Good morning All. I did it again. I didn't get my devotional posted on time. Sorry!
Numbers Chapter 11. I can sadly say, I'm like the Israelites. I'm a whiner and complainer during hardships. Hardships are supposed to come. We are told they will come, but God promises to never leave us nor forsake us. He will be with us during the hardships. He will go through them with us. God uses hardships to help us grow and keep us focused on him. But I act like I shouldn't have any hardships. Yes, hardships are okay, but just for a very short time. If they are too long and start to make me feel burden, then I complain to God. Rather than trust God to go through the hardships with me and make me a better Christian, I complain.
God's anger with the Israelites was so great he had fire come down against them and also sent a severe plague which killed some. Let me confess, I should have been dead many times over. But God's grace and mercy has kept me alive.
So I don't want to give up but keep moving forward. I want to grow and be an overcomer.
I've also complained because of feeling so overwhelmed at Camp. But God is opening doors of people volunteering to help and take pressure off of me. I'm very thankful for that.
God really is good and really does love us. I have to learn to persevere without whining and complaining. I have to learn to trust him to get me through each hardship and that it will bring glory to his name.
Chapter 11 starts out with the people complaining about something evidently so insignificant that Scripture doesn’t even bother to record the reason. It may have been important at the time to the people but not from God’s perspective. Here at the beginning of their journey, God reminds us that we’ll get burnt if we are complainers. Many of us are good at complaining to each other. We need to learn to take our problems to the One who can do something about them – just like Moses did.
And we have to beware of putting limits on God (verses 26-29). He can work through whomever He chooses.
Also, the people’s complaints were discouraging to Moses. We need to think about the effect our influence, behavior and words can have on other people. We may think we are insignificant in the grand scheme of things, but we aren’t. Someone is always watching our “walk” and taking note of our reactions and actions.
In 2 Peter 1:3, Peter tells us that God has given us all things that pertain to life and godliness – and yet my flesh still demands its own way.
Lord, your will be done today. You know my situation. You now what’s best for me. I trust you.
I kept thinking….Be careful what you wish for…..you just might get it
“We want meat” !!!!!!
(Well not the kind that kills us)
We all whine sometimes PB, just remember it could be worse …we could be related haha
Complaining is easy. Things don’t go the way you want or the way you think it should. Struggles come up or life gets hard or busy and it’s easy to resort to complaining. I’ve found myself there many times and I often think the same thing. Knowing how God felt about and dealt with the Israelites complaining can be an eye opener. How has God felt about my complaints? How much punishment do I deserve for doing so? It brings to mind James 1:2 my brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials. I can’t say that joy is something I have much of when I go through trying times.
The Israelites had so much to be grateful for and yet they were complaining. Fast forward to 2019. I have so much to be grateful for and yet there are times when I find myself complaining. May I instead remember to count it all joy like we read in James 1:2.
Here again in chapter 11 we also see that Moses has been bearing too much of the load like what we saw before when his father-in-law, Jethro gave him the advice to get help and delegate. Now God directs Moses to gather 70 elders to help Moses bear the burden of the people. We get a taste of how stressed out Moses must have felt even in his questioning of how the meat is going to be provided for the people. God asked him if the Lord’s hand is shortened. There are situations sometimes that we can get so involved in where we may need to just let go and let God. We may take too much responsibility and ownership instead of surrendering it over to the Lord. God is big enough to handle any situation in His way. It may not look like what we may expect or be the same as what we have seen in the past. I think Moses may have had a bit of a problem with this as we will see coming up in chapter 20 when he strikes a rock instead of speaking to it as God instructed him.
I sense God speaking to me today about surrendering, trusting and obeying without fearing, worrying or complaining.