Filled or Empty Series #4: Filled with Complaints

Empty

#4  Filled or Empty of Series

Filled with complaints

  You will find in chapter 14 of Exodus the account of the miraculous way that God brought deliverance through the Red sea. In chapter 15 you will find the song that Moses and the people sang to the Lord. What a glorious time of celebration and praise. Then they traveled on and three days later instead of praise we hear complaining about no water. God took care of that for them and on they went.

Then in Chapter 16 we find the Israelites in quite a state. It has been about a month and a half since they left the bondage of Egypt and now the horrors of the bondage is starting to dim and they have lost their vision of the Promised Land. This was taking too long. Maybe what they had wasn't so bad. The here and now was beginning to feel intolerable so the complaining began in earnest.

There are plenty of situations in scripture that deal with being filled or being empty that have really good life lessons for us and quite honestly I wanted to skip this one about being filled with murmuring and complaining and jump ahead to the next one, but God slowed me down and showed me some things in my own life and guided me not to skip over this.

When I read this section of scripture, I can't help but wonder; did it not occur to any of these complainers to suggest a prayer meeting about the problems that came up? I mean come on. What on earth happened to their faith? Did they not have one speck of faith that the God who had done all those things in Egypt and parted the Red Sea could still meet their needs?

It is so easy to think these people were crazy. They were witness to some of the greatest miracles of all times and yet they were saying "we should have stayed where we were." Really? Back into bondage? Back to slavery? Back to where the ruler's population control program meant your boy children were thrown into the river. Really? Go back? What a bunch of whiners.


Exodus 16: 1-10The whole Israelite community set out from Elim and came to the Desert of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after they had come out of Egypt. 2 In the desert the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron. 3 The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the Lord’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.”
4 Then the Lord said to Moses, “I will rain down bread from heaven for you. The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day. In this way I will test them and see whether they will follow my instructions. 5 On the sixth day they are to prepare what they bring in, and that is to be twice as much as they gather on the other days.”
6 So Moses and Aaron said to all the Israelites, “In the evening you will know that it was the Lord who brought you out of Egypt, 7 and in the morning you will see the glory of the Lord, because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we, that you should grumble against us?” 8 Moses also said, “You will know that it was the Lord when he gives you meat to eat in the evening and all the bread you want in the morning, because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we? You are not grumbling against us, but against the Lord.”
9 Then Moses told Aaron, “Say to the entire Israelite community, ‘Come before the Lord, for he has heard your grumbling.’”
10 While Aaron was speaking to the whole Israelite community, they looked toward the desert, and there was the glory of the Lord appearing in the cloud. NIV


I imagine their lack of faith irritated the almighty. It irritates me and I don't even know those people. Hebrews 11:6 says that without faith it is impossible to please God. Ok, now I have to get real. I don't know those whiners but I do know the one I see in the mirror every day. I told you God didn't want me to skip this one. He knows I need this reminder.

I have to admit that often I complain instead of pray. It seems so innocent, like....I wish this situation would be different, or I wish that person would stop being....whatever. I wish things would happen faster. I wish our leaders would do things differently. I wish this or that for this person or that person. (I am putting this all mildly of course.)

I have to ask myself, do I just wish things were different or do I have a little prayer meeting and pray and ask God to change things that need to change. Do I pray believing that He cares about the situations around me, and do I pray believing He can change things?

Complaining and whining is kind of the opposite of faith and it is offensive to God. Dear Lord, help me to be strong in my faith and diligent in my prayer life trusting You.

Those folks that left Egypt and got discouraged, lost faith, and lost sight of what God had already done. Think for a minute what He has done for us. He delivered us from bondage. He parted the waters of death making a path to our Promised Land. Jesus is our bread of life supplied daily for us and He is in us a fountain springing up. How do I forget these things even for a moment and lapse into times of worry and fretting and complaining?

We all (me mostly) need to remember what God has done for us and trust Him every day.