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Featured"","block_context":{"text":"Featured","link":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/?cat=18"},"img":{"alt_text":"desert road","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hollywsmith.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/desert-road-300x202.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":631,"href":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions\/631"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hollywsmith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}