Moses is very troubled. Yesterday we were told he heard the people of "every family" wailing about having to eat the daily manna sent by the Lord. We were also told that this wailing made the Lord "exceedingly angry" so we know that Moses is troubled not only by the growing unrest among the people but also by the Lord's anger toward their ingratitude. We'll see in our text today that Moses feels angry too. He feels angry toward God for calling him to perform the difficult task of leading the people to the promised land. He knows the Lord knew how hard this job would be---harder than Moses himself ever imagined---and now he is beginning to consider this job a curse rather than a blessing. Moses takes his troubles to the Lord and pours out all his feelings and frustrations.
"He asked the Lord, 'Why have You brought this trouble on Your servant? What have I done to displease You that You put the burden of all these people on me? Did I conceive all these people? Did I give them birth? Why do You tell me to carry them in my arms, as a nurse carries an infant, to the land You promised on oath to their ancestors? Where can I get meat for all these people? They keep wailing to me, 'Give us meat to eat!' I cannot carry all these people by myself; the burden is too heavy for me. If this is how You are going to treat me, please go ahead and kill me---if I have found favor in your eyes---and do not let me face my own ruin.'" (Numbers 11:11-15) Some Bible scholars suggest that it was an organized demonstration when every single family wailed to Moses from the doorways of their tents. I believe that's quite possible since it struck me as odd that every single person in a group numbering 2,000,000 or more would all be complaining loudly at the same time with no exceptions. They made not have made any verbal threats to Moses but I think he feels threatened. At the very least he knows they may reject him as leader and choose for themselves a leader who will say what they want to hear and do what they want to do (this very situation will come up later in Numbers when the people propose choosing a man to take them back to Egypt). But Moses can't disregard the possibility that his life may be in danger. If the people's anger burns hotly enough against the Lord, they may attack and kill Moses for being the Lord's spokesperson. I think that's why Moses begs the Lord just to go ahead Himself and take him out of this life so that he doesn't have to "face my own ruin" at the hands of man.
I was surprised to find a few Bible commentators criticizing Moses for pouring out his heart to the Lord in this manner. Was Moses wrong to be angry with the Lord? In the sense that the Lord is always right, yes I suppose so, technically speaking. But if Moses is wrong then so is every human being who has ever lived, for who hasn't been angry with God at some point for allowing hard times to come? Even if we didn't face and acknowledge our anger or admit it to the Lord, it was there. And if Moses is wrong for being angry with God, then so were many other men of the Bible who gave vent to their frustrations in prayer and who asked God the age old question of "Why?" when facing difficult circumstances. King David poured out all his feelings in the psalms, whether those feelings were good or bad or ugly, sometimes appearing to accuse the Lord of having abandoned him and/or Israel. Job, in his sorrows, expressed his anger with God and even cursed the day of his own birth, crying out that it would have been better if he'd died in the womb than to have to live with the circumstances the Lord allowed to befall him. Several of the prophets were angry and overwhelmed to the point of wishing God would just take their lives---men such as Elijah and Jonah and possibly Jeremiah whose heart was so broken for his people that he has been nicknamed "the weeping prophet". King Solomon went through a period of time in which he found no joy in living, causing him to complain angrily that everything was purposeless and empty, causing him to make the bleak statement that "the day of death is better than the day of birth". I do not feel any criticism whatsoever toward Moses for telling the Lord he's angry and overwhelmed to the point of not wanting to go on. Who better to tell than the Lord? Who but the Lord can help him?
I've had to go to the Lord before and say, "I'm angry. I'm angry You've let this happen to me. You knew all along this thing was coming and You didn't do anything to stop it. You directed me to go down this path knowing what lay ahead. I know I was in your will when I went this way, and You knew hard times were coming, but You told me to go this way anyway." There was a situation that went on in my life for approximately four years that almost completely broke me. I had prayerfully chosen a path that I believed---and still believe without a doubt---that the Lord told me to take. And yet disastrous things happened. I complained and wept and begged and poured out my anger before the Lord because I couldn't understand why something bad happened to me when I was smack dab in the will of God. I had been obedient to the Lord and yet an awful thing happened anyway. I can relate to Moses because Moses was in the Lord's will when he accepted the call to lead Israel out of Egypt and to the promised land. Moses was following the Lord's guidance to the best of his human ability as he managed the large group of people in the wilderness. Moses is living in the Lord's will but bad things are happening anyway.
We tend to have the expectation (the mistaken expectation) that everything will go smoothly as long as we obey the Lord. But the Lord doesn't promise us that. There are plenty of examples in the Bible that prove to us it doesn't always work that way. The men and women of the Bible who faced the most opposition were usually the very ones who were the most zealous for the Lord. The unbelieving world has no respect for the people of God; they will oppose us for living for God. Satan has no respect for the people of God; he will stir up negative feelings toward us and will cause people to place obstacles in our path in an attempt to persuade us to give up on godly living. The Bible warns us that persecution is to be expected when we live for the Lord: "Everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted." (2 Timothy 3:12) This doesn't mean we'll be martyred for our faith but it means there are people who will not like us simply because we serve the Lord. It means we'll be excluded sometimes because of our faith. It means we'll be laughed at for our faith. It means we may be passed over for opportunities and promotions because of our faith; it's not legal to discriminate against us for our religion but when we don't join in with sinful pursuits we won't be considered "team players" and we won't form some of the social/political connections in the organization that will get us noticed by those in charge of moving people up the company ladder. If we are going to stand up for the Lord and do anything for the Lord in this life, we are not going to be liked by everybody and that's okay. Moses isn't liked by everybody---possibly not by anybody here in Numbers 11. King David wasn't liked by everybody. The prophets weren't liked by everybody. The apostles weren't liked by everybody. The Lord Jesus Christ wasn't and still isn't liked by everybody. We can hardly expect life to go smoothly when we are going against the grain of this world by standing for godly principles.
So what can we expect from living godly lives? We can expect the help of the Lord, which is just what He's going to give Moses. The Lord is going to help Moses bear the great burden he is under, both by providing His own support and by appointing others to share the load with Moses. During the terrible time of trouble I spoke of earlier, the Lord was my support even when no one else was around. But He also provided human help. He brought people into my life who loved and encouraged me and strengthened me in the faith. On top of that, a day came when something finally clicked for me while I poured out all my anger and hurt in the presence of the Lord. I was saying to Him, "Lord, You love me and You knew this was going to happen and yet You led me down this path anyway. Why?" This was what I'd been saying over and over to Him for years but all of a sudden I heard my own voice as it must have sounded to the Lord and in an instant everything changed. Everything changed in my heart and in my mind. I repeated my question to the Lord but in an entirely different tone and attitude, saying, "Okay, Lord, You do love me. I know You do. You also knew this was coming when You told me to take this path. So since You love me, and since You told me to go this direction, that means You intended all along for me to go through these circumstances. That means You have a purpose for these circumstances." All of a sudden I saw my circumstances as coming from the hand of a loving God who wants the best for me. This revelation was not my own doing; it was the work of the Holy Spirit. I'm not trying to make myself sound like an ultra spiritual person who knows the mind of God. That is not the case at all. But all this time I'd been fighting against my circumstances and obsessing continually about how to make them go away or how to escape them, when what I should have been doing was asking the Lord, "What is it You want to teach me through this?"
There are times when we bring troubles on ourselves through sin. We can see the justice of reaping what we sow. It's hard to be angry with God when we know we caused our own problems by living in opposition to Him. But there are times when we're living in God's will and troubles still find us. That's when we tend to feel angry toward God. We say to Him, "I was doing everything right. Why did You let everything go wrong?" Hard as it may be for us to do, the question we should be asking is, "Lord, what is it You want to teach me through this? What is it You want to accomplish through this?" A lot of times our troubles would go away far sooner if we'd just get with the program far sooner. The quicker we draw close to God and submit ourselves to Him, the quicker our circumstances often clear up. Like a good teacher, He'll keep us in the classroom until we learn the material. It wasn't until I stopped trying to escape the classroom and started asking the Lord what He was trying to teach me that my problems began clearing up.
The Lord is going to help Moses with the problems he's having in Numbers 11. This won't be the end of Moses' struggles. The people will continue to oppose him at regular intervals. But if everything always went smoothly I don't think Moses would have spent much time in the presence of the Lord and I don't think the Lord would have been able to increase Moses' faith time and time again as he comes to Him for guidance and comfort. And I'll tell you something else: I wouldn't be here studying the Bible with you right now if I hadn't gone through those four years I didn't think I'd survive. I don't know where I'd be this morning or what I'd be doing, but there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that I wouldn't love the word of God the way I do---or love the Lord the way I do---if He hadn't allowed me to encounter something I never could have seen coming. If you'd told me this particular thing would happen, I would have laughed in disbelief. But He brought me to it and He brought me through it and, as much as I'd rather be dead than go through it again, I am forever grateful for the hard times I endured because the Lord Jesus Christ is precious to me in a way He never was before. There were days when I felt like He was all I had but I found He was all I needed. His promises have been tested and found to be true. His grace was sufficient in my time of need. When I was down to nothing, and when there seemed to be no reason to rejoice, His presence with me was so strong that I felt like shouting with joy from the rooftops. If the Lord had made Moses' job easy, Moses wouldn't have loved the Lord the way he did. Moses wouldn't have learned that the promises of God are true. He wouldn't have known that God's grace is sufficient. He wouldn't have trusted and depended on God the way he did. God loves Moses too much to let him have a mediocre relationship with his Creator. God loves Israel too much to allow her leader to have weak faith. He is going to allow Moses and the nation to go through troubles because spiritual muscle is not built in times of comfort and ease.
No comments:
Post a Comment